Weekly Update 02-07-11

     It has been a crazy week for us here in Jamaica! Living the life! So we were off to a somewhat of a rough start. My companion Elder Hunter was not feeling well at all this whole week. He all of a sudden had this huge infection in his mouth and he had canker sours all up in his mouth everywhere, and his gums were swollen as can be. You would have had to see it in order to fully understand, but it is seriously crazy. Something that I have never heard of before. He has herpes in his mouth. It has been a bit rough for him. As he was not feeling well I was making phone calls and getting appointments set up so that we can meet the wonderful people that we are going to be working with. The work here is so great in Jamaica, we have seen miracles already in which I will talk about in a bit. Getting blinded into an area is a lot of work, we got sent here knowing no one. It is kinda fun, because we just call people up and set up appointments, it is great being the new missionaries in town. 

     The highlight of my week and one of the highlights of my mission was that we had a General Authority come and speak to the Zone Leaders and also to the mission. It was so great to be able to have the opportunity to get to know him on a personal level. Elder Pearson is such a wonderful servant of the Lord and I look up to him in a lot of ways. The night that he came and spoke to us he told my companion for me to give him a blessing, and it was so great to give my companion a blessing.

     That same night when we got home after meeting with Elder Pearson, my companion was in major pain and we had to get some help. Luckily we live in the same house as the Mission Nurse, which she takes very good care of Elder Hunter and I, they even bought us some groceries. SHHHHH! No telling anyone about that, we keep that as our little secret. Anyways.... We went to the Emergency Room late that night and we got to the hospital at about 11 PM at night and we didnt get home until 5 AM the next morning, yeah... It was hard for us. We were so tired that morning, and we had to make it over to the Mission Office because Elder Pearson spoke to the entire mission. It was so great, but we were so tired.

     Now I am sure that you are all wondering about the miracles that we had that I began to talk to you about. Well... This Sunday church was so great. I happen to got transferred into an area where my recent converts the Bradford's moved. They havent been going to church as much lately and I went and saw them my first night here. I was able to talk to them and sure enough they showed up to church. It was testimony meeting and my companion and I both got up to share our testimonies. After we shared our testimonies everyone got up and was talking about the testimonies that we shared, it was so great. Sister Bradford then got up to share her testimony and talked about how the missionaries brought her back to church in East New York and baptized her 2 sons. She then said that, that missionary is here today Elder Doyle. It was a good first Sunday here. There was a guy that came up to me after sacrament meeting and told me that he has seen me before and he feels like he has met me before, but he doesnt know where. He has some children that arent members of the church. He said that he knows that I have to teach his daughters about the gospel, and the missionaries here have been trying to teach them for a long time. It was a miracle. Also another guy brought his friend to church and he isnt even a member in this ward, but his friend lives here in Jamaica. He introduced us to his friend and we are going to start teaching him. He seems so ready to accept the gospel. I know that there are going to be a lot of great things that are going to happen for us in the near future. It has only just begun. I now have to get going I love you all, I am completely out of time. I miss you all. I wish I had more time to talk, but I dont. LOVE YOU ALL!

Elder JD Doyle