Week #75

Bula Vina' Everyone! It has been quite the adventure this past week! The weather has been so unpredictable hahaha! From 8:00 - 2:00 in the afternoon it is crazy HOT and then from 3:00-10:00 at night it pours down rain and the thunder gets pretty dang loud here! It is pretty awesome I'm not going to lie. So much has happened this week! Remember that infection on my toe?....It came back! My toe got so big earlier this week that I had to wear a different size shoe on my foot! Slowly it has started to go down and hopefully it will be better again. It's all good...FUN TIMES! Proselyting this week has been random but awesome! While trying to visit one of our less actives we came across this man who walked right up to us. When he walked up to me and elder Willoughby he said, "Hey Elders! My name is Isei!" He then told us to follow him. Currently the village is closed to missionaries but we took this guys offer as a "VIP" pass into the village. We followed him to his house and we sat down. He sat in silence and then said, "Lorenzo Snow!" Elder Willoughby and I were way confused. Then he said , "Lorenzo Snow is the president of your church right?" I almost died laughing. We told him that that was a long long...LONG time ago. He told us that his kids are members but he was never baptized. He said he wants to take lessons and learn more about the church. He's an interesting guy and we're excited to get to start teaching him and his wife. Lately we've been trying to visit the village Nauluvatu. There's a young boy there named, Osea, and he hasn't been baptized yet. His family is pretty poor and have no way of paying for transportation to get to church and so we were really praying to help him find a way. After meeting with another one of our members, he offered to pay for Osea's transport to church every Sunday! He also does not have much money but I know the Lord is going to bless him for his efforts. I've been learning a lot about the gospel this week.... Specifically on what it means to others! For the longest time we have been working with this family to try to help them come back to church and they just have never showed up. All Saturday morning I had planned this lesson and I was going to ask them why they weren't coming. As we walked into the house before I could even speak the father began to speak. He said, "Elders, my family and I respect you. You come over to our house and we've been praying so much just to find a way to church. Never mind we have two small babies but we need to take the sacrament!" Then he said so confidently, "We are coming to church tomorrow! I don't know how we are going to get there but we are going! Just pray for us please." Just sitting there the spirit filled the entire room. I didn't know how he was going to get to church either but I knew he was going to be there. The next morning we waited at the bus stand for them. No bus ever came..... The members started telling us it had been years since they had come and that they probably weren't going to come. We stood and waited and then saw them walking up this dirt hill. They came and stayed all 3 hours and were the happiest family in the chapel. They are a family that understands 1 Nephi 3:7! After visiting them some of our appointments fell through and so we took a road we had never taken before. Long story short, we went down this muddy hill and when we tried to turn around the truck could not make it back up the hill. No matter how hard we tried. We said a prayer and it still didn't work. We had some other Elders come and pick us up. The next morning we went to go and try again. This time we gathered rocks for about an hour and laid them on the muddy road to give the truck traction. Finally it worked and we made it up the hill. The lesson we learned is that prayer is a 2 way equation. We must pray for help and then we must do all we can on our part for it to be answered. It's a cool story. I'll tell my kids someday hahaha! Other than that this week has been amazing. I'm loving the challenges and trying my best to grow my faith by embracing all the trials. I love you all and look forward to updating you next week!

Love, Elder Jonutz