the two lessons we taught this last week made me want to stay out here forever and keep teaching people about the Gospel. I love it so much!

Hey guys!  Another week has come and gone and it sounds like things are going well in good ol' Cedar City.  Dad and Ross are the mountain men who always help people shoot big bucks but can never shoot any for themselves haha ;).  Mom is busy being a mom and a grandma now.  Meleese and Kevin have been parents for about a month now.  Lainey's volleyball team still sucks haha but it's okay Lainey.  My senior year of football we lost our first 4 games and went on to make it to the semi finals, so there is still hope!  Don't give up!  And yes, I am still here haha but I had a killer week that I am excited to tell you all about.

So Saturday we went to the Amsterdam Museum.  We learned a lot about the history of Amsterdam.  It was a cool museum and a relaxing day.  That evening we looked a lot of people up but no success.  That's the hardest thing about keeping the work going in our own city, is keeping the investigators progressing.  We are gone so much that when appointments fall through and people aren't home, we can't schedule another appointment for another week or week and a half.  We are trying to fix that by finding loyal investigators who always keep their appointments, and we have been able to do that this week, luckily.  But I will explain more later.

Sunday was a pretty easy going day.  We had a nice church service and J, an inactive who is just being reactivated showed up, but the best part was that she showed up with her son, who we are teaching, her nephew, and a friend she brought with!!  It was awesome, and they all really enjoyed it.  We set up an appointment with her and her son for later in the week.  We stayed after church for a while talking to members and setting up appointments with them.  We are trying to get to know them better.  After church was a lot like the previous day.  A lot of lookups and not a lot of people home...  We were both too excited about the appointment we set with J and her son to get down though.

Monday was our office day.  It all went smoothly, but we were still there until late scheduling some stuff.  We have a lot of members here who all at the same time want to serve mini missions.  That's just like a two or three week mission working with a companionship in this mission.  Elder Alston and I organize those, and we spent a lot of time getting contact with those people and assigning them to different areas.  We are happy they are doing it though because they are usually big assets to the mission, and it will be a great experience for them.  We also got everything ready for the Zone Trainings we would be attending that week.  And those trainings took up the biggest chunk of our week.  And it got off to a pretty crazy start haha.

Tuesday we woke up in the mission home and left early to drive to Sint-Niklaas, Belgium for the first zone training in the Antwerp Zone.  We drove through Rotterdam in the morning, and that was a rookie mistake.  Everybody knows that there is terrible traffic there in the mornings!  I guess we forgot, and that resulted in us sitting in traffic for 1 1/2 hours getting through that city.  We hit a little bit more traffic through Antwerp and got to the Zone Training an hour late...  whoops haha.  It was a great zone training though.  Elder Bourne and Elder Bosco are the Zone leaders there and they did a great job.  Elder Bourne has been one of my favorite companions on my mission, and he did a great job.  We got done with the Zone Training and drove back to Amsterdam.  We hit more traffic getting through Antwerp mainly because the roads there are terrible and the whole layout is a joke.  There was a point when 4 lanes merged down to 1 lane in the span of about 10 meters.  it cause a huge traffic jam and a lot of impatient Belgians honking.  And then you have two poor american kids, dressed funny in the middle of it all.  We managed to get through and we made it back to the mission home later that evening.

Wednesday we only had to drive 15 minutes to Zoetermeer for the Den Haag Zone Training.  That was really nice and really well done too.  I saw some old friends and ate pulled pork sandwiches from the crock pot for lunch.  Super american and I LOVED it.  We left  for Amsterdam for our appointment with J, the less active, and her son who isn't baptized.  Her son is 12 years old and a skater kid.  We got pretty tight with him at church and it was fun talking with him again.  The mom wants him to get baptized soooo bad.  We taught him the second lesson, the Plan of Salvation, and it was probably the best second lesson I have given on my mission!  I have never taught a 12 year old before, but I love it, because I love teaching simply and that's exactly what we do with him.  We taught a simple, powerful Plan of Salvation lesson, and he opened right up and had a lot of great questions.  We were able to answer them all and he LOVED it.  The mom had some questions too because she has been inactive for about 20 years now and she forgot a lot of things.  The Spirit was so strong.  And the mom was in tears when she saw her son so engaged in the lesson.  It was really cool to be a part of, and I feel like they are getting closer as a family as we teach them, read from the Book of Mormon with them, pray with them, and as they come to church together.  We will be teaching them weekly.  They are the loyal investigators we have been looking for!  We drove back to the mission home that night to stay the night.

The next morning we drove to Zwolle for the Apeldoorn Zone training.  That was the last one we would be attending for the week.  It was also really good.  These past few transfers, President has really been stressing following his training plan.  We have created a program for the missionaries to do so, and it is really working.  His training plan item that the mission is focusing this transfer is Preach My Gospel Chapter 2, and all of the Zone Trainings were based off that chapter.  It was really nice to see that the whole mission is unified, and we are seeing more success from that too.  chapter 2 is all about planning and studying and that is something that our mission could definitely improve on.  Elder Alston and I focused on it this week as well, and we made two really good lesson plans for our appointments and they were some of the best lessons I have taught on my mission.  The first one was that Plan of Salvation lesson, and the second one was later that night after the Zone training.  We drove back to Amsterdam and taught this young couple.  They are member referrals from this great member in Amsterdam.  She brought them to church once and I talked to them afterwards.  I tried setting up and appointment and they told me that they would just call if they wanted us to come over.  That's just a nice way to reject us, and it happens all the time and they never call back.  I didn't want to be pushy, so I pulled out a mormon.org card and wrote our number on it.  I also referred them to that website if they had any questions, because coming across anti material happens way too much here.  And then I left.  But on Monday they called!  So we had our appointment on Thursday night, and it went so well!  They are a cool young dutch couple.  They both work and have a really nice apartment in a beautiful part of Amsterdam, and they are both interrested!  That doesn't happen very often! haha we taught them the first lesson and they understood it so well.  We stressed dispensations and apostasy, and after we taught about the great apostasy we asked the question, "If there was only one church when Christ was on the Earth, then why are there so many christian churches on the Earth today?" They thought for a long time and she gave a killer answer.  She told us that the churches all have a piece of the puzzle, but they don't have the full puzzle.  We asked what we needed to get the full puzzle and she didn't know.  She looked at him and he thought for a second and then said, "We need a prophet!"  It was awesome.  We then told them about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon.  She loved it all.  She told us that it is like she had heard this before and it makes perfect sense.  We told her that was the Holy Ghost communicating with her through her thoughts and feelings.  She had been raised more religious and was more interested and open for it than he was, but he was still open for it.  We are excited to continue to teach them.  They are our other loyal investigators that we have been looking for! 

Yesterday was even more driving.  We had our interviews with the Zone Leaders and drove the whole mission.  We met with them and had some good talks.  Things are going really well in the mission right now and we are all unified.  Elder Alston is really funny and he makes the long car rides enjoyable.  We are doing great here, and I am loving it so much.  Honestly, I am getting pretty excited to come home.  I am going home to great things and I feel ready to start that next step in my life.  But those two lessons we taught this last week made me want to stay out here forever and keep teaching people about the Gospel.  I love it so much! 

I love you!

Elder Bishop

Elder Alston

Driving off into the suns

"As long as we are fulfilling our responsibilities, whatever they may be, and working diligently, then the Lord will bless us."

Amsterdam

Hey guys!  It was nice to hear from you all and it sounds like things are going great back home!  Meleese is busy with the baby, Dad is busy at work and then on the mountain with Ross on the weekends.  Lainey is enjoying being a freshman and playing volleyball, and mom is doing a million things at once, and I still don't get how she does it!  I am getting a better idea though, because I have never been so busy in my life!  This week was transfer week, and I want to apologize for this email right now because you could probably go back 6 emails and they will be almost identical.  But I will still give you a run down of the week.

So Saturday for P day we went to the Rembrant House.  It was a really nice house on the canal with a lot of historical items and paintings.  It was actually pretty cool to see his art studio in the upstairs and all his collections.  I just can't believe how much history is in this city.  It was a fun P day on Saturday, and that evening we did a lot of preparing for Sunday and I will explain why.

Sunday was a busy busy day!  We had church that morning and Elder Alston gave the Priesthood lesson about family history work.  He did a great job by the way.  Elder Alston is great at presenting, and he has helped me with my presentations.  The second hour we both gave the Gospel Principals lesson.  it was about family relationships, and we had no idea where to go with that topic.  There were only a few in that class who have families.  But we came up with the idea to split them up and put them into family units and discuss it on their own.  We got back together, did a really funny role play and then had a big discussion. It was a really fun lesson in the end, and a ton of people commented on it afterwards.  We were really happy afterwards, mainly because it was over haha.  And then for Sacrament Meeting, I gave a talk and Elder Alston translated.  It was crazy, but it all went well.  After church we hurried to the mission home to have dinner with President and Sister Robinson.  Sister Robinson is a great cook, so I look forward to that every time we eat with them.  We all drove to the mission office after that and finished up everything with transfers.  After the transfer board was set, we called the missionaries and told them.  It's always fun calling them and telling them, because they are all freaking out!  Some are excited and some are sad, and some are a little awkward haha but it's still fun.  We went back and stayed in the mission home that night.

Monday morning we left for the office to get everything done there.  We got all the numbers totaled and had our meeting with President.  We got some more things organized and planned, and we were there pretty much the whole day.  Even though we were in the office all day Monday, we still saw a miracle.  That afternoon before dinner, we got a phone call from an unknown number.  I answered and it was a lady who was in church a few weeks ago.  She was a friend of a member, and the member invited her to to church.  She went and she really liked it.  After church that day, I told her what we do as missionaries and tried making an appointment.  She told me that she would study more online and call us if she had any questions.  Basically she gave me a nice rejection, but I gave her a mormon.org card and told her everything she wants to know about the church is found on this website.  I just wanted to make sure she wasn't going to the wrong sources online.  We left church that day and I didn't expect anything to happen from then on, but here I was, three weeks later talking on the phone with her, and she told me she is curious and wants to hear more!  We set up an appointment for this week!  It was a nice miracle that helped me get through the long day in the office.  Like I mentioned last week, I saw it again this week, that as long as we are fulfilling our responsibilities, whatever they may be, and working diligently, then the Lord will bless us.  We got home late that night (when I refer to home I mean the mission home, because that's where we stayed all week).

We woke up the next morning and went to the airport to pick up the new missionaries!  There were 11 who flew in.  5 Elders and 6 Sisters.  There were too many to stay in the mission home, so we had a hotel right at the airport called the Sheraton.  It was a nice Hotel.  We took them straight there and got some legality and financial things organized, and they had interviews with President.  After that, they went to Den Haag to pick up their residency permits.  While they did that with the office elders, we met with president and assigned them to their trainers.  They came back and napped until dinner.  Dinner was probably my favorite part though.  We went to this restaurant in the hotel that fed us real american hamburgers!  They were really good and I remembered how good hamburgers can be haha.  After dinner we had a devotional and they opened up their letters for their first area and trainer.  They were all SO excited and we pumped them up even more haha.  Elder Alston and I got to stay in the hotel that night since we were giving some trainings early the next morning.

Wednesday morning we woke up and went to the breakfast buffet.  It was probably the best breakfast buffet I have ever been to haha.  and then we got started with the trainings.  We gave the first one to just the greenies and got them caught up with what's going on in the mission right now and the mission culture.  That was an hour long and then the trainers came in.  They met their trainers for the first time and it was fun to watch haha.  We then gave a training to the trainers and then we made our way to the mission office and the greenies left with their trainers.  Seeing them made me reflect back on my mission and think a lot about all the things I have experienced and learned out here.  I remember my first night very vividly and meeting Elder Harvey for the first time, and I realize how long ago that really was!  That was in the beginning of 2013!  A LOT has happened since then.   We were back at the mission office though and we ran a few errands for sister Robinson.  We had to drive to Gouda and pick up some plates for the departing missionaries and help them get there bags weighed and everything, and then we drove to the mission home to have their departing devotional and everything.  It was weird this time because the 5 sisters going home came in after me.  Let's just say I'm glad I get 2 years haha.  It was a nice meeting that night though.  Three of the sisters'parents came that evening.  I saw them see each other for the first time since they left, and it was crazy!  I just thought about seeing my family in the airport in Amsterdam in just 12 weeks.  Not gonna lie, it made me a little bit trunky haha.  I am just excited to see you guys.  We had a nice devotional that night though and then went to bed.

We woke up the next morning at 3:30 am!!!  It was awful, but we needed to get the missionaries on their flights.  We got to the airport and sent them off, and we were back at the office by 8ish.  We went back to the mission home and took a nap, because we simply couldn't function by that point.  We woke up a few hours later and realized we had a lot of things to plan for for the coming transfer.  We went to the mission office to do that.  We updated some things and made our schedule for the transfer (it's gonna be another busy one).  And we also realized that we were giving a mission leader council the next day!  We did a lot of planning and preparing for that.  We each had a 30 minute presentation that we needed to give.  It was a little overwhelming, but we finally got it all done.  We made it back to the Mission home late again.  President stayed up for us and made us french toast and bacon for dinner that night haha it was really nice of him.

The next morning was the mission leader council.  It went really well!  All of our presentations were good and I think the zone leaders and sister training leaders learned a lot.  I always feel inadequate presenting at mission leader councils, because there are such good missionaries there who could give just as good, if not, better presentations.  But I talked about the Holy Ghost and how we can use the gift of the Holy Ghost most effectively in our missionary work.  I talked about living worthy and developing a relationship with him.  I talked about the big question, "is it the Holy Ghost or is it just me?"  I answered it through D&C 58:27-28.  I explained how it is important that we are agents unto ourselves and we make our own choices.  We need to use our own intellect and abilities to their fullest extent.  That's how we come closer to Christ.  If the Spirit makes all our choices and does everything for us, we will not develop.  I then explained how the Holy Ghost is a catalyst to our progression.  He will help us with the decisions we need help with.  He will make up the difference between our abilities and the abilities we need to make the right choices.  So as we have this relationship with the Spirit, and we know that he is always with us in all our decisions, then it won't matter whether it's us or him!  We trust that he will help us with what we need help with.  After that I mentioned how we receive that help from the Holy Ghost and how we can recognize it.  After we receive that revelation, we need to act on it.  That is when the Holy Ghost becomes that catalyst in our lives and accelerates our progression here on Earth, is when we receive that revelation and act on it.  That was my 30 minute presentation summarized into a paragraph haha so I hope it makes somewhat sense, but I was pleased with how it went, and if nobody else learned anything, at least I learned a lot while preparing for it and giving it.  After the Mission Leader Council, President took us out for icecream haha.  It was another busy, but fun day.

We woke up this morning, and we are both really tired, but what missionary isn't haha I guess it's just part of the job.  This week was really fun, even though we didn't get the chance to teach any lessons.  I still learned a lot and had a lot of fun.  It's fun working with President and Sister Robinson so much.  They are great people, and they teach me a lot.  But anyways, I gotta get going.  I apologize again for the letter.  it is just a lot of information that you probably don't even care about haha but that's my life right now, and I am absolutely loving it!  I hope you all have a great week!  I love you and miss you more than you know.

Love,

Elder Bishop

I have noticed that the Lord has continued to bless us with success even though we have not had much time to find new people on our own.

Hey everyone!  I can't believe I'm back at the computer again already.  This week went by SO fast and we are already rolling through September.  It sounds like you all had a great week though, staying busy at work and school and with the new baby.  I have been staying busy too.  

Last Saturday was our P day and we took it pretty easy.  We did visit one museum though, in downtown Amsterdam.  It was a Bible Museum.  It wasn't exactly what we were expecting, but it was still pretty cool.  There were old Greek and Hebrew Bibles written in the 1400's.  And they had displays of different German and Dutch bibles written shortly after.  It was a lot of history and pretty cool to see.

Sunday was a miracle day!  We went to church that morning and met a guy who just walked in.  He had been to a lot of different churches in Amsterdam, but he decided to come to our church that Sunday because he saw "Jesus Christ" on the sign and it was close to his house.  He had a great experience and wants to start coming regularly!  We got his number and will hopefully start teaching him soon.  Right after church got over, a woman came up to me who I had never seen before.  She told me that she was a member of the church, but had been inactive for about 20 years.  Her friend invited her to a baptism in Eindhoven, and told her she should start going back to church.  She lives in Amsterdam and was in church for the first time in a long time.  We talked for a little bit and she mentioned how she has a 12 year old son who isn't a member who might be interested.  We got her information and set up an appointment for Tuesday to meet with her son!  I have noticed that the Lord has continued to bless us with success even though we have not had much time to find new people on our own.  We have been busy helping other missionaries, but the Lord still provides.  It was a miracle.  After church we had a nice lesson with a recent convert.  She is a really cool girl from Suriname, and the young adults have done a great job welcoming her in the ward.  That evening we had a dinner appointment with the P Family.  They are from the Philippines and a great family.  The mom is a member and the dad is not.  They have two teenagers who are both members, but the son isn't very active.  The mom is holding that family together, but she is struggling to do so.  She invites us over every other Sunday to try to help.  Elder Alston and I have done a great job getting a good relationship with them.  We had a nice dinner and shared a spiritual thought at the end which was powerful.  The mom really appreciates us coming over and we love it, so it's a win win situation.

Monday was our office day.  We were really busy planning with President and Sister Robinson, getting last minute things ready for the Mission Conference with Elder Ballard.  We also talked more about transfers and our Mission Leader Council coming up.  Elder Alston and I were busy the rest of the evening planning for the conference and making sure that everything runs smoothly.  We had to cancel our appointment that evening, but were able to reschedule for later that week.

Tuesday we were on exchanges, and I was with Elder Rudolph in Eindhoven.  Elder Rudolph is the one who played football at SUU.  We were companions back in Bruges, and it was really nice working with him again.  We had a lesson with a man named G.  He is a recent convert and a great man.  The Spirit was very strong during the lesson.  We had some time to talk to some people on the street and knock some doors.  We found two people who were interested and got their information so they could go back.  Elder Rudolph and I had a great talk that night about the mission.  We also talked about Cedar City and football haha, but it was nice being with him again.  

We met back up on Wednesday and drove back to Amsterdam.  We had a lunch appointment with a different lady from the Philippines, and she fed us SO MUCH FOOD!  I felt sick afterwards, but it was so good.  She is a nice lady and we all had a good time.  After that we needed to go down to the mission home and meet up with President.  We picked him up, and drove down to Rotterdam to meet with the Stake Presidency in the Rotterdam Stake.  We had a meeting about missionary work, and it was mainly just a correlation.  We talked a lot about the Facebook campaign that will start on Monday and some problems that we have seen in that stake as far as missionary work goes.  We found some solutions and will be fixing it.  It was a very productive meeting, and a great opportunity to be able to sit in and watch how it works.  That is one of the biggest things I have learned out here on my mission, is how communication works in the church, and how to progress and move forward in the church.  We drove back to the mission home and stayed the night there for the Mission Conference the next day.

Thursday morning we drove to  Zoetermeer (right outside of The Hague) for the mission conference.  It was the best Conference I have been a part of during my mission.  Elder Ballard was there with his wife, Elder Hallstrom was there with his wife, and Elder Dyches from the area presidency was there with his wife.  All six of them spoke and they were so great.  I learned a lot of personal lessons and received inspiration on how I can finish my mission strong and how I can prepare to continue to grow after my mission.  Elder Ballard said something that stuck with me, that really assured me that my mission has so much worth to me personally.  So I have been reflecting back a lot lately on my mission.  People often ask me the question, "What is the biggest lesson you have learned on your mission?" That is such a hard question to answer!  I have learned so much out here, but I summed it up into one simple reply.  The biggest lesson I have learned on my mission is I have found out who I am as an individual, and I have found out who Christ is.  That has really been a great foundation for me for the rest of my life.  I know where I am at and where I need to go, and I know how to get there.  Now I just need to get there!  But I have found that path in my life, and I have found that thanks to my mission.  Elder Ballard also mentioned the biggest lesson he learned on his first mission, and this is what stuck with me.  He said, "I found out who I am, I found out who God is, I found out who Christ is, I found out who Joseph Smith was, and I found out what the Book of Mormon is."  I am so lucky to have learned that lesson on my mission too.  I learned a lot more throughout the conference and at the fireside that evening.  It was a really busy day, but everything went smoothly.  It was fun while it lasted, but honestly, I am glad it's over!

Yesterday Elder Alston and I were dead tired!  It was a pretty slow day, but it ended great.  We had our lesson with G that we were supposed to have on Monday.  He is progressing very well though.  He prayed about the Book of Mormon, and he believes that it is true and that it is the word of God.  We taught him the Plan of Salvation, and he loved it.  He was fascinated by the Spirit World, and he told us that it all made sense to him.  We assigned him a few things to read in the Book of Mormon and he was excited to do so.  His sister is also interested, and we are picking her up tomorrow morning to come to church with us!  Hopefully G will be able to come too.  That is the biggest thing holding him back.  He is active in another church and has responsibilities there, so it is hard for him to come to our church even though he wants to really bad.  he has a testimony of the Book of Mormon though, and we will tie it back to that.  it was a good lesson though to finish off the night.

I am so glad it is P day today though!  it will be nice to not have to worry about anything.  I am loving it though, especially with Elder Alston.  We have a lot of fun together which makes the stressful times better.  But ya, that was my week this week.  Like I said, it sounds like you all had a good week, but I shook hands with an apostle... beat that ;) haha I love you guys so much!  Make sure baby Mia doesn't get too big before I get home!

Groetjes,

Elder Bishop

1. Bible Museum

2. This is what shopping malls in Europe look like

3. Dam Square

4. Biggest H&M I have ever seen (this picture is especially for Meleese haha)

5. Amsterdam

Your attitude plays such a huge role in your mission. You can choose to be happy even through the hard times. You can choose to be positive and look for the miracles, big and small.

Brugge Belgium

Hoera een meisja!!!!  hahaha I am SO excited and happy for all of you!  Especially Meleese and Kevin.  She looks so cute in the pictures and I can't wait to hold my new baby niece in person.  She is so tiny I can hardly believe it.  I am so happy for you Meleese.  You are gonna be such a great mother.  It sounds like everything else is going good too.  I'm glad you all had a great week, because so did I :)

Last Sunday was very spiritual and we saw a lot of success.  We had a great church service, and afterwards we went to visit a recent convert who just moved to Amsterdam.  She wasn't able to make it to church for some personal issues, so she asked us if we could come by and give her a blessing.  Her friend was there too.  He is not a member and doesn't believe in God, but he is interested and came to church with her the week before.  We taught him after we gave her a blessing, and it was very spiritual.  The Spirit was present and he felt it.  We invited him to pray after the lesson, and he was very nervous at first and didn't really want to because he wasn't even sure if God was real or not.  We walked him through it and taught him the importance of prayer.  We told him that he needs to communicate with God and find out for himself if he exists or not.  After we explained it better, he agreed to pray.  He said a very good prayer and closed in the name of Christ.  We all lifted our heads after and he began to cry.  The Holy Ghost was testifying to us all that God really does live, and not only does he live, but he loves us and listens to us.  That is my favorite part of missionary work; helping others develop a relationship with God.  It was incredible, and it is moments like that where I never want my mission to end.  The sisters will continue to teach him because we simply don't have time.  I wish we did because I really like him, and I am confident he will be baptized, but it doesn't matter who teaches him, as long as it happens.  That will be a cool experience for the sisters anyways.  After our lesson with him, we drove to our other potential investigator.  We taught her the Restoration lesson and it also went really well!  She has some different ideas, but she understood our message and why it is important.  And she is willing to read and pray about the Book of Mormon.  She also wants to come to church.  She really likes us too and wants us to continue to come over and teach her.  It was nice teaching a couple lessons after church that day.

Monday was our office day, and I was lucky enough to have access to a computer and follow the whole process of Meleese having her baby and seeing pictures right away.  Shout out to Kevin for keeping me in mind :) That was all I could think about that day.  I shared dad's jerky with the office staff and they all loved it.  We met with President and Sister Robinson and talked for a LONG time about the coming transfer.  We were all there until dinner time so we got some Mcdonalds together after our meeting.  They are such great people, and I am lucky to be able to spend so much time with them, because I have learned so much from them.  it was a long day in the office though, but we still got a lot done.

Tuesday was the beginning of our Belgium excursion!  We woke up early that morning and I drove from Amsterdam to Brussels.  We made it to district meeting in a little city right outside of Brussels called Leuven.  We attended the district meeting there and then went on splits with the Elders in Leuven.  That is so close to the french speaking side of Belgium that we taught a restoration lesson to a french speaker and we had to bring a joint teach who could translate.  It was a KILLER first lesson though.  He was a practicing catholic, and we blew is mind haha.  We had scriptures to prove it from both the Book of Mormon and the Bible, and he loved it.  It was probably the cleanest, most thorough restoration lesson I have been a part of, and the Joint teach did a great job translating.  We stayed a little over an hour and told him we needed to go when we finished the lesson.  He didn't want us to go.  He loved talking with us and we set an appointment for that same week.  He told us we need to stay an hour and a half next time haha.  When we were leaving he told us that he was gonna go straight to mormon.org to study some more.  It was a great experience, not only for me, but also for Elder Steenblik.  He is a greenie and that was the first restoration lesson he taught.  I am glad he was able to be a part of it.  We had a fun day in Leuven with the Elders there, and the best part about it...  I got to sleep on a lumpy air mattress that was half full that night!!!  Haha it was awful, but I was so tired it didn't even matter.  I fell straight asleep.

We woke up the next morning and continued our trip to Brugge!  Yes, I went back to my favorite city!  It was awesome too.  I swear it was even more beautiful this time than it was last year.  I can't wait for you to see it.  We spent a lot of time looking people up, which was a lot of fun for me personally because I got to see some familiar faces.  We stopped to get a waffle at my favorite stand, and this will give you an idea of how often I used to go there.  When I showed up, the guy remembered me and gave me a discount for my waffle haha.  That was a year ago, and he still remembered me!  We visited the C family, and they were doing great.  We will be staying with them when we visit Brugge our last couple days.  We also visited the S family.  They are also doing really well.  He is the ward mission leader there and we talked about a lot of people.  He brought up the Caroma family and asked me if I knew them.  I told him about the miracle I had with them right before I left.  I told him that we were on the coast in a tiny city looking up a referral.  It was the only time I had been to that town.  While we were there, a lady pulled up in her car and stopped us.  She told us that she was a member of the church but hadn't been able to find it since she moved to Belgium.  We got her information and gave her the church information.  I left Brugge shortly after that, not knowing much about what had happened with them.  That happened almost a year ago.  When I told Brother S that story he was happy to tell me that she has been coming to church regularly since I left, and she brings her 4 little kids with her.  Two of her kids have been baptized since they started coming back, and the other two will be baptized when they are old enough.  What a miracle!  The primary tripled in that small little branch with those 4 kids, and the branch loves them.  That goes to show that we never will really be able to see all the fruits of our labors in this life.  I was lucky enough to see some of mine when I went back to Brugge almost a year after I left, and the joy was almost overwhelming.  I was SO happy to hear that.  That night I upgraded from a lumpy, half-filled air mattress to a small, leather, couch!!!  haha once again, I was too tired to care, and I fell straight asleep.

We woke up the next morning and drove to Antwerp for our last exchange of the week.  I was with Elder Bosco in Antwerp.  It was cool being with him,  we are very similar people  and we had a great day together.  We taught a couple lessons and got some belgian fries.  They were super good and it was a lot of fun.  Antwerp is a really cool city too.  It was so nice being back in Belgium for the week.

The next morning we woke up and drove until we went to sleep that night haha.  We had to interview all the Zone Leaders that day and follow up on things and introduce things.  We went all around the country, and we were dead tired that night.  It was a killer week with a lot of great experiences, but I was still soooo ready for a P day!  We will probably go to a museum today and then take it easy the rest of the day until tonight.  We got some people we need to get ahold of and then we need to prepare for Elder Ballard coming on Thursday!  It will be another crazy week next week, but it will be a once-in-a-life-time experience.

I told you how I want these last 3 months to be my best 3.  This week was a great start, and it is looking like next week will be too.  Of course missions aren't always just fun and enjoyable.  They are hard and stressful and tiring too.  But your attitude plays such a huge role in your mission.  You can choose to be happy even through the hard times.  You can choose to be positive and look for the miracles, big and small.  If you do that, then you will love your mission, both the good times and bad.  I know that because I LOVE my mission.  I haven't seen the most success, and I have had big trials out here, but I choose to be happy, so I am happy.  I am more happy than I ever have been in my life.  I am happy for you guys too, with the arrival of a new family member.  I love you all so much and miss you more than anything.  I can't wait to hold baby Mia in my arms.  I hope you all have a great week.  Remember, choose to be happy!

Groetjes,

Elder Bishop

Brugge

Brugge