Sorry this email is a day late. We kind of last minute switched pday to today because we had a special visit from Elder Clayton (Presidency of the 70) and Elder Ellis (70) yesterday. That was sweet, but I will tell you more about it later. This week was another solid one. Elder Ipsen and I did work and I just had a good time for most of the week.
I went on a division this week with one of the Zone Leaders, Elder Shumway. I walked with him in his area all of Tuesday. It was nice. He has a beautiful area and he is a good guy. It poured rain that day for the first time since Ive been here. It was crazy how fast everything starts to flood. Luckily it stopped after only 2 hours, but makes me a
little nervous for when the real rainy season starts in Nov/Dec. Thursday was another insane storm. You have never seen lightning like this with rain coming down this hard. It was osum. It was night so when the lightning struck it lit up the whole world.
Wednesday was presidential elections here so we had to be back in our houses by 5 pm because some extremists get a little rowdy during elections so we just avoid the situation. It was a nice little break. We all just chilled around the house and played an intense game of Monopoly. I was the first one out, though:( But like I said it was a nice little break.
So when I was in Maputo we had 24 investigators with baptismal dates. Last week Elder Ipsen and I started with 4. And those 4 were kind of iffy. We have been working really hard to find new families and get the ones we have to be more committed. As of right now we now have 8
investigators with baptismal dates. And all 8 of them have legit commitment right now. We decided we were getting weak investigators because we were letting them be weak. When they wouldn't keep commitments we wouldn't really say much about it. But we have changed our attitudes to being more bold, and trusting in the power and
authority of our calling as missionaries and representatives of Christ. Since we started doing that, our lessons have been infinitely better and more powerful. We can already see the change in our investigators and in the stronger desire to follow the Lord. The thing we have been really emphasizing with them is that these commitments
they make are not for our benefit as missionaries, they are for them. They are promising these things to God and when they don't do them that's something that they have to take up with Him. It seems to be registering with them and I love it!
So all my life one of my biggest faults has always been patience. I just don't have it haha. And the Lord knows this and is so kindly always giving me opportunities to work on that. First it was waiting for my visa. Then it was waiting to get to Beira. This week I got fed up a bit at church because it just isn't the same as back home. There is a lack of reverence and the children are always just running
around. Its difficult not to want to tell them to sit and show them how I think it should be. Elder Clayton touched on this yesterday in his meeting with us. We are not here to change their culture and make them into Americans. We are here to love them and share to Gospel. This includes the culture of the Gospel. We are here to discourage the
negative cultural traditions while implementing the culture Christ established, not our own culture. I also read the talk by Elder Uchdorft this week called "Continue in Patience." I loved a part in it where he says something along the lines of patience is the ability to wait, and put our desires on hold for a time. But he also says patience isn't just sitting back passively and waiting for things to happen for us. Patience includes, accepting the situation, waiting or realizing it will take time to change, and all the while working for
the change you desire. I really liked that talk. I don't really like having to learn patience all the time, but someday I think if I patiently keep trying I will get the hang of it.
Not much else from this week. It was a good one. Sorry if I worried you by not writing yesterday! Also thanks for the recipe Momma! I could use some biscuits and gravy if you got that! Also Elder Ipsen said that for mail all you have to do is mail it to the Mission office in Maputo and they will send it up with someone when they travel up here! I could use some tie clips:) Ok I love you all and love hearing
from you! Until next week.
Much Love,
Elder Hruby
No comments:
Post a Comment