Greenhill Close

So...we have spent a lot of time out and about and we still have almost no one to teach (apart from a few less actives). So that's a bit frustrating. Its not really that fun. But we'll keep going. Today we might go see an art gallery here in Wolverhampton that I heard about from Martin, our investigator in Rugby who let us paint with him at his house. That will be fun.

Our one ray of light, the one person who we have been working with who is actually progressing in the gospel is a returning member named Kris. He wants to come back to church, but he struggles socially. He was just baptised about 6 years ago. We had a really amazing experience with him the first Saturday evening I was here. We wanted to help him see how God could help him overcome his challenges, so we read Ether 12:27 with him. He then looked up and said something like, "I guess I just need come to church and have faith that God will help me overcome my weaknesses." We were just sitting there thinking, "yup, that's it. You got it." And he was at church with us the next morning. We had a few more really awesome lessons with him this week, he has a powerfully testimony of the truthfulness of the restored gospel and the reality of the plan of salvation. We are trying to bring as many members with us to see him so that he will be able to know more people and feel more comfortable when he comes to church. Hopefully this week when he comes to church he will speak with the bishop about preparing to receive the Aaronic priesthood.

That's about it for this week. We have been stopping by a lot of less actives and former investigators, so hopefully we'll get to build up our teaching pool more doing that, and find some people who are really ready to progress toward baptism and activity in the church. It will be awesome. I hope you all have an amazing week!

Love,

Elder Seth Poulsen

This is in our area here in Wolverhampton.  We were cycling past, so we had to stop and take a picture. 

*Mother's note - My maternal grandfather, Jack Greenhill, was born in England.  We still have family living within Seth's mission boundaries and we hope that he will have a chance to teach some of them.

A New Old Companion

1. Does this guy look familiar? Well, seven transfers (about 10 months ago, it was last June) ago I served with Elder Baker in Gloucester. Now I'm with him again, in Wolverhampton! Pretty crazy. I guess I'm sort of following in my father's footsteps by having the same companion more than once. Elder Baker was the District Leader here before, but he was released for his last transfer (yep, I'm killing him off in a month, he'll be headed back home to Colorado) and now I am. I was pretty surprised on Monday when I found out I would be with him again, but also pretty excited. Its going to be awesome. Just so you know, the clay pot in the foreground of the picture with the roll of sellotape on top of it is what we try to flick a paper football (made of an old train ticket) through during our companion study and planning sessions. It keeps things interesting. I can't quite remember the score right now...I think its 23-24 or something like that.

*Mother's note*  I sincerely feel guilty for including such an unflattering picture of Seth's companion.  (you would think he could have gotten a better shot)  I hope if the poor boy's mother ever sees this that she will forgive me

2. This is me at the rugby manufacturing museum in Rugby. The balls used to be made here by hand out of leather and shipped all over the world.

So this week was a bit rough as far as missionary work goes in the new area. On Tuesday I went around Rugby and said goodbye and shared my testimony with the people I taught there, it was great. A few of them gave me some nice cards. It was also great when I told them I knew that The Book of Mormon is true scripture from God that they could turn around and say back to me that they know it too--that is really cool. What an experience. Wednesday was transfer day! We took a train to Coventry and then I got picked up on a coach full of missionaries headed to the mission home. Upon arrival I met up with Elder Baker, and we headed back to Wolverhampton by train.

When I got here we had no lessons set up with investigators. We have set up many since then, but we still haven't yet sat down with anyone to have a lesson. Hopefully we will tonight, we have one set up. But so far we have had 11 out of 11 fall through. (I did have 10 out of 10 written there, then we just a moment ago received a text message cancelling our lesson for tonight) So that's pretty impressive, but not in a very good way I guess. But we will press on, and have faith in good things to come. The ward here seems good and supportive, so hopefully we will see some amazing things happen here. We have been on the streets a lot, talking to people and trying to find more people to teach. Hopefully this will work out! But whatever happens, we'll be sure to have a good time in the process. I love you all, thank you so much for all the love and support and prayers from home.

Love,

Elder Seth Poulsen

Elder Poulsen Buys Pointy Shoes?!?

Probably the spiritual highlight of this last week was getting to do a baptismal interview for this super amazing 12 year old kid named Haydn who was taught by the other Elders in our district here and was baptised by his older brother this weekend. He was awesome.  His testimony was so pure. He was a really cool kid too.  He has two brothers. When I first went into the interview he was really nervous, so I helped him feel comfortable by just talking to him and being his friend and telling him some crazy stories about my brothers and I making holes in walls (one example being when Boone's head ended up in the wall while running football plays in the upstairs hallway and another being when we were playing tag at our old house on Cherry lane and I chased Alex into table, sending the edge of the table through the wall). After that he was relaxed and was able to share his testimony of the gospel with me. Hopefully he will soon be ordained to the office of a deacon and be passing the sacrament. 

I was going to send you some pictures of shoes, but I never got around to it. I found out that I could get my shoes resoled because pretty much every town centre (if I write center, then the computer puts a red squiggly line under it)  in the country has a cobbler or two. So that's pretty cool, so I got one pair of my shoes resoled so they'll last a lot longer now. And then I also am going to have to send a picture sometime of the crazy shoes that I bought with some of my birthday money. They're super pointy and crazy looking. But they're also really cool, that's the style over here - even if it is useless for walking in because the front is so long. I'll probably mostly wear them Sundays for church. 

In other news, I'll probably be leaving Rugby this week! Pretty crazy. Maybe I'll get to go back to Wales, that would be sweet. But wherever I go, it will be amazing, because we are doing the work of the Lord! We'll see where I am next week...

I hope you all have an amazing week!

Love, 

Elder Seth Poulsen

Lame Sick Week

So this week was pretty lame because I got pretty sick. So not too much missionary work has been getting done in the last few days, just a lot of sleeping and some watching General Conference. Our teaching pool has expanded a little bit. It now consists of: 

•                a Latvian lady who will listen to us, but barely speaks English. We don't even have any supplies in Latvian, so that's difficult

•                a Muslim guy who doesn't want to change (maybe Elder Myrtaj will be able to help him out, he was sort of raised Muslim)

•                a really awesome Hungarian lady who has been reading The Book of Mormon in Hungarian and has a bunch of questions, but we can't answer them because she barely speaks English. Fortunately, there is a Hungarian Elder named Elder Magda serving in Coventry right now who is from Hungary and so we're probably going to get him over here this week to teach her and answer her questions. It will be awesome. 

So that's pretty cool, but obviously not the greatest. Hopefully I'll get better soon so that we can find some more amazing people to teach. We actually have an appointment scheduled for tonight with an awesome family, so hopefully I'm well enough to actually go to that and we don't have to reschedule it. Our recent converts Jan and Julie are still awesome, they both enjoyed conference and everything. 

General Conference was Awesome!!! I've only actually seen 3 of the sessions, but they were quite great and certainly helped me to answer some questions I had about how I can be better. I just love that! Its so cool when that happens. Revelation through prophets is amazing. I especially liked President Uchtdorf's talk about being grateful in our circumstances. Being grateful because of Jesus Christ, not because of stuff that we have.  Also, When I was watching one of the sessions at the Coventry chapel, a member brought a friend along and so I was able to chat with him and be his friend, so that was really awesome. He was a cool kid studying Psychology at a university there - really smart. I hope he gets baptised and serves a mission some day. That would be amazing. Anyway, I hope you all always remember that God is really awesome.

Love, 

Elder Seth Poulsen

My Birthday

My birthday was definitely awesome this week, just so you all know. For my next birthday I will be home! That is so crazy. Anyway, I was on exchange with Elder Hogge, a missionary in our district when I woke up on my birthday. They have tennis rackets and courts near their flat, so we got to play tennis in the morning before study! That was awesome. Then we had Zone Meeting, a meeting with all the missionaries serving in the Coventry stake here, so I got to have 26 missionaries sing me happy birthday in the most horrible voices that they could muster. It was great. A few people asked me if I would be doing anything on my birthday and I replied simply enough, "doing missionary work."

The other day I had dinner at this guy's house http://www.mormon.org/richard. It was pretty cool. 

The day after my birthday was my one year mark on the mission, pretty crazy. I have less time to go than I have already done. I don't think my brain has fully comprehended or understood that yet. But I guess that will come over time--meaning before I know what happens, I'll be home. Sometimes it seems like I have been on my mission forever, and sometimes it seems it has not been too long. But one thing is for sure. It has been amazing, and it will continue to be amazing. 

Unfortunately, our friend Peter did not get baptised this week as he is struggling with some health problems. But hopefully it will be happening in the near future. 

Our teaching pool here has gone from a pool to a puddle to pretty much nothing, so we'll be hitting the streets hard this week, with the faith to find the people that the Lord has prepared to receive the fullness of the Restored gospel. Thankfully, the weather has been good. It is going to be awesome!

 Love, 

Elder Seth Poulsen

"Them That Will Receive You"

This week has been good, we were able to successfully introduce our friend Peter to the Elders of the Warwick branch, he should be getting baptized this weekend if everything goes well. He is amazing. Its going to be awesome, we're going to get to drive over there to see it with a few of the members here who got to be good friends with him while he was here. In our own area, we are going to need to be focusing on getting our recent converts further integrated better into the ward (thankfully we have ward council this week, that should be good) and at the same time finding new people to teach and baptize. I am excited! The work of the Lord is good. 

I was particularly inspired by one passage as I studied from Preach My Gospel this morning. "You are to build up the Church by finding “them that will receive you” (D&C 42:8). Such people will recognize that you are the Lord’s servants. They will be willing to act on your message. Many of these people have been “kept from the truth [only] because they know not where to find it” (D&C 123:12)" (p. 156). This made me think of how the people we have been able to teach and baptize recently have been so prepared by the hand of the Lord to receive and act on the message we had to share with them. It is so awesome, and there are so many more people who are ready for it. And with the Lord's help, we will find them!

Love, 

Elder Poulsen

*Mother's note - bonus pictures this week emailed to me from Sister McSweeney, one of the members in Elder Poulsen's ward.  She made a special birthday meal complete with a cake to celebrate his birthday which is on Wednesday of this week.  Happy Birthday Elder Poulsen!!!

Make Sure You Pronounce it the British Way

1. So last p-day we went to a lake (technically a reservoir - make sure you pronounce that the British way in your head when you read it--I think its a French word and so the British way of pronouncing it is more correct anyway). We might go to another, smaller one today if we have time. God's beauty is good. 

2. Boats. I love them. 

3. Nigel's baptism! This guy is way awesome. I know, I haven't said much about him. He is dating a member of the ward here. He has awesome faith and when he is feeling the spirit, he says some amazing things. He almost took me down into the water with him when he went down, he's a bit bigger than the last person I baptized (who was 13 years old, if you remember correctly). But we both made it out alive, so it was ok. 

We have a few more people here on the road to baptism as well. One is this way awesome guy named Peter, he has been to church the last two weeks and to the baptisms. He's got some seeing and hearing impairments due to a motorbike accident he was in (plus more health problems as well), but his mind is so sharp, he all ready has an amazing understanding and testimony of the restoration. However, today he is moving to Stratford-upon-Avon (Shakespeare's birthplace!). But it will be cool because we'll get to go over there tomorrow to introduce him to the elders there (its part of the Warwick branch, in the same stake as us) and we'll get to go see his baptism in a few weeks assuming everything goes well. 

We also just started teaching an awesome couple who told us all ready that they want to be baptized. We have just been so exceedingly blessed in the work here. It’s awesome! God is so good.

I have been studying a lot about the Doctrine of Christ recently--how all men must take the steps of faith in Jesus Christ, Repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the holy ghost, and enduring to the end to find the fullness of joy in this life and in eternity. It is so apparent in the Book of Mormon, and its in the bible too if you seek it. Its so amazing! I am so thankful to be a member of the Lord Jesus Christ's true church Restored to the earth in these times and for the opportunity I have to help other people find it and receive the fullness as well. 

Love, 

Elder Poulsen