I' TRANSFERED AGAIN!
So for the last 6 weeks of my mission I will be going... (drum roll)…back to Pointe-Noire!
Yup, back to my “birth-city” to the sector “aeroport”. Which is the branch that
meets in the church built building. I’m really excited to go back and live in Congo
for the end. I feel like the first time I was there I was too busy with the
language and being trained and girl-friend problems. But now I can go and
simply enjoy the work and have no worries. I’ll be working with another African,
I can’t remember his name, and I’ll be living in an apartment with only 2
missionaries. The apartment is actually right above the apartment of the senior
couple, so it’ll be fun to get to hang out with the couple more than normal. So
anyway, that is why I said this is an “ice-cream sandwich” mission, cuz it
started with Congo, filled in the middle with Cameroon, and now another layer
of Congo! It’ll only be six weeks but I’m pumped. I will also be excited to see
some of my old converts (hopefully they have stayed active for the past 2
years).
This week was a good
week of work, kinda slow for all the elders and we are just working our
hardest. We have been teaching this little family, I’ve told you about their
four boys that I absolutely love. Well they had their baptismal interview
yesterday and all of them passed, which means in the coming weeks they will be
baptized. I’m super proud of them and loved teaching them – one of my all-time
favorite amis. I will attach a photo.
Congratulations on
reading in the book of Mormon! Keep it up and I’ll join in the family reading
once I’m back. As for the weather, I’ll be honest, I was kinda hoping for a
long winter with massive storms when I got home – you guessed it, I’m tired of
endless heat. But either way, I’ll take the climate as it is. Well that whole situation
with BYU, just proves what is written in 2 ne 1:20. When you keep commandments,
things work out temporally. Awesome!
In keeping
commandments, I’ll share with you a fun story from our missions. The other week
we paid fast-offerings from our food fund. And as we our counseled we decided
to give an amount that would be generous. Well, that week we were a little low
on money. Not a lot, just at the point where you have to watch what you are
buying and keep a budget. Because there is no shop that sells reliable meat in
Bonaberi we asked the senior couple to bring us some meat and cheese from town
– which they happily did. When they gave us the food they only asked for 5000
francs. Now meat and cheese, especially in the quantity asked for by 4 teenage
guys, is expensive in Africa. So we were kinda astonished, but gratefully paid
the 5000.
Later, we examined
the packages and saw that the cheese alone was 5000, but that the meat was
another 6000! That is a lot of money for a missionary budget. I’ll be honest,
my first thought was, “awesome, because the senior couple made a mistake we
have more money to spend on ourselves! Maybe this is God’s way of blessing us
for paying a generous offering?” But then Elder Larson said, “Yeah, I thought
to myself it’d be awesome to keep the money, but then I realized ‘what, no! That’s
a terrible idea – it’s not honest’.” And
here is the point of the story. I felt guilty, and realized that I was going to
be dishonest – definitely not a part of the gospel. So we all determined that
next time we placed an order of food we would pay back the senior couple. And
that’s what we did, we put money aside and next time we saw the couple, we gave
them back the money. And it just felt good! All we got in return was “thanks so
much for being honest.” So keeping commandments, big or small, is important.
And keeping commandments makes you feel good. That’s the principle, King
Benjamin in the book of Mormon said, “Remember the blessed and HAPPY state of
those who keep the commandments.” (Mosiah 2:41) It’s true, I’ve seen it as a
missionary working with others and in my own life – things are simpler and
sweeter when commandments are kept. So keep commandments, in this there is
safety and peace.
