Hello everyone! I have some great news! We have another investigator with a baptism date! Not sure if I told you about her last week, but her name is Maddi Williams, and her mom is very less active and her grandmother is an active member in the ward. Maddi is 12 years old and has actually been coming to church almost every Sunday for the past year, so that's really awesome. She has a date for November 7, and I'm sure she can hit it if she keeps trying for it. No sweat :)

Well, Elder Wade and I are staying in Launceston for another six weeks. I'm not disappointed or discouraged though, because I know that the Lord has some reason that we are together still: whether it be for that one person we meet, or whether it be so that we can learn something from each other, I don't know now, but I'm sure I will know here in the near future. We talked for a little over two hours on what we need to do to improve the area and to improve our relationship, because if we were gonna spend another six weeks together then something had to change and be fixed, so I have a lot of confidence in this new transfer.

Elder Wade, Wijeya and me!

Wijeya still needs some help though... He seems to have given up drinking for good because since we've been over on Sunday he hasn't been drunk once, but the smoking is another thing. He says he is trying, but when we were over he showed us his new purchase of a block of tobacco for making homemade cigarettes. Oh Wijeya... we're trying to think of some ways we can help, but it doesn't seem like he wants to quit all that much. I guess we can only encourage him so much, but in the end it's all up to him and exercising his agency. He does want to be baptized, but his priorities are a little askew right now. He is an EXTREMELY giving man though, and I really think that when he is baptized he will make an amazing member: when we went over to his house to help him move his furniture (he moved up from the mainland and his furniture finally arrived) he tried to pay us $50.00 for our help, but when we refused he just said "FINE! How do I pay it to the church!?" This guy is legit. He also took us to a museum and wants to take us to a seahorse museum like 45 minutes away this Wednesday, and he does so much for us it's awesome. And his family is coming down in December and he really wants them to be a part of the church as well, so that's cool. He did dip our on church on Sunday though, but hey, like I said about agency. We've got a LOT of members fellow shipping him, and a lot of the members are excited to meet him, and we meet with him nearly every day, so we'll just have to look at what we're doing wrong and fixing it.

Me kissin' a kangaroo

Monday we went to this Wildlife Park in Deloraine with Elder Jensen and Calachan ,and that was really cool because there were a lot of free ranging kangaroos around and we got to pet them and feed them our of our hands. It was pretty legit, and all of us even took a swing at kissing one on the lips to get a picture. Germs?... Nah man; memories! 

Tasmanian Devil

We also saw Tasmanian Devils and got some cool pictures of them as well. Two of them in the enclosure even started fighting, so we made gag bets on which one would win, but the tussle only lasted for about 10 seconds. Those little things are NASTY when they get mean.

Me and Jackie Legs!

I Love nothing more than prayers and letters from home and friends! :)

That's the main bulk of the week, but it's been a good week. Keep praying for Wijeya and that he will have the desire to continue to change his life, and he really has improved a lot, we're just hoping that he keeps improving. Thanks for the prayers everyone, keep the faith, and as always, God be with you till we meet again.

-Elder Landon Cook

PS... Hahaha, this mission has SOARED by: I hit my six month mark on Thursday, so I get to burn a tie!!  .... YOU ASK ME WHY!?!?

Apparently this has been a missionary tradition all over the world for decades, I've talked to members who have kids older than me and they're like "So when do you burn your tie?"

6 months: burn a tie

12 months: burn a shirt
18 months: burn a pair of pants
24 months (the night before you go home): BURN A FLIPPIN' SUIT!!!

Elder Wade and I makin' some friends

Elder Wade feeding the baby Kangaroo

Elder Jensen and Elder Wade tryina sneak a kiss from their true love

Me just kangarooing (they have finally accepted me I believe)

These are some baby Tiger Quolls also

known as Spotted Tailed Quolls

Another view of a Tasmanian Devil

And plus, totally forgot to add this everyone: Wijeya took us to a WWI museum with dinosaurs and stuff. We didn't finish seeing around (weren't even close) but we're going back to do it today

Man, it has been a wild week. Honestly I'm exhausted, but it's all good because that means we're working hard. I think. Anyways, that guy we went to taught last week, his name is Wijeya, and he is about 50 or so and is from Sri Lanka. Our first lesson was kind of weird, and I think it's because he was a little drunk. He was talking on how the sky is God (or something like that) and when we taught he closed all the doors to keep the "vibrations" in the room. Eh, it was a little strange, but it was a good thing that Job Tai was there to help us out. The next few lessons went a lot better and we could actually feel the spirit, and when we mentioned General Conference to him he seemed really keen to come on Saturday and Sunday, but he didn't show up to any sessions, and I think it might be because he was previously drinking and he felt ashamed to go, but when we asked him about it he denied he was drinking (even though we could smell the alcohol on him). Our lesson on Sunday was tough to teach because he was all over the place and our lesson wasn't as organized as it should've been. He speaks fluent English and is very keen to be baptized, but there are a few things he needs to work on. He smokes and drinks a lot, but he doesn't like to admit to either when we ask him, so yeah, there's that. He is a great guy though, we just need to be patient with him. He even offered to take Elder Wade and I to some seahorse sanctuary for helping him move some furniture to his house, so that's really cool.

We also met with Maddi Williams, and she's the granddaughter of a member in our ward and she's been coming to church for almost the past year. We taught a good lesson with Brother and Sister Furlan, but the lesson went a bit long. She said she isn't ready to be baptized yet because she wants to know if the church is true or not, so we'll keep working with her.

Friday we had our interviews in Hobart, so that was an all-day thing because it's a three hour drive there and a three hour drive back. Interviews with President Maxwell are always my favorite; he just has so much spiritual insight to help anyone out. It's a sad thing that he's leaving next June or so, but that's just how the cookie crumbles.

General Conference was amazing! I loved each and every one of the talks, especially the ones about parenting, because in my life that's been one of my biggest concerns recently: when I get back and start a family, I want to be able to raise my children in righteousness and in the gospel, so I made sure to pay especially close attention to those ones. But in all, it was great. I loved the one about "Ponderizing" a scripture every week, and I'm gonna start applying that in my life.  The scripture the Spirit led me to was Mosiah 2: 5-6 about the people turning their tents towards the temple.  I could tell President Monson was struggling, but he is such a man of inspiration, nothing short of a prophet of God

That's about it for this week, and after this Elder Wade and I plan on going to a zoo where we can feed kangaroos and Tassie Devils OR go to some caves out in Mole Creek about 30 minutes away, so today'll be a good day. So mom asked me a few questions is a letter I got from her this week, so here are the answers:

No, I haven't gotten even the slightest tinge of an Aussie accent yet, but I'll work on that (because trust me, I want one)

The weather is warming up, but the temperature will fluctuate throughout the day quite a bit, so it's kinda tough planning what to wear.

I did get the letter you sent a few days back, and thank you so much for that! I love letters! And tell Sari I got hers last week too. Actually, a few months back Grandma sent me a letter and I got it, and it had money in it as well. Can you thank her for me? I've forgotten to say that I received the letters every week, but tell her thank you so much for the letter and money. 

I think that's it everybody, but I have one favor of you all to ask: please pray that my companion's drive to work will increase. His enthusiasm is almost at zero, and it's hard to work when all your companion does is nap all day. Seriously, that isn't as much as an over exaggeration as you think it might be.  I've done nothing but tried to lead by example. I get to studies on time, wake up on time, listen to good music, try to give him uplifting encouragement and correction to be a better missionary.  I have talked to President Maxwell about it, but I asked if he could not say anything to him because I know it would infuriate Elder Wade and crush our companionship entirely, and if we have to spend another transfer together with him knowing I am upset about his disobedience it'll be "not so good" for another 6 weeks.  Forcing a companion to work only sours them even more to working, so I don't know what to do.  I just know that this trail is put in front of me to help me learn something even though it's tough.  I'm busy all the time which makes it harder, but thank you for raising me to be a clean person, even a little OCD. For the past few days I've actually gotten out of bed half an hour early to make him breakfast and coax him out of bed on time with French toast. It's been working, but I need him to realize I can't baby him and hold his hand into being obedient.  I need help on what to do, and I've done (I think) almost everything in my power to try to encourage him without getting punched in the face (he absolutely HATES correction, and there's a lot that does need to be "straightened out"). I need some kind of help, advice, inspiration, ANYTHING to encourage him, but I guess the best thing right now it to ask for your prayers that he'll have a change of heart.

Anyways, thanks for the prayers in advance, I love you all, and as always, God be with you till we meet again.

-Elder Landon Cook

(Pictures: Elder Wade and I up on Mt. Wellington again because he's never been there)

More of us on Mt. Wellington (we were in our suits because we had interviews that day)

on a road to the top of Wellington 

More pictures on a road to the top of Wellington 

Another beautiful view

Boys will be boys

Even though it's spring I could still see my breath on top of the mountain,
 and Elder Wade just so happened to get a picture of me breathing out

This is one Tall tower 

Pouring and smoothing concrete at Todd's house

(left our legacy at the bottom of the trampoline hole)

Jack Prebble, basically the man

Pizza before watching General Conference 

So this week was a little bit disappointing in the way of hoping to have some new investigators, but all's well because the work continues!

Tuesday was Zone Conference, and that was amazingly insightful. President Maxwell and Sister Maxwell, along with the AP's, Elder Hartly and Seuli, flew down for it. It was like a seven our meeting, but it was just amazing. I love President Maxwell so much, I'm glad he's my mission president.

So although last week seemed like this week would be amazing, our hopes might've been just a teeny bit unrealistic. We got a referral from a member last week, and we're meeting with her this week. Her grandmother is a member in the church, and this referral, Maddi, who's 12, has been coming to church for the past year, and some of the members joke that she's more active in the ward then most of the youth in the church, but she hasn't been baptized! What!? So we met with her on Sunday and she's gonna start taking official missionary discussions and we'll work her towards baptism, hopefully pretty soon. I just hope that I don't get transferred out of here before I see her baptized, because I REALLY want to be a part of it, but if I do get transferred in the next few weeks it's because Heavenly Father needs me elsewhere. After church on Sunday a HUGE miracle happened!

So Elder Wade and I were inside the church closing up the church and making sure that everyone was out, and all of a sudden we got a call from Job Tai (the BEST member missionary I have ever met, and probably will ever meet) and he was saying "ELDERS!!! BOYS!!! A MIRACLE JUST HAPPENED!!!" and he told us how when he was walking to his car from church a random stranger walked up to him and asked "When does church start? I got a pass along card from some Elders in Europe and was wondering where I could find you guys." WHAT!!! Like, this is nothing short of amazing, and the fact that he walked up to Job, the kindest and literally the friendliest man I have ever met, was definitely led by the Holy Ghost. Our P-Day is supposed to go until 6:00 PM to go around and do what we want, but we're cutting our P-Day two hours short to meet with him at 4:00PM today. Job said he's WAY keen to meet with us, and Job said he'll tag along just to help us out. Pray that he will feel the impression of the Holy Ghost as we teach him the truths of the Gospel. But those missionaries in Europe... man, missionary work is definitely a team effort, no one can take the credit for anything at all, between multiple companionships, amazing members, and the testimony of His spirit, no one can say "I baptized this person". But the sad thing is that those European missionaries may never know how they've influenced this man's life, all because of a pass along card.

Our P-Day today in general is basically shot, because we're actually going to go do service for a member (Todd) after we go email (gon' go pour me some concrete today), then after that we're gonna go home, shower, and then go to the lesson with the guy Job met yesterday. We actually don't even have his name, but the fact that he gave Job his contact information right on the spot and wanted to meet with us missionaries the next day is absolutely miraculous. This week is gon' be a good one!

So that's that for now, but life on the mission field is going good. I make sure to take heaps of pictures and videos wherever I go, because Todd said that when he was on his mission the best way to capture the memories is by taking HEAPS of photos and videos, so that's what I'm gonna do from here on out. He says there are so many things that videos and pictures can capture than writing in a journal, and I want to capture these two years as best as I can. I love you all, keep safe and keep the faith, and as always, God be with you till we meet again.

-Elder Landon Cook

P.S.  Last P-Day we went down to the Gorge again, but this time we went to some place called Duck Reach, which is basically some power plant that was abandoned in the 60's off the side of the river, it was way cool, took tons of awesome pictures.

picture (instaGOLD) of the abandoned power plant

 

 

Power Plant



More of us at the Gorge river

 

Elder Wade begin 2Legit2Quit





Elder Wade

 

 

 

me at the Gorge river

 

 

 

 

 

Elder Seuli (the AP) and I



More of Elder Seuli and I (with the Zone Leader Elder Kaanapu in the background



Job Tai is basically the best member missionary I think I will ever meet in my life

Job Tai, his son Job Jr. JJ, Elder Wade and I took this picture after our 7k run at 530AM, it was awesome

Jai Eccles (Tim and Helene's 9 year old son) on top of a 30 foot tree

Elder Rock makin' some delicious spaghetti and'a meatballz

 

This wasp was terrorizing our bathroom and causing a ruckus for the past four days

so we did what any rational person would do..

 lure it with syrup on a plate, capture it,

 and THROW IT IN THE FREEZER!!!

Tim Eccles and I smashing Helene Eccles (his wife)
and Elder Wade in a 10 match game of tennis

Standing on corner in Tasmania Australia.
Ooops.... apparently breaking the law.  I better start moving

Wow, let me tell you about this week. It's literally been a week like none other, full of blessings and miraculous encounters like I've never experiences on my mission before. So for the past few weeks I've been doing absolutely everything that I can in order to try to help Elder Wade get pumped for working and trying to work hard in the missionary efforts, but no matter how much tracting or other means of finding we just weren't seeing any progress. We would tract for literally hours and hours a week, but just... nothing would happen, not even a new contact, and a real investigator was a rarity. Thursday night we were laying on our beds and wondering why our efforts don't seem to be working at all, and that we must be approaching working in Launceston at the wrong angle, and we decided from then on to start to put our efforts in working with members to gain their complete trust and friendship to receive referrals from them.

Well, we couldn't have gotten a bigger slap in the face from God that that was the right decision, because literally the next morning we got a call from the mission office up in Melbourne that we had a referral that has been trying to contact missionaries for the past few days. His name is Tim, and he's about in his 30's and is an awesome guy. He's actually met with missionaries in the past about a year ago, but when we talked to him and met up on Sunday before church he said he had the "sudden urge" to talk with missionaries again. Wow, just wow... amazing. He wasn't able to stay for church because he was sick, but that's alright. He wants to be taught again, and he LOVES how family oriented the church is, and thinks that the Word of Wisdom is brilliance. He's going back up to Sydney next week, so we want to meet with him a few times and try to convince him to come to church next week before he goes.

Saturday afternoon we played basketball with a member and one of his friends who are our age to see if we can eventually get him interested in what we have to teach. We played basketball for about an hour and a half and got to know him really well. His name is Jai and he's 17 which is awesome, so it's really easy to get on a personal level with him. It's funny, because the member who made friends with him is about 45, and they just became friends through playing basketball out in the open parks. We swung by Emma and Brendan's house, and they're a really keen young couple with a few kids that we actually tracted into. We saw that both of their cars were there at about dinner time and we swung by to see how everything was going. Brendan answered, and he said "Hey boys good to see you again. Why are you out so late?". Well, we be workin'! He said that they were having dinner, and that if we came by at an earlier time during the week they'd be more than glad to have to hear what we have to teach. He also said that both he and his wife read the Plan of Salvation pamphlet we gave them, so that was AMAZING to hear! Elder Wade and I are both pumped to teach them at the soonest time that we can.

Sunday after church we went to the a new contact we found also while tracting, and his name is Ray and he's about in his 50's or so. We went back when he said to come back but he wasn't there, but his 18 year old daughter was. She saw us when we were talking with her dad on Wednesday, so she was already more familiar with us than just normally tracting into her. We talked on the doorstep for about 20 minutes about this and that, and she's actually pretty chill. Her older brother actually knows someone in our ward who is on a mission in Japan who gets back in December and they're like BEST friends, so that's way cool too. She said that her parents work out of the house and that the she and her brother live at home, so she said we could probably swing by any time and teach the whole family. Awesome, awesome, AWESOME!!! And get this: she does weightlifting. She's not like buff or anything, but you know all those stories of people baptizing someone and then later getting married to them after the mission? Yeeeeaaaahhhhh... Jokes, jokes.

Sunday night we also had two lessons with member families: one a dinner appointment with the first counsellor of the bishopric and one with the previous stake president. We explained the Family Mission Plan to them, which is a way to get referrals from them and they both love the idea. They each gave us two referrals right there on the spot, and the way they explained them to us they are as good as active members they say. Wow, such an amazing week of blessings.

Not sure if this boy of mine can take a serious picture :)

So for weeks on weeks we've been working with almost no sign of progression, and literally in the past three days all of this comes pouring out on top of us. The Lord works in mysterious ways everybody, and there's no doubt about it that He is starting to show his miraculous wonders to us. Elder Wade and I are both extremely pumped to see the work continue to progress here in Launceston, and I know that as long as we work both smart and hard we will see the ward continue to see more people drawn unto Christ by entering into the waters of baptism to make that covenant with Him.

Everybody, the church is true. If it weren't then the work would never progress around the world at the rate that it does. I love you all, I love my mission, and I can't wait to see how this next week turns out. And as always everybody, God be with you till we meet again.

-Elder Landon Cook



Playing with the Furlan's bunny (1st councilor in the bishopric)



A detailed personal study of Lehi's dream

Our beautiful District Leader Elder Jensen