The ex Office

Hello friends and family!

First off, I want to apologize in advance, as I will not be able to write everyone personally as with transfers I wont have very much time. I'm leaving!! wow it came sooner than expected but I'm excited. The Office has been pretty crazy, full of new experiences and other ways to serve in the Mission but I am feeling relieved to return to the normal line of work.

My new companion is named Elder Van Orden. He is from Idaho and known for his diligence as he doesnt let anyone pass in the road without talking to them about the gospel. Ive been able to walk with him a little and I'm excited to see how the work can be hastened in the Chamanculo Ward. I will have the chance to be a district leader again and I hope to be able to work with the district so that we can meet the goals that we have set.

 I am going to have a hard time leaving though as we were working with a bunch of amazing people towards baptism. Especially Estelio and Fred. But luckily, to finish the transfer we had a baptism this saturday of Emanuel. I had the honor to baptise him and the service was beautiful. Wilton who was baptised a month and a half ago, gave an amazing talk and invited his friends to church the next day. He has to be one of the most amazing converts that I have been able to see during my time on the mission. His faith and desire to learn and become better astounds me every time I see him and how meek he is with other people. I love him a ton and I will really miss him. Luckily as district leader in the same district that I was in, I will be able to do interviews and divisions with some people so I will still hopefully see some of these people later on.

I will miss working with Elder Stevens, it's been a ride hahaha. Having to learn how to run a lot of things in the mission without ever learning how, this will go down as some of my favorite time on the mission, especially after Elder Flitton and Elder Cordy were called to be Assistants and we lived in the same house hahaha too much fun. But everything has its time and its season and my season now is named Chamanculo, so I hope that it will all be great!

Love you all and I hope that everyone can continue to have faith in the directions and leadership of the church, God calls imperfect men but will always perfectly guide them in the direction that He knows is best. Até a próxima! (To the next)

-Elder Thornton

Emanuel's baptism

Maningue News August 2018

The Office: Road Trip and stuff

So a couple of things went down this week, so I'll just let you guys in on some of them. First off, we had stake conference and many of you out there are probably not aware of the fact that my companion Elder Stevens is a piano wizard..... so he played for the conference and all so we spent a ton of time there. It was an incredible conference.

Something that stood out to me was a story that was told in the last conference I was at in Beira but it still hit me pretty hard. It's the story of the large rock, where the master asks a man to push a huge rock every day from morning until night and then he leaves. The man accepts and starts diligently to push the rock with everything he has for days. Day after day he pushed and nothing happened, the rock never even moved. But he kept on pushing, then one day another man came to him and pointed out that he seemingly was wasting his time doing nothing. The man pushing the rock started to think and began to doubt what he was doing, "the task is not possible, if I only push a couple hours every day it won't make a difference" and so he started to slowly slack off. Soon the master returned and asked how the job was going. The man started to explain his doubt and his new found laziness towards a seemingly impossible task. Then the master explained to the man that he never asked the man to move the rock. The task was simply to give all of his effort pushing the rock, and such efforts had transformed the man's body. The master asked the man to look at his hands and arms. Then his legs. The man realized that he had become much much stronger than he was before. His muscles had seemingly transformed. Then the master said "The job was to push the rock, I always knew you wouldn't be able to move it but that wasn't the point. I wasn't so worried with where the rock went as much as I was with who you would become. If I want to move a rock, I'll do it myself."

This story has brought a lot of understanding about our purpose on earth. Our task is simple, read our scriptures, pray and be as the savior is who is in heaven, perfect.... wow a seemingly impossible task. Often times people will point to our lives and speak of money, fame, accomplishments, or popularity. They point to the rock and say, you haven't done a thing! This tactic of the devil has been used over and over again for years and years cleverly drawing our attention away from the things that have changed, like our patience, our love, our service, our devotion, our families and spouses. We are changing, pushing against the impossible day after day becoming what the master intended all along. I loved it. So that was conference.

Then we had an opportunity to go on a road trip with president to buy some clothes for him that he couldn't find in any other stores near by so we got to go with him and we had a fun time. Me and Elder Stevens and Elder Flitton and Cordy went with President and everything went super well.  We had a run in with the police that was pretty scary hahaha because they were telling me and Elder Cordy that we didn't have our documents when we had just renewed them so we didn't have physical copies but everything is alright!

Then last night president called us late and asked us to come over at 19. We asked why and he told us to bring some flour.... hahaha great answer. So we brought the flour and got to his house and found out that he wanted us to translate for him as a man from the United states would be face timing to ask for his daughters hand in marriage! Hahaha it was super cool to be able to meet him and translate for a moment like that. Luckily he accepted and gave his blessing so... phew hahaa but it really was a cool opportunity. Then we ate cake, hence the flour hahaha.

And that was the week! Life is too good and im excited for the transfers coming up and the mission tour from Elder Sitati here in a little.

-Elder Thornton

The Office: Elephants, Giraffes and Beaches oh my

The mission has been a dream lately and it seems to just get better and better every week. To start, on Saturday we were having a normal day, we taught a lesson to Emanuel and Ines, Iren and Ben who hopefully will be baptized on the 25 of this month, and then we were going home. Right now we are living with the AP's (Elder Cordy and Flitton) and so we got back, showered and everything and we got into bed and then ... the phone call. A missionary that was supposed to get here on Sunday magically showed up and president told us to get there as fast as we could because we didn't have any way to contact him. So we throw our clothes on, jump in the car and we go to the airport.... but get this, HE WASN'T THERE. At this point we were super confused so we asked some workers about him and they said that he was standing at the curb when a small mozambican showed up and he took the new missionary with him in a taxi....... Wow, I don't know if I have ever been that scared on my mission because we were the only ones from the church that knew he had gotten there. So we ran around the city trying to find him and after about an hour or two we finally found him at one of the chapels with the small dude that took him away. Man that was a crazy night.

Then the next day we went with president to a place called Zimpeto as they were opening a new chapel there. That was also an experience but it is a pretty nice little chapel and the sacramental service was also awesome.

Then on Monday..... hahaha I think it had to be my favorite P-day of all time, Presidente invited us to spend a p-day with him and Sister Senna and the first counselor of the Mission. We woke up super early and started our long car ride of 3 hours to the other side of the bay that Maputo sits on in order to go to what is called "the Elephant Park" which is pretty much a safari. We drove around all day seeing all types of animals and we finished at the ocean on one of the prettiest beaches I have ever been on. Many pictures were taken and I will send some of them.

Then yesterday we had a meeting with the new Elder and the new Sister that recently got here about the mission and all. We finished off the week with an amazing lesson with Esélio. We taught about Saul and Alma the younger as Esélio expressed doubts about the reality of repentance for a sinner like him. Wow, the spirit was incredibly strong and the lesson could not have gone more smoothly. We all ended up in tears and we ended with a baptismal date for the 1st of September.

I testify of the reality of Repentance and the difference that it makes in our lives. As stated in Mosiah 27:25,26  "E o Senhor disse-me: Não te admires de que toda a humanidade, sim, homens e mulheres, toda nação, tribl e líingua e povo tenham de nascer de novo; SIM, NASDER DE DEUS, SEREM MUDADOS DE SEU ESTADO CARNAL E DECAÍDO para um estado de retidão, sendo redimidos por Deus, tornando-se seus filhos e filhas. E tornam-se, assim, novas criaturas; e a menos que façam isto, não poderão de modo algum herday o reino de Deus."  (Translation: And the Lord said unto me: Marvel not that all mankind, yea, men and women, all nations, kindreds, tongues and people, must be born again; yea, born of God, changed from their carnal and fallen state, to a state of righteousness, being redeemed of God, becoming his sons and daughters;
 And thus they become new creatures; and unless they do this, they can in nowise inherit the kingdom of God.)

I know that there is always a way back to the loving arms of our father and creator. He may not always be happy with the decisions we make but that never will change the fact that he will always extend his arms beckoning us to come home while putting in our path all the steps we need to finally achieve his end goal of eternal salvation and joy for all man-kind. I love this work and the people I serve.  Hope you all have a great week.

-Love Elder Thornton

Awesome Sunrise or Sunset

 Elder Flitton and Jonny

 Elder Flitton, Elder Stevens and Jonny

 Elder Flitton, Pres. Senna, Sister Senna and Elder Cordy

 Elder Stevens and Jonny

 Elder Stevens, Jonny, Elder Cordy and Elder Flitton

 Elephant Park