The Lord is hastening his work in His time. Brethren that time is now.

Dear Family, HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!

Thanks for the letter. It was good to hear from you and see how everyone is doing. So about your inquisition about the 9-year old and adopting her. As I read it, I just got this overwhelming feeling about it and feel that it's something that we should do. I agree on it. I will pray about it still and confirm my feelings, but as of right now I say do it.

That's good to hear about the Chinese new year. It was good to see how happy you all were and you all enjoyed it. We did indicators last night and the Chinese branch just loved the Chinese New Year. Not even half the members showed up....the Elders were sad about that, but it was funny also. I am glad you enjoyed my last letter. Last week really was a great week and a lot of good things took place. This week has also been a really good week, but it has had its bumps. I came down with the influenza last week and it about killed me.... (don't mind the words.) I was down for 2 days and today I am still hurting in the throat and things. I called Sister Olvera and got a hold of Doctor Chamberlain because I was getting nervous about the whole thing, if it was strep or if the flu would really hurt me or anything. He met with me and he said it wasn't strep, but just the flu and so I just slept and took ibuprofen for the body aches and I was good. 

I did get a letter today from Grandma and Grandpa Nelson, The Belnaps and Holly. 

So what happened this week. 

The Life of a Zone Leader: 

Last Monday we had to go pick up an Elder from President Meredith that needed to stay with us just that night and then Tuesday morning we had to get him all packed and get him to the mission home, got his bags weighed and then he took off. 

On Tuesday after we helped him get all packed we got a call from the Berkeley Elders and they needed to do a bike swap because their tire popped. So we grabbed the mission truck and headed out to Berkeley to pick them up and brought them to the mission home. We then helped them find a replacement bike and took them back home. So we spent most of the day helping Elders in our Zone which was a great opportunity to serve. That night we taught sister Garcia again and taught her one of the last commandments of chastity. Everything was good and they are married, Hurrah. We are so happy for them. She was listening so intently and when we talked about her baptismal date she was on top of things and it was so good! I am really excited for her. When we taught the of law of chastity, we told the two little daughters Rosa and Beledia to scurry off and play in another room. We taught another one of our investigators that night also, but it didn't go as well as hoped for. We watched "Finding Faith in Christ" which helped her grow her faith in Him. She still didn't read in the Book of Mormon so we read with her again. 

On Wednesday, we had Zone Conference. Zone Conference was really great! We had a district leader council that morning to get some items taken care of in the Zone. 

Zone Conference though went really well. We learned a lot about how to work with members. We watched a presentation From Elder Nelson to Bishops and then a presentation from President Meredith on making ward mission plans. We did a Zone Musical number that I put together. We sang "Lead Kindly Light" in Spanish, English and Chinese.  It turned out well, but the San Leandro Zone's song was amazing.

Picture of Zone Conference - I am on the right on the back row. (7th from right.)

After Zone Conference, we headed to see the Bejerano Family. It went really well. We watched the Restoration 20 minute video with the father and then the mom showed up. She is the one that knows the stake president and relief society president. Once she showed up you could tell the father got really nervous and didn't talk much after that. It went really well though in that lesson.

Afterward we went to the Temple Visitors Center with our investigator Sister Flores. We watched the Testaments with her and she really enjoyed it. Afterward she said that she could feel a battle going on inside her and she could feel the spirit working on her. It was such good progress with her. While we were there we went to another lesson with some recent converts about temples there. The Visitor Center sisters were a little worried about us because we had scheduled a appointment right after another. It went really well though. They call us the Visitor Center Elders because we are there so often. 

On Thursday we got up early because we had to pick up another Elder from the Assistants and were with him until lunch time when we did the same thing and took him to the mission home and got him all packed up. 

Stake Coordination: This was amazing!! I learned so much. I wasn't nervous at all; more just excited. We got there at 6:45 to meet with President Meredith and his councilor  We also were with Brother Davis the stake mission leader. We did an accounting for a month period of indicators for the Oakland Zone. Right afterward we went into a Bishops meeting with Elder Packer our Area 70, the stake presidency and our mission presidency. That was such an inspiring meeting.

Elder Packer read the scripture from D&C 88:73 about the Lord hastening his work in His time. He then said, "Brethren that time is now." He also told us about the MTC they are dedicating in Mexico. That school McKenzie was at. That was cool to hear about when he mentioned that. He said that the work is hastening. It was funny too, though because he said, "I know that we have these meetings and we all get excited and then it dies off about a week later. But this is different. This is a new time for the church and like Elder Mains said, 'The church will never be the same.'" That got me so excited. He mentioned that the work is moving forward like never before and that all of us as members and as a missionary force need to work together. I am so glad to be serving at this time and to get to work with these leaders. The Lord is moving forward the work. 

Friday night I started to get really sick so we had to cancel our exchanges. We met with a member family though and we got them excited for the work to move forward. We invited them to pray for missionary experiences and to stop praying for the missionaries. We need the help of the members to give us people to teach or we are going to have nothing to do. 

On Saturday I was super sick. I slept for a good 3 hours in the morning. We helped some members move that morning but it went well. 

That night was so awesome. We had an Elders Quorum dinner that night and we invited all of our investigators to come. The Garcia family attended, the Bejeranos and also Sister Flores. It was so good to see those investigators being with the members. We kept saying that we were fellow-shipping our investigators to death haha. After the dinner we ran over to the VC with the Bejerano family and did the Christus presentation and then showed them a quick tour of the Visitor Center. We were so blessed that day with our investigators. They are doing so well. 

On Sunday we had 2 investigators at church which was really good. That night we attended a baptismal service with Sister Flores so she could see that and help her to resolve some of her concerns.

We then spent the rest of the night working on maps to split up the sixth ward here on a command of President Meredith. The stake wants sisters and one less companionship in the Spanish ward in Oakland. We had to do some work to find safe areas for the sisters here in Oakland. 

This morning we went to meet with President in his office and we presented the map and he loved it. We are trying to make some big changes for this next transfer this next week. We are going to be staying, but our area will be changing. We are excited and hope to work with these new sisters and the Elders. 

We also had dinner with the Tongans. That's why the potato is the size of a football!

Well Thats about all. We are doing a district activity so we have to go but I love all of you! I am excited about the 9-year old. I will pray about it and let you know but I felt a strong impression about it and I am good with it. 

Love you all! 

Elder Hill