Christmas 2010

G'day Everyone!




I hope you all had a Merry Christmas! Now we have New years to look

forward too. Yessss!

I had a great christmas. Elder Christiansen and I have become great

friends and we had a lot of good laughs and some fun eating at members

homes. But of course the highlight was talking to my family! I miss

them so much! It was a refreshing moment and now I know that I need to

Endure to the End.



We had a great week this week. Plenty of teaching! Which is rare since

this week was full of the busyness of christmas. We had some amazing

experiences though and we had a few investigators at church on sunday.

It was a Christmas to Remember. Our mission is getting so close to

reaching all of our goals too which is so exciting. One experience

that I'd like to share is when we had the opprotunity to teach our

friends Arthur and Eric from Taiwan. They have NO concept of God. So

we explained the role of the Holy Ghost and also Who God is. We also

taught How to pray and invited them to do it. Arthur gave his first

prayer. It was a neat experience. He prayed in his broken english with

all his heart and at the end we asked him: How do you feel? He said,

"warm." You shouldve seen the excitement in his eyes. It was a

blissful moment. I know that God lives and that he is very eager to

let his children know that HE IS THERE and that HE LOVES them. But

sometimes He needs our help, for those of us who DO know, to help

those who dont. I love this gospel.



Elder Nelson

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!


What an exciting time of year this is! A time to ponder on the past
year, to recognize God's hand, his tender mercies, to recognize change
and progression and of course a time of celebration! To celebrate the
birth of the Only Begotten Son of God, Jesus Christ. I love the
Christmas season. I learned an important lesson from our Elders Quorum
President yesterday at church. He said "Do we celebrate Christmas? or
Xmas?" To keep it brief he said "Lets all make sure in this great
season to let people know that we celebrate CHRISTmas not Xmas" Lets
keep Christ in our Christmas. I loved that lesson. Its so true and it
made me think about how I can also have more of an emphasis on CHRIST
during this season. Another thought occurred to me as we sat in Gospel
Principles class. What is the "christmas spirit" that we talk so much
about? Why is Christmas such a happy time? My own personal opinion is
that it is the HOLY GHOST. And why is the Holy Ghost so much more
obvious" in this season. Of course it is because of what the TRUE
meaning of christmas is but also I believe it is because we catch the
spirit of giving. The Holy Ghost is a giver of truth and happiness.
Some people who dont even believe in Jesus Christ feel this same
spirit because they are also giving. We know from experience that it
is fun to get presents but the real JOY comes from GIVING presents. So
what was the Greatest of ALL presents that has been given to the
Children of Men? The ATONEMENT of course! "For God so LOVED the world
he GAVE his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in Him shall
not perish but have everlasting life. For God sent NOT his Son to
condemn the world but that through Him all mankind may be saved." I
know that Jesus Christ is the Savior of the world and that He lives.
Its not a fairytale. Its truth. I love this great work and I'm excited
to be able to talk to my family this week! My new ward is great. Its
really strong and really diverse. We had a pretty rough week because
almost all of our appointments fell through but we had some miracles
and Elder Christiansen and I got to know each other a bit better. Have
a Merry Christmas! Cheers!

Elder Nelson

Tears and Mundays

G'day,


So I was just at a different Internet Cafe and their system failed or
something so I lost the email I was just about to send in reply. It
was done and everything and then BAM! and NO MORE HAPPINESS! This will
be short. Lo siento. So BIG changes. I'm no longer in Wollongong. I'm
in the Granville area in the Parrmatta Zone. I'm pretty excited about
being here because this is one of the "powerhouse" Zones if you know
what I mean. My new companion is Elder Christiansen from St. George
Utah. He's an awesome missionary. He's about to hit his year mark and
he's just gun as. We taught an amazing iinvestigator last night. His
name is John Munday. Him and his partner are both from New Zealand.
They are really cool. I love Kiwis. We taught the restoration and it
was seriously one of the best lessons I've ever been in. Elder
Christiansen is a great teacher. It was a great welcoming into this
great area. It was sad leaving Wollongong. I'll have to tell you more
about it later. It was a tearful goodbye. I'll have to go now but I
love you all. Thanks for the great update. Sounds like everything is
going great. The pictures looked great too. Love you all. Ofa atu.
Alua

Elder Nelson

Payback eh?

G'day Mates!




Como se valu(sp)? Se va tres bien. How are you? I'm great! Our new

African Member from Togo, Charlesmagne, is teaching me a little

French. Its really fun. So since you didnt get my email last week you

just gotta get me back by not sending one this week eh? Ahh I see.

Well let me tell you whats the haps here in Wollongong.



This week was pretty awesome. Elder Tamatafaarere went back to his

area in Campbelltown so I got Elder Kerr back. He missed wollongong.

You just cant really beat this place. Plus we're seeing a lot of

evidence of God's hand in the work down here. I had fun with Elder

Tamatafaarere for the short time that I was with him. So much happened

while I was with him it feels like we were together for a whole

transfer. Hes a funny as Islander. Massive and just the biggest softy

ever. He also can barely keep his massive body awake so he's always

falling asleep haha. It was good to have Elder Kerr back. He's a great

missionary. I need to learn more from him. He knows a lot about the

scriptures.



This weekend for the Wollongong ward is the Christmas Nativity

Pageant...thing. Its gonna be sweet as. Katrina Stewart asked me and

Elder Kerr to sing We three Kings and for me to play it on the guitar

since we will be the wise men but we just found out that Elder Kerr

has to go to his last area because one of his previous investigators

is getting married and baptised so he wont be able to make it. I'll

probably be with Elder Sermersheim's companion for the weekend. But

other than that it should be fun and we should be able to get some

investigators to it too.



Triston is still with his family in Bega. Hopefully he comes home soon

but Renee came to church! Her partner is the famous footie player.

Renee, Jr. and his Rm brother Setu came to church and it was really

fun having him there. I'm pretty sure Renee liked it. She went to

Relief Society too which was great because they were going to leave

before Relief Society. Triston and Renee are probably our best

investigators. They are very genuine people. They would great members

of the church. Jacob, our Greek Orthodox Priest friend had to return

back to Greece yesterday morning. We went and said good bye to him.

Hopefully he'll catch up with some missionaries in Greece.



On friday we had a very exciting experience. I met Tad R. Callister!!

Yeah buddy. And Elder Jensen of the Seventy. They visited the mission

and had a short meeting with us in Carlingford. We werent going to be

able to go at first but Elder Kerr REALLY wanted to go so we asked

president and he allowed us to go which was very nice. Elder Jensen is

actually the church Historian so they were busting out all these cool

historical facts and trivia from the church's history. Before the

meeting started we got to shake all their hands which was great. They

wanted to know who we were and where we were from and I thought to

myself "Crap! do I say I'm from Sacramento, CA or From Springville,

UTAH?" In the end I decided to tell them I was from Springville

UTAH...ya know..just incase Tad needs to give me a ring and get in

contact with me. haha. They were like "Oh, its so great to have so

many missionaries out from UT." Man I'm a Cali Kid and I always will

be. haha jk it was all good. Then they got to serious stuff. Their

message was on POWER and Authority. whats the difference? "The

Priesthood given to you by the laying on of hands gives you authority,

keeping your covenants gives you power." They strongly emphasized the

importance of our "exact obedience" and how that is what will gives us

power and the spirit of prophecy that the sons of Mosiah during their

mission which made them so successful. It was a great mesage. After

that Elder Callister finished off with His testimony of the Book Of

Mormon and he SMASHED it. It was awesome. I definitely believe the

Book of Mormon is true. And for those of you who believe its true but

dont really know why? Read it. Ponder its words in your heart. Ask God

if it is true. Apply its teachings. The Book of Mormon is such a

remarkable book. I love reading it.



The South Coast Zone has been great. We've got some high, faith

testing goals this month and we are going to try and see how far we

can all push each other to help the mission acheive its goals. One

thing we are going to try to do. I got the idea from our family's

tradition. We're going to do "A Christmas gift for Christ." At our

meeting on friday we're going to have our missionaries write down one

gift they are going to give to christ this month to improve themselves

as missionaries and to help the mission to acheive its goals. I think

it will be great. We are also going to be showing this documentary

that Johnny Jackson showed everyone in Elders Quorum called Marathon

Monks. Check it out. Its crazy.



Well I think thats about it for this week. I hope you all have a great

week. This is the last week of another transfer here in Wollongong. I

dont know whats going to happen this one. We'll find out Saturday

night. Love you all. Catch yas.



Elder Nelson

G'day!




What up hommies? We had a sweet as week. We've got some crazy happenings

over here in the Gong. First of all I have a new companion! His name is

Elder Tamatafaarere. Haha....no serious thats his name. I'll give you three

tries to say his name right and if you get it right then I'll uhhh shower

you with missionary blessings...ha :). He's from the beautiful island of

Tahiti. Now some of you may be wondering at this time: "What happened to

Elder Kerr?  Anyways Elder T is

with me because we have some French speaking investigators from Africa and

since Elder T is from Tahiti his native language is French so he's our

secret weapon. Man you should see this guy. He is Massive!! I'm serious.

Wait until you see pictures. He's taller than me and about four times the

size of me. Massive as Tahitian. Its pretty fun walking around with him and

seeing peoples reactions. No one has yelled at us since hes been here. Hmmm

interesting. He almost broke our investigators couch too! He's a great

missionary and we're actually from the same intake so we'll go home at the

same time. Tonight we've got some appointments with some French speaking

Africans. Haha I thought it was pretty funny when Elder T. first came here

because we just went African hunting. We just drove around looking for Black

people. Its been awesome. They are so humble.



So Elder Kerr is fine. He's in Campbelltown with Elder Williams. He gets to

hang with Elder Stringam today so he's lucky. Yesterday was an exciting day.

I was priviledged enough to give Johnathan the Holy Ghost. You shouldve seen

him. He came to church in a suit and tie. Man he looked spiffy. He's so

solid right now I hope he stays that way. Now Stephanie is a different

story. Hopefully the ward really picks up their feet now and

helps Johnathan to stay strong in the church and helps Stephanie to come

back.



But, that wasn't the only reason why church was good. We had a few

investigators there! I've told you before but we always struggle getting

investigators to church. I dont know why its gotta be so hard! But

everything paid off this week when Triston and Jacob came to church. I've

told you about Triston eh? He's doing so awesome!! I reckon he'll get

baptized. He already believes that the Book of Mormon is the word of God.

This was just the first time hes come to church and he loved it! He also

just wants to learn more first before he gets baptized but I reckon we'll be

setting a baptismal date with him soon. Also you know Jacob, our Greek

Orthodox friend? Well he came to church too! He got fired from his job! Can

you believe that? I've never heard of a Priest getting fired! Haha oh but I

shouldnt laugh. He's pretty tore up about it. This means he has to go back

to Greece. But Elder Kerr and I feel like this was an answer to our prayers

because since he got fired he had that opprotunity to come to church. He

loved it too. Your probably thinking like many others that he got fired

because he's been meeting with us but I dont see why he would tell anyone

that he's been meeting with us and we've only been meeting with him at his

house so I dont know what happened.



So that was our week. It was a really fun week. We've had many many miracles

happen. Its been so fun finding and teaching the investigators in this area.

I love it here. Even though sometimes it is frustrating I've probably worked

harder in this area than in my other two areas so its been very fulfilling.

I love you all. I know the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is

the only true church upon this church and I'm thankful for the priesthood

and the saving ordinances we are able to perform because that authority. I

know that Thomas S. Monson is a prophet of God. Cheers as. FA!



Elder Nelson


(I assume this is Jacob in the picture with Elder Nelson and Elder Kerr)