Monday, June 16, 2014

The Church is Growing Quickly!

Wow, there are lots of cool things happening!
That's awesome that Braden is starting his papers! What would be cool is if he left the beginning of January, because then they normally send them home just before Christmas. That way he would only miss one Christmas! I'm glad to hear about dad's promotion. I prayed this week that that would be able to work out soon. And it did! Conner, you are awesome, and you have a lot of faith. It's incredible how much of a difference little things can make.
 In Doctrine and Covenants it says that through little things I accomplish great things. Little things like scripture study, prayer, FHE, visiting and home teaching can make all the difference in the world. I have seen that here. As those things begin to stop, our lives slowly deteriorate, in a way that we don't even recognize it. But when we begin to do those things again, we see how much of a difference that makes. As a missionary would say: "Will you do daily scripture study and prayer, weekly FHE, and do your visiting and home teaching? I promise that if you do, your quality of life will increase. You will start to see miracles in your life. You will be more in tune with the spirit, and your house will be more like a home." I've seen how much these things help. Remember, God gives us all things. He only asks a little in return. We will always be unprofitable servants. Because even if we try to pay him back, He will pour even more blessings upon us. Ok, anyway, that's enough of my soapbox haha. 
We had an incredible week. Time is going by so fast! I've already been with Elder Ralison for almost half a transfer! We're hoping that we'll get one more together. If for nothing else because we have a huge sector and it's really hard to figure out all the neighborhoods. 
Tuesday we had an awesome lesson with Rocia, who was supposed to be baptized last week. We had an incredible lesson. The Spirit was really strong. It prompted me to say, "The idea isn't to be perfect so you can be baptized, but to be baptized so you can be perfect." After I said that, I didn't know what to say. I had never even thought of that before. But it was an awesome example of following the Spirit. And it really helped her. Now she is going to pray about a date to decide when she will be baptized.
Wednesday we had district meeting. And big news! On the 29th of June, there will be a city-wide conference for all the members in Pointe-Noire to divide a branch! And we are also going to organize a district!! That is big news! A huge step in the right direction! And we're waiting on the papers to divide another branch! That will put us at five!!! We are coming very close to a stake. It's really exciting. All the members are really excited. A district means a district president which takes the responsability off of the mission president and allows real training programs and a more functional church here in Pointe Noire! Later that day we had a lesson with the Louzolo family. They told stories about the war between the two Congos in the 90's. At one point his whole family was put on their knees and they were going to kill them, but miraculously because he is a doctor they put him on a train to come to Pointe Noire. Another member said that his family had followed the prophet's counsel to have a food storage. So they were able to live for a couple weeks before they decided where they were going to flee to. They prayed and ended up going the direction opposite of what common sense said. And instead of following the road, they followed the rails, even though everyone thought they were crazy for doing that. They found out later that there was military waiting on that road killing all the young men that came by. You couldn't go 10 feet without stepping over a dead body. Crazy stories. Just more examples of the importance of following the Spirit.
Friday we had another awesome day. We got 7 lessons in again! One of which was with someone named Vekache. We met him about 2 weeks ago. We went to teach him the second lesson and said he wanted to be baptized. We asked when he thought he would be ready and he said next saturday! He said even if you have to come every day next week I'll do it so I can get baptized. It might be closer to 3 weeks, but it's going to be really awesome! 
This last week members were giving us lots of food. We got a total of 3 papayas, 6 massive avocados, a pineapple, kwanga (cassava stuff), some sort of yams, and a whole frozen chicken! It was really cool. The people here are very kind and generous. 
Sunday we had an awesome day at church. We had 15 investigators from our sector at church! There was a couple that came for the first time that came up to me after church and said "What do I have to do to be baptized in this church." I responded "We can help you with that." haha So cool! The people here are incredible. And best of all, it's a family!
All in all this week we had 22 lessons! Not bad :) Even though we had a couple rough days of having a lot of lessons fall through, we ended up having a productive week. We're hoping that next week will be even better!
Anyway, have a great week!

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