Mormon 9:18-19 -> "And who shall say that Jesus Christ did not do many mighty miracles? And there were many mighty miracles wrought by the hands of the apostles. And if there were miracles wrought then, why has God ceased to be a God of miracles and yet be an unchangeable Being? And behold, I say unto you he changeth not; if so he would cease to be God; and he ceaseth not to be God, and is a God of miracles."

Dear family and friends,

It's amazing how fast time goes but also how much can happen in the little time we have. The last two weeks have been great and pretty eventful. First of all, happy birthday to Mom and Zach and Olive! So many birthdays in one week haha. I hope you all had fun and I love you all! Also, for everyone else, I hope the first couple weeks of 2017 are going well. My good friend Elder Smith went home just before the New Year and I'm sure he's tearing it up back in Utah. He will be missed here in the Netherlands.

Missionary life as a three-man is different, but exciting. We get along great. I'm not sure if there has ever been a companionship made up of a Utahn, a Kiwi, and Wisconsky (thank you Oma Buntin for the nickname), but we are making history as one of the best companionships and the best three-man to serve in the Netherlands. We work hard and we play hard and we have seen some miracles. I am a strong believer that the best missionary work is done when you have compunity and this transfer will be a testament of that truth. 

The first Friday of January we had a lesson with Diana where we set a goal with her to be baptized on 25 March. She is a little nervous and there are still some things we need to talk about with her, but she is full of faith. We hadn't met with her for a month and she hadn't been able to read too much in the scriptures so I think that lack of expsure to the Spirit has lead to some of her doubts and worries. She knows the message is true though and is willing to take steps to grow in faith and learn how she can take that next big step to follow Jesus Christ.

Things are going great with Gracia, Giorgio, and Ashley. They are a blessed family. They almost made it to church on they 8th but due to sickness and something else coming up they were unable to make it. The past couple of times we have been reviewing the first two lessons for Ashley because she didn't get to learn about those. She is great and is open to being taught and learning by the Spirit. We were able to meet her boyfriend this last time and he was hilarious and also a great singer. Him and Ashley sung some Beyonce for us before we left haha. He's super religious though and had a lot of good questions for us and accepted a Book of Mormon before we parted ways. Hopefully he'll be in attendance the next time we meet with the family.

Asmara bore her testimony in church a couple of weeks ago and we've been talking to her and she feels like she knows that the Church is true and the Gospel is restored... but she needs a dream to tell her to get baptized... aight. We'll keep working with her and who knows? Maybe God will give her a dream.

On the other side of things, it is very cold. The bothersome thing about Dutch winters is that it doesn't get cold enough to snow very much, but it is warm enough to rain. So it's pretty darn cold, and it's wet. I'll be honest, sometimes it's hard to want to leave the apartment and to go outisde, but thankfully we're usually not all feeling that way at the same time... usually... and so we do get out and work. This past Thursday we had a cool experience with staying out in the cold rain. We went and looked up this guy, Vincent, in Almere Haven. He is busy with cleaning up his house a little bit but very nice and said we can try again in a week and he should have time. So after that we bussed back towards home and it was 20:30 so it would've been easy to just be done and go inside and get out of the rain, but we decided to take a little walk and go look up a potential in Filmwijk. Her name is Jetta and she was home! We gave her a Book of Mormon in 2016 and she said we could come back after the New Year to see how she likes it. She had just read the introduction and the testimonies in the front and so we talked a little about that and then made an appointment for the next week to come and share the story of Joseph Smith. She is such a nice lady and her husband was even cool with us talking to her which is not always the case. We were able to close with a short prayer and say "tot volgende week!"

Friday evening we had dinner with the best family in the world (second to the Wright family). Familie Daniels is a "dry-Mormon" family. They basically believe almost everything we do and don't drink or smoke or anything, but aren't baptized or don't agree with some church doctrine.. not yet. They're so cool though. It was the first time Elder Enger and I had met them and I just felt so much love from them. They have three kids, one 14, one 7, and one 6. Their 6-year-old girl is adorable and reminded me of my nieces. They are also super duper spiritual and we had so many cool conversations with them. One of the best parts about them though is how much Tania and Monier love each other. It's so cool and they were telling us how they met and dang. Monier was smooth. It was a good night though and I'm super excited to get to know them better.

I'm super thankful for Almere and for Elder Gemmell and Elder Enger. Unfortunately we heard on Saturday evening that Elder Enger would be leaving for Belgium and the three man life was brought to an end. He left Monday and now it's just the Kiwi and Wisconsky taking on Almere. It's aight though. The time I've had here so far has been special and I've learned a lot and been able to grow a lot in many different ways. I'm excited to see what the remainder of this transfer holds and to keep seeing miracles being worked in the lives of those around me, and in my own. God is still a god of miracles, I know that to be true.

Love you all and tot volgende week!


liefs,

Elder Matt Wright





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