Exchanges And Driving

Well, well, well, it has been a couple weeks since I have emailed! I have been extremely busy and haven't had a proper p-day in a while! Thankfully, I have time today to take a break and write wha has happened. It has been a blur! It is a really long email so no need to read all of it. 

Fun Australian experiences:

-Australia is known for their snakes. I was driving with some Elders in the middle of the Australian bush. We pulled over on the side of the road because I needed a bathroom break. I walked out into the bushes and one of the Elders from Australia said, “I wouldn't have dared go out that far because there are so many snakes!” He was pretty worried about me…but thankfully I didn't get bit by a snake! 

-I was driving at night through one of the local intersections. On the other side of the road a car was speeding through the intersection and then out of nowhere a brilliant flash of light blinded me. It was a speed camera flashing and getting a picture of the speeding car! I had never been so close to when a speed camera had gone off at night! 

-I was driving some Elders back to their flat one night when all of the sudden they started freaking out in the back seats because there was a very large baby huntsman spider crawling in and out of the window/door. They didn't know what to do. I had them all stop freaking out so I could drive safely. Then we made it to their flat and they all scrambled out of the car. Then we had all our flashlights on as we tried to find this spider and remove it from the car. Sadly, we never found it….so there is still a very large spider chilling in our van right now! :) 

-Another couple fun Australian words: Legend and champion. They will say it to let you know that you did a good job! I love when Australians call me a legend or champion because I feel like a champion haha. 

-It is officially spring in Australia now and we had fathers day!

The last couple of weeks highlights:

-Elder Mitchell and I drove into the Adelaide hills to a beautiful disc golf course! It had mountain biking trails which made me excited to hop back on my mountain bike in 10 months…

We played disc golf in the drizzling rain. And then we walked into a massive gang of kangaroos! There were probably 20 of them all eating grass. We got less than 5 feet away from them! Probably not the safest thing, but we couldn't believe that they weren't moving! I threw a stick at them but they still didn't budge. Then we made some loud noises and got some of them to hop away! They are the funnest animal to watch hop around! I was so close to just walking a little closer and petting them haha. But I wasn't feeling like boxing a kangaroo…

-We had to sadly drop an Elder off who was going home. Afterwards, we had MLC which went well! 

-The next day we did service by helping the senior couples move everything out of my old flat. I am going to miss that flat! I had lived there for 7 months! 

-Then the craziness started. We had a long 4 days of exchanges! On Thursday we drove up to Broken Hill! A six hour drive away. It was a beautiful drive with all sorts of vineyards and amazing plants! Then it slowly transitioned to the Australian bush as we left South Australia! Surprisingly, there were these massive groups of cactus. Not the normal cactus that you see in the states, but just different ones. Then we made it to New South Wales! That was pretty epic! I have now been in 4 of the 6ish states in Australia! The Elders gave us a warm welcome when we staggered into their flat at 9:00pm. 

-Let me tell you about the goats on this drive. In the Northern Territories there are wandering cows you have to watch out for everywhere. But in New South Wales there are heaps of goats everywhere! I don't know where they come from, but they are always clustered on the road. You really have to pay attention when you are driving. I started using my car horn to scatter them off the road! I have never used a car horn so much. It was like parting the red seas! Goats would go scattering to either side of the road. 

-The next morning we drove to Wilcannia which is a small gas station outpost town 2 hours outside of Broken Hill. We did some good missionary work up there! Gave some copies of the Book of Mormon out and got some lessons scheduled! I was with Elder Fiefia from the kingdom of Tonga and that made it fun! Elder Mitchell and I then drove back down through Broken Hill and then drove the 4 hours to Mildura! Mildrua was in another state of Australia! Victoria! Fun times except there were too many 30 minute time changes! 

The sun set early and so we had to drive 2 hours in the dark. And that was the most tiring and adrenaline pumping drive of my life because of the kangaroos! 

Let me illustrate: The sun had set….it was danger time…within the first ten minutes Elder Mitchell almost hit a kangaroo! It was crazy! He swerved just in time….

30 minutes later I took over the driving. But 15 minutes into me driving, I had to slam on the brakes and violently swerve a kangaroo… I barely missed it. It had jumped right in front of the car. Then for the next 30 minutes it was like there was a massive kangaroo patch. We probably saw 40+ kangaroos! I would drive and slam on my breaks every couple minutes! I only had to swerve 3 times. It felt like a weird video game! It was intense! It was really draining to watch out for all the kangaroos! Just driving and seeing their glowing eyes just sitting on the side of the road….

We were so happy and blessed to make it safely to the zone leaders flat that night! 

-Saturday we had exchanges in Robinvale with the zone leaders. It was another hour's drive from Mildura. It is islander paradise in Mildura and Robinvale! I literally felt like I was on the island of Tonga and felt like I was in the movie “the other side of heaven.” Had some nice lessons and Elder Vidal and I drove another hour to the border of the mission to teach this part member family from Vanuatu! Then we had a sports night with the Tongan youth and ysa! We played basketball and that was a blast! They were so much fun and it was both the most chill, but intense basketball game ever haha. 

-Sunday: We had a beautiful drive to church. There were blooming almond trees and rows upon rows of mandarin oranges! And also rows upon rows of grape vines! It is fruit pickers paradise! So many seasonal workers! We had church in Robinvale and I got to play the prelude music and all the Tongan youth sang to it! They are amazing singers! Then church was another experience! It was fast and testimony meeting and it was 95% in the Tongan language! So I didn't know anything anyone was saying! However, I could feel the spirit and that was all that mattered!  New favorite hymn: folofola. I have gotten pretty good at singing it! The Tongan language is beautiful! We had a member lunch afterwards and they fed us Tongan food! They didn't have horse for us to eat, but they promised if I came back next time they would feed me horse! They told us to eat, eat, eat, until we couldn't eat anymore! I loved spending time getting to know their culture! 

-We then drove to Berri which was 2 hours away. We had to go back into South Australia and they had this big checkpoint. They went through our car to make sure we weren't smuggling fruit or veggies…

Berri seemed like something out of a movie!  Another picking community. We went with the Elders to teach some Fijians! We walked into their big complex and it seemed like something out of a movie. Everyone spoke Fijian. So we were saying bula and kova vinka to everyone… I felt like I was in Fiji, haha. The milky way that night was beautiful! 

-Then Monday morning we drove back to Adelaide! Adelaide feels like home now! After being here for over a year, I have come to love Adelaide with all my heart! I just sighed a big sigh of relief when I entered Adelaide city. In the last 4 days we did 24+ hours of driving. We got back to the office and had to take Elder Larsen who had finished his mission to the airport! He was my first companion! By October, I will have dropped 4 of my 6 companions off at the airport to return home! I have also now been to every area in the mission. Pretty unreal. 

Spiritual thought: 

So I did a lot of driving and driving to Broken Hill. As I drove, the spirit asked me to relate this drive to faith. So I pondered and these are the thoughts I came up with:

I realized that I had never been to Broken Hill. Neither had my companion. We had to prepare and plan for it. We had faith, confidence, and trust that eventually we would make it to Broken Hill even though we had never been there. It got me thinking. Wow, I am really having faith that there will be this small little town in the middle of nowhere. 

Then I thought about the covenant path and the path back to our Heavenly Father. 

We have to have faith and trust and confidence that Heaven is real and that someday we will make it to our final destination. Sometimes it seems like we are in the middle of nowhere in the world and life. Just trees, bushes, and goats. Or school, work, and family. Sometimes it is hard to remember that we will make it to our destination, when we are in the middle of life. Along the covenant path we have little checkpoints. These checkpoints are baptism, receiving the Holy Ghost, the sacrament, temple covenants, patriarchal blessings…. These can be related to the little servos or petrol stations that helped us know we were on the right track. The GPS can be related to the spirit guiding us to Heaven and helping us stay on the right path and giving us the assurance we are on the correct course. When we go down the wrong path in life, the spirit can guide us to repent and turn back to the correct path just like the GPS. We have to keep pressing on the straight and narrow path just like we did when we were driving. Things tried to stop us or get in our way like goats, construction, or the dark of night. Just like life we have things that get in our way, try to distract us, or slow us down from our final destination. But thankfully things like the light of Jesus Christ can guide us through those challenges and our darkest hours. Our darkest hour was before we made it to the light of our final destination. We had our car lights to help us see just far enough ahead to take a step with faith. 

We had to have faith we would reach the destination. Just like life, we have never seen Heaven but we have read about it and have evidence of people who have been there. 

We ran out of petrol so we had to fuel up again. Just like life, it seems we will never make it and we run out of “petrol." That is why we recharge our spiritual batteries and fuel up every day by scripture study, prayer, partaking of the sacrament, and attending the temple. 

Then you finally make it to the destination....we arrived to a warm welcome by these happy Tongan Elders. They were overjoyed to see us and were expecting us! 

And oh how sweet the joy will be when we make it to Heaven. We will be welcomed in with open arms and you can wrap yourself in the loving embrace of your Savior. He will be expecting you! He will be overjoyed that you made it back and didn't get left behind on one of the forbidden roads of life. 

A couple scriptural thoughts: 

3 Nephi 27:14 

“And my Father sent me that I might be lifted up upon the cross; and after that I had been lifted up upon the cross, that I might draw all men unto me, that as I have been lifted up by men even so should men be lifted up by the Father, to stand before me, to be judged of their works, whether they be good or whether they be evil—”

Now think about this:

Can you imagine standing to be judged for your crimes by a judge who already paid the price for your wrongs and served your sentence before you even committed them? This is Christ; His judgment is mercy and will be justice for the oppressed. He will relieve our burdens when we give them to Him--offer Him your sorrows and failings and He will take them up! 

Romans 6:23 “For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” 

There are consequences for all of our actions. The law of restoration is very real. We will reap what we sow whether it is in this life or the next life! I am striving for the gift of eternal life made possible by Jesus Christ. 

This scripture also stood out to me this week:

Romans 12:2 “And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.”

In the world of changing values, family, friends, businesses, co-workers, and so many other things are trying to get you to conform to the world. They want you to let go of your standards and God's commandments. They want you to cast aside your morals and conform to the world's standards. But this scripture counsels us to instead be transformed by Jesus Christ’s atonement and prove that which is good, acceptable, perfect, and conform to the will of God. We must conform to God's way, not the world's way.  I invite you to choose one action to take this week to fortify your values and stand up for God’s standards when everything around you is telling you not to. It is all about integrity….

Well I hope and pray everyone has a great week! 

Here are the photos of the last couple weeks: https://photos.app.goo.gl/aQQ8KBNbu3WtdU5v6

Cheers,

-Elder Jones (zhang zhanglao)