Facebook Moments that truly make your think and shows Elder Killian's Testimony!!!

 

Pictures with comments by Aunt Wendi!!!!!!

 Elder Killian shares some pictures from his mission.  Because there are limited notes from Elder Killian on the pictures.  As his Aunt I will add in where necessary!!!

                                                 Real Men wear pink from Ron Jon surf shop!!!

Missionaries need a chance to enjoy the local area and it looks like Desmond is sporting his new hair cute.

                       "Hanging" Loose and just enjoying what life throws their way as missionaries/

Desmond overseeing the grilling of the beef or maybe because it has warmed up in Florida it may be "Gator Burger's"!!!

                                             The Sisters and the Elders enjoying a little snack!!!

Now looking close...there has been an encouragement to possibly eat all the snakes dumped down in Florida so.........."snake burgers".

I am guessing there is a Gator out in the water look at all the people watching and taking a picture!!

                                 When in doubt pizza is ALWAYS a GREAT meal for missionaries!!!

                                                    Desmond cooking up some yummy food!!

It Finally Happened!!

 Apparently we have a cold front moving in soon, which back home certainly wasn't fun news. Here in Rockledge though, it pretty much means I can finally get some solid use out of all the long sleeve shirts I bought for England! Speaking of weather, I finally got to see some legit "Florida rain" and it is pretty gnarly, it comes in massive sheets and builds up so fast that I finally understand why the entire state has an excellent drainage system on literally every road!

When it comes to the work itself, I have some great news! But I am first going to tell you about zone conference so I can build some suspense I guess. For those who may be unaware, zone conference is a massive gathering of every missionary in the zone (we still follow COVID precautions though) where we receive training from the AP's and President Ashcraft and his wife. It goes on for several hours so I will just give a highlight. The AP's gave a training where they took a tape measure and extended it to 100 inches where each inch represented a year in a person's lifespan. The had someone go and pinch the 18 and 20 inch marks to show just how short our missions are in the grand scheme of things, it was really cool!

Anyway, the really cool thing that happened was the sisters over in Port Saint John called about a week ago saying they may have a person who we can teach that they found but that lives in our area. A couple days later we have an appointment to meet with this guy and in the first ten minutes he is just like, "What do I have to do to get baptized?" Apparently he ghosted the sisters for a couple weeks to pray and ponder and he received a testimony that it is what he has to do! We put him on date for March 6th and we will be teaching him again soon! So even if we didn't find him ourselves, we have been trying very hard and the Zone Leaders said that the Lord sees our efforts and blesses us!

I love talking with you guys!

Elder Killian

Pic #1 - photo shoot at a practically abandoned park we were filming at the assist in our finding efforts

Pic #2 - we did some exchanges and so I went with Elder Chadburn, he is a cool dude

Pic #3 - the ocean got me good when my back was turned, we are allowed to wade in up to our knees but a wave hit me

Fun Pictures of the past week sent to his Mom

Here are some fun pictures that Desmond sent to his Mom.  I do not know all of the context behind them..BUT we know that the "meme" was made by one of the Sister's in the mission.

I am going to gain more than a testimony......

 The members have been feeding us really well, I jog every morning and it is just barely enough to fend off gaining weight. I'm not complaining though, with the members feeding us do frequently we are given that extra time to really try finding and teaching new people. While cold texting we have found that after sending an initial message about Jesus Christ, we generally lose people. So now we are trying to instead ask them if we can send them daily messages. Apparently that strategy has worked for other missionaries to build up a relationship with random people. We have about four people we text daily, we are playing the long game but we will get there eventually! 

We had this really funny experience where a guy we do service for weekly decided to show us this really cool park that is way underused. We actually took the district to it today for P-day because you are just hiking along with palm tree and ferns spilling onto the trail when...BAM! There is a nicely maintained soccer field with lights just chilling in the middle of the swamp. Anyway, this guy, Mike, is super cool. We are hiking around this park when we go off the path and behind a fence and he takes us out on this peninsula to that is surrounded by a huge lake that apparently had some crocodiles in it but we didn't see any personally. If this lake were in Idaho, it would be a hotspot for literally everyone, it is taken for granted out here. Then again, I probably wouldn't feel comfortable canoeing around in a lake with crocs in it.

I just want to say how awesome all of you guys are by the way. Sometimes I forget how often missionaries are prayed for and as soon as I remember I get like a jump-start instantaneously. I also got a couple packages this week that were super amazing (the rice crispies lasted a whole minute)!! Which reminds me that I have a couple letters I need to get writing!!

Everyone one of you is amazing!!!

Elder Killian

Pic #1 - The district playing at the secluded soccer field!! We played in the warm rain!

Pic #2 - Us on that nature walk, it was about two hours long!

Pic #3 - Rootbeer from a popular store called Publix, it's probably the most sugary soda I have seen in my life.

                            Note: From Aunt Wendi we also have a Publix and the soda is SUPER sweet.

The Warmest Winter!!!

 As a missionary, it can be very difficult to measure your own success. In "Preach my Gospel" it talks about success as a missionary and how it should be gaged. Overall, it is a very confusing matter that is pretty much dependent on the individual missionaries own goals and growth. The phrase "planting seeds" is used so frequently to talk about the future effects of our efforts when we can't see anything immediately happening. It is a great sentiment but...it is much nicer to see progress and not just know it is there. Which is exactly where faith ties in! We have to recognize the fact that it isn't our work, but Heavenly Father's, and his work stops for no one. This was a really long tangent which leads me to service, which is super awesome because we actually see results for our work the day that it happens!! With some of the service we have recently done, sometimes I just stop and think, "Wow! I am just over here in Florida helping a man I have never met before build a patio." The thought then follows that everyone should have an opportunity to serve a mission. The blessings that come with doing your best to bring peace and joy to other peoples' lives are indescribable!!

There are also the weird experiences, like how we helped a family move a piano by transporting it on an open trailer that was not meant to transport anything like a piano. Literally ten straps and forty-five minutes later we were on the road and it was stressful to watch. The piano swayed, tilted, and threatened to tip many times, but it ended up being OK, if not a little out of tune!

Pic #1 - a selfie of us on our way to deliver cookies to some Sister Missionaries

Pic #2 - Elder Moses and I by the papers we layed, it isn't perfect but definitely better than when we got to it

Pic #3 - an aloe vera plant I got from a member that I am trying to save!!