November 24, 2014

Warning, this letter is a TOTAL missionary letter.

Mom I think you are starting to absorb my sense of humour. That was hilarious (yes I think I'm hilarious). To assuage your concerns, we got about 3 inches of snow, and now it's like 10 degrees Celsius and raining so all the snow vanished pretty fast. A few days ago there was freezing rain and that was fun to drive in. No close calls yet though.

As for Christmas, not sure. My clothes should suffice until I get back at this point. pictures for sure, I love receiving pictures. I'm going to have a huge collection for my wife when she starts scrap booking (lol). Not really in need of anything else. Just love and maybe some cookies. Actually a cheap side bag would be nice. The backpack is really hard to get on and off while wearing a winter coat.

This week was a good week overall for us and for the district as a whole. We're doing a great job raising our vision, and each week has gotten better since we started. For us we are doing a good job managing to get lessons, especially with members, but our investigators are kind of weak. We're doing our best to bring the spirit, but a number of them just let us back because they like us or because we are really persistent. we're still trying to find the ones who are prepared.

Yesterday we were doing just that, passing by formers and parking a ways away so we could walk a bit and talk to people and knock. Our appointments had cancelled and we were on plan B. None of the formers were home, and no one we had talked to was interested. After one pass by we got back in the car and decided to find a gas-station so we could both use the restroom. I wandered around for a while, not sure why I didn't use the GPS. We got lost in the maze that is Saint-Francois and ended up on some random street We'd never been on before. We stopped to figure out where we were, and I got the distinct impression "I'm on this street for a reason." I knew there was somebody here, but not which house. I pulled the car up the street, staring at the houses. Suddenly I stopped and said to Elder S..: "We're going to knock this house." We got out and knocked on the door, and waited, and waited, and waited. Finally the window by the front door opened and a middle-aged woman poked here head out to see who it was. We contacted her and she was really cool. She gave us print-outs of her favourite picture of Christ and we gave here a Book of Mormon in exchange. She was thrilled to receive it (she was ready to buy it) and we left her with a card. We didn't push for a return appointment or anything. We then got back in the car. We both felt that we had finished what we needed to do in Saint-Francois and left to go eat dinner. It was really a testimony builder to me. Earlier, in my frustration at our lack of success, I had prayed silently and asked God to guide us to those who are ready. He answered that prayer. I'm going to do that again!

I love you all so much! Can't wait to see your faces on Christmas!

Love, Elder Hardy

p.s. forgot the cord today. Sorry no pictures :(

November 17, 2014

A good week, though not as good as Joliette's

The subject of the e-mail is a joke referencing how the whole district is geeking out right now because Joliette was blessed with 8 new investigators (that is over 8 times the mission average for one team in one week). We had a good week ourselves though.

President Patrick has begun a new idea in the mission called "raise your vision." The idea has been to raise our vision (of course) of what we can accomplish here in Quebec. President is just tired of (and I'm guilty of this) missionaries using Quebec as an excuse for stagnant numbers and low baptisms. He's pushing us to push ourselves. The way he wants to accomplish this is through a better use of goals. If we raise our vision of what we CAN achieve, we will set goals accordingly. Then we need to go out and work to achieve those goals. If we do so we WILL achieve what we audaciously dreamed to be possible in Quebec. I'm really excited about this idea. It is so clear to me and I can feel that this is the time to turn on the jets! We've spent the last year and a half re-centering our vision on why and how we do missionary work, now it's time to raise it. With permission, I've set district goals for the remainder of the transfer (they're quite audacious) and been focusing calls and trainings on working hard to achieve worthy goals. The result has been a genuine improvement in just one week, and the prospect of steady improvement as our vision keeps rising.

Also on Friday we invited G.. to be baptized. The effect was magical. He didn't say yes, he said I need to know first. Now he is actually investigating and not just having us over to chat. The lesson was really powerful. The spirit really has opened his heart and prepared him to really start on the path to conversion and eternal life.

I have a message for little Zach Hardy: I love Pokemon too!!!!! But not as much as I love you!!!!

The play looks like it went super well! Don't worry Paige, I'm certain you'll have plenty more moments to shine in the next few years at least.

Also I almost forgot: the stake is doing a one day "media split" on November 29th. We'll be bringing along different tech-savvy members with us all day and they will document our daily activities and posting them on Facebook and other social media. The idea is to flood the internet with posts relating to missionary life. You can follow this event by using the hash-tags #missionnairesmtl and #terrebonneelders (ask a young person what those are). You will see my beautiful face!

Also Christmas is coming! Brace yourselves! I am pumped to get to call you guys and see your faces!

Lots of Love!

Elder Hardy

The window this morning (dang, I look as tired as I feel):

Me and Elder Spencer in our car:

Me and a river still during splits with Elder Noel:

November 10, 2014

Paige is adorable

Wow those pictures of Paige are just adorable! I'm sure she did amazing!! Lizzie looks so cute too in her little wings.

Well Lizzie is my last hope to have another sensible musician in the family. Oh well, I tried (jokes). In reality my singing ability has greatly improved on my mission because it's the only instrument I really have out here. Maybe I'll go out for choir and band when I get back to BYU. Good thing that's a million years away...

Speaking of singing this weekend was Stake Conference and our ward did the music for the Saturday session. We did a super awesome, but way too hard for the choir in question, rendition of "Au Grande Prophete" (Praise to the Man). The tenors were great, but we were too loud because we were the only section that knew the part. The song ended on an F above middle C for the tenors so I decided to blow the top off of the Stake Center. Luckily I was the only one who could really hit the note, so it sounded good I think. 

To respond to your question about service, we are looking for community service opportunities, but mostly just keeping our eyes peeled for unplanned opportunities. A good example of how it works was last Wednesday we were doing pass-byes in the afternoon in Saint-Francois. This normally isn't a good use of time, but we felt that it was the right thing to do. No one was home at any pass-byes and no one on the street had been interested, then we pulled up on a certain street to pass-bye a former. The former had been dropped due to a complete lack of progression, and normally we wouldn't have passed by him without calling in his case, but for some reason we had gone to his street. We sat in the car for a bit without saying anything when we got to the street. After a few minutes Elder S asked why we were still sitting there. We had no idea. We got out of the car and saw a man raking his leaves who hadn't been there when we pulled up. We grabbed our bags and literally ran to ask if he needed help. He accepted and randomly had an extra rake. I grabbed the rake and started raking with him while Elder S started bagging the leaves. It took about 25 minutes to finish and the whole time we talked about his life, his family, his home in Haiti (all in French I'll have you know). At the end we asked if he'd be interested in hearing our message and he accepted gladly. We haven't managed to teach him quite yet, but soon my friends, soon. It was such a huge testimony to me of the power of service. I could have walked up to him and just contacted him and left. I would have fulfilled my purpose technically, but we're here to serve man (lol) and the spirit had led us to this man not to be like "Hey, Hey you! Join our church!"  He sent us literally in response to his prayers for help, and used our service to open his heart to learn about the restored gospel.

That was a long story. I can't help but tell it as excitingly as I can.

As for being in charge, it's going good. I'm trying to figure out how to be nice to the Sisters without being TOO nice and friendly like their last district leader. As for phone calls, they still make my stomach drop, but It has been a long time since that feeling stopped being enough of an obstacle to keep me from doing them. 

I know that the gospel we live is the true gospel of Jesus Christ. I know that he will come again to the earth, and the joy we will feel at his coming will surpass all the emotions we can experience in our mortal lives. I love you all so much! Never forget who we are. We are God's converted disciples. We are all he has with regards to ground troops. Its up to us to go get the dirty work done so the spirit can testify and convert.

Love!

Elder Hardy 

November 3, 2014

Time has wings. Good thing I have a 12 gauge.

Time goes so fast! Now even the weeks feel really short! I feel like I was just here writing to you this morning! Part of the acceleration problem is that we got a car and now we aren't ever trapped outside our area with nothing to do. We've really cranked up how hard we are working, and we're seeing the blessings. Me and Elder Spencer decided we were tired of just waiting passively and hoping we get lessons. This week we went out and looked for them. Then all our scheduled appointments fell through so the end result was still only a few lessons, but at least we tried! This week the new less-actives and investigators we picked up should combine with our normal crowd and then continue to augment! Things are getting a little more exciting here in Terrebonne!

District Leader is an interesting challenge. My mind has two levels of focus to maintain now: my area, and the district as a whole. I've been praying and have already felt the Lord strengthen me in this assignment. I can testify to the reality of revelation, because I've received it about where the district's focus should be. Also, so many phone calls!

Wow Mom that's sad to hear the response that came to the thought of even stepping foot in the chapel. Satan is powerful isn't he. He doesn't just create apathy towards the truth, he convinces people to fear it. Funny thing is if the roles were reversed they'd likely get all offended that you wouldn't go in to their chapel. Good thing that doesn't bother us because we understand that Christ's Atonement makes all fear illogical (except the fear of God of course).

I have such a testimony of the truthfulness of the restoration. You all know I spend a lot of time thinking, and every line of thought I start on the subject of religion leads back to the restoration being the only logical thing that God would do. I think that having the gift of the Holy Ghost counts as being biased towards the truth though. Logic aside though, even if some korihor-like philosophy professor was to come along and tear my reasoning to shreds (unlikely) he could never take from me the spiritual witnesses I have of the  truth. Christ lives, and he will come again. I know it. He is the Savior of my soul, and the redeemer of any who are humble enough to accept that he chose a 14-year-old boy to receive his truth and not them.

I love you all so much!

Elder Hardy

Me and Elder Spencer waiting for our ride to go do service    

Me and Elder Dawagne saying goodbye at transfers    

Elder Anderson and I on my first split as a district leader