ENJOY Fifteen Miracles!!

Today is Sunday, December 6, 2020

               On Wednesday December 9, we wish Happy 3rd Birthday to Macie Megan Kearl

Another wonderful week of interviews and Zone Conferences here in the Canada Montreal Mission kept us hopping!! We feel so very blessed that our minds and bodies are capable of keeping up such a pace….and then we think of 96 year old President Nelson, and realize our pace should be simple at age 66!!! We are continually so inspired by his incredible optimistic attitude (#give thanks,) his brilliant mind, his nimble fit body, his incredible gift of teaching, and the power and conviction of his testimony of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. What an inspiration to us, and to the world!!

Richard’s interviews, and my visits with our Longueuil and Mount Royal Zones were all great! We are so hopeful all our missionaries will fare well during this wonderful Christmas season. With limited contact with ward and branch members, and absolutely no meals in any ones homes, it is a challenge. Zoom has been the lifeline, and the lifesaver for all of us. Our goal is for each team is to have 20 lessons a week…with members and/or investigating friends, and we are thrilled to report that missionaries are excited to do everything to meet that goal!! Teaching does still happen, just not in the way it has been done for centuries! Social media has become the way of finding friends to teach, and missionaries are becoming experts at creatively finding folks! For example they research the towns or cities they are living in, find old, old photos, post them with some clever question like ‘do you know anyone in this photo?;’ and people respond; the conversation continues; and eventually with inspired questions, and answers, the Church always comes up, and the missionaries often get to start teaching! Other teams are doing Family History finding…simply they put an ad on social media offering to help folks get started on their family tree! So many people are thrilled to begin working on their own family tree, and jump at the expertise of our missionaries! Such a great way to introduce people to the Church! And there are dozens of other finding methods that 'we' are getting great at!!

Christmas decorating is complete, with 'Saints Channel' Christmas music streaming, adds to the ambience; and we are dreaming of having family, friends, and missionary friends come join us in celebrating this wonderful time of the year - the Birth of our Saviour Jesus Christ. Like all of you, it will be a dream to have dear ones join our festivities in person, BUT we do look forward to wearing our Zoom out visiting with loved ones everywhere!! 

This week promises to be another wonderful one with Office Meetings, Mission Zoom Leadership, Montreal Zone interviews, and Zone Conference, and Friday we hold our Mission Leadership Council;...as well as celebrate our 44th Wedding Anniversary!! Next week is Week 6, which we can’t believe is already here…so we are working on transfers…we have 9 departing missionaries, and 6 new missionaries arriving, which means we have to close two areas…again. We keep praying the border will open so all missionaries that were originally assigned here, and are waiting in another mission,  will finally be able to come!! Our complement is supposed to hover around 180, and currently we are at 127.

Life as a missionary is as good as it gets, and actually gets better everyday!!  We feel so very blessed to have this opportunity to serve, and grow together. Thanks for your love and support of us, as well as missionaries everywhere. Who do you know that would like to hear the message of the Restored Gospel….we could hook them up!!

Have a wonderful week!!

With Much Love, 

Dad and Mom, Grandpa and Grandma, and Richard and Gayle

Keep Smiling!!!

 

                Canada Montreal Mission Miracles December 6, 2020

The following miracles show the dedication, desire, commitment, and sure grit of our outstanding, consecrated, dear missionaries who we dearly love. We feel so blessed that they have learned to recognize MIRACLES everyday!! Everytime we read these beautiful, tender stories, we know that their commitment, and resolve to stay on their own covenant path is strengthened… Read on, and enjoy!!

December 6th, 2020 Missionary Miracles

LaSalle Elders:

« We actually just had service the other day and I wanted to tell you of an experience we had while we were at Moisson Montreal. Feel free to share this with Sister Low if you like. 

We had a job in the cargo bay that was a little less involved than usual. Most jobs there keep you very busy but here we were splitting time between 2 different jobs, but neither of them were enough to keep us too busy so every 20 minutes or so we had a couple minutes of downtime. One of these downtimes comes along and I see a man who looks like he's struggling a bit to put these boxes of food in his van, which is almost complete full of food already. I honestly wasn't sure how he was going to fit it all. It was in this moment that I felt a very clear prompting that we should help him. So we walked over and asked him if he would like some help which he cheerfully told us that would be very much appreciated. 

After getting all the boxes in his car, he talked with us for a minute and told us how appreciative he was that we helped him, and that his name was Paul. He also told us that he has some physical health issues and it would have been much harder on his own, as some of the boxes we lifted were heavy. 

We asked him what he was going to do with the food and he said that he was going to deliver it to people who were less fortunate during this time of pandemic and that he does it once a week and he wouldn't get home until late that night. He just seemed like such an honest and sincere man. 

We introduced ourselves as well and talk to him for a bit. He was a good guy and after he left and went on his way, I think both Elder McStravick and myself both felt very happy and fulfilled that we gave heed to that prompting. « 

Laurier Elders:

« You can share these with Sister Low

An amazing experience we had this week was we were setting up some Christmas decorations, and I opened our door to put a little wreath on it, and just at the perfect time a lady walked by and asked us if we are part of some kind of religious group. So we explained to her who we were. She had noticed that there are a few missionaries in this building. She said she had retired from looking into different religions basically; (and maybe we would have handled the conversation a little better,)  but we gave her a passalong card and invited her to visit the website. I really hope she goes there, and I hope that we can see her again too! »

Montreal Elders:

« The work has been super awesome especially with Jason!!! I would like to share the ‘Miracles of Jason’ that we had with him so far. 

We had our 1st miracle meeting him when he was a referral from sisters in Maryland and a Bible referral from the Zone leaders before which was really cool.

2nd Miracle: This week on Friday we were on exchanges and I was with Elder Zhou and we had a lesson that night with Jason and the Maryland Sisters. We talked to the sister before hand a little about about what we wanted to teach Jason that night. We were thinking about focusing on our purpose to life, why Jesus is important in our lives, and to focus on Why CPR (Church, Prayer, Reading Scriptures) help us rely on Jesus and give us purpose. So that night we taught him our purpose on earth; why Jesus Christ is important, then Prayer and Scripture Study. Then lastly was Church. The sisters said "Jason now we would like to talk about 1 more principle about ‘why we are on earth’” and I was: sweet they are gonna lead this out for the last part. Then they said "Can you go to Mosiah 18?" And my first thought was "huh? Why Mosiah? That's the Baptism scripture" Then I thought "it talks about mourning with those that mourn and lifting others burdens so I guess that's something members of the church do" so I thought it was okay. Then they tell him to read verse 9 and 10. They started teaching about Baptism and why its important and now I'm like "whaaaaaaat? That's not part of our plan?" And Elder Zhou taught and I did as well and we all bore our Testimonies on Baptism and the Spirit was strong and then the Sisters asked Jason if he would think and ponder about Baptism if that’s something he wanted. And we left the lesson and I was very confused as to why we changed it to Baptism but the Spirit was there and it felt good. THE NEXT MORNING Saturday morning, I get a message from Brother Robertson saying "My twins are being baptized today and we are inviting you" and my First thought was "Let's bring Jason!!". This was an amazing miracle because the Sisters were so inspired to talk about Baptism even though we didn't plan on attending the Baptism that day. Jason attended and greatly enjoyed the Baptism and had questions about the laying on of hands.

3rd miracle: On Sunday Evening Jason sends us a text saying that his mother's ill and wants us to pray for her. We tell him that we will definitely pray for her and asked for her name. 2 minutes later he messages us and says "guys did you pray for her? She feels better already!". Me and Elder Noad look at each other and are thinking we didn't pray for her yet.... what happened? So we ask Jason "did you pray for your Mom?" And he says ya in my heart while I was giving her first aid. The next night we get into the lesson and we talk about what happened and he was saying how it was truly a miracle because his Mom has diabetes and her blood sugar was low. Normally her blood sugar would be 10-7 to be healthy and the lowest he has seen for her was a 5. That night it was at 3 and he was thinking about calling an ambulance because she was nauseous and had a migraine and didn't feel good. He called a nurse but it said that they were busy due to Covid 19 things so he tried applying first aid help to her. He said that for some unknown reason there was halloween candy in his first aid kit. He says he never bought halloween candy and he doesn't remember his mom buying any either and she had, he doesn't know why it would be in his first aid kit. He used the candy to stabilize her sugar level and gave her advil and other medications  but thought "It takes at least 30 min to kick in" but she felt better after a couple of minutes. Usually when her sugar levels are low too, she needs help getting to the bathroom but this time after feeling better after the couple of minutes she goes without help. Jason said it was nothing short of a Miracle and he said that it was thanks to us praying. We didn't pray at that point she was healed. We told him that it was HIS prayer and HIS hard work and HIS Faith, that helped his mom that night and we didn't do anything at that point. He was blown away and was so happy and filled with joy. 

That night we talked about the Atonement, Faith and repentance.... which was what we had planned. « 

Trois Rivières Sisters

« This last week, President Langlois challenged us and the elders to find a family. We were pumped and also looking for ways to find a family. The Elders put up ads on children's bible stories since we had French ones to give, and we put up some more ads for Bibles in both languages as well as a family history booklet!! We did find out though, one of the potentials we are working with this last week has a BEAUTIFUL family and we also found another Spanish family through a bible ad that lives a 5 minute WALK from the church ! Bible ads are miracles !! President Langlois was excited to hear about our success !! »

Riverside (Ottawa) Sisters:

« You can tell Sister Low that we took her up on her wonderful suggestion of having Jennifer bring up the church to her husband who isn't here with her in Canada. And she told us a story, one morning well they were talking over the phone, her husband asked her if she knew what church these two men in white shirts who were sharing about Christ were and at that point Jennifer didn’t realize or know that missionaries were sent that far away and we told her that they were most likely missionaries from our church and she was so excited to tell her husband about that. And share more of the gospel with him. »

Chapel Hill (Ottawa) Sisters:

« One of my most favorite thing as a missionary is hearing peoples first prayers. Whether it's just been a while, their first prayer outloud, or just their first prayer with us. It is always a spiritual experience. The last two lessons with our friends Etienne and Mirella, they both have said prayers now. They are so sincere and they invite the spirit strongly. Mirella just lost her father and was hesitant to pray but we comforted her and told her a prayer can be whatever is in her heart. So, we knelt down and she said she would like to try. It was a really good experience. You can tell Sister low. Sister Hawkes may have mentioned it before. This was in the lesson that we taught the plan of salvation with the love diagram that we talked about in interviews. » 

Kirkland (West Montreal Island) Elders:

« Wow. So..GERRY!!! 

Gerry Has made leaps and bounds. Long story short, Gerry the 70 year old Jewish man, has accepted Christ as his personal Savior and Messiah. He received witness from the Spirit. We were all there when he prayed and asked. It was one of those missionary experiences I will remember for the rest of my life. He accepted a date for baptism on the 9th of January!!! »

LaSalle Sisters:

« I had a little miracle today that I wanted to share with you. We went shopping at the Angrignon mall this afternoon right after we got the tripod for the mission. We spent about an hour there and then we started to head home. On our way to the exit, I get stopped by a woman and her daughter. I turn around and I look at them, they talk to us and I hear this very distinct accent... They were from Tahiti!!! They saw us walking in the opposite direction from us and the daughter told her mom "Mom, she's from Tahiti!" and they tried to catch us as we were walking. That made me sooo happy! Finally I got to meet Tahitians (other than missionaries)! We talked a little bit, I told them that we were missionaries and strangely they had no idea what the church was. It's okay though! Now they do. She even told me that if we had any celebration in our church or gatherings of any sorts, they would be happy to attend them. Isn't that amazing? The mom asked for my Facebook so that I can keep contact with them. I also checked her daughter's profile and apparently she's friends with a member in the LaSalle ward. That's incredible. That was a sweet little miracle we had today and my heart is full. »

Hochelaga Elders:

« Hello President

Elder Rees and I have seen so many miracles this week. We are working very diligently and are reaping the rewards of it. Like you said "exact obedience brings miracles", it is true. We have been able to put our friend Ange on date for December the 19th. She has a testimony of the Book of Mormon and seems to receive some sort of revelation about it every time she reads. We asked her to read Alma 32 this past week, she said that the spirit hit her like a ton of bricks. She said that the chapter taught her that she can’t cheat her way to heaven and that she has to do whatever it takes to be a part of this church and do the things she has to to grow her faith. It was amazing! We were also able to talk to a woman and we shared a message with her and then told her that our message is a message for the family and she said she is going to invite her entire family for the next time. That same experience happened twice this week. Hopefully we will start to teach those two families this week!!!« 

Cole Harbour Nova Scotia Sisters:

This week Sister Pedersen and I had a cool experience with Area Book contacting. Last week near the end of the week we called a young lady named Randi. We talked and got to know her for a little and then shared a brief uplifting scripture from the Book of Mormon before we hung up. As we concluded our small message she asked us where we read our scripture from which lead her to ask us for a copy. As we spoke more about the Book of Mormon she became more intrigued and we were able to set up a time to go and drop one off to her. A few nights ago we went to her door step at 6pm and set the Book down and then stepped back and called her so we were at a safe distance when she opened the door. She was so excited to read and told us that the missionaries she had met before covid, talked to her a bit about the Book and then she never heard from them again. She was so excited to start reading and learn more after a few hours of pondering the words it contains. 

We plan to reach out to her tonight. « 

Champlain Gatineau Spanish Sisters:

« Hi President! 

I wanted to say thank you for that extra push with Ramiro. This zone Conference and that interview was just what I needed to be more bold. We asked Ramiro on Sunday if he would be baptized and he said yes!!!! I was so happy! I have never asked that before and it was so sweet that he said yes!!! We tried picking a date and he wasn't sure, but we are going to have a member next time with us who can help us. We also reconnected with a former and have a lesson with her on Wednesday! She's Spanish and she's super awesome!! « 

Kentville Nova Scotia Sisters:

« Miracle of the week #1: we started teaching a new friend named Kashish! He is incredibly elect. He's from India and has only been in Canada for about 4 years and has no Christian background. In fact, he didn't even know what the word "Christian" meant and he had never heard of Jesus Christ before. I have never taught someone who wasn't already familiar with Christianity, so having the privilege to share the good news that the Son of God died and rose again for him was something I will never forget. He loves learning about Christ! We sent him an Easter video and he really seemed to get it- that because of Christ, everything can be made right. He is progressing so well already. 

Miracle of the week #2: Robert reached out to us and said that he's ready to accept God now! We still haven't been able to have a proper lesson with him yet, but we have had some good contacts. « 

Enjoy your WEEK...look for miracles!!