What's good everyone,
Hope everyone had a good week.
On Wednesday we went to a birthday party of this random kid that I had met once or twice before. Some lady in the ward really wanted all us missionaries to be there. Not sure why we've been having all these random things that don't feel like missionary work the last few weeks, but I am not complaining. Apparently the kid was turning 17 but he literally looked like 11 so not really sure what is going on there lol. We basically and just sat there and ate snacks and talked to the other kids that were there. They also did a limbo, and because I was the tallest one there they were very adamant about me doing, which I very gladly did😃. But at the end of the party my companion talked to the kid for a while (in spanish), and he said he wants to take the lessons, so that's good.
We were able to meet with our friend Kelvin from Malawi this week to have our first actual lesson with him. He is horrible at communicating and is really busy, so it is really hard to meet with him. So I'm really grateful for any time I get to see him because I really like him. We taught basically the whole Restoration, and he seemed to be very intrigued and receptive to most everything we talked about. We gave him a Book of Mormon and he agreed to read it. For some reason the Book of Mormon is only translated like halfway through in his native language (Chichewa), which was making me pretty upset. I don't know what the point of even having it on the gospel library app is less than halfway done.
After that lesson we headed to a lesson with Idar (the one that Cole jumped on a call with me) to a city about 20 minutes away. If you have consistently read my emails you know that I have worked really hard with Idar, and that I care a lot about him. At our Bible Study class on Tuesday he was being weird and saying he would just see me at Bible study next week anytime I asked him when he wanted to meet or if he was coming to church (he has come to church and met with us almost every week I've been here). Well after convincing him and driving to him, which we rarely do, we were able to meet with him. As kind of expected, he doesn't want to meet with us anymore. It kind of came out of nowhere as he was reading a Book of Mormon chapter every day, coming to church, and meeting with us every week, and then all the sudden all of it crashed down. I was really disappointed afterwards as I have put in more effort with Idar than anyone else I've taught, but at the end of the day I can't control his agency.
I'd say one of the main highlights of the week was some progress with our friend Franklin. He is a guy from Nigeria I found on facebook probably about a month ago, and we had only met up with him one time before this week. This week he came to our Bible Study class on Tuesday, our game night Friday, our soccer activity on Saturday, as well as had a lesson with us on Friday. So was really really good after not having seen him for like a month. He has kind of a standoffish personality, but I really like talking to him and spending time with him. We got him laughing a lot at game night which was good to see from him. We gave him a Book of Mormon at our lesson, and he agreed to read it even though he said he hates sitting down and reading scripture. Only thing is he can't come to church on Sundays because he currently works night shifts on Saturday nights, so I'm trying to have faith that he will somehow be able to come.
But without doubt the best part of the week was our lesson with our friend Sven Erling we had on Sunday after church (self referral who originally wanted to talk about the Bible). I've talked in the last few emails how he has been making really fast progress, kind of unexpectedly. This week we walked into a classroom at the church to have our lesson, and before we even sat down he turned to me and my companion and said he wanted to be baptized this Wednesday. Me and my companion were pretty shocked, and confirmed that he really meant this Wednesday. We then explained to him that it is standard to have it on Saturday or Sunday, unless he really wants to, which he agreed to and said he just wants it done as soon as possible because you never know when you could die. Pretty crazy. We met with him for the first time barely over a month ago, so he has progressed insanely fast. Baptism should be happening this Sunday as long as everything goes to plan.
Other random things that happened this week:
-Went to another Christian concert this week, this time of someone who used to be taught. Wasn't nearly as enjoyable as the last, but when we told him a few days later that we were there (we had to leave early and couldn't say hi to him after), he seemed really happy to know we were there.
-An 11 year old asked for my snapchat at our volleyball activity😂😂
-All the filipino guys we play basketball with kept yelling "RUDY GOBURTTT" anytime I shot it after I told them my favorite player was Rudy Gobert lol. Then came up and said they needed to look at my hand after I made a few shots😂.
Despite having Sven tell us he wants to get baptized this week, it was a bit of frustrating week for me; mainly because we are no longer teaching Idar anymore. As I already said, I have put in so much effort to try and help Idar, and feel like I have received revelation on how to best help him many times. After my time teaching him came to an end this week, I couldn't help but have the thought that all the effort I had put in was for nothing, and question why I received the revelation I did for him. We also had a few other lessons get canceled that I felt like I was prompted in planning for, which produced similar thoughts. When driving back home from Idar's lesson, I had a lot of thoughts circulating. When I got home, I continued to have thoughts wondering why I was prompted so many times to help him in the way that I did just for it all to so ubruptly come to an end. Within those thoughts, this scripture came to my mind, "7 And if thou shouldst be cast into the pit, or into the hands of murderers, and the sentence of death passed upon thee; if thou be cast into the deep; if the billowing surge conspire against thee; if fierce winds become thine enemy; if the heavens gather blackness, and all the elements combine to hedge up the way; and above all, if the very jaws of hell shall gape open the mouth wide after thee, know thou, my son, that all these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good (D&C 122:7)". It's pretty simple, but it was a good reminder to me that no matter what we experience, if nothing else, we gain experience from it. Both my brothers gave good advice as I discussed this with them as well. One simply said, "when ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God" (Mosiah 2:17). The other reminded me that we can only do all we can, as we cannot control the agency of others, which brought to mind this scripture, "17 Therefore, dearly beloved brethren, let us cheerfully do all things that lie in our power; and then may we stand still, with the utmost assurance, to see the salvation of God, and for his arm to be revealed (D&C 123:17)". That is kind of a lot of scattered thoughts, but the point is I was reminded that, even if it's hard for us to see, we can have peace knowing that God has a purpose in all things that He allows to take place. In hindsight, I didn't really have much of a testimony of anything in the gospel before my mission, but I do remember having a conversation with my mom telling her that I had faith in God's timing. Even though it's tough when things change in frustrating ways, I think it's one of the most important things for us to remember.
Lyric- "They say, 'If it happened, then it's meant to be', guess we'll see"
-Vince Staples
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