Elder McGuire in the Maritimes: When Blinding Storm Gusts Fret thy Shore, And Wild Waves Lash thy Strand

Monday, July 4, 2016

When Blinding Storm Gusts Fret thy Shore, And Wild Waves Lash thy Strand

Blend your kale! It's almost been two years of juice every morning

It's been 23 months and I finally bought a souvenir for my mission.
#Eastcoastlifestyle #sweatersatthebeach

Elder Wilson avoiding my selfies

Elder Argyle came prepared for Canada Day

Dear Family,
Happy Canada Day! This past Canada Day made me reflect on how much I
have been blessed to serve in such a beautiful country for the past
two years. I love the people of Canada. They are very spiritual people
that love to ask questions and make sure that everything is genuine.
They have a large commitment to family and community. I will forever
miss the way the old protestant churches look next to the bay water
and schooners everywhere with the sun setting. I love Canada. The line
that titles my letter is actually from the Newfoundland national
anthem. When I was in Newfoundland we would often meet people that
lived there when Newfoundland was it's own country. Back in 1949 when
Canada joined Newfoundland the anthem wasn't sung much anymore but I
will always sing it. There's something interesting about being
patriotic. I have often wondered why it's apart of the gospel as
before my mission I wasn't over zealous about country, government, or
politics. I still am not. However, I do have a testimony of being
involved with the community and loving your heritage. The people of
Atlantic Canada have a mixed descent of English, French, German,
Portuguese, and Mic Mac people. Before my mission I thought that I was
going to a cold boring place where everyone is old white and catholic.
Canada is a melting pot (or fruit salad if you want to be politically
correct). I love how each person is so passionate about who they are
and who they are striving to become. Even the angry ones who are rude
to me every single day I know that they made the choice to come to
earth and God placed them in Atlantic Canada for a reason.

The members of Atlantic Canada have remarkable faith. They are often
the only members at their work or their school or even on their
street. It takes faith to go to church each week despite not living in
an LDS community that thinks what you are doing is normal. God knew I
wasn't strong enough to be born out in the Maritimes, but He gave me
the privilege of serving the people here for a short time.

This past week we were blessed to find two new investigators. The
first one we found knocking, Jack. He is legit. He looks like
Nightcrawler from X-Men. He was born in Amsterdam and now lives in
Nova Scotia. He said that when he was 13 his parents were splitting up
and he wanted to know what he should do and so while he was looking at
this wooden statue of the Saviour in his house a knock was at the
door. It was two mormon missionaries who talked to him a little bit
and comforted him during his trial. Years passed and he became
obsessed with spiritual things. He bought a bunch of translations of
the bible and the koran and things like that. He had the elders over
all the time about 5 years ago every day but we don't have a record in
our books about that. He's pretty legit. We read from Alma 32 about
how he can know of the truth of what we teach by acting on it.

The second new investigator we found was Jim. The sisters street
contacted him at the bus stop in Bedford. Jim is an older french guy
from the acadian shores in Nova Scotia. We taught him the restoration
and then read a little bit from Mosiah 4 because he was wondering how
the world could stop all the wars and have peace. Service is the path
to peace. On Canada Day we got to be in the parade. I thought we were
going to get a lot of negative reactions but everyone was really
friendly. I'll try to find the photos that one of the members took of
me.

HURRAH FOR ISRAEL! HURRAH FOR CANADA! HURRAH FOR NEWFOUNDLAND!

Love,

Elder McGuire