Last Email from The Land Down Under!!

Saying Goodbye to Brisbane!

3/6/2018
Dear Everyone,

  Woa..... haha this is pretty surreal... This will be my last email home. It is kind of a bitter sweet thing because I am excited to go home but sad to leave the land and the people that I have grown to love. 

This week has been a busy week a little slower than last week though which is good. Miracle though is our investigator Stew Lepau came to church this past Sunday which means he is as good as gold to be baptized on Saturday which I am pretty excited about. The Lord truly is good to us I think :) It reminds me of the scripture verse found in 1 Nephi 1:20 Talking about the lord's tender mercies.

I guess I just want to bear my witness since this is my last email, That I know that God knows you individually, personally and perfectly. There is a divine plan for you and even me. Even when things are looking down, if you will turn to the Lord, He will help you. And the only reason why I can say this is because He has helped me time and time again, right when I needed him. It wasn't when I expected it but it was when I needed it. I have learned while I have been serving to trust in the Lord. 

I remember when I first came into my mission my first mission president gave each missionary this blank aluminum coin and a nail and he said to engrave in it what you wanted to be engraven in your soul. And I chose to scratch in faith. I have learned so much about faith and what it is and isn't. I don't have a perfect knowledge, but like Nephi of old, I know in whom I trust. I know God lives and Jesus Christ lived and died for us but He now lives again and He continues to lead and guide us! I know Russel M Nelson is the true and living prophet on this earth. I am grateful to the Lord for making of me more than I ever could make of myself. And this is my testimony in the name of Jesus Christ, amen

Alofa Atu Fa Soifua!-Elder Pierce

Flat Out Like a Lizard Drinking Mate!!

                                               Zone Temple Day- Australia Brisbane Temple
3/1/2018
Dear Everyone,

  Crikey mate! Since I have last emailed we have been flat out like a lizard drinking. (ie very very busy) We have had meetings with the Stake President Salanoa so that we could coordinate our efforts with the stake and the zone in missionary work. We had a Zone Conference as well as continuing to work with a missionary in our zone...... yeah.....  

We mowed some lawns in the poring rain (I wouldn't recommend that one but it needed to be done) We also had that same a missionary spend the day with us.  Then Elder Bullock and I got a new companion till the end of the transfer. Elder Fiaui from Samoa! Haha we have been really enjoying that because he is really funny and we have been learning how to speak a little bit of Samoan with him. 

My new companion... for two weeks Elder Fiaui

riding the train to Brisbane for the temple

Also we have had to run a lot of errands and such for the zone and everything. We had our Missionary Leadership Council meeting (my last one) and that turned out really well, President McSwain talked a lot about getting the gospel out of our heads and into our hearts. Man it has been busy, but in a good way :) 

Then yesterday we got to go to the temple but the reason why I am emailing today is because by the time that we got back from Brisbane taking the train, all of our libraries had already closed. So here I am writing today. Also heads up, I will be emailing next week on Wednesday. 

So ya that has been my week! Sorry about all of the confusion with when I am going to email... I don't really know either.. haha But I know that the Church is true and that Jesus truly is our Lord and Savior!! 

Have a great week everyone!

-Elder Pierce

A Crazy Week

2/18/2018
Dear Everyone,

So this past week has been a good week for us here in the land down under. But like my subject header says it has been a bit of a crazy one. Starting off Thursday, I was on trade-offs with Elder Fiaui in his area Collingwood Park and we had a pretty good time just working hard. It was Elder Fiaui's first time leading the area on a trade off so that meant it was a little bit hard for him but it all turned out alright. We had some complications with some missionaries in our zone this week which is probably made it so crazy. And for a lot of the week we were busy on errands and such. 

Saturday we helped this less-active move to a place like 45 minutes outside of the area. But the good news is that the Bishop took us to a pie shop on the way back named Fern-vale pies and I ate a crocodile pie! (just like a chicken pot pie but with crocodile instead.) It tasted just like chicken though! for real. And then on Sunday we had church from 10-4 and then after church because we were having a musical fireside in Yamanto ward we had a practice at 4:15 and then the actual musical fireside at 6 and then we got back to the flat at 7:30. So Sunday we spent all day at church! haha 

But ya so overall a pretty good week. I hope you all have a great week!

-Elder Pierce

A God of Miracles

2/13/2018
Dear Everyone,

  First off, hello again from the future, it is already Valentines Day here in the land down under, so I wish you all a happy Valentines day. Being a missionary I actually completely forgot about it... haha one of the members just reminded us. It's funny in a mission you are kind of in a time warp. 

But this past week has been a good week for us here in Ipswich! It has been a hot one though.... wow..... it has gotten up to 40 a couple of days which is like an oven especially with the humidity... But things are still good. A little bit of heat can't stop the work of the Lord. I think this week I have been reminded again that it is the Lord who does His work and we have the privilege of being the tools in His hands. 

A couple of cool things that happened that I will share: One day as we were going along we prayed in our planning session that morning that we could be put in the places that the Lord needed us to be. So that day was a little bit of a slow day because we had no set appointments. As we went through I remembered a Less Active family who we hadn't seen in ages. So after a lot of fallen through lessons and such we came to their home (the C's) When I came in I could tell Sister C. was a bit distressed with tears in her eyes. We had a bit of a chat and shared a scripture in 2 Nephi 2 about how the Lord can consecrate our trials for our gain. After we were about to leave Sister C. walked us to our car and said. "I knew you would come around today boys because I prayed that Heavenly Father would send you here." Really cool to be directed by the Lord and not only that but not even knowing it.. Really cool :)  

Then we followed up with this other semi-active family and then lo and behold, Brother L's Older brother Stew is living with them now because of some bad family relations. But as were teaching him for the first lesson the spirit was so strong and Stew was so prepared (at the age of around 62) and we have put him on baptismal date for March 10th (my last Saturday in the mission) So the Lord is truly moving! We also had a Pacific area broadcast on Sunday and one little insight that I wanted to share was from a talk by Lynn G Robins of the 70 and he shared about the Christ-like attribute of simplicity and how it was important that we learn to live simply. 

But I love you all and hope you have a great week! 

-Elder Pierce

G'day!!

2/6/2018

G'day everyone from the land down under,

 So this past week has been a good week one full of cool things the Lord has been teaching us. One of the people we have been working with Royce (he is a newly wed and his wife is a returning less active) is on baptismal date for March the 24th. We are going to try to move that up..... so that I can actually be there.. haha  It was really funny how he was put on baptismal date because after our lesson about the plan of salvation, I had to go to the bathroom and while I was in there, Royce turned to his wife and my companion and said how about the 24th?? For what? Baptism! haha So that was pretty cool he set his own date.

Other than that we have found a few new investigators who are we excited to teach but the search is still on to find those people that God has prepared to be taught. But Ya that is pretty much my week!

I hope you all have a great one!

-Elder Pierce 

"Make sure you go home tired"- The Final Transfer

 The Ipswich sign on the motorway 

1/30/2018
Dear everyone,

 

   So here is the news.........(drum rolling).... I will be staying in Ipswich for my last transfer and my companion will still be Elder Bullock. So I am excited to be able to give it my all for my last little bit of my mission. It's like President McSwain told me in my interview just past, "Make sure you go home tired" So I will try my best. 

As far as last week went it was hectically busy with all of the stuff we needed to get done for the transfer. We had our deep clean and weekly planning as well as our missionary leadership council meeting. Needless to say we were smashed and there was a lot less missionary work done than we would have hoped. haha 

We recently have started teaching a new referral who is a part-member family. They are newly weds and the husband is a non-member and he is quite keen to learn about the gospel! So we are excited for them. Things are looking good! 

I love you all and Hope you have a great week. And just I wanted to make sure to write in my email this week my witness and testimony that Russell M Nelson is truly the Lords prophet on the Earth today! I have felt the spirit bear me this witness and I know that the Lord is truly leading His church!

President Russell M. Nelson

Have a great week!

-Elder Pierce

This Missionary's Testimony

1/23/2018
Dear Everyone,

So this past week has been a good week. even though it has only been like 3ish days since I last wrote. But ya It's pretty funny on Sundays since we cover the two wards we go to church from 10am-4pm.... haha heaps of church but it is a good thing. We even get to take the sacrament twice. We did some service on Monday cleaning out a shed. And now we are on today.... haha 

But I guess I will just bare my testimony in this email. 

    I know that God lives and that His plan is perfect and that no one of His children will ever be left behind. I know that Jesus is our Lord and our Savior, that He suffered and died for us and through His atoning grace we can be made perfect. His grace is truly sufficient for all no matter how far we have fallen. I know that the work I am doing here in Australia is pleasing to God and that I am working hand in hand with the Savior to bring to pass the salvation of souls. 

I love you and I hope you have a great week!

Also this is the last week of the transfer so we shall see what happens...

-Elder Pierce

Busy Week- Brisbane, Brad Wilcox and a Baptism!

Baptism Day!

1/19/2018
Dear everyone,

Brad Wilcox

  Sorry about not emailing until today... I has been really really busy.  Well I feel like it has been so long since I last emailed that I don't even remember what happened. ya lets see... Well I guess I will start with our mission conference with Brad Wilcox. It was really cool because he such an animated speaker and everyone there was able to feel the spirit. He talked a lot about the scattering and gathering of Israel. He talks about the double portion of the birth right which was given to Joseph which is why there is both Ephraim & Manasseh. Really cool stuff. 

We have busy with a lot of meetings recently which has been both a good and a bad thing.. haha Also been working on doing lots of door knocking so that we can find more people to teach. (that is the never ending cycle) And then we went to the temple yesterday and I had to go into the police station in Brisbane city so that I could get my finger prints done (part of getting a Visa extension). But the only sad part was when we got back to Ipswich all the libraries were closed.. So hence I am emailing today. 

And then we have been busy getting Brandon's Baptism organized. But that happened today and it turned out great :) Our Mission President has said something really cool when he first got in the mission. He said it is our job to be like Ammon as a missionary and find our Lamoni converts (people just prepared for us to teach) and it has been a sweet experience knowing that Brandon is one of the people I know the Lord sent me here to teach. 

Hope you all have a great week!

-Elder Pierce

L to R Elder Bullock, Brandon, Elder Pierce

G'day from the Land Down Under!

A picture of my companion in his glory (with a giant dictionary)

1/9/2018
Dear Everyone,

This past week has been a week of what we call hard yakka (or hard work) for instance on Saturday we went door knocking for 7 hours! yeah! haha needless to say we were tired after that. Also the day before on Friday we helped this less active lady move who needed a lot of help... So that was an all day move. But it has been really cool because while we have been working really hard the Lord has blessed us in other aspects of the work. Like we have gotten a couple of really good referrals from some of our members in the Raceview ward. And then it was really cool because Brandon (that foster kids who I talked about that I taught in my first area) he finally got permission to be baptized on January 20th!!! Which will be awesome! So we are so pumped and he has been way keen to get baptized. 

Also in our mission we type up what we call "miracle texts" when you set someone on baptismal date and so this is the one that me and my companion came up, we thought it was pretty funny. 

Twas the night before P-day

And thoughout all of PEC

Everyone there had a referral as far as we could see

And just when we thoguht the night couldn't get any better

Our First counsellor piped up and said we just got the letter

That their foster child, young Brandon Baker (11)

Will finally be more prepared to meet his maker

After the 20th of January when he will be baptized!

And all we could say was we were delightfully surprised  

Also really cool we will be having a zone conference with Brad Wilcox on Friday which will be cool!

Love you all have a great week!

-Elder Pierce

Some good ole taro 

(the potato-like root that is a favorite in Polynesian cooking)

Happy New Year! (Living in the Future)

Zone t-shirts!  

(An awesome pic I forgot to send)

1/2/2018
Dear everyone,

Wow it has been like ages since I have legit emailed... haha also just so everybody knows p-days from now on in my mission will be on Wednesday. ( I forgot to mention that..) But ya This past bit has been really good. We enjoyed Christmas and it was great to see all of the family. 

Sorry to hear about Janice, wish the family well for me. Also sorry if I didn't write you a personal email this week because I had a lot of emails to read..... heaps.... But things have been going really well with my new companion, Elder Bullock.  He is a farm boy through and through- he ain't no city slicker. haha He is really handy to have around he can practically fix anything and he has a great work ethic. 

Birthday dinner for Elder Bullock (the blonde Elder)

We have been doing lots of tracting because we have been losing a lot of our investigators, which always makes for good fun. As far as our New Years went we had a dinner with a family around 3:30 and then we had to be back in the flat by 5. So we just celebrated by going to bed early because we were really tired.. haha We also had a busy week because we had to do a lot of paper work... which means not as much work time. But ya we are excited for the New Year! to work hard and smash it. 

I love you all and hope you have a great week

-Elder Pierce

PS. We had the new years before you! so i was living in the future!

The whole zone with our t-shirts

Some mangoes a member gave us for Christmas

Goodbye old friends and Hello to the new!

                                   Twinning ties (by the way the Christmas package was perfect!)

                                        Handmade ties by the Ide Family-sent for Christmas

12/18/2017

Dear everyone,

 So it has been a really crazy week!! Wow! haha It has gone by like a blur. So first things first is that my date to come home will have to be postponed I am not sure when to.... but ya sounds like some crazy stuff is happening so I guess only time will tell what will happen. I will have to leave that one in Heavenly Father's hands! 

Like I said it was quite a busy week. It being Elder Ray's last week, we spent a lot of time saying good bye to lots of people that he has come to know very well. He was pretty trunky but hey it was his last week. 

                                                          Goodbyes for Elder Ray                             

                                                                         The Zone

So we had everything this past week. The Christmas conference which ended up being really fun and good. A great time to gather as a mission. We had every this part where every zone teamed up with another zone and sang about Christmas and the culture of the area where they are serving. So we had Australian Christmas and my zone did a song called Christmas in the Island, which was heaps of fun! But ya so then on Friday it was Elder Ray's last day in Ipswich because we took him into the mission home around 3pm. 

                                             Taking Elder Ray to the Mission Home

Then after that I went with another missionary whose companion also went home. His name was Elder Ho and I spent a couple of days with him until today. But it was really fun because I was in Pimpama with him! So it was really fun to work in my old area for a few days and see a lot of old faces! But then today I picked up my new companion. His name is Elder Bullock and he is from Canada, he is a farm boy and a hard worker. So ya we will see how this transfer goes :) 

But I love you all and hope that you have a great week!

-Elder Pierce

                                             L to R: E. Walburger, E. Pierce, E. Meyer
                   Pierce trained Meyer, Meyer trained Walburger = Father, Son, Grandson, haha

Elder Pierce's Mission Posterity goes on with a "great grandson" being trained by Elder Walburger

Stake Conference

12/10/2017

Dear Everyone,

 Sorry everyone this is going to have to be a short, rushed email because we had to do quite a bit of things. Also the other elders are with us so we all traded pictures, it being the last week of the transfer. So with all of that in mind I will have lots of pictures to send next week! But you will all get jipped a bit this email. 

The week was really good. We had a stake conference session where a local Seventy spoke.  His name was Elder Leota, a very funny Samoan guy. Elder Ray is as you could say ready to be home.... haha or in other works pretty trunky. But I have really enjoyed serving with him he has been one of my favorite companions by far :) Lots of lessons learned and now I am excited for my last transfer. Home stretch which will start this next Monday. 

Love you all and have a great week! 

Elder Pierce

A few group pics grabbed from the Mission website :)

In His Own Time and Way!

12/6/2017

G'day everyone

  So sorry that I am emailing late... we got to go to the temple today which was awesome as always! This past week was a pretty good week one in which we were able to see some cool miracles! always fun. 

Recently we have been going through some of the church records to find some potential -part-member families/ less active families. And we have recently found this one who is a lady named Vannesa who joined the church when she was about 10 and came for a few years and then just fell away. But we came by the first time and she said when the Elders usually came by she would just argue some points of doctrine like tithing or Word of Wisdom but she said something was different about the day we came by and she was just more willing to talk. And then we set up a return appointment and we taught her a close-to 3 hour lesson where we just broke through a lot of her concerns which was really cool. Then on this past Sunday she just texted us and said that she was going to come to church (first time in a really long time and we didn't even invite her..) and when she came she just couldn't stop crying, she felt the spirit so strongly. So it is really cool to see the Lord work with people in his own time and way! 

But ya this next coming week will be really, really, really busy with it being the last week of the transfer so hopefully I will have some pictures. This is truly God's work and I know that He loves us and has a plan for each and every one of us :) 

Have a great week

-Elder Pierce

Knocking Doors in a Big Way

11/26/2017

Dear Everyone,

  So this past week was a pretty good week nothing TOO exciting that happened and nothing really bad so it was pretty good overall. We have recently dropped some of our investigators that were kind of wasting some our time kind of.. haha your classic telling us their life story for 2 hours every time we go and then not really progressing.... so yaaa... 

So we back at it again with the door knocking in a big way. So we have found some new people with some really good potential so we will see how that goes. Really that was pretty much our week. 

My love sent to the Ides in this hard time! You are always in my prayers!!! 

Have a great week everyone :)

-Elder Pierce

Busy Week

11/19/2017

Dear Everyone,

 

So we had a pretty busy week, luckily it was kind of cloudy and overcast so it wasn't as hot for us :) always nice. But ya we had to drive in the city one day to go for a dentist appointment for Elder Ray. and then on Friday we had a last minute awesome Mission tour with Elder Uceda and Elder Halleck and a local authority Seventy Elder Walker. It was so awesome because Elder Uceda has some fire in him, I tell you what. He talked about how sometimes missionaries just talk to much when people don't keep commitments and such when we should instead just DO things with them instead of talking about it. If they haven't prayed then that is what you need to do. Stop the lesson and pray with them. We have to get out of the way of the spirit and Heavenly Father! 

But ya that was really good. And then we have a new investigator we found through a referral who has started to come to church so ya things are moving along quite well.

Love you all! have a great week!

-Elder Pierce