HAPPY NEW YEAR

MERRY CHRISTMAS! I am sorry that this E-mail is a day late but because of the
Bank Holiday on Monday I’ve had to E-mail on Tuesday. I hope everyone had a
good Christmas and enjoyed a lot of good food and family time! It would even
seem that the Holiday spirit was strong enough to get Chelsey to write me an
E-mail! And it would seem that dad hasn’t been forwarding my E-mails to Chelsey
since October which makes me wonder which is worse the fact that Chelsey hasn’t
been getting my E-mails or the fact that she just barley figured it out :P. Any
who Christmas sounded amazing back in the US/Hawaii (St. George McKenna’s)/Rome
(Ma and Pa) and it was wonderful here in Britain!

The St. George McKenna’s have been celebrating their Christmas Holiday in Hawaii
enjoying sunsets and crab chases, Mom and dad are still enjoying their cruise,
Chelsey went to the Huston McKenna’s for some delicious turkey, and over here in
England for Christmas Eve we got together with Elder Curgenven & Sharrard and
made a delicious turkey with some vegetables, Yorkshire puddings, roasties, and
of course gravy :). After dinner we watched the Lion King and Finding Nemo on a
projector in the relief society room! It was a wonderful Christmas Eve and to
top it all off we wore matching PJ’s :)! (Everyone’s parents use to give them
PJ’s for Christmas Eve and so we decided to keep the tradition going).
Christmas day we started off with an American breakfast at the Nowells house and
then for the evening went to Stu Pattendons house who is a YSA in the ward;
during Christmas day we watched the Polar Express and Prince Caspian. For New
Years Eve we are planning to hang out with Phil, Rachel, and the Sumner’s for
some food and board games and then off to Louis for some X-Box 360 racing games
:). On New Years day we are going to the Chapel to watch as many movies as we
can and then in the evening we’re going to the Padrove family for some Uno and a
New Years Day feast. It should make for a pretty fun New Year. But despite the
festivities of the holiday missionary work presses on!

We had something amazing happen this past week… Louise Moyo wants to get
baptized! We never thought that she would be strong enough to make that step
(she was the one who had the horrible accident as a child which has made her
terrified to go under water) but she has! We had a wonderful lesson with her on
Wednesday in which the Spirit was very strong! The topic of our lesson was
obedience. We discussed Abraham, Nephi, and focused on the promise that there
is no commandment that God gives us that we can’t accomplish. It was a
painlessly plain lesson; the Spirit was defiantly there, and at the end Louise
told us that she wanted to take the steps necessary for baptism! IT IS SO
AMAZING! I love being a part of this work so much! Because I absolutely know
that there is nothing that could have persuaded her to make that choice, then
the power of the Holy Ghost! I love my Heavenly Father so much and I love
seeing the change that is wrought upon the hearts of the people! I will miss
this work… but I know that I still have a few weeks to make a difference and I
am determined to do so! The Church is true, Joseph Smith was a prophet, the
Book of Mormon is the word of God, Christ lives! And I will do all that I can
to help people understand that!

With all of my love,
Elder McKenna

P.S. The baptism is for Louise is planned for January 23rd (the last weekend
before I go home)

CHRISTMAS TIME!

Hello! It would seem that everyone is still busy enjoying Christmas season and
all the magic it brings! Once again I didn’t get any E-mails (except for the
St. George clan who took the Christlike attribute of diligence to heart and sent
an E-mail off to the UK), mum, and pa. But you have been sending a lot of love
via royal mail so thank you for the post and pictures (I got the Thanksgiving
photos! They were great).

The St. George McKenna’s seem to be doing well getting ready for the Christmas
season and their luxurious trip to Hawaii! Ellyse is bonding with her pig
Wilbur, Meghan is dominating the boy football teams, Jackson scored his first
goal (the first of many :)), and Carson is enjoying the time off of school;
while mom and dad outrun a storm on the open sea which seems to have SMASHED
itself right into Britain! These past few days have been crazy! I have never
seen such bad weather in my whole mission! The whole country seems to be
covered in snow! We have about 3 inches here in Chorley but it seems that the
storm has passed and is smashing down south. It’s funny because I always
thought that the weather here couldn’t really get any worse and then BAM! We
get a snowstorm! So needless to say it is ridiculously cold over here! But
overall life is great and in answer to a few questions… no, I’ve never really
heard who Roy Keane is but I’m sure that I’ve just never heard of him because
I’ve never really brought him up, if he was the captain of Man U I can imagine
that EVERYONE knows who he is… My release date is January 27th, and I will be
arriving home January 28 or 29th I don’t know exactly yet… My Christmas plans
include the following:
Christmas Eve: going to the chapel with Elder Sharrard and Curgenven to make a
Turkey dinner and watch movies.
Christmas Day: American French toast and Pancakes at the Nowells for breakfast,
then on to games and movies with Phil and Rachel with lunch, and then off to the
Pattendons for tea and movies! This year we are allowed to watch the Toy
Stories, Narnias, Miracle on 34th street, lion king, The Polar Express, and play
racing and sport video games! It’s going to be pretty awesome!

Well, Things over here are going amazing as always! Despite the freezing
temperatures and torrential snow storms, things are always pushing forward in
the Lords work :). PHIL AND RACHEL ARE GETTING MARRIED! Phil finally popped
the question (actually Rachel told him that they were going to get married and
he said ‘O.K.’) and in their unromantic style :) the two of them went to get a
ring, Rachel picked it, Phil bought it, then wrapped it, and put it under the
tree until Christmas :)… despite the lack of creativity I’m just happy the two
of them are finally sealing the deal so I don’t have to constantly worry about
them! Louis is doing well but because he hasn’t been able to get work he has
had to move back in with his mum. Louise and Jane are amazing and Louise is
working towards her baptism. We have met some more amazing people who have
great potential. But unfortunately I just don’t have time to write… I love you
all tons! I’ll call around 6 or 7 PM on 274 1302! And I don’t know if I’ll be
able to E-mail next week because I think the Libraries will all be closed :(.

Love,
Elder McKenna

p.s. MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ONE AND ALL! :)

Transfers!

Thank you for all the Christmas packages and all the amazing letters! All is forgiven for the lack of E-mails and you have officially made Elder Atkin jealous by the amount of love being sent via British Royal post :). I'm sorry that I wasn't able to E-mail on Monday but this week is transfer week and as such our P-day is on Wednesday and. I WASN'T TRANSFERRED! I thought for sure I was going to be transferred, because Elder Atkin and I came out together, but President is allowing us to stay together so that we can die together here in Chorley! It's pretty amazing because Elder Atkin, Elder Newson (Elder Newson was the missionary who I met at the airport, me and him are the only ones from Vegas), and myself have become good friends and now I get to end my mission with one of them!

Well, things back home seem to be going great but unfortunately I have no time to E-mail today because it's transfer day and we have some things that we have to take care of for the zone. But I love you all a ton and for my parentals I'll e-mail the time I'll be calling you (on your luxurious cruise liner) next week but it will probably be around 7 pm English time so I don't know what time you'll be because I won't know were in the world you are :).

All of my Love,
Elder McKenna

Rachel was BAPTISED!

Hello! Things back home must be pretty busy with Christmas and the Holidays so
much so that NO ONE EVEN WROTE ME AN E-MAIL! I know that the life size picture
thing looks a lot like me but I’m still not home, still out here on my mission,
and an E-mail would be nice now and again :). But I still love you and hope
that the Spirit of Christmas will fill your hearts with love for your wee little
brother, enough so that you’ll send him an E-mail.

Okay, rebuking aside, the only information I really have to relate from mom and
dad’s email (because they are the only ones who HAVE E-mailed me) is that
they’re getting ready for their cruise and it sounds like it is going to be
amazing! And in answer to the question that was given to me by mom and dad
(because they are the only ones who HAVE E-mailed me)… Senior missionaries are
amazing! I love the senior missionaries here in the EMM, they are the ones that
the rest of us look up to and they are always there to bring a bit of comfort
when you may be having a difficult time. Overall it seems like mom and dad are
doing extremely well and thank you for letting Jaryn’s sister know to let Jaryn
know to write me a letter!

Well, another week and another E-mail. Usually I have a very difficult time
with what to write about but this week I’m defiantly going to write about
Rachel’s baptism and confirmation. Rachel Johnstone was baptised on December
05, 2009 by Elder Larson (who came down from Manchester to be at the baptism).
The baptism was extremely spiritual… The speakers were inspired and gave
beautiful sermons, the songs were festive (we ended up singing ‘joy to the
world’ and ‘once in Royal David’s city’ because Rachel doesn’t like how slow all
the other hymns are (she use to be Church of England and they sing some pretty
intense hymns)), and the people were touched, but I think what really shows the
kind of person Rachel is was summed up in the actual baptism. Normally during a
baptism the person being immersed doesn’t say anything at all they just go into
the water quietly and the ordinance is performed… not Rachel. When she and
Elder Larson got into the water they realized that it was a bit cold and Rachel
walked up to the glass of the font, looked out into the crowd, found Brother
Casewell (he was the one who filled the font), pointed her finger at him and
said “He’s the one to blame for this cold water!” that pretty much sums up the
‘firecracker’ Rachel is… She was baptized and it was an amazing event. The
following day (Sunday, the day of confirmation) I had the privilege of
confirming Rachel a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
and to bestow the gift of the Holy Ghost upon her. After which the congregation
began to bear their testimonies. One by one the members went up and bore
testimony of the Gospel and our Saviour and then Rachel stood up, walked up to
the podium, and bore her testimony which was beautiful and filled with the Holy
Ghost… but before she started to bear her testimony she thought that she would
implement something she had learned to do as a little kid to catch peoples
attention so she said, “alright I want to try something real quick, raise your
hand if you had a piece of toast for breakfast (pause), now raise your hand if
you had a bowl of cereal for breakfast (pause), O.K. now that I have your
attention I’ll start with what I want to say.” The only problem with this was
that everyone was fasting (because it was fast and testimony meeting) and so no
one raised there hand at all… after she had finished, sat down next to me, and
about 4 other testimonies were given she leaned over and whispered, “everyone is
fasting today aren’t they” I just started to laugh and Rachel turned about as
red as an Apple. Despite Rachel asking if people had eaten on Fast Sunday the
meeting was amazing and Rachel just seems to radiate cheerfulness now that she
has been baptised and confirmed. As for Phil he was present at all the events,
has been very supportive, and I still think he is going to propose to her this
Christmas! He knows the church is true and is just doing things on his own time
scale, eventually I know he’ll join as well.

Overall life is great as a missionary… The sky is blue the church is true and
the Book of Mormon is too.

Love,
Elder McKenna

P.S. the Birthday presents for December Birthdays are going to be a bit late...
sorrey :)