Grateful for Plan of Salvation and Eternal Marriage

Dear Family,
"Congratulations!" "Have a wonderful life together," "You two should have done this a long time ago," these were the type of remarks I heard all morning. This is because John Crew and Vivian Thomas were married!!!!!!!!!!!!! :D It was very exciting to be present for such a momentous day in both of their lives. It was fun and I am so excited for them to continue to progress in the gospel and be sealed in the temple next year! :) It really hit me when in the ceremony Bishop Strickland stated, "which covenant will last throughout the remained of their mortal lives." It really stuck out to me. I am so grateful that I have been blessed with a knowledge of the Plan of Salvation and know what will take place after the grave. I am also grateful that accompanied by this knowledge we are blessed to live in a time where temples dot the entire earth. All those who have a desire to receive the greatest of all of God's blessings are having the opportunity and access to go the temple.

In preparation for the wedding, we were asked to provide the cake. :) This was quite the experience. Luckily, John and Viv were not interested in a tier cake.  All they asked us to make was a fruit pizza. Fruit pizza is made by taking sugar cookie dough and making a big pizza crust, and then you cook it, and then you put cream cheese on top, smother the whole thing with powder sugar, and then top with sliced fruit, and then sprinkle with powder sugar on top! Elder Tran and I decided to make it last night, but our first attempt failed miserably. Both Elder Tran and I forgot about the cookie dough cooking, so we burnt it really bad. :) This morning we ran back to Walmart and grabbed some more cookie dough and this time we decided to form the dough into a giant heart. It worked out perfectly. And it passed the delicious test. Within Five minutes of bringing out the cake, it was all gone! :) Success. John Crew is getting baptized on The 20th of November.

On to the second star for the week! Bo Hyon Drake. Sister Drake is from South Korea. She is the nicest lady in the world. Every time we come over to her house, she makes us food. We always tell her that we do not need the food, but she insists until we submit to her wishes. Sister Drake loves Jesus Christ. Her greatest desire is to live with Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. We have been teaching Sister Drake and she accepted the invitation to be baptized! Sister Drake quit smoking and drinking coffee just because we told her it was a commandment. Sister Drake reminds me of the scripture in Alma Chapter 32:16, "Blessed are they who humble themselves without being compelled to be humble; or rather, in other words, blessed is [she] that believeth in the word of God, and is baptized without stubbornness of heart, yea without being brought to know the word, or even compelled to know, before they will believe." Yesterday Sister Drake was interviewed by President McConkie and was found worthy to be baptized! Her baptismal service is scheduled for tomorrow right after church, then she will be confirmed next week during sacrament; the same time John will be confirmed! The Lord is truly blessing us. It's because Elder Tran is the coolest missionary ever!

The rest of the week went as follows:
Monday: In the office during the morning. We had a specialized training meeting with the Newberry District in the evening. I've always know President is inspired, but Monday was really cool. A missionary has been struggling and I didn't agree with the way it was being handled, but in the end, President saved the day. It was humbling to see the Spirit of the Lord work through President McConkie.

Tuesday: Elder Tran and I were "volunteered" (more like "volun-told" as they say it in the army) to clean out the storage unit. It was an all day process. It's still is not perfect, but it is 100 times better than it was when we first got there.

Wednesday: During the morning we had Correlation with Brother Edwards. In the afternoon we had a Specialized Training meeting with the Downtown Columbia District. The meeting was really good. After the meeting we drove to Sumter to swap one of the new cars with a car that was sold this week. Sumter was the half way point between Marion (where the old car was and us, with the new car).

Thursday Elder Tran and I had the opportunity to proselyte the entire day! In case any of you wanted my opinion on black lights, I feel they are of the devil. Every time I have met someone who owns one, they always have an evil spirit about them. We met a man who had a very contentious spirit and his entire house was lit by black lights.

Friday : We began the day with a Post Development meeting. We were honored to have two chaplains attend our meeting. They both spoke about their experiences in the army and also gave us background info about basic training. I feel I will be able to relate better to the soldiers now that I have learned more about them. The rest of the day was tracting!

I hope all is well with all of you! I love each of you and keep being examples to those around you!
Love,
Elder Cowan
CPTP