HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Hey family!  So I will start off by saying that I am thankful for all of your prayers for Margot.  She was baptized this last saturday and confirmed on sunday. It was such a great weekend and I feel so grateful to have taken part in her conversion. She is the best and she said that she will send postcards to Irvine!

It was a great week!  We started off by going to Lyon for Mission Leadership Conference and there we learned about the new initiative that the Church is making called "He is the Gift."  It opens the 28th of November and it is going to be huge!  It is a great chance to get the world focused on the true meaning of Christmas during this Holiday Season.  On Thursday we presented this initiative to our missionaries with a Power Point presentation. The Church is buying the masthead space on YouTube and will have a strong presence on billboards in Times Square in December. We are pumped to share the "He is the Gift" video with members and amis alike.  For Zone Training, my companion and I also talked about having a "company of heroes" as a Zone. This is a Ben Bollard approach to things.  I talked about the Easy Company during WWII and about how they were a Band of Brothers all fighting together for a greater cause.  We as missionaries are doing the same thing and the fraternal and Christlike love we gain for each other is enormous. It was a really fun presentation. 

We are also preparing our other amis Marie-Antoinette for baptism on the 7th of December. So please don't stop the prayers. 

Tonight we are going the Kahnes' house. Their son served in California and he is so cool.  Jeremie and his wife are coming too.  I love this ward and these members.  A baptism will really show them that they can trust the missionaries.

Looks like Dad and Joe's family had fun in Vietnam this past couple weeks. Thanks for the invite.

Also huge shoutout to Audra and Pops for helping with my applications to college. 

 

LOVE YOU ALL AND HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

Elder Bollard

Bonjour from Toulouse

So to start out, I want to say sorry for not writing last week -things got really crazy. This last week has been one of the most eventful weeks of my mission so far.

For starters, Stake Conference was yesterday. The Toulouse Stake is enormous!  It covers from west of Toulouse to east of Montpelier.  There were around 400-500 people there. President Roney came with his wife. It was a great conference with some strong discourses based on unity in the branches and wards.  There are some really strong members here who are doing a lot to build up the Church.

The night before was the Priesthood Leadership Council for the entire stake. We and the Montpelier Zone Leaders (Elders Thompson and Crawley) were invited to come. President Roney was there and at the end he said "get ready to teach tomorrow at stake conference" to me and my companion. I freaked out.  So during his talk yesterday, he asked us to come to the podium (it was in a giant conference center) and teach the Stake something about the Savior. So Elder Montgomery and I walked to the podium and taught a lesson that neither of us really remember. It was pure scripture and testimony on the Atonement of Jesus Christ. One of the scriptures I shared was from Alma 7 and we taught parts of the Plan of Salvation. I felt like King Benjamin, not because I was teaching hundreds of people but because "my whole frame trembled exceedingly" (Mosiah 2:30).

After we spoke, we felt really good and I knew that the spirit had taken over.  As we were walking back up to our seats,  President Roney continued his talk.  He told the congregation that he had lost his mother while he was serving his mission and, at that moment, he decided to consecrate himself. He then said that the "same experience" had happened to me.  When I got back to my seat next to our ami, I looked at the member next to her and she was crying. It was a really cool experience.  It was a bit weird after the meeting because random people came up and hugged me. Haha. But the best was when we went to our ami Margot and introduced her to President Roney. She got emotional and said that she wants sons like us. She is getting baptized the 22nd of November.

Also, I found out that one of the amis that I found and taught in Pau was baptized this past week. The mission is too awesome.

It was so cool to see all of the pics of my family releasing balloons on Mom's Birthday. She was smiling for sure.

Wow I have a lot to say this week.

So - quick side story. The whole city of Toulouse is planning for riots. There was a man killed in Albi by the Police and now there have been major riots in Toulouse. The city was shut down on Saturday which was the day that all of the missionaires from the two zones got into Toulouse and we had to walk home cause the metros were closed. One equipe got tear gassed last week so I feel like I am playing Battlefield 4 sometimes. The French SWAT look like juggernauts with mustaches.

 

Anyways, the work is moving and we have Margot (from Polan) getting baptized the 22 of Nov and Marie-Antionette getting baptized the 6th Dec. Please pray for them.

The mission is the best and don't forget that the God loves you!

 

Elder Bollard

Elder Bollard had no time to write a group message this week.  He is busy with his current assignment as a Zone Leader.  He did take time out yesterday though to celebrate his Mother's Birthday by joining the family in sending a message to her in heaven.