Elder Hansen gave a good report on the status of their work. They are teaching lots of investigators right now and enjoying seeing them progress. They met with Rick again this week, the English student who has LDS friends in Utah. They taught him more about the gospel and feel like they are developing a friendship with him. Eric is also looking forward to the visit tomorrow of Elder M. Russell Ballard, an apostle and one of the general authorities of the LDS Church. As we reported previously, this is quite a rare honor for them to have such a great leader visit their mission. Eric reports that the mission president wants to make sure the missionaries have fresh haircuts, wear their best suits, and arrive early. :) Obviously, their spiritual preparation for such an occasion is the most important thing.
One of the young men who was recently baptized, John, has expressed a desire to serve a mission himself. Eric is excited about this and has been trying to help him prepare. John has accompanied Elders Hansen and Liu on many of their teaching appointments, and enjoys sharing the gospel with others. I'm not sure when or if he would actually be able to serve a mission, because the LDS Church is not currently recognized in China and members are not allowed to proselyte there. This really poses a problem for all of the Chinese members of the church, because when they return home, they will not be able to enjoy the fellowship and help of other members of the LDS Church to strengthen and inspire them. We are praying that situation will change in the near future.
Included in the photos we received earlier this week was the above photo of what appeared to be some kind of memorial plaque for a person who died in 1842. It is difficult to read, but says the man became a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in September of 1841. We asked Eric about this plaque in our e-mails this week. Turns out they were knocking on doors and met an elderly woman who showed them this plaque, which she said she had found many years ago in a shed on her property. She had no use for it, so she gave it to the missionaries. It is an extremely rare find, and is related to the earliest history of the LDS Church in England. The earliest Mormon missionaries came to England in 1837, but I'm not sure there were missionaries in this part of the country until 1841, so James Lees may have been one of the first converts. We are trying to see if we can find out more about him. Meanwhile, Elders Hansen and Liu turned the plaque over to the mission president. Eric believes it will be displayed at the Church's visitors center in London.
After seeing the crazy Circle of Life video we posted earlier this week, we asked Elder Hansen about their car. He reports that it is a Meriva, which is made by Vauxhall, a GM brand in the UK. I visited their website, and it looks like the car is pretty small. It appeared in the video that the three missionaries in the back seat were pretty cramped for space. On a related note, Eric has to get a UK driver's license. Apparently, this is an expensive and complicated process, including training with a driving instructor. He has to get used to roundabouts, driving on the left side of the road, and using his left hand for everything. One curious thing is that you automatically fail your test if you use hand-over-hand turning. I guess we do it wrong here.
Elder Hansen reported on the beauty of the area, especially the Peaks district which they have visited a few times. He said there are some decent places to rock climb, but unfortunately that activity is against mission rules (too dangerous apparently). He also said the Peaks district is actually within their assigned area, so they are trying to decide if they should go out there to knock on doors.
Finally, part of preparation day this week was to be spent playing basketball with a bunch of Chinese guys. Eric has been working on his basketball vocabulary in Chinese, so he hoped to be able to "spit game verbally and physically." Maybe he is the same old Eric after all.
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