Last Email From Elder Edwards.

Dear family,

This will be the last ever mission email I will write... That's crazy! Things here are definitely starting  to get all wrapped up and it's starting to almost feel real that the mission will end. Don't worry though we are still working hard and I have one last Baptism for this Saturday.

I can't wait to get home and tell you all about everything. I have so many stories but I don't think I'll ever be able to tell it all. 

  The highlight of this last week though was almost as a dream come true. I got a call last night from a recent convert of mine from Fogo (João and Natalia) informing me that yesterday they were interviewed and it was approved for them to go to the temple. Now, according to their visas, they will be getting sealed in Brazil this February or August! I am stoked for them and when I get home I will be able to talk with them on Skype!

Love you all. Hope all is well

TALK TO Y'ALL SOON!

3 Weeks To Go...

Dear family..

You're telling me that time goes by fast.. I only have three weeks left and days are passing by like hours..

As for mission work.. Things here are blowing up.. We had 84 people in church Sunday (when I got here it averaged 48-53), this week we have 2 baptisms and to be honest we have stopped focusing on baptizing. Here in Sal there are enough people for us to be a stake but there are over 300 inactives so we are all working our hardest to bring them all back and then we will baptize their friends and family ha. It is amazing to be a leader in this zone there seriously is soo much going on. President told me last week.. "Elder Edwards... You have a lot of responibility out there, in your hands there is a stake."  So we have all been working like crazy to "git r done"

Love you all. Talk to you soooon

Elder Edwards

Only Four Weeks To Go!

Hello my family,

I am still Zone leader and after last nights transfer I am going to finish my mission as Zone Leader in Sal and my new and last comp will be Elder Gomes from Fogo. The weather here just got perfect.. besides the fact at night it's a little bit cold (around 70 degrees)... Oh man the weather out there sounds like a nightmare!!! The turkey should be planned as soon as possible.. My body is suffering from a lack of turkey. I am going to need a ton of stuff when I get home... Everyday I keep thinking of stuff that I don't have, real cloths to wear, a phone, girlfriend, and much more...

As for this week... It was pretty hard. I spent the week with Djony and the first two days went really good. He showed up excited and ready to work.. Then after that he decided that mission work is exhausting and I spent the next 7 days dragging him around and trying to help to not be a fubeka.. I love Djony but I am excited to have a real comp now.. 

Well I only have 4 weeks left and the Mission President has entrusted me to save this branch and to strengthen

Sal so it can become a stake.  I plan to just go to work and get as much done as I can these next couple weeks. Time is going by super fast and I know I'll see you guys soon!

Love,

Elder Edwards

January 8th!

Hey family,

Well this week was really cool but kind of unexpected. So I went to Praia alone with the intention of coming back here with my new companion but that didnt actually work out... The Conference was amazing and was one of the most spiritual ones yet and then at the end President Oliveira told me that I wasn't actually going to receive a new comp until the end of the transfer (dec 8) and until then I would be serving with a mini missionary. I now have my mini missionary (djony my recent convert from

Santa Maria) and things are going very = good! I love djony and we just have a good time all day long and at the same time teach txeu lessons. 

Also the other good news I got is that my flight was bought and I am now set up to go home January 7th and my flight to slc arrives at 10:35 january 8th. Wahoo!!!

 I was thinking that you guys might like to come back and visit CV during the summer or spring time. Praia isnt all that interesting but I think you guys would really like to see Mindelo (mini Brazil) and Sal. There is a lot of cool history stuff there and after visiting the old salt plant today that was founded by the Portuguese I decided that one day I need to take you guys there. 

 Love you all a ton!

Just 5 weeks! Keep waiting but dont get too trunky.

Elder Edwards

Home Stretch.

Wow things here are passing as if the whole mission was just a dream. I only have 8 weeks left but it feels like just yesterday I was a new greenie trying to get used to mission life... and creole. It's going to be soo sad to leave the mission live and enter back into the real world but the time is coming and now I need to make sure that I am all prepared to be a grown up ha.

This week I had the most marvelous experience and I would like to invite you all to experiment the same thing this week. We had a meeting with all of our missionaries and the theme was about gratitude and how we need to always strive to be more and more grateful. "A person who is ungrateful is someone who doesn't recognize the Lord's hand in their life" if we strive to be grateful we will notice that God is in all aspects of our lives and is always blessing us. We read in D&C 58:7-8 about how the Lord expects us to be grateful in all things and we have the duty to offer up to him our sacrifice of a broken heart and a contrite spirit. So what I did to count my many blessings was on Saturday afternoon I started a fast with the intend of only thanking the Lord for EVERYTHING that I have and he has given to me and I didn't ask Him for anything. During the fast and especially during sacrament meeting I felt a new light come into my life and I realized that God is truly watching over me. When I got home from church I told my companion silmply.. " I love God" and that was exactly what I felt nothing else. It was really good and I'd like to invite all of you this Sunday to try the same thing and see how much God is already doing for you because then you will know how much he will do for you in the future.

Thanks for all of you help. 

With love,

Elder Edwards

ps please dont send anymore mail.. It probably wont get here

Coming Home.

Dear family,

Wow things here are weird and crazy... So I got everything figured out in Santa Maria and then last night I got a call from the president saying that he has to take the zone leaders out of santa maria and put us on the other side of the island because there they are killing the Lords work and once we fix them we can become a district.. So I am now in Espargos.. I have been thinking a lot about this and I think that I am going to start school in January... I wanted to extend because I didn't think I would have enough time to get everything set up in Santa Maria but now I have learned that the Lord is doing His work in His time. He didn't need a lot of time but it was him that pieced everything together and built up his church. Now my work here is coming to an end and I feel like it's time to start school and prepare to one day have a family..

 I hope all is well with you guys. Love you all.

Elder Edwards

***Update: We were planning on having Elder Edwards home before Christmas but they were unable to schedule a flight that would get him off the island in time. So he will be arriving back in the ol' US of A the first week of January. We can hardly wait!

Drum Roll Please....

Elder Edwards has his release date. He will be arriving January 2nd and we couldn't be more excited. I was really hoping we would have him back to spend Christmas with the family but the people of Cape Verde are lucky to have him a bit longer. Here is this weeks update from our Elder:

Dear Family,

   Drum role... Edwards' official coming home day as of today..... JANUARY 2ND! WAHOO! I talked to the mission pres and he said that my release date is the 2nd so I think that I should be flying in January 1st of December 31. That should be a good enough amount of time to get settled in, play a little bit of xbox, maybe buy a laptop for school, have a car? hopefully kiss a girl and get into school. That's about as far as I have though into things. 

 Today we finally moved into a new house which is looking sweet! It's a brand new apartment that has never been lived in before which is complimented perfectly with a brand new oven, fridge and washing machine.. Now we're living large and in charge. I think that I am going to be staying in this area for the next transfer (starting on the 5th) which should give me time to baptized all of our new amigos and realize our wedding.

Things this week having really started to turn around. We were praying to know how to better help our area and we both felt like we needed to leave a bunch of investigators that haven't been progressing. On Monday we set our minds and all of our faith to finding the elects that were ready to progress and ready to make there first steps to come closer to Christ. We ended up receiving a bunch of references and marked a new investigator with a baptismal date almost everyday. It never ceases to amaze me how full of miracles the Lords work is and how he will always answers our prayers and help his work to keep moving forward.

Love, Elder Edwards