Week 70 - October 19, 2015 - Hyderabad, India

This week was super awesome.  We got to know the area a little bit better and it felt like we met some new members almost everyday.  I think one of the biggest problems is that a lot of people come to Hyderabad for a job for a few years and then they join the church and then they end up going back to their native place, so they end up getting lost and no one has any contact with them so that's why its seems like not many people are coming.

But we had a zone conference on Tuesday and we did alot of teaching focused on 5 minutes or less to help people feel the spirit of our message right off the bat.  This Sister from California is doing a research program on the Saints in India, so she has been traveling around trying to talk to a bunch of members collecting information for her research paper.  Then she wanted to interview my companion so we went to the Marriott Hotel and they had a buffet with a ton of desserts so it was hard to leave that place.

Then on Sunday morning, we had Praveen's baptism and this guy has been coming to church for like 6 months non stop, so I think he was really excited for yesterday.    The weeks are going to be pretty busy in preparation for everything.  This Stake kind of reminds me of President Uchtdorf's talk last April about the Potempkin village because it seems like now all of a sudden that an Apostle is coming, we need to activate the less actives and make the church look nice and start coming to meetings on time.  I guess sometimes it takes an Apostle to get things in order.

Things are going great though and Hyderabad is really awesome.  I think we are going on some exchanges this week and its always fun to work with the other missionaries.  Finally, I was on the bus on Saturday afternoon and out of nowhere this thought came to me about the eternal potential of man, and I think its really amazing how much good and change just a single person can bring into the world as long as he is committed to a noble cause.  I think many people just settle for who they are but if they can look beyond that and see who God wants them to be then great things can happen.

Love you all.

Elder Wakefield