RUBY!

Jacob and his cousin Ruby who is in London for a week with Utah State.

This week has been really really good but super stressful. We had lots of meeting this week and trainings but I learned a lot and I am excited to apply what I learned to the work. So we have had some tough things happen this week. First off, F, the man who had been looking for me ended up dropping us because he is moving away. So that was tough for us after the miracle that we saw with finding him again and bringing him back to church. But we hope and pray when he comes back he will contact missionaries again. We also found out that D's boss changed his work hours and he now has to work on Sunday's and every other day from 6 in the morning to 6 in the evening. All he wants to do is come to church but he also needs to support his family back home in Africa. So he will not be able to make his baptismal date on the 12th of March. He was super sad about it but he said he still is willing to work towards baptism no matter how long it takes. He really loves the gospel so much so I'm not worried. We fasted with him on Sunday for his job and that he would be able to find a way to come to church.

So I was on exchange this week with one of our zone leader Elder cook. He's a way sick guy. He's from Heber Utah and knows a few of our buddies from the MTC. Anyways, we had a pretty crazy lesson and some guy freaked the heck out at us and told us we were preaching false doctrine to this girl and it made me super angry haha so we just left.

So this week we were finding on Exhibition Road and I stopped this man who looked a bit sad. We started talking and he said he was in a hurry. I knew he was from South America so I asked him where he was from. And he said CHILE! Hahaha I was pumped! I told him Sam was living there and he got all stoked and we started talking about Chilean life and he was just super super cool. He had seen missionaries in Chile but he wasn't interested. We asked if he would like to come take a tour in the VC and he said no. He wasn't very interested, but we did share our testimonies with him and it was one of the most spiritual experiences I have had. I don't know why, but I do know he felt the spirit and he was very humble and grateful for our testimonies. I hope he can find some missionaries in Chile one day. But that was super cool. We later on found a super cool Mexican guy who loves the Book of Mormon but he lives far away so we referred him to some elders in Gilford.

Well something crazy happened on Saturday hahaha. So we were contacting all over London and we were heading back to the chapel and while we were walking up the stairs I hear "JAKE!" I flip my head around still in normal person mode because I responded to Jake not just Elder Parkin. And sure enough Ruby was walking up towards the chapel! It was so awesome haha. We gave each other a big hug and talked for a bit. Thanks for the packages! It was so good to see her haha. It almost felt normal and like I hadn't seen her for just a few weeks. But it made my day and it was totally unplanned but perfect timing haha. I guess Parkins just have connections haha.

This makes me sooooooo happy!!!!

Lords Hand

I saw the lord’s hand in D this week. I received an email from Bedford ward news and it had a picture of D and his son C in the baptismal clothes. D was able to baptize C on Saturday and it made me so happy. I know the Lord is really helping that family and I'm so glad I was able to get to know them.

Two months ago at D's baptism

D baptizing his son on Saturday!!!

But my week was good. I hope all is well back home. I love and miss you guys. Keep being the best family in the world. Thank you for everything. I love you!

Jake