Thankful I'm not perfect

Date: Thu, May 21, 2009 at 5:01 AM
Subject: What a Week!!

Hello!

How is everyone this week? Excited for summer? I sure am! It's getting warmer here and I like that.

Well, my time serving on the Isle of Man is over. I'm currently in Rochdale, which is just outside of Manchester. My new companion is Elder Winward from Salt Lake City and he is great! The work here is going amazingly well, we have 3 investigators dated for Baptism this transfer, and many others we're working with. It's going to be a busy week as I get to know and start teaching all of them! I'm so excited though.

As for my last week on the Isle of Righteousness... I mean Isle of Man, it was amazing! We got to do service for some members and helped the Allen's get in and settled and in the last couple days said goodbye to everyone. It was a lot of fun, and I'm going to really miss that blessed Island. Elder and Sister Allen (from Portland, Oregon by the way) are incredible and will take good care of it as well as Elder Llaguno and his new companion, Elder Frogeley, who was the assistant up until he went out there! And Guess who the new assistant is?! My trainer, Elder Ayers!! I'm so happy and excited for him. This means that I'll get to work a lot more closely with him and the other Missionaries, especially as I'm back on the Mainland! It's an exciting time, but I sure do miss the Isle of Man!

Yesterday was one of the craziest days of my mission. I went on the ferry completely alone then had to catch some trains to Manchester where I was literally found by a member family from Rochdale who drove another Elder and me there. It felt really weird to be alone, but I know it was approved by the Lord because it was approved by President Bullock!

And last night was absolutely AMAZING!! Here's the background story: The BYU Chamber Singers have been on tour here in the U.K. for the last 3 weeks. They got to do festivals in Ireland and did a lot of concerts here in England/Wales. I was a bit sad to see that they were coming because I was going to be on the Isle of Man and would miss the times that they would be here. (President Bullock gave approval for us to go with investigators if possible, but on the Isle of Man there was just no way we'd be able to go.) But there was a bit of hope because on transfer day (yesterday) I saw that they were going to be in Oldham and I thought maybe I'd be transferred to Oldham that day. Well, Rochdale just happens to be right next to Oldham, so we got to go to see one of the BYU Singers concerts!! It just happened to be their last, and as I said before, it was AMAZING!! The spirit was so strong, and I learned a lot from all of the pieces they sang. They even did a few pieces that I sang in Chamber Singers and Provo High! It was so exciting, I'm so thankful that Heavenly Father gave me that chance to do that.

It's been a pretty crazy couple of weeks, but the Gospel is still true. I'm so thankful to have a testimony of the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. This morning in study I started a list of the blessings of the Atonement, and it's incredible the things that we can have from the Savior's sacrifice for us. I noticed though that every single one of the scriptures that I studied mentioned doing some part of the Gospel of Jesus Christ (Faith, Repentance, Baptism, etc.). I've learned that that is true, if we want to experience all of the blessings of the Atonement in our lives then all we have to do is live the Gospel. It's that simple and it's so amazing. And it's possible as well. This week I've been more and more thankful that I'm not perfect. Every day is a new chance to learn and to grow and to improve on what we did yesterday. Being perfect without experiencing any of this would be very boring. But I'm so thankful that through Jesus Christ we can become perfect and return to live with Heavenly Father again. I love this work and I know its true!! How are your Missionary experiences going by the way? They will come if you pray for them, I promise. I know that prayer does work, Heavenly Father really does listen and answer our prayers. I know that He did answer Joseph Smith's prayer by appearing to Joseph Smith with His Son, Jesus Christ, and that they called Joseph Smith to be a Prophet. He was and is a true Prophet of God and the Book of Mormon is how we know that. I'm so thankful for the restored Gospel!

Well, you are amazing people and I love you so much. Keep up the incredible work and please please keep the letters coming! Feel more than welcome to flood the postbox with letters this week! My new address is:

Elder Rowley
7 School Lane
Rochdale
OL16 1QB
England

Please write. Don't forget it. Thanks again for everything, I love you all so much. Have a wonderful week and keep having Missionary experiences!

Love,

Elder Rowley