Life in London

I thought I would tell you a little bit about my area. This area once again has tons of Africans mainly from Nigeria and Ghana, there are also people from all over the world. Our church building houses two wards. An English speaking ward of about 150 active and a Spanish speaking ward of about 90 active. The Spanish ward is mainly all South American. We have four missionaries in our zone who are all from South American (Chile, Honduras, Brazil, and Argentine) and they cover all of London and teach every single Spanish person in London. They cross the river on a daily basis to teach. In the London Mission there is a Portuguese ward of mainly Bazillions. They have four Portuguese missionaries that do like our Spanish missionaries and they too cover all of London for Portuguese speakers. I use my Spanish literally every day. There are tons and tons of South Americans here. They accept the gospel so well. I got a Spanish dictionary from one of the elders and I study it for ten min during lunch. So when I contact them I can pass on the referral. The Spanish elders baptize like crazy. The members in the Spanish ward know what it is like to do member missionary work. They really know how to share the gospel with their friends. It is wonderful and a great example for us all.

Last week we went all around south London. Megs when we come back here after my mission I will not know my way around the part of London you will want to go to cuz the area I serve in now, will be too scary for us to go to. Gaurtented. The nice places in London are around the river Thames and about four blocks south of the river, then you hit the ghetto. All of the touristy things are north of the river for the most part. We have a few things that are fun to see in our area but they are all right next to the river and because there is no missionary work in that part of our area we never go there. The nice London that most people think about is North of the river. There are a few things touristy things for us to see here though. There is the London eye, and you can see Big Ben and Parliament, the view of them is better on our side of the river but we can’t go up to them cuz that is on the other side of the river which is out of our mission. We have some great art museums. The Holocaust Museum/War Museum (we are going to go to that) Greenwich University (really Victorian England and very old.) that is where the prime meridian line is. We went there last week and that was fun. It was like something from old old England. My favorite thing is Tower Bridge. That is such a pretty bridge! When I saw it I thought wow!!! that is on Sherlock Holmes! Today we are going to go up in and on top of it. I am excited to do that.

We get around using the bus. All of the buses here are double Decker. We use the tube (underground) to get around too. Our zone is the smallest in the mission. It is most of south London with a few exceptions. Probably about 1 to 1.5 million people live in our area (we have a lot of work to do) I would say about 7 million people live in the zone. It is the more popular side of London because of so many immigrants and council housing. We have all elders in our zone they do not allow sisters to be in central London and for good reasons.

Just know we are always safe, we are smart and follow the spirit, God protects us.

Love you all hope all is well!

Love Elder M. White

I'm in London

Hi all,

Michael is doing very well, we skyped him at Christmas and he was his same happy self. We talked for about an hour, in the end we were able to bare testimony and have a family prayer together. We all loved it.

He has loved the Plymouth area and learned so much from the missionaries and the members and people he was blessed to teach. Since his last blog he was able to see 2 more baptisms before he was transferred. On e was Lin who is a student at the university and a friend of Chao Li a young man that was baptized a few months ago both boys are from China. They did lots of teaching them together. Also there was Martyn who was the step son of a less active member i n the area he is in his 30s and Michael described him as a really sweet man.

Here is an exce rpt from Michael’s letter on the 16^th of January:

This week has been good. We did have our baptism of
Martyn. He has a great story. His step mum who used to be

an active member. She has been less active for many years and then

3 months ago his mom got to talking to the sisters on Mormon chat.

They gave us the referral and so we start ed teaching them. Martyn
was so shy but he finally came in and sat do wn on the lesson and

three months later we baptize him and the fa mily is coming to church.

Also Chao Li is back from China. Man I totally missed that kid.

He is planning on staying in England for an other few
years so that makes me happy. Yesterday at church we went to the
family history center and did the genealogy for his dad and so we are
now figuring out a time where he can go up to the temple and be
baptized for him. It was cool cuz both him and Lin (who was just

baptized a few weeks ago passed the sacrament yesterday too.

They are doing well. We have seen a lot of great success here in

Plymouth. Yesterday at church I was looking around and while

I have been here I have seen 8 baptisms and 6 of them have been

adults and all six were still at church! That made me really happy.

Jan 18 2012

Just giving you a heads up to tell you my new area. I moved and I moved far away. Elder Simmons stayed in Plymouth. I moved to the area of Peckham. You would better know it as downtown London. YOU know big Ben and parliament? Yeah, they are both in my area. I am in that part of London and it is a zoo. Crazy, crazy.

Life is good! Love you all! I will email on Monday.

Here is my new address

Flat 4, 53 Kelly Ave.

Peckham, London

SE15 5 LD

England

Dear Family, Jan 23^rd 2012 (Chinese New Year)

I never thought I would leave Plymouth. I loved it there. It is by far the most beautiful place in England I have seen. Every time I tell people I came from Devon or Cornwall they say wow that is the prettiest place. It really is. It killed me though to leave all of those recent converts. Chao Li and I just both cried when we said bye. Man I'm going to miss that guy. He said he is going to the temple to be baptized for his dad in a week or two. So good for him. He is a star missionary too. Russel as well is getting close to going to the temple. He is taking the temple prep class. He cried too when I left.

Now for my new area, London, London, where do I begin. My area is predominantly African. At church yesterday we had 120 people at church (biggest ward in London) and I would say realistically 100 of them were black. I was really cool. The bishop is from Nigeria the Stake Pres. from Ghana. At ward council not a single one of them was white. It was great. I feel literally like I am in Nigeria.

There are tons of Pentecostal churches here. We will walk down the street and see church after church after church. They look like little shops but they are churches where they do "divine healing" and give out "the miracle salt." The funniest one is "The Holy Ghost Zone" and it was publicized in a big neon sign flashing. All of the businesses are named after funny things too like "Trinity hair salon" or "Saviors chicken and Chips" . The other day I was walking and saw a moving company that was called "Exodus Removals" and then it gave a phone number and it said " call 07800615265 and ask for MOSES" I am dead serious. They sure love the Lord here but man they do not comprehend one true church. The people are very kind though. I thought that it would be like Slough but no it is nothing like Slough. I am not sure if it has as much crime as Slough. I have had to get used to sirens literally every five minutes though and armored vehicles driving down the street but I haven’t seen crimes yet so I am not too worried. It is literally the ghetto. Up by the Thames there is a very nice area for about four blocks south then it turns into the ghetto and that is my area. When we tell people where we work they ask us why don’t you go north of the river where it is nice and not in this run down place but they obviously don’t understand we can’t cuz that is a different mission, the Thames is the mission boundary. We can go halfway across the bridge and that is it. It is going to be really weird to talk to people who have been to London and they will be thinking of a totally different London then what I will see. I hear that the black market is huge here!! So I am stoked to get some cheap stuff here. 

Here we are really working with two people that have serious dates. One is a young lady named Lorraine and she is very kind. She is from Ghana and has come to church a few times. She hasn’t been taught much though. If she is baptized it will be the first baptism here in six months... this area hit a dry spell especially for London. She has been taught the restoration and the gospel of Jesus Christ. She really is promising. He is from Egypt and his name is Frank. Great kid and really really really knows his bible. So he has been keeping his commitments but it is literally 50/50. Great kid he knows what he needs to do question is if he will. Oh I forgot to say that Lorraines’s date is for the 11 of Feb. As far as the work I won’t lie I am still adjusting. It will take me a while to get how to work in this kind of environment. I am not worried I will adjust well and quickly as I allow God to shape me and mold me into what he wants and expects.

My comp is Elder Amundsen. Really great kid and loves the work. He goes home in a few months. He is from St George big into theater and very musical, and talented.

OK that is a bit about the area. I will let you know more as time goes by.

Well family, really that is all I have time for today. I will send pics of our adventures of London at a later date.

Elder M. White

Doing great in Plymouth

Here in Plymouth we are all doing great. Yes, mom we do stay in areas really long here. However, for me to be in two areas in one year that is really rare. My trainer, Elder Whitehead was in four areas his first year and that is more normal. Most missionaries have one area they are in a really long time and I happen to have two so far.

As far as the ward down here. It is a really good ward. However it is shrinking. The church in this part of England really breaks my heart I won’t lie. The recession has really hit hard here so many move away to find jobs. There are some amazing people down here which I love so sososososos much.

As far as our baptismal dates we are having a baptism this weekend with Lin. Chao Li would baptize him but he is going back to China for the holidays; up until Jan 13. Chao Li is a star. Lin is a great kid too. We went to Chao's home this week and we had China night. He made us some Chinese food and I have no idea what it was. But it was really good. Lin came along also. We taught Lin the Law of Chastity this past week, and man I hate teaching that to people who don’t speak fluent English. We had Chao Li with us to help him understand, but still it didn’t help much. It was awkward. :)

As far as S---- her parents want her baptized on Christmas Eve. S---- is really cool. Then Martin is doing well. He is a very humble and meek man. He is so good and he is really progressing well. We also picked up another baptismal date this week. He is this man from Nepal that we have been teaching. We have been teaching him via skype with a Nepalese convert in London whom I know. But his date isn’t for awhile. So we have to take things nice and slow for him. His date is for Jan 28. Martin baptismal date is now for the 14 of Jan. As far as the rest we are finding a few new people and that is good. We keep searching for more.

Today our zone is getting together to make a movie for the Christmas mission presentation. It is crazy because of how far apart our zone is. I had to get permission from the APs just to have them all get together because of the travel distance. While I was in Slough we used to get together every p-day; we were so close together there. But I think everyone in the zone is excited for that. We have a few new missionaries in our zone; one from Ukraine and the other from Scotland. The zone is doing really well. We have 12 baptismal dates in the zone, which is actually an all time high from me in this zone. We are right up there with the London zones in that aspect. Four of the candidates are getting baptized this week.

Christmas is coming up and so that is exciting. I will skype you on Christmas so it will just be like what we have done in the past. I will call Young on Dec 19. I got permission from my mission pres to call him. This week our Zone is going to the temple. We are all stoked about that! I haven’t been to the temple in... 8 months. I know that a lot, if not most missionaries, don’t go but I have missed it so much. I love going to the temple. We are also having another General Authority Elder Causse’ (however you spell it) come to our mission. He is from France. That is the exciting news.

Love you all,

Elder M. White

He was baptized!!

Hi All,

As with many things this season of the year seems to get away from us it certainly has for me. Tonight I am making up for my neglect of Michael's blog. I decide to just put a few highlight from the last month so you can catch up on what he has been doing.

Nov. 14^th 2011

Chao Li was baptized!!! Man that kid is a stud. I will send ya some pics soon. The baptism started late cuz we were waiting for Chao his friends to come. I asked him "so how many friends did you invite?" and he says "oh like three or four." anyway we are outside the church waiting for them and then up pull two car fulls of Chinese!!!! 12 of them I think! We had more Chinese then church members there! It was a very spiritual baptism. I don’t know if I told you about his past. Chao's dad passed away about 8 years ago when he was 16. He is very sensitive to the topic but he loved the Plan of Salvation. So it was so cool to teach him the Plan of Salvation and he was so excited to be able to see his father again in the next life. At his baptism he had a very spiritual experience concerning his father. It was very neat to hear that. How true this gospel is and how amazing God’s love is. It was a very neat baptism. One that was right up there with Young’s. After the baptism we had the APs spend the night at our flat that night so they were down for the baptism. It was fun being with White bread again. I love that kid. After the baptism we had to celebrate we all went to KFC Elder Whitehead said it was my year mark gift for me

As far as the work is going it is all going well. Our zone is struggling a bit. I just don’t know what to do with missionaries that don’t want to be obedient or hard working? Any advice? We can only do so many exchanges too cuz our zone is so dang big! We don’t have any dates but that will soon change. Just give it time. Elder Simmons is a machine and really a hard worker. Our goal is to have a confirmation for Christmas. So we are working for that! Our goal is to have a family baptized by then. We feel God has one out there for us to teach. So please pray they or us will be led to each other.

Nate/Beka I am so sorry about the loss of your mother, you are in my prayers Young, I am sure that the President will let me give ya a ring before you leave. I would be shocked if he didn’t. I will call him today and ask. But I am sure it will be fine.

Nov. 21, 2011

I hope all is going well back in the good old land of Utah! This week has been a week from @##!!# work wise. I think we did bazillion hours of finding! I thought it was all in vain but God did reward us :) not greatly but hey it all starts with the one eh? We got one new investigator. He is a university student and really isn’t that interested but just open minded (ha that is how they all start ) So we only met with him for like twenty minutes. But it was a tender mercy that is for sure.

This week though we did have a fun thing on at the church. There were two fund raisers that our church did. The first one was called "children in need" and that was good. The mascot for it is a bear called pudsy. He is some yellow bear with a spotted patch over his eye (kinda creepy) but they had elder Simmons and I in the pudsy costume and that was a lot of fun. I felt like a Disney land guy. It was funny. There were also a lot of people there! The only thing was we couldn’t really proselyte. We did however run into a bunch of families that we had knocked on their doors two weeks ago. That was funny and they ran away from us when they saw us.

We also had this band concert night at the church where the Plymouth city band played for charity. It was good. We were able to talk to a lot of non members. I think there were about 110 non members there. A few of them wanted to know more about the church. It was good so we were able to give them a chapel tour and teach them. We did that for about fifteen people. We were not able to ask for their info though but we left them with our number and they said they would like to come to the services sometime. So who knows eh? But that was good. Being perfectly blunt I think this week was just a lame week. Just nothing tons happened which is sad. I guess that means God will send some blessings soon eh?

Nov 28 2011

We just gained a new baptismal commitment. His name is Lin. He is from China. I have no idea where. He is a good kid and Chao is helping us teach him. His date is for Dec 31. Chao is doing great. He bought a brand new suit on Friday just for the p-hood and he loves church. He is so excited to go to the temple and be baptized for his dad. All of the RCs here in Plymouth doing well. All of them are active which is so good to see.

I can’t take too long because we have to drive up to Reading for a leadership conference today.

Thanks Giving here was really good. We had about three turkey dinners. One from an American. We also went to the Mayflower steps where the good ole pilgrims left. They had some ceremony there for it. I will never be in Plymouth again on Thanks Giving so it was kind of cool.

I took my driving test again without telling you............................

I PASSED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That was actually probably the highlight of my week! Not having to worry about anymore driving lessons and driving tests. I feel like chains that were bound around me are now cut and I can roam free in the meadow of..... well the meadow. So that was exciting. It was intense ok so I have to tell you all a quick story about it. We get to the test center 15 min early. And in England when you are learning to drive you have to have these huge magnetic "L" plates on your car. One on the back and one on the front they stand for "learner". I get there and one of the instructors tells me excuse me one of your L plates is missing. I look at the car and I see that one of them (the rear one) had fallen off!!! Thus making it so I can’t take my test. I look at Simmons and he says "they don’t call me the speed demon for nothing" we get in the car and the nearest place to get them is 15 min away!!! If I am late then I lose all of my money. Literally even one min late! We get in the car and yeah anyway I run in get the L plate pay for it and run back. We get there right as the examiners are coming out of the door for the tests! If I would have been a minute later I would have failed. That got my adrenaline pumping and so for my whole test I was dying. To make it even worse they brought the main dude of the test center on my test to make sure my examiner was doing a good job I guess... it was freaky. The test dudes here don’t talk. It is like you try and talk to them and they say things like "grunt" or "no" or nothing, they are so quiet. But, I passed!!!!!!

Dec 5th 2011

We now have three baptismal dates. The first is Sashka. She is the sister of Rebekah one of my RCs when I first came to Plymouth. Her parents wouldn’t let her be baptized but they have given permission. We went there about five days ago and I just thought ok we are not leaving this house until she has a date. And so we did. She is preping for the 16th of Dec. Just pray that her parents hearts will stay soften. She has come to church a ton and has had all of the lessons but the commandments. She is nine so there is not too much to worry about there. Please keep her in your prayers. She will need them and so will the parents. They are nice they just don’t understand baptism and what it is.

The next is--in the Chinese friend of Chao’s. He is funny. We have taught him all of the lessons but the commandments Chao is helping us and is a real help. I would have him baptize him but Ch--- is going back to China for the holidays. So we are going to try and encourage R---- (another RC when I first got here) to baptize him. Lin only concerns are just getting cold feet.

Then we have Martin. Martin is the son of a less active we have been working with. He is 27 years old and is a slow learner. Nice guy and coming along well. His mum used to be really active. She is coming back with Martin. In the past when missionaries have gone round M---- would hide but he didn’t hide for Elder Simmons and I. His date is in Jan due to him learning slower.

I talked to the Elders in London yesterday and this man who I ran into at the Slough bus station named "Wayne" who was wearing the man u hat just got the Mel p-hood and baptized his best friend. So that was neat to hear. I never would have thought that would have happened after talking to him at the bus station. Crazy how that works eh? Then all of the RCs here are doing well in Plymouth. Russel also got a calling as a ward m missionary. So good for him. I am excited to work with them all. God truly has blessed me to see the fruits of my labors and see as many baptisms as I have and for a good chunk of them remaining active! That makes me the most happy!

This wee we talked to 2 different men who slowly allowed the addiction of pornography mutate their lives. Both men had once been active members of the church. I will not go into any more detail but because of pornography one of the men has issues with every single issue you can think of in the LOC. Literally. We counseled him to speak to someone with that authority who can help with the healing process. I don’t know if he will. He knows the church is true. He has begun to read his b of M again. He prays again. But refuses to talk to anyone about it. I only hope and pray that he will. He is a good man with a good heart. I look at his life and he hates it. He tells us this every time we go there. His kids hate him. They don’t believe in God. One of them has put him into debt by thousands of pounds. His self confidence is shot. He has physical problems now as a result of his actions. Then this is what he told us “Elders you take a lesson from me. You take a lesson me and you never, NEVER! Do what I have done. You tell all that you can that this is not what happiness is. Satan makes things breaking the law of Chastity look fun and it may be, but only for a short while, then you have the consequences of it and I am still suffering from them." this man’s plea for us to not do as he had done. It really humbled me and once again the "flaxen cord" analogy came to my head.

With both of these men talked of the Atonement, We talked of healing and the power of hope and faith. I hope and pray that these men will take this into account.

Love you all

Elder White