May 22, 2011
Hello from Brahma Lodge!
We had a good week this week. Very eventful. We had Elder Tad R Callister from the Seventy visit our mission. We had a giant metro conference. It was nice to see so many missionaries. In this mission we are very spread out. I met some new missionaries this week. One of them was a Sister; she has been out over a year. I took many notes from what Elder Callister addressed us about. He also had a Fireside later that night for all of Adelaide. He speaks and teaches doctrine so clearly, he is definitely a General Authority. You can feel the power in his words, he is a man of God. Because we were at Firle Chapel for our long conference and the Fireside was later that evening, Elder Tasi and I just did some proselyting in the surrounding areas. I had a reunion with my first baptism, Patience Barlee. We were just on foot and I saw her get into the car and about to drive away from her house but I waved her down. It was a sweet reunion, very joyful. Other of my first earlier baptisms have moved out of town like Black and Neo.
On Saturday we had a Ward Activity at our chapel. It was a pot luck dinner. Except we didn’t have to bring any food. It was a Hawaiin or Polynesian theme. Every one was dressed tropical style. I wore a flowery tie. We had quite a bit of investigators and nonmembers at the activity. Two former Sister missionaries that have gone home did a surprise visit to the activity, they both served in this area. Interestingly enough I saw an old investigator from Mt Gambier. She had moved to Adelaide and we lost track of her. She is the niece to an active sister in Paralowie Ward. They are Maori. But she lives far away from Para Lowie Ward but she just came to help set up the activity and cooking. The main reason it was a Hawaiian them was because also that night the bishopric shared with everyone the New Ward Vision. The key word was “Ohana”. This in Hawaiian means one big family. They addressed the need for the ward to have more love and unity and be like a family. The Ward responded well. I noticed from then on the members were friendlier and if they hadn’t introduced themselves to our investigators they did so afterwards. The investigators all enjoyed the activity. They really caught the vision as well that this is a big 2nd family to them. Also on Sunday I noticed a change in the Ward. Ohana was said not a few times yesterday, from member to member in the Corridor, to it being mentioned in classes. Hopefully this becomes the Culture and doesn’t die off.
Thomas and Peter are set to be baptized on the same day on June 11th which is not too far away. This Sunday we also had our Ward Conference. The Stake President taught priesthood and it was all about missionary work and how to be meaningful Home Teachers. We shouldn’t just go Home Teaching for the sake of a statistic but we need to do it as men holding the holy priesthood of God.
I am telling all the Indian and Nepali families that I know about Jarom leaving to serve his mission in that part of the world.
Well I am going to go now. It is bit cold and rainy now. Surely there will be blessings for riding in the rain.
Love you all heaps
-Elder Montgomery
Monday, May 23, 2011
"Elder Tad R. Callister, who is the Pacific Area President, will be visiting Adelaide this week."
May 15, 2011
Hello from Brahma Lodge!
We had a good week this week. Peter is progressing towards his baptism. We taught him the Word of Wisdom and he has committed to live it. We are helping him overcome smoking. As of yesterday he hasn’t smoked for 24 hours. We will see him tomorrow and see how he is going. Peter has a friend named Thomas. After Gospel Principles class we committed Thomas to be baptized. He will be baptized In June. We are excited about Peter and Thomas. We see them just about everyday. We want them to be involved In the YSA. We have been taking members to help us teach, it is a bit more difficult to get the best I-care because we can only see Peter and Thomas during the day.
Elder Tad R Callister, who is the Pacific Area President, will be visiting Adelaide this week. I remember him giving an excellent talk about the Restoration during the beginning of my mission during General Conference. I believe he will also become apart of the presidency of the Seventy shortly. He will be holding a Missionary Fireside this Wednesday evening specifically for investigators, new members and less actives but probably more exciting for me is we have a Metro Zone Conference personally with him, except for missionaries in the Northern Territory, poor guys. We are looking forward to that.
We have been inviting members to invite some of our investigators for dinner for fellowshipping and it has been really good. I haven’t eaten anything too intense lately, no pig brain, eye ball and intestines this week. Although I did eat curry based meals twice last week.
I can’t believe Jarom is leaving soon. I remember the first hour or so after I was set apart. I was glancing at the television and realized, shoot! I am not supposed to watch that. I remember flying alone to Utah and thinking to myself this is the last time I will be alone for 2 years. I enjoyed it by eating at the burger king in the air port. It will be weird for me to drive a vehicle back on the right side and also to be driving a vehicle alone. There will be some changes for me when I do come back. Especially hearing my first name, I imagine I will get use to that pretty quick. I want to serve a mission for sure when I am older. And with my wife. That is my long term goal one day. I love missionary work.
I am going to go now. We are going to have a Zone P-day. Because the Wyhalla missionaries are down for the metro conference. We are going to play a big game of touch rugby. One half of the Zone against the other. I am the only American in the district, the rest are islanders and one other Australian. We are going to own.
Love you heaps
Elder Montgomery
Hello from Brahma Lodge!
We had a good week this week. Peter is progressing towards his baptism. We taught him the Word of Wisdom and he has committed to live it. We are helping him overcome smoking. As of yesterday he hasn’t smoked for 24 hours. We will see him tomorrow and see how he is going. Peter has a friend named Thomas. After Gospel Principles class we committed Thomas to be baptized. He will be baptized In June. We are excited about Peter and Thomas. We see them just about everyday. We want them to be involved In the YSA. We have been taking members to help us teach, it is a bit more difficult to get the best I-care because we can only see Peter and Thomas during the day.
Elder Tad R Callister, who is the Pacific Area President, will be visiting Adelaide this week. I remember him giving an excellent talk about the Restoration during the beginning of my mission during General Conference. I believe he will also become apart of the presidency of the Seventy shortly. He will be holding a Missionary Fireside this Wednesday evening specifically for investigators, new members and less actives but probably more exciting for me is we have a Metro Zone Conference personally with him, except for missionaries in the Northern Territory, poor guys. We are looking forward to that.
We have been inviting members to invite some of our investigators for dinner for fellowshipping and it has been really good. I haven’t eaten anything too intense lately, no pig brain, eye ball and intestines this week. Although I did eat curry based meals twice last week.
I can’t believe Jarom is leaving soon. I remember the first hour or so after I was set apart. I was glancing at the television and realized, shoot! I am not supposed to watch that. I remember flying alone to Utah and thinking to myself this is the last time I will be alone for 2 years. I enjoyed it by eating at the burger king in the air port. It will be weird for me to drive a vehicle back on the right side and also to be driving a vehicle alone. There will be some changes for me when I do come back. Especially hearing my first name, I imagine I will get use to that pretty quick. I want to serve a mission for sure when I am older. And with my wife. That is my long term goal one day. I love missionary work.
I am going to go now. We are going to have a Zone P-day. Because the Wyhalla missionaries are down for the metro conference. We are going to play a big game of touch rugby. One half of the Zone against the other. I am the only American in the district, the rest are islanders and one other Australian. We are going to own.
Love you heaps
Elder Montgomery
"Happy Mother's Day!"
May 8, 2011
Hello from the Brahma Lodge
Happy Mothers day!
I just talked to you not long ago.
There really isnt much i can write to you, you are pretty updated i feel. We are just doing the work, We are pretty excited about Peter. Who received a dream that the church is true. June 7th is the date that is set as of now. We know he does smoke so we are going to teach him the Word of Wisdom in his next lesson. It was great to hear from everyone. That was my last phone call home. Amazing this chapter in my life is almost over. I need to make sure i live it today and take it all in.
Yes that is quite an update about Dan's graduation. Those are some crazy obstacles you guys went through. That poor car. Glad to hear everyone is okay
Talk to all later.
love you heaps
Elder Montgomery
Hello from the Brahma Lodge
Happy Mothers day!
I just talked to you not long ago.
There really isnt much i can write to you, you are pretty updated i feel. We are just doing the work, We are pretty excited about Peter. Who received a dream that the church is true. June 7th is the date that is set as of now. We know he does smoke so we are going to teach him the Word of Wisdom in his next lesson. It was great to hear from everyone. That was my last phone call home. Amazing this chapter in my life is almost over. I need to make sure i live it today and take it all in.
Yes that is quite an update about Dan's graduation. Those are some crazy obstacles you guys went through. That poor car. Glad to hear everyone is okay
Talk to all later.
love you heaps
Elder Montgomery
"There was a prompting and we needed to follow it..."
May 1, 2011
Hello from Brahma Lodge!
We had a good week this week. We had a number of powerful lessons this week. One we really had to be patient and work for. We are teaching this family and we had a good discussion about temples. I wanted to help them with a vision that was past baptism. I wanted them to look towards the temple. They are excited to be sealed for time and all eternity. I felt prompted to share a certain video that was on the “Church History” DVDs under the video, “Nauvoo, a Temple Reborn”. We brought a member to the lesson and he brought the DVD. We were in the living room and ready to watch this video about temples. But the family we are teaching didn’t have a remote controller to the DVD player. We couldn’t scroll down to watch the correct video, when we pressed the button on the actual DVD player to skip chapters it went straight back to the main menu. There was a prompting and we needed to follow it and do whatever it takes to have this family watch this video. The next day we brought another member to the house and this time he brought a lap top so we could watch the DVD on that. But of course he had thought he left the DVD in the lap top but we soon found out the lap top was indeed empty. We asked the brother if he would go home to retrieve the DVD. This he did, he didn’t live too far away. He returned, put the DVD into the lap top and of course the lap top would not read the DVD. I felt beaten by this time. But one of the brothers of the family reckoned that he could work the DVD player and we would be able to watch this certain DVD. I admit I doubted he could make a difference; I had pressed every button trying to work this DVD player to make it do what I wanted it to do. This brother wasn’t home the first time we attempted to watch the video. Thankfully this young man was able to work the DVD player, he scrolled down and we finally began to watch the DVD. I don’t even know what he did differently than me but it doesn’t matter, I will take it happily. The spirit was so strong in this house as we watched that DVD. I know they felt the spirit. Opposition was so strong, definitely there was something initially keeping us from watching this DVD. But God will always win.
My companions English is great, he will have an American accent in no time.
Yes we are still in a bike area.
We were given a chicken by a member, the district had another Barbie, we are big into those at the moment, but I brought a live chicken. It took work to prepare him but we chucked him on the Barbie and ate him, even the organs. I don’t think I have actually killed, eaten or prepared anything before my mission. I think every Boy Scout should. Surely in wilderness survival you need to know how to do these things.
Thank you so much for the package mom. I am almost finished eating all of the lollies. I love Reeses. I have shared some of course.
Yes that wedding was pretty big here in Australia. These natural disasters are occurring way too quickly. Heaps of people were telling me about the Tornadoes in America. I had to tell many people I do not live near there.
I don’t know what we are going to do today for P-day. I think it will be a quiet one, I am going to get a haircut from a member for free, and that is exciting. I haven’t paid anyone to cut my hair since I was in Yuma. Usually I just cut it myself.
Love you heaps
-Elder Montgomery
Hello from Brahma Lodge!
We had a good week this week. We had a number of powerful lessons this week. One we really had to be patient and work for. We are teaching this family and we had a good discussion about temples. I wanted to help them with a vision that was past baptism. I wanted them to look towards the temple. They are excited to be sealed for time and all eternity. I felt prompted to share a certain video that was on the “Church History” DVDs under the video, “Nauvoo, a Temple Reborn”. We brought a member to the lesson and he brought the DVD. We were in the living room and ready to watch this video about temples. But the family we are teaching didn’t have a remote controller to the DVD player. We couldn’t scroll down to watch the correct video, when we pressed the button on the actual DVD player to skip chapters it went straight back to the main menu. There was a prompting and we needed to follow it and do whatever it takes to have this family watch this video. The next day we brought another member to the house and this time he brought a lap top so we could watch the DVD on that. But of course he had thought he left the DVD in the lap top but we soon found out the lap top was indeed empty. We asked the brother if he would go home to retrieve the DVD. This he did, he didn’t live too far away. He returned, put the DVD into the lap top and of course the lap top would not read the DVD. I felt beaten by this time. But one of the brothers of the family reckoned that he could work the DVD player and we would be able to watch this certain DVD. I admit I doubted he could make a difference; I had pressed every button trying to work this DVD player to make it do what I wanted it to do. This brother wasn’t home the first time we attempted to watch the video. Thankfully this young man was able to work the DVD player, he scrolled down and we finally began to watch the DVD. I don’t even know what he did differently than me but it doesn’t matter, I will take it happily. The spirit was so strong in this house as we watched that DVD. I know they felt the spirit. Opposition was so strong, definitely there was something initially keeping us from watching this DVD. But God will always win.
My companions English is great, he will have an American accent in no time.
Yes we are still in a bike area.
We were given a chicken by a member, the district had another Barbie, we are big into those at the moment, but I brought a live chicken. It took work to prepare him but we chucked him on the Barbie and ate him, even the organs. I don’t think I have actually killed, eaten or prepared anything before my mission. I think every Boy Scout should. Surely in wilderness survival you need to know how to do these things.
Thank you so much for the package mom. I am almost finished eating all of the lollies. I love Reeses. I have shared some of course.
Yes that wedding was pretty big here in Australia. These natural disasters are occurring way too quickly. Heaps of people were telling me about the Tornadoes in America. I had to tell many people I do not live near there.
I don’t know what we are going to do today for P-day. I think it will be a quiet one, I am going to get a haircut from a member for free, and that is exciting. I haven’t paid anyone to cut my hair since I was in Yuma. Usually I just cut it myself.
Love you heaps
-Elder Montgomery
Sunday, May 22, 2011
"This is my first time training on my mission."
April 26, 2011
Hello from Brahma Lodge!
I have a new companion, his name is Elder Tasi. He has been on Australian soil for less than a week now. He is from America Samoa, which is an American territory. He learned how to speak English in 3 weeks at the MTC in New Zealand. He probably was exposed to English growing up. But still we have language study to help him learn.
This is my first time training on my mission. I am enjoying it so far just starting from scratch teaching everything on how to be a missionary and Preach my Gospel. Also one thing is new for me. For the first time in my mission I am in a bike area. I almost went through my whole mission in a car. So this is definitely a whole new chapter in my missionary life. But it is good, you can definitely talk to more people on the bike than you can in the car. My legs are a bit sore. My area has hilly suburbs. When I feel the burn in my legs I say to myself in my head sometimes, Glory to God Glory to God.
This week I have been introducing Elder Tasi to all the members and investigators in our area. The Hunts had us over for dinner last night, which was also my birthday. They put a candle in a cookie, it was sweet.
Ya it is pretty weird I am 21 now. I miss telling people I am 19 or 20, people are always shocked to hear my age. They usually think I am 25. I think it must be the tie. It makes me look mature.
Yes I will live with you for a year. I will choose Glendale and then transfer to Mesa community or to ASU a year later. I am not decided what I want to do when I go home. I really should start praying about that. I have a question, how much are you going to sell the house for? Maybe I have someone who is interested in buying our house, with a bit of money up front. He has family in America who could do the transaction for him.
I am glad you enjoy the videos and pictures of Darwin. Special place it was. I wouldn’t mind going there for a holiday in the distant future, during the dry season. I do know Elder Carlson. He is out bush at the moment, I might not see him before I go home.
My package is at the office the mission secretary tells me.
Yes I told Sister Maude you loved Donny Osbourne. J/k Osmond.
I will have to buy a phone card. I will have more details of what time I will call you later. I know skype is used in some missions but there is no word we could do it in this mission.
Well I am going to go and celebrate my birthday this P-day.
Love you heaps
-Elder Montgomery
Hello from Brahma Lodge!
I have a new companion, his name is Elder Tasi. He has been on Australian soil for less than a week now. He is from America Samoa, which is an American territory. He learned how to speak English in 3 weeks at the MTC in New Zealand. He probably was exposed to English growing up. But still we have language study to help him learn.
This is my first time training on my mission. I am enjoying it so far just starting from scratch teaching everything on how to be a missionary and Preach my Gospel. Also one thing is new for me. For the first time in my mission I am in a bike area. I almost went through my whole mission in a car. So this is definitely a whole new chapter in my missionary life. But it is good, you can definitely talk to more people on the bike than you can in the car. My legs are a bit sore. My area has hilly suburbs. When I feel the burn in my legs I say to myself in my head sometimes, Glory to God Glory to God.
This week I have been introducing Elder Tasi to all the members and investigators in our area. The Hunts had us over for dinner last night, which was also my birthday. They put a candle in a cookie, it was sweet.
Ya it is pretty weird I am 21 now. I miss telling people I am 19 or 20, people are always shocked to hear my age. They usually think I am 25. I think it must be the tie. It makes me look mature.
Yes I will live with you for a year. I will choose Glendale and then transfer to Mesa community or to ASU a year later. I am not decided what I want to do when I go home. I really should start praying about that. I have a question, how much are you going to sell the house for? Maybe I have someone who is interested in buying our house, with a bit of money up front. He has family in America who could do the transaction for him.
I am glad you enjoy the videos and pictures of Darwin. Special place it was. I wouldn’t mind going there for a holiday in the distant future, during the dry season. I do know Elder Carlson. He is out bush at the moment, I might not see him before I go home.
My package is at the office the mission secretary tells me.
Yes I told Sister Maude you loved Donny Osbourne. J/k Osmond.
I will have to buy a phone card. I will have more details of what time I will call you later. I know skype is used in some missions but there is no word we could do it in this mission.
Well I am going to go and celebrate my birthday this P-day.
Love you heaps
-Elder Montgomery
"...zone barbie today and also go to St. Kilda"
April 17, 2011
Good to hear from you!
I have only 2 minutes left! sorry. short Email. safe and healthy. We will find out transfers tonight. I have a feeling i am being transfered. but i have been wrong many many times. I will get those scripture cases to you, i hope they werent wiped out from the floods.
We are going to have a zone barbie today and also go to St Kilda, i went there back in october 2009 with my district.
I love this work.
Love you heaps
-Elder Montgomery
Good to hear from you!
I have only 2 minutes left! sorry. short Email. safe and healthy. We will find out transfers tonight. I have a feeling i am being transfered. but i have been wrong many many times. I will get those scripture cases to you, i hope they werent wiped out from the floods.
We are going to have a zone barbie today and also go to St Kilda, i went there back in october 2009 with my district.
I love this work.
Love you heaps
-Elder Montgomery
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