This week has been pretty intense. We had specialized training, which is just like leadership training, but it was done on a zone level and everyone was able to attend. President Brower gave us some updates on the upcoming mission merge. There will be 190 missionaries once all is said and done along with 12 zones. That will make us one of the biggest if not the biggest mission in the world. We will be covering 10+ million people and who knows how many languages. There are more foreign speaking missionaries in the east mission than there are English speakers. They even have a Mandarin-speaking ward, how cool is that?
Unfortunately, our trio has now been resolved. Our assistant's extension is over and as a result President Brower had to move a few people around. One of them was Elder Bindrup. It was sad to see him go. He's actually serving in Hamilton, which is where Elder Bennett is serving as a zone leader. Things are a lot more quite with Elder Bindrup gone but there's also a lot more room in the fridge so I can't complain.
I got more bad news during specialized training from one of the assistants. Jing, our Chinese YSA (Young Single Adult) investigator back in London, didn't get baptized. Elder Kneale had really strong hopes for her but...it didn't happen.
On fast Sunday, one of the Stayner members said that his nonmember son approached him and said that he wanted to be baptized. Boy, did our eyes light up when he said that! Good times are ahead, I can feel it. It's conference weekend next week, too. I'm thinking that a lot of opportunities will present themselves then, with members bringing friends to listen to the prophet and whatnot. When I think about how it has been 6 months since I watched conference last, part of me thinks, "Wow, has it really been 6 months?" And the other part of me answers, "Yeah, it has definitely been 6 months." I always have pretty polarized thoughts when it comes to time.
