Well this is it

 June 28, 2022

My last email. I can't believe it's already almost over! I will be returning home this Friday and I don't know how I feel about it. I'm obviously excited but it's been sad saying goodbye to so many people this week.

Anyways... this week was awesome!

On Thursday, We went on exchanges with the APs and that was a ton of fun. It was only for half a day. We visited a lot of people and had some cool lessons.

Friday was crazy! We had MLC and it was my last one. At the end, we had a small testimony meeting for all the departing missionaries and it was powerful. We also had our departing interviews!! It didn't really set in that I was leaving soon until then. It was at the mission home and it was great. 

Yesterday we had a really cool lesson with a couple returning members. We also had FHE and played water balloon volleyball! That was epic. That was my last time seeing the ward which is pretty sad. I love those guys

Elder Macfarlane 

Pic 1: Water Balloon Volleyball 

Pic 2-3: Last MLC

Pic 4: My good friend Doc

Zions Camp/ Off Site Zone Conference

 June 14, 2022

This week was sooo awesome!! It was a special week. We spent a LOT of time outside and doing tons of fun activities. It was the best!!

On Wednesday, the entire MLC met up at a church owned facility called Zions Camp. It was so fun. We recieved a little bit of training from President Metts, but most of the time we were doing different games/activities. The purpose of the different activities were to improve our critical thinking as a mission... and also to have a little fun. One of the leaders there, Sven, talked to us about the importance of prayer and always having a prayer in your heart. He is a spiritual beast. They had tons of "team building" exercises there and the MLCs job was to learn them cause we would be doing them with our stewardship later in the week! One of the activities was a HUGE wall that we all had to work together to get over. We were in groups of probably 10-12. It was so fun and a little stressful sometimes. Apparently one of the other groups had President Metts in it and they got him over the wall!! There is a video of it somewhere and it's hilarious. You don't see you mission president getting launched over a wall very often 

The training we received on Wednesday was super good. President talked about looking back. We did an activity that demonstrated how hard it is to walk in a straight line while looking backwards. The point he was trying to make was how hard it is as a missionary to move forward if we are always thinking of home or looking back to our old life. It was really good. He shared with us that we currently have 200 missionaries in the mission, and 50 will be going home in the next 2 months!! Thats crazy. I'm in that group. He basically invited us to press forward and not leave the mission with a culture of looking back. I never really thought about how as leaders, we can effect so many other missionaries.

Friday was also SO fun! We went to Zions camp again!! It's like a 3 hour drive there and back so it was a lot of driving. We had zone conference with half the mission. They kept calling it Off Site Zone Conference instead of Zions Camp for some reason. We all thought that was odd but funny. We did similar activities that we did on Wednesday but we were in charge of leading it. I think everyone had a good time and learned quite a bit. It was eye opening to me. I realized how young the mission is cause I don't know very many people anymore!! Its a little sad but that's just how it goes. People move on and new people come in. The best part of today was the end. They had all the departing missionaries give their final testimonies. President Metts called on me first!! I was caught off guard at first but it was good. It was a very spiritual moment for me. Not just giving my testimony, but hearing the testimonies of others and of some of my close friends I've made out here. The spirt was present and I could really feel it.

God is good and he loves you all!!

Elder Macfarlane 

Pic 1-3: Zions Camp

Pic 4-5: Interviews