November 20 letters

To Dad:

Hopefully England will for sure win the World Cup this year everything is in place for it to happen. 

Elder Reynolds also feels the same way as you about England haha he's so negative about it it's really funny. He's pretty good at soccer so we always look for kids playing in the street and then we pull over and play them.  We are undefeated right now.  The township kids are always so surprised when the Mlungus beat them hahaha. 

To Mom:

Thank you for updating me on what day Thanksgiving is because me and my companion were trying to figure out if it happened already yet or what. 

This week was really great.  Of course the highlight of the week was stake conferenece in Mdantsane.  That place is really special to me so when we got to Mdantsane on Sunday morning and we actually drove up to the chapel my heart was really beating fast.  I was so excited to walk into the chapel and meet everyone.  We got there about 30 minutes early so when I got in the doors I peeked my head in the chapel and looked around for a second and there was so many people who just got so excited to see me I was so happy.  For the next 30 minutes everyone was coming up to me and talking and getting really excited and I was so happy and excited to see them.  I really loved that ward so it was special for me to be back.  I was able to see again 6 of my recent converts and I found out that at least 5 other people who I either found or who I was teaching have been baptized since I left.  The people were really surprised to see me and Elder Greengrass together.  

The stake conference was really sweet too.  If you remember President Mahlangabeza from MD 3rd ward.  He was the bishop when I got there but he got called to the stake presidency so his twin brother became the bishop.  Anyway Mdantsane became it's own stake since I left and he became the stake president.  He's only 33 but he's really powerful.  Anyway he gave a sweet talk about the importance of general conference and the changes for next year.  The rest of the session was a broadcast from Salt Lake City.  Brother Tad R Callister spoke first followed by Sister Bonnie L Oscarson, Elder Kevin S Hamilton who is the area president, Elder Carl B Cook my man who served in the Africa Southeast Area Presidency, and the final speaker Elder Andersen from the quorum of the twelve.  Really it was an enlightening meeting.  It was like a bonus session of general conference specific for Africa's needs.  

Otherwise the week has been one of the happiest of my mission.  I feel like me and Elder Reynolds have been friends since childhood or something.  We're just always laughing and having a great time.  We are having so much success too it's just unbelievable.  Nothing really significant has happened solidly so far but we are expecting 6 or 7 baptisms this transfer which will be sweet.  We should for sure be together next transfer too and we're setting some really high goals.  I'm just loving it here in King Williams Town.  As people get further along on their progress I'll tell you more about them, but for now we just have a really full teaching pool. 

I finally sent some pictures of people I loved in Uitenhage in this email and the baptism we had my last Sunday there.  Maybe in the next couple of weeks I'll also send you a picture or 2 from King Williams Town.  We took some pictures on Elder Greengrass' camera so hopefully he'll send me those and I'll send them to you. 

November 13 letters

To Mom:

Me and Elder Khoza got along perfectly.  We never had any disagreement or anything.  He is super humble and so we got along great.  Me and Elder Reynolds are going to get along perfectly as well.  He's also really humble and righteous.  He has got me fasting every week which is crazy and we're waking up at 6 which I never thought I would say that in my life haha.  But Elder Reynolds is super obedient so I have no worries about our companionship.  

We have been smashing it so much these past few days.  We just talked to everyone we saw and found so many new people to teach.  We found a sweet guy from Zimbabwe yesterday called M who is married with a small baby.  Apparently he's a lawyer with several degrees, but our lesson was so powerful with him.  I'm praying that he'll get baptized because for sure he's a potential stake president.

On my first day I met our fellowshipper L.  I like him a lot.  But apparently his mom isn't a member.  So I went to talk to her and found out that she's never been taught the lessons by the missionaries.  I guess every new missionary came in and just assumed she's been taught the lessons.  But she hasn't so we talked to her and set an appointment to start teaching her the lessons.  I have a really great feeling about her especially because L is going on a mission really soon.  But she came to church and the speakers in sacrament meeting were Elder Reynolds talking about the restoration, me talking about the Book of Mormon, and L talking about missionary work.  At the end of sacrament meeting I saw her wiping tears from her eyes.  She was clearly very touched by the messages and testimonies.  Her husband passed away a few years ago and we testified to her that she can live with him again.  Really sweet.

We also met a girl named A on Saturday, taught her the restoration, and on Sunday she turned up to church like an hour and a half early.  We're aiming her baptism for December 17th. 

I found out that next sunday is stake conference in the Mdantsane chapel where I used to go to church every Sunday.  I'm really excited about that.  Practically everyone I loved from Mdantsane will be there and Elder Greengrass will be there as well so the 2 of us are going to meet up with all of our recent converts and it's going to be a big day for me.  I've thought about Mdantsane a lot since I left.  It really has a special place in my heart. 

I promised you pictures but I think I'm going to wait until next week to be consistent with my usual character haha.

To Dad:

I didn't describe my apartment to mom but it's a double story house with an automatic garage that we pull the car into.  Pretty weird.  And it has carpet which is just blowing my mind. 

Nov 6 letter

To Mom:

I guess I'll have to give you some details about the week. 

Firstly the baptism. 

The service was another really perfect baptismal service.  The whole ward came to support again.  Anika and Nwabisa were so happy to get baptized and they both bore great testimonies about how great they felt after their baptism.  There was also a young 8 year old girl that joined in the baptism.  Nobody prepared baptismal clothes for her but luckily we thought ahead and prepared baptismal clothes for them anyway so that was lucky. 

We also had the confirmation of the Goeieman family.  They didn't come to church last week to be confirmed because they had a child sick in hospital but they came this time and we confirmed them and it was also really great.  I am planning to focus on families in my next area. '

Speaking of my next area.  I am getting transferred on Wednesday.  I'm going to King Williams Town which is close to Mdantsane where I started.  I'm really excited because I have no leadership other than district leader of a 2 man district which pretty much means no leadership at all hahaha.  I am going to focus on baptizing so many people.  My new companion is going to be Elder Reynolds from England.  I'm pretty stoked because I have met him a little bit on mission and I like him a lot.  Funny thing is that he's actually my first companion that has had more than 1 companion before me hahaha.  My Zone Leader is going to be Elder Greengrass again so that's nice.  Sadly Elder Dove is leaving me to go and be companions with Elder Ivins, so I'm going to be a little nervous to be in a new place without him for the first time. 

This week we wanted to find some people to baptize next transfer and we had a lot of success.  We had one really cool experience.  There is a family called the M family.  Father mother and 3 daughters.  Apparently the wife was going from church to church looking for something right.  The husband didn't really like church because he just didn't think it satisfied his needs so he didn't go, but the wife had been praying that the husband would lead the whole family to a church where they could worship together and be closer as a family.  The husband didn't know that but apparently he was just standing by the church one day and he realized that in 30 years of living here he had never seen that church, and for some reason he had the strong prompting that this is where God wanted him to be, so he went in on Sunday at about 1:00 after church ended and he talked to the bishop.  We went out to see them on Saturday and taught them the Restoration.  We had such a powerful lesson.  The spirit was definitely there, they were close to tears.  They promised us to be at church on Sunday although they didn't actually come.  I'm sure though, that they'll be baptized in the 2 months or so.  

I think you want to know about the zone conference with Elder Koch.  Apparently Elder Ballstaedt's great uncle Immanuel Ballstaedt baptized Elder Koch's parents which is crazy.  So Elder Koch started out the meeting by announcing to everyone that he had served a mission with my brother and saying "Elder Heald's brother was the greatest baptizer in the history of the Mozambique mission."  then he went on to talk about Elder Ballstaedt and how awesome his great uncle was.  Me and Elder Ballsteadt were laughing for the rest of the day that we have royal blood in us and at least we are related to greatness.  

Elder Koch's training was really something special though. He said so many things that were just so profound.  I am actually going to completely change the way I do missionary work after hearing his training.  Me and Elder Faingata'a and my companion have just been talking about the training the whole time since he trained us on Thursday.  Just before lunch he announced that he would only be interviewing 2 missionaries.  Me and Elder Ballstaedt looked at each other and just laughed we said it would be us 2.  But no he didn't interview either of us.  Apart from the doctrine though which was just so amazing he also bore a powerful testimony.  I really knew that the gospel is true while he was speaking.  The AP's texted us that under no circumstances should we ask Elder Koch to take a picture with us.  as soon as we got that text I told Elder Khoza that Elder Koch was going to ask me to take a picture with him anyway.  I was right haha.  But the zone conference was a really great experience for me and Daniel was really lucky to have such a great mission president

I have been getting all sorts of comments ever since then though about my brother and his baptizing prowess hahaha. 

Unfortunately I'm with Elder Faingata'a and Elder Dove right now.  We had to take Elder Huang to the airport so me and my comp split up and he has all the pictures.  I'll send you the pictures of the baptism next week. 

Sister Koch sent these pictures to me (Mom)