Bishop, Thatcher PT

Hello Everyone! It's been a while; everything has been crazy hectic the last few weeks. Two weeks ago, I got assigned to Tchioco/Eiwa in the Lubango zone. However, I wasn't actually transferred for another week, so I ended up staying in Luanda for a bit. I decided to switch over to the other Elders' area that stayed in the same house just because I never got to work there before. It was actually really fun, and I got to help train a new American Elder! After the weird week of being transferred but not being transferred, I finally got to my new area! The area here is pretty cool. There's actually a Group here in addition to the Branch, so it's pretty interesting. The Group is very small, and we're working on having the members actually show up on time. My very first Sacrament meeting there, we started with three people in the congregation. The Branch is still very new, and we're working on getting all the things running as they should be and getting members t...

Hello Everyone! This week I had a bunch of exchanges; it's really fun getting to teach with other missionaries for the day. Every time I have an exchange, I get to see how other people teach lessons, follow the spirit, help others, and testify of Christ. It's truly incredible how many different ways there are to fulfill the missionary purpose. Every exchange and every companion I've had shows me that we are called for our specific abilities and talents. God makes us His tools as we are. Obviously, we grow and improve, but who we are and our individual abilities to touch lives is what makes the call so important. It's why I'm called to Angola and not some other mission, or why fallible people are called in the first place rather than perfect Preach My Gospel robots. Through God's help and His Spirit, our natural talents become His tools in the work of salvation. We've been doing a lot of finding recently, and we're starting to mark baptisms and grow our t...

Hello Everyone! This week we baptized and confirmed Arsénio! He's such a wonderful guy and has an incredible testimony of Christ. He's been helping us find more people and introducing us to his friends and family so that they can learn about Christ's church too! We had zone conference this week, and it was as amazing as always. I'm really thankful for my mission president and the APs; they are incredible and always make Zone Conference so spiritually uplifting! The trainings were super helpful and are definitely helping us focus more on our missionary purpose and converting others to Christ. We found a pizza place today, and when we ordered pizza, it came with the Angolan classic of corn on top. Unfortunately, it didn't have the shredded chicken that generally comes with it, but oh well. This isn't the first corn pizza I've had, and it's definitely not going to be my last. Don't knock it till you try it. Have a wonderful week! Elder Thatcher Bishop