"You Can Collect Your Gold Star After Church"

 I love Catford Ward so much.

This week has had it's challenges. It was just one of those weeks where we talk to tons of people and they just wouldn't stop. That's okay. That's the nature of this work sometimes. Despite that we saw some great things happen, we especially saw miracles yesterday. I feel like the Lord will reward us more for the labours we perform when we're tired. On Saturday morning we saw that our lesson total was way down, but we felt that we could still get to 20. We made plans to achieve it. We worked diligently. Hardly anything happened on Saturday and even Sunday morning but we kept going and the Lord provided the rest. What a great experience. I know that when a standard is presented by our leaders, we can achieve it if we do our part. It might not be pretty or glorious or mind blowing, but it doesn't need to be. That's not what's asked of us. We just need to work our hardest! And smartest, I might add! :)

We've also seen our finding become more effective as we've used the Book of Mormon in every finding encounter (within reason.) Based off the experiences we've seen from it, I've set a goal- to have a spiritual experiencec from the Book of Mormon every day and then to use that experience throughout the day. It's very small and simple but by small and simple things great things are brought to pass! :) It also helps them understand how important the Book of Mormon really is.

Sorry this is a bit short! We have a great P-Day planned today- getting some Jimmy Spices at the O2 with some other Elders from the Zone :) and then we'll clean the flat and I'll start purging my suitcases of... well, random stuff. I know there's still two weeks but I do NOT want to be "that guy" who has to throw away tons of stuff at the Visitors Centre. HAHA before my mission I was defintely that guy. But not anymore.

I love you all so much! I know that this is God's work, that Jesus is the Christ, and that this is HIS church on the Earth today!

Have a great week! :)

With love,
Elder Frederickson

The picture is of the Wandsworth Zone last P-Day :) I know my hair is really long but I got my hair cut reallyyy short.

Pushing the Work of Salvation forward

Dear family and friends,

It's been a really good week. We saw a lot of success. I attribute this to renewed diligence in planning. Not that we weren't diligent before, rather, we just put more emphasis on planning out our appointments in a smart way. We put enough space between each one to ensure, for the most part, that we could contact along the way to every day. It's a small and simple thing, but we were greatly blessed for it. We found many new people.

In the midst of this, I also learnt a great lesson. While we were contacting to an appointment, there was this guy covered in tattoos smoking outside of a tattoo parlor. I thought to myself "there is no way this guy will be interested" and geared up for rejection. We talked to him and he turned out to be way interested! He is already a Christian but doesn't have a church and wants us to help him quit smoking. Goes to show that we can't judge anyone on the streets. We cannot know who has been prepared by the Lord until we talk to someone. It's the same principle as finding out if the church is true, really... we don't know until we ask God! We can't know if someone is interested until we ask them!

We also picked up a new baptismal date. There is an investigator who was found a couple of years ago who, for various reasons out of her control, hasn't been able to be baptised. Things have fallen into place and, at last, she will be baptised this month :) we have set a date for May 31 but we might move it forward if she can quit smoking before then. She is SO excited and so are we. Our other baptismal date, Cash, is doing great. He is really excited for baptism. He said he wants to be baptised this week! But we have to teach him... so we set a date for May 31. We'll move it forward if needed, but since we can't see him much that will probably be the actual date. We have a number of other people who can have dates soon. It's exciting, exhausting, and fun! :)

I also had a really cool experience this week with family history. I decided to use some of the Work of Salvation internet hour to go on Family Search and work on the My Family book. I was reading up on one of my great-grandfathers on my moms side of the family. Naturally, I wanted to see if he served a mission. According to the document, he did... and his first companion was James A. Cullimore... Elder Cullimore's great-grandfather. WOW. When I read that, I felt something extremely powerful. As if there weren't enough crazy things about the fact that Elder Cullimore and I were companions! When I was skyping my family yesterday, I asked my grandma about all of this and she confirmed it and added that James Cullimore and my great grandfather were best friends. Wow. Talk about the Spirit of Elijah! I immediately formed a bond with my great-grandfather, a man I never met, and strengthened my bond with one of my best friends. What a blessing Family History work is!

I love you all oh so much! You are all incredible! I feel your prayers and love hearing from all of you each week!

With love,
Elder Fred

Best Stake Conference Ever!

Sarah got to see Matthew at the Wandsworth Stake Conference! Both she and Sarah Signore are on BYU Study Abroad in London!  Such a tender mercy! #Oaktonstakereunion

Greetings From Sunny South London

Dear everybody,

This week has been great. Not much to report regarding investigators. We are still trying to build up our teaching pool. I was quite impressed with the articles that the Assistants and also the Eastbourne Elders wrote for the Harvester. After reading it on Saturday night, I felt that we could be doing more to increase our teaching pool. As it turns out, the solution seems to be simple planning smarter- ensure there is time for contacting between each and every appointment and keep things interesting by always being on the move! They said something in particular that struck me, "rarely did the Saviour have set appointments, he did most of his work while He was travelling." I thought about that and it is so true! What a wonderful insight! We set goals and made plans to talk to more people (everyone we possibly could, within reason), followed through, and saw miracles. We met several people who seem to be prepared to receive the Gospel.

I also learnt a lesson regarding persistence. Now, usually, I'm quite a persistent person... but when it comes to contacting and a conversation is going on and on and it doesn't seem like it's going anywhere I start to get a bit flustered. My mind starts to wander a bit. I just want the conversation to be over and to talk to any one of the hundreds of people walking by... but that isn't right. We stopped someone and they've stopped and we owe them our time and attention, even if what they have to say isn't quite what we want to hear. Yesterday we were talking to this guy who used to be a Jehovah's Witness but now does NOT like organised religion. We talked and talked and talked... on three seperate occasions I almost just ended the conversation... but for whatever reason, I felt we shouldn't. We kept talking and in the end, he actually was quite interested. If we give these people the time they deserve, we are also giving the Holy Ghost the time HE deserves to work on the hearts of these people.

I am also really grateful for the AUF project. We are finding some great people from it.  the Lord is also softening the hearts of these people and those that live around them. The way things are going, by the end of this week, our teaching pool will be composed almost entirely of people found from the AUF project. What a blessing.

I also love the goal our Zone has set to read the Book of Mormon in a transfer. I feel my testimony of it strengthening even more! I love reading it cover to cover because it allows me to "connect the dots" more, relate one story to another, and simply read it in the way Heavely Father laid it out! When you read Chapter 3 of Preach My Gospel, you get a similar effect. When we read with the Spirit, we can be informed regularly that these things are true and divine in nature. I would invite all of you to join me in beginning the Book of Mormon. It is so powerful and so true. It changes lives. I'm not going to ask all of you to read it by June 1st (which is the deadline I've given myself) but I'd invite you all to start reading!!!

I am really grateful as well to have my wonderful cousin, Sarah, as a member of the Catford Ward for my last few weeks of my mission. Who would've thought that was going to happen? The tender mercies of the Lord are real. It was also awesome to see BOTH Sarahs yesterday at Stake Conference. I feel like I see people from home all the time hahahaha apparently an Apostle once counselled missionaries "if you can't avoid it, enjoy it." I haven't been able to verify that, but I like it haha.

I'd also like to share two talks with all of you that I listened to this week and really struck me. Throughout my mission, I've developed a deep love of the word of the Lord as given through his inspired servants. Often times, throughout my mission, when God wants to communicate directly to me, he does so in the form of a that is sent to me or that I find in a shelf in our flat. Anyways, here a couple that I loved this week. The first is by Neal A. Maxwell and deals with our unique view of "Pre-mortality", the belief that we lived with God before we were born, a doctrine unique to our church. The second is a talk that I love by President Monson because it's just awesome.

https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1985/10/premortality-a-glorious-reality?lang=eng&query=neal+a+maxwell+premortality

https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1987/10/missionary-memories?lang=eng

This week will be good! We have Zone Conference in Crawley tomorrow. It goes without saying that I am excited.

I love you all so much! Have a wonderful week!!! :)

With love,

Elder Frederickson

First Week of the Last Transfer :O

April 28th

 

Good morning, everybody!

It has been a good week. Our numbers (at least with lessons) were a bit down because we spent a lot of time working on AUFs and I have found that it is quite a bit more difficult to teach lessons on a doorstep than on the street. It is, however, necessary since we have 36 total AUFs that are spread out all over humanity. AUFs are something called "Address Unknown Files."  We are also instructed to knock at least 20 doors near each one. When I was in Basingstoke we had 10 and it took us a whole transfer... so you can imagine how much 36 is hahahaha and we have til June 4th to do it! We've definitely seen some cool miracles from the project though, including finding a less-active who wants to come back and has three children aged 9, 10, and 12. Another cool thing- two of the AUFs are a married couple who were actually referred to us by our Romanian investigators... so I guess they're members?! I recall them talking about their "Romanian Church." Could it have been THE church? :) We'll have to pick them up again and check into that. So far all of the AUFs that we've spoken to (I think 12 or 13 now) have been pleased to see us.

We also picked up some new baptismal dates. We began teaching this awesome guy named Ashley. He said that the message we share (we've taught Restoration and Plan of Salvation) "makes sense, logically" but that he needed to double check to ensure everything "matches" with the Bible. It does. Now we need to emphasize church attendance and the Book of Mormon. We also began teaching a French/African woman named Lisette. She LOVED our message, she double checked every time we quoted scripture to make sure we weren't making up scriptures hahaha. In particular, she loved our testimonies. She was impressed with our message because we invited her to ask God and said, with confidence, that he'd answer. That was refreshing. They, along with Susan and Cash, are dated for May 31st.

Lately, we've been seeing a lot of success with getting our less-actives to church. I'm struck by how prepared some of these people are to come back- all they need is a bold but loving invitation. It takes a little bit of faith to do this but it makes a world of a difference.

A couple of days ago, the streets of South London began to adorned with Rick Ross posters and I have to admit, I laugh every time I see one! Also, only a few of you will understand this, but someone on the street we were knocking the other day was blasting "I've Got A Feeling" and I cringed. It's been what, three or four years now? And it still send shivers down my spine. 

Also, word on the street is that the Wizards are up 3-1 on the Bulls in the playoffs? That's what I like to hear! :) Shout out to them for making major, major improvements in the past two years.

This weekend we fasted as a Zone to have 15 baptisms in the Wandsworth Stake this transfer. I know it will happen. We also broke our fast with one of my favourite Nigerian members who fed us Jollof Rice and Goat. It was really really good.

Yesterday was also Elder and Sister Bradford's last Sunday in the Catford Ward. The work they've done there the past two years has been incredible and I am going to miss having them around SO much. 

I know this work that I am engaged in is the work of Almighty God. I am so grateful for the privilege I have to share the Gospel each and every day to the people of London.

I love you all! :)

Elder Fred

Shout Out to the London Marathon

April 14th -

 

Wow! It is hard to believe I am writing this letter again! The past week has flown by. There have definitely been ups and downs but that is what missionary work is all about. It certainly hasn't been an easy week.

First thing, big time shout out to the London Marathon for starting right next to our chapel and shutting down all bus routes to our chapel, especially in Greenwich and Charlton! Hahaha but also big time shout out to everyone who did the London Marathon because I could never do that ever. Maybe some day. :)

One thing that was particularly hard, but that I learnt a lot from, was regarding one of our investigators. He kept every single commitment we gave him. He stuck to the reading calendar. He came to church. He saw Conference. We did everything we could for him- prepare lessons, acts of love, we even organised a temple trip! But he just didn't progress. He didn't get an answer Why? I'll be honest, I asked myself that this week. He did his part, we did ours, why didn't the answer come? I feel that sometimes these things happen because that's just the way God wants it to be. Like a lot of things on my mission, it's confusing and doesn't make sense and is a bit hard to swallow, but sometimes we have to just trust God and accept the fact that His thoughts and ways are simply higher than ours. I do know this- that he felt the Spirit We plan on getting him hooked up with missionaries back in Colombia. I think that he'll be much more willing to accept the Gospel there where he can hear it in his language I'm grateful for the opportunity we've had to plant that seed of faith in him. I am confident that some day, it will grow and he will be baptised.

On the other hand, Lux is doing great! Besides Church Attendance (which was an all-around nightmare yesterday due to the London Marathon) he is fantastic. The first thing he said to us when we walked in was "I have several questions regarding the book of Enos." He also referred us to one of his friends. He is excited for his baptism. We'll have to push it back a week but that't okay. He has changed a lot since I've met him. It goes to show that you cannot judge the people we meet on the street (or knocking!) because you never know who will progress. We need to always be following up as Elder Ballard counseled us last week and that is when miracles come!

P-Day should be good. It's so hard to believe it's the last one of the transfer! We're not doing anything too crazy. Maybe going to Greenwich and taking some pictures.

I am sorry if this letter makes me sound down, I'm super happy I promise! :) But some weeks on a mission are more challenging than others and this was definitely one of the more challenging weeks. This week will be wonderful though. Lots of appointments, progressing investigators, pancake breakfast with the zone, and exchange... it'll be great :)

I love you all so much! I know the message that I share each day is TRUE!

With love,

Elder Fred

Love Conference!!!

Good morning, my friends.

Everything is great here! Conference was good. In particular, I enjoyed Elder Ballard, Elder Bednar, President Uchtdorf, and Elder Oaks (Priesthood session.)  Since Wandsworth Chapel is... well, on the other side of London, we decided it would be a much better idea to organize viewings at our chapel and at the homes of less-actives. This was fruitful. The Spirit was felt by all, in some way or another.

This week, the focus was progression. We spent the week doing things we felt would strengthen our investigators. Perhaps we could've done a bit more finding, but at the end of the day there isn't much point to finding if you don't progress those you find! :)

I've been making a concentrated effort to pray for and expect miracles. These miracles have taken the form of referrals! From investigators, from members, from mormon.org... it's awesome! If you ask everyone for referrals (including the Lord!) you'll receive, sometimes in ways you don't expect. I'm learning that you can think of all the techniques, tricks, and schemes possible to get referrals but at the end of the day the biggest things you can do are ask, serve, and WORK! If we do those things, the Lord will provide.

Our investigators are doing well. It's really crunch time with them. We're bringing them both to a baptism this Saturday. We're taking Andres to the temple.  He saw the Sunday morning session yesterday. He was obsessed with President Uchtdorfs talk!  Hahaha I wish I could peer into his mind to see how it works. We were able to focus on President Uchtdorfs talk though and help him recognize that he is feeling the Spirit. He is definitely progressing though.

L. is one of the fascinating people I've ever taught. He's amazing. He finished 2 Nephi this week and when asked about how he liked 2 Nephi his comment was that he couldn't believe they ate raw meat but he researched it and found that when you cook meat, it loses a lot of vitamins so now he understands. He also commented on how he loved the Isaiah chapters. Wow. We also made him a CD of Churchy songs he can listen to on Sunday, because he asked for hymn recommendations when we taught Sabbath day.

We also began teaching an Italian girl.  She is SO COOL! We brought along Tony, a recent convert and he did amazing. She is Catholic but she said that our belief that God isn't three people mysteriously in one, but that God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost are seperate beings makes "much more sense." Amen to that. She accepted a date for May 3rd. We'll see what happens! She's YSA so that's always good, means we have a great support system.

Today will be fun! The Zone is getting together at Wandsworth chapel just to chill I think. It'll be good to hang with everyone and play some sports.

I love you all so much!

-Elder Frederickson

Picture: (Most of) the original Basingstoke District. Idk what the pose is, I was trying to make fun of Sister Wests pose but ended up channelling Spider Man.

"When I was a hippie, I had the swag" - March 31st

Hello, everybody!

This week will be a slightly short email I think.

This week has been wonderful. We worked hard. We saw miracles. Our investigators are not progressing as well as they could, but we've set goals and made plans to help them progress this week. We have high hopes from them. The member referrals have begun to pour in. There is a huge harvest to be reaped in this area and the time for it has come. Obedience, planning, faith, and WORK are a few of our tools that we intend to use to reap. It's so exciting to serve here!

We had two investigators at Sacrament! But we had four show up right afterwards, so in reality we had six! We were so excited to have so many people at church!  there is a spirit of missionary work here. It's awesome! I love this area and this ward.

Funny story of the week: Yesterday this guy wearing a Che  hoodie and jeans carrying a saxophone walks right into the really intensely spiritual combined thrid hour where we were talking about the atonement. I knew something interesting was about to happen hahaha.

We had a munch and mingle afterwards and this guy starts playing a really jazzy version of "When The Saints Go Marching In" while dancing. It lasted about two seconds before Elder Bradford (senior couple) shut it down hahahaha.

I love you all, have a wonderful week! :)

With love,

Elder Frederickon

March 24th

Dear friends and family,

Last week, it dawned on me... I have two transfers left. That is not much time. I have eleven short weeks to reap the harvest and... well, the rest of my life to think about it! As such, I felt it necessary to increase the work rate here. A lot. After transfers happened, Elder Ganta I just went all out! We talked to EVERYONE. Absolutely everyone. We were rewarded for the work we put in and saw miracles.

Our two main focuses were wasting no minutes and getting people out to church. We are making sure that we are finding as much as possible between set appointments. It really is as simple as putting in that extra mile to show your love for the Lord. When that happens, the Lord provides. Sometimes he provides in ways we do not expect. For example, despite our focusing on getting our investigators to church, only one that we'd been teaching came. Despite that, several non-members showed up with whom we were able to set appointments and we hope to work with them in the coming days and weeks.

One of our investigators did came to church, and he was just wonderful. He loved the service. He is such a deep thinker and always thinks outside the box. After gospel principles, he was going to go home but he felt something telling him to stay a bit more. He even made a wonderful contribution to the ever-entertaining Priesthood lesson! We offered him a reading calendar but he said he'd rather just read it cover to cover. He is definitely progressing and we are so excited for him!

We also started teaching a Jamaican named Ricky. He's awesome. 

 

A funny story from the week- on the way to an appointment, we walked through this on high-streetish place in Catford where there is always lots of activity and many colourful characters. We saw an old, drunk man stumbling around carrying a boom box blasting a loud reggae beat. Over this beat he sang "How Great Thou Art" at the TOP OF HIS LUNGS. I love London.

Anyways, to end this on a more spiritual note- two scriptures I came across this week.

Helamen 3:29-30... the scriptures are POWERFUL. Are we using them the way we should?

29 Yea, we see that whosoever will may lay hold upon the word of God, which is quick and. powerful, which shall divide asunder all the cunning and the snares and the wiles of the devil, and lead the man of Christ in a strait and narrow course across that everlasting gulf of misery which is prepared to engulf the wicked—

 30 And land their souls, yea, their immortal souls, at the arighthand of God in the kingdom of heaven, to sit down with Abraham,and Isaac, and with Jacob, and with all our holy fathers, to go nomore out

And 2 Corinthians 9:5... do not forget this, fellow labourers :) 

 6 But this I say, He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he which soweth bountifully shall reap also bountifully.

I know this church is true and the work I do is the work of the Almighty! I love you all so much! :)

With love,

Elder Frederickson

 

March 19th

Dinner with Becky was wonderful! My new comp is good. He is from India. He's been in the flat for a transfer already so I know him. This coming transfer is just a five weeker, then I might be outta London. We'll see :)

Elder Mafubelu is moving- he has my DREAM moves call hahahahahha ZL in Reading with Elder Hanks. Obviously I knew that wasn't happening though hahaha. He was the one with whom I butted heads sometime but we really sorted things out. I'll attach a picture with him from this morning at Clapham Junction. Our ZLs are Elder Popa and a new ZL, ELder Alejandre from Spain. I LOVE Elder Alejandre he is such a nice guy.

I am really excited for the transfer to come. We have so many people that are going to be baptised. Idk if I'll be here two transfers. We'll see! :) 

Thank you so much for the package as well :) I loved it! You guys are the best!

Love you!

March 10th

This week was definitely an improvement on last week! 

We didn't have any investigators at church, but we felt that we did a lot more than the previous week to get our investigators there. In large part, this was a result of their agency but that doesn't really excuse us. There is always more that can be done. So we've set goals and made plans to increase sacrament attendance even if our investigators don't come. For example, we are going to emphasize having members invite their friends to church. We already got started on that yesterday! I am confident that this won't just increase sacrament attendance, it will also help our teaching pool grow.

I had a wonderful exchange with Elder Mafubelu this week. He is a fantastic missionary and I learnt a lot from him. On that particular day we did not have any teaching appointments, so finding was a big focus. It was a fruitful day and we found several new investigators in all shapes and sizes :) we'll be teaching many of them this week and we're really excited. Now, as with any exchange, my aim is to carry that increased enthusiasm and lessons learnt and apply them every day the rest of my mission. So far, so good! :)

Something I have been focusing on this week is using the scriptures more in all phases of missionary work. To do this, I obviously needed to improve the quality of my personal study. This has been great, I've seen a lot of blessings from it. I am loving the scriptures more than ever and feel as if I am now teaching with greater spiritual power than before. By this I mean that the Holy Ghost is bearing more powerful testimony. I couldn't really ask for anything more.

Our investigators are doing well! Sometimes it can be easy to be frustrated with the Lord's timetable but perhaps he is just teaching us patience. Our most progressing investigator is back in the hospital, so she couldn't go to the temple and couldn't make it to church. We will keep doing all that we can to help her. Her desire to gain a testimony is so sincere.

I must admit, I got so excited when I read on President's letter that Havant had a baptism this week. Even though it's been a year since I served in that wonderful place, I still love the members there a lot. How wonderful it is that they saw a baptism! :) 

P-Day should be alright! We ended up going to the O2 last week. Beyonce was performing there like the next day so all of her merchandise was set up hahaha. We just kinda walked around and went to this really good restaurant. Today we're just going to clean the flat and chill. Sometimes those are the best kind of P-Days, to relax and prepare for the week.

I love you all so much! :)

With love,

Elder Frederickson

Good Morning - March 3rd

Hello, everybody!

This week has been difficult, but very rewarding. Zone Conference was exactly what I needed. Seriously, every single presentation spoke directly to me and was inspired. I came with seven questions and, after studying my notes the next day, I had answers to all of them.

We now have some investigators committed for March 29th for baptism, how exciting! They are great. We are going all out and working our hardest and the Lord is rewarding us. We're also seeking to establish a stronger relationship of trust with our ward leaders. and  we will find a way to do even more. 

There is a couple of things that I have been focusing on over the past week, personally. This weekend, I really wanted to have a more meaningful fast. I had studied Isaiah 58 and decided to try a couple of simple things. First, I tried talk about the fast as little as possible. Even little comments, like "we need to have some good food to break this fast!" or saying that I'm hungry. I also tried to make the entire fast a spiritual experience. Connected with that, since we are emphasizing church attendance so much as a mission, I decided I needed to better apply the doctrines that we teach regarding the Sabbath. I read through doctrine regarding the Sabbath as taught in PMG Chapter 3 and thought... is this really how I view the Sabbath right now? Short answer: it wasn't. Obviously I wasn't like... shopping or watching a film or anything like that. I was pretty much just treating it like any other day in the week. I decided there were some little things I could do to increase my testimony of the Sabbath in the mission field. First, I made a concious effort to make sure the music I was listening to was appropriate. Not that I listen to irreverant music during the week, but perhaps I could be EXTRA conscious of what I was listening to. Second, I tried to study the scriptures a bit more. For example, while Elder Bognar was accounting, I took a moment to study and write in my journal instead of cleaning or just chillin. It was all really good, I learned a lot.

P-Day should be fun today- we are going to Wimbledon which is a bit of a hike but it should be worth it to chill with people, see the tennis stuff (maybe?) and have a great lunch at Jimmy Spices.

Things are definitely look up for the week to come. We have a lot of appointments and investigators who are more willing to progress and keep commitments. It'll be a good week! :)

I hope all of you have a great week! I feel your prayers! 

With love,

Elder Frederickson

Walking London

This has been an interesting, difficult, and rewarding week.

To cut a long story short, I was without an Oyster (through no fault of my own, might I add!) so we were on foot all day every day. Between companionship goals, and stake mission plans, and District goals we had a LOT of travelling to do. Nevertheless, we were able to do the vast majority of our visits and we were rewarded for our dedication to carrying out the plans we'd made. It was EXHAUSTING, like I've never been more exhausted from missionary work.

We are working right now with a family from Grenada who have been investigating the church several years. Their son is baptised but the parents are not because they are not married. This is because they've struggled to obtain a British citizenship. However, as we were discussing them in correlation meeting, our Ward Mission Leader commented that where he served his mission (Salt Lake) many people thought they couldn't be married for the same reason, when citizenship is not actually a requirement for marriage. He invited us to do some research on the matter. Luckily, our Bishop is a lawyer so we called him and he worded his answer as follows- "anyone can be married here." Exciting! So they will be baptised in the near future. I think they'd be married and baptised this week to be honest but the mother is recovering from surgery so it might take a bit more time. We are so excited for them.

Things are doing well. The focus continues to be growing our teaching pool and getting people to progress. We're doing this by making as regular contact as possible. We try to see everyone each day but it doesn't always work out. We think we can improve the quality of those visits by making them of a more spiritual nature rather than just quickly following up. Teach them the doctrine they need for the day.

We also are trying to be more charitable in our work and demonstrate our love by action! We did all manner of acts of love this week- giving blessings, baking cookies, and providing people with suitable clothes for church. It's paying off! It really helps build trust between missionaries and investigators. They are MUCH more willing to be honest and bring up concerns.

Things are going well. Still a bit slow, but we're trying to go by the Lord's timetable and not our own... and I feel we're being blessed for that.

Sorry this is a little short and all over the place... haha I am still a bit tired! :) Another big thing- I think this was the first week on my mission (probably my life actually haha) that I wrote in my journal every day. I want to keep that up! Some of you (well, actually just missionaries in my mission that I've been close to recently which is like three of you) might know that I have obsessively studied PMG (Preach My Gospel) chapter 8 (Use Time Wisely) for like two months now and learned SO MUCH from it. I've now moved on to chapter 4 which is about the spirit! My focus this week comes from that chapter- now that I've improved the quality of my evening prayers, I want to improve the quality of my morning prayers! We'll see what happens. I am also going to try and recognize the Spirit more throughout the day and learn a bit more about how he speaks to me.

I love you all so much! I hope your weeks are rewarding and full of miracles! 

With love,

Elder Frederickson

Good Morning!

Hello dear friends!

It's been a great week. We're being blessed bountifully for the work we are putting in. We're going to see the Big Ben again as a Zone today. That will be fun! :)

Things are moving along, although perhaps at a slower pace than the natural man would want. That's okay. These people are on the Lord's timetable. If we are doing what is necessary, we can be satisfied that the Lord is pleased with our labours.

Right now, we are trying out different ways to communicate with/build the trust of the members, especially the ward council. Members here are SO busy supporting their families that we often go long periods of time without seeing them.  We decided that we needed to communicate with the Ward Council on a more regular basis. We now email our progress record to the whole ward council every Friday and include with it some notes on how our week went, who we're working with, and what actions need to be taken to help move the work forward. We also include some brief reminders about praying for the missionaries, the wards baptismal goal, and things like that. We also list off our teaching appointments for the next week and ask who can come. This has been incredible effective. The members LOVE it. They're always thanking us for the updates.  Now we are going to try and emphasize having that information filtered into the individual quorums and auxiliaries through the Ward Council so that the whole ward can join together in moving this work forward.

Our investigators are doing well. We're trying to see all of them each day so we can follow up with the commitments we've left in person. It's been quite effective. We're doing out best to plan for this effectively while scheduling in quality finding time. It can be challenging but it is definitely rewarding. It really all does come down to effective planning. We also need to write EVERYTHING in our planners. Well, I do at least. Otherwise, I forget everything! :)

Since the mission is emphasizing the Sacred Time between 6:30 and 10 AM, I prayerfully considered how I could better make use of that time. I decided that I was also making 10 to 10:30 PM sacred time. From 10 to 10:15 I write in my journal, since I've found that the better I am about writing in my journal, the easier personal revelation comes. At 10:15 I pray, allowing me plenty of time to be in bed by 10:30. It's made waking up in the morning SO much easier. People who know me well know that I am NOT NOT NOT a morning person, I know it is simply the Lord blessing me for obedience to His schedule.

You guys are all so wonderful and I love you so much! Have a great week.

Oh, and happy late Valentines Day ;) and Presidents Day... forgot that existed...

With love,

Elder Frederickson

Visit from Bishop Buhler

Matthew's Curry Recipe

I guess he has learned how to cook!!! Here is Matthew's Curry recipe!!!

 

Hmmm well I've made two. One that's tomato based and one Korma tasting one.

 

I use the same powder for both of them. Here's what I do

 

Get a little bowl, mix up a bunch of spices until it smells good.

The three main ones are garlic powder, coriander, and cumin. I also put in a lot of Garam Masala. I also sparingly use cinnamon, ginger, cardamon, cayenne, paprika, chinese five spice, ground cashews... basically whatever I can find :)

 

Then I dice and fry an onion or two, as well as a red chili or two. When it's done, fry the chicken then throw in the powder and let it fry for 1-2 minutes. Then you put in a little water, a medium amount of yoghurt, and quite a bit of tomato puree then you mix it all together and let it simmer for twenty minutes. 

 

The korma one you just do the same thing except replace tomato puree with coconut milk, red peppers with green peppers, and put in a bunch of ground almonds and a bit of peanut butter :)

 

Always serve over rice :)

 

I'll have to make it for a family dinner over the summer.

Using Time Wisely to Fulfill Our Purpose

Dear everybody!

The work is moving along at a brisk pace, although not quite in the way that I expected.

R. is doing okay... we set a new baptism date with him for March 1st. He has committed to do the stop smoking program after he goes on a one week holiday to Egypt.

D. is doing well.  At the moment, he is dated for February 22nd. I know it can happen. He just needs to exercise his agency. We're visiting him every day. At this point, it's pretty much all on him. Funny story about that, by the way. D. has a flat mate named A. who, to say the least, isn't a big help with the Word of Wisdom problems. When we visited him on Friday, A. was there, there was this guy named E., who I'd never met, in A.'s bed and he just sat there the whole time grinning. Obviously D. was there too. They were all drunk (it was 11 AM...) and we told D. that he wasn't receptive to spiritual truths while he's drunk. A. (who, up to that point, was singing along to something on his phone, I think it was R. Kelly) just stands up and rebukes D. and saying that he needed to "keep his committments" and that our time was "precious." Profound. I think we are going to try and teach him. Also E. spoke up at one point and told us that we "ought to bring a member of the church who used to be alcoholic but changed his life." Evidently, these guys had a peek at Preach My Gospel Chapter 10.

D. came to church yesterday and "loved" it. We're teaching her tomorrow. Hopefully we'll begin to see her more regularily.

Forgive me, as a lot of what I am about to say will make a lot more sense to my fellow-labourers.

I learnt so much this week. It all stemmed from a District Meeting that was inspired in every way. First, the Zone Leaders addressed the whole Zone on having more meaningful street lessons. It led me to deeply ponder the purpose of finding and key indicators and how we use them in our proselyting. I have come to a few conclusions on the matter:

1. Their purpose, in my opinion is to help us keep track of the progression of those we're teaching, to assess where we are and how we can improve, which, combined, help us fulfill our purpose as effectively as we can.

2. Key Indicators represent events for a specific individual that lead to lasting conversion. They represent the progress of specific souls towards eternal life. As such, we should do all that we can to make them meaningful. If the key indicators ever become about us or our prideful desires, then we need to repent.

3. You should aim to have increasing key indicators each week. You don't just wave a wand and quadruple the number of lessons you teach. You work hard. You pray with faith. You do all you can to demonstrate charity. You obey with exactness. The work progresses. The members see this and then the work takes off.

Based off these conclusions, Elder B. and I have set goals and made plans to change. To re-assess the way we look at key indicators and the souls the represent. Why are we here? Love. If we focus on love- love of God, and of all mankind, then we cannot fail. We will have been successful missionaries.

I hope I don't sound too preachy :) these are just a few thoughts that really struck me.

In the actual District Meeting, Elder B. asked Elders F. and O. to prepare presentations on hope and charity. They were incredible. I can't wait to apply their inspired counsel.

Lately I've also been studying prayer- especially it's purpose and the way I pray. I am going to continue studying it throughout the week. I am so excited to see what things I learn.

It is such a blessing to be in this zone. I love London! I love the people here, I love my companion, and I love my mission leaders. Their counsel is so inspired. I am excited to see what this week has in store.

Also, shout out to my incredible trainer, Elder von Allmen, who finishes his mission next week. He is one of the finest missionaries the England London South Mission has seen. I am so grateful for his friendship, service, and all that he taught me.

You all are awesome! I feel your prayers each day.Transfers are next week! Always exciting :) I know that the message we have is true. It's changed my life and it can change everyones.

With love,
Elder Frederickson

The Promised Land

Good morning, everybody!

London is truly the promised land. My favourite thing about serving in London is all the people. There are so many people all the time and they almost always want to talk to you! It is such a blessing to serve here.

With all of these new people to talk to and teach, we've had to, as President Uchtdorf puts it.... "slow down a little." As fun as it is to teach as many people as we can and have wonderful conversations, it's simply not the most effective way to do things. We overloaded ourselves with appointments, were late to most of them, and flogged by the ones we weren't late to. Perhaps a bit of repentance is in order, as we definitely could've seeked the Lord's will a bit more regarding our finding efforts.

This week, we're approaching things a bit differently. We are going to try and visit every member of the ward council and encourage them to be examples to their quorums and auxiliaries with the missionary work they do. These members have so much potential. I love them already and am so excited to work with them.

Last week I also had the opportunity to go on exchange with Elder Aragones in Peckham! It was so much fun. He's an amazing missionary and I learnt so much from him and the way he works his area. They live in the same flat that used to be used by the Kennington (spanish speaking) Elders, two of whom I've served with. I got to eat at the fabled Chicken and Chips establishment "KHF," where you can get two pieces of fried chicken, three hot wings, fries, and a drink for £3. It was good. It's good but I decided that I need to severely limit the amount of cheap fast food I have here because let's just say it's taking a toll. The same day I made this decision we found an investigator that worked at Chick Chicken which apparently was the only venue in which we could teach him. When we arrived he had prepared... you guessed it... chicken and chips. Oh well. I'll do much better this week! :)

We also had a wonderful zone training last week. The biggest things that I got out of it were that we need to teach for understanding. Teach at the investigators pace. "Investigators should be baptised when they are ready. Not a day before and not a day after." If that means it takes a bit longer than you wanted, so be it. It's not about us, it's about them and Heavenly Father. I also decided that I want to really focus on serving out of love. Making my obedience and my work motivated by my love for others, especially Jesus Christ.

Today we're going to Greenwich for a Zone P-Day. It'll be great. I'll send some pictures next week!

I love being here so much. I love these people. I love this city. I love my companion. I love life!

With love,

Elder Frederickson

First Week in London

So, transfers have come and gone, and I have moved to London! My new area is Catford, which covers Greenwich, Lewisham, Catford, and some other parts of London. We are in the London Wandsworth Stake. It's a completely different mission here. My new companion is Elder Bognar from Hungary. It's funny because he replaced me in Trowbridge. He is SO amazing, I love serving with him SO much. 

We have one baptismal date here. He will be baptised on the 18th of January, provided that he quits smoking. He has the desire, through the Atonement all things are possible. 

Church was a fascinating experience yesterday. I have never been to a ward like this one!

We worked really hard this week- we had only one investigator last Wednesday so we did tons of finding and the Lord has provided us with appointments throughout the week. Now the challenge is to find members to take with us! I am so excited to see what happens here.

Not much to report besides that, in all honesty! 

Some other things that are different about Catford.

• For the first time since last March, I don't have my own toilet. I have moved from a two man flat that had two toilets to a four man flat that has one. 
• We are one of the only companionships whose number isn't 07800615***. We have this weird number. I still don't know it hahaha
• We can have Zone P-Days here! We also meet as a Zone each week for District Meeting.
• For the first time in my mission, travel is EASY. We can get anywhere in our area in like 20 minutes. Gone are the days of waiting for buses and trains.

That's about it, for now. Sorry this is so short!

Love all of you! Have a great week! :)

With love,

Elder Frederickson