It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas! Colchester has turned on the lights in town, and *drum roll* the 2016 Christmas Initiative comes out in Friday!
With the joy of Christmas approaching fast, it has been matched by an equally strong opposition. The past week was a definite refiners fire for us. Physical, mental, and spiritual exhaustion are all parts of the game as a missionary, and this past week seemed to have way more than normal.
Tuesday-Wednesday we were in London for an exchange. I always love going into London, especially at this time of year. The next exchange will be even better, because it will be right in the middle of the Christmas season. London feels significantly warmer than Colchester, because Colchester gets more northern ocean wind. We were out walking around in London all day Tuesday traveling to appointments and talking with people, and I even got to go south of the river to Kennington! South of the river is outside our mission, but the missionary I was with is in the Brittania ward, which covers everything inside the M25 (all of London, even south of the river).
Wednesday morning we left as soon as possible to get back here, and then drove to Ipswich for a meeting. We came back with two more missionaries and had our own exchange from Wednesday - Thursday. We have been so busy lately that we need exchanges in our area just to help us cover the work load we have.
Friday morning we had everyone in our zone leadership meet in Colchester and Skype into the mission office for a mission wide training meeting. We are starting to do more of these meetings over Skype to save time and money. Train tickets are not cheap, and neither is time as a missionary.
I can only try to describe the physical drain that is put on us, and I don't think I describe it very adequately. Those of you reading this that travel a lot know a bit about what I am talking about. What is even harder to describe is the mental and spiritual tolls we bear. If I had to describe my brain visually at the end of most days, it would look like an old TV with no cable connected- just white noise on the screen.
We are getting super excited for the Christmas initiative this year, as it is different from past years. In just a few days the video will be posted on
christmas.mormon.org
This years video includes an invitation to act- to find ways to serve in the month of December. We will be showing this video to everyone we can to make full use of it.
Cheers!
Elder Spencer Ammermon
England London Mission
64-68 Princes Gate, Exhibition Road
South Kensington
London
England SW7 2PA