April 4

April 4, 2016

Elder Liao is pretty cool, he is coming up on the end of his mission. He is from Minnesota but his parents are from Taiwan. It's kind of weird instead of just vahaza [White] we also hear sinoa(shnoo) [Chinese] all the time too. It's kind of interesting.

I'm way excited for conference!!! I'm jealous you already got to watch it!!! Ill get to watch it this weekend. Most likely I'll watch it in Malagasy and then watch it in English on my own some other time. I am very grateful for living prophets and apostles who guide Christ's church. Their testimonies of the living Christ are the basis of our belief. Everything else is just an appendage.

This week has been pretty hard. We did a lot of talking and walking and not a lot of teaching. We had two days this week where we didn't teach any lessons. That doesn't happen very often here in Madagascar. Most missionaries I know have had one, maybe two days their whole mission where they didn't teach a lesson.

Side note; Sundays are usually the hardest day of the week for me. I always get my hopes up that people will come to sacrament meeting, but then they don't and I get kind of sad. When the sacrament comes around I begin to feel a lot better because I remember Christ and his sacrifice. It is such a privilege to get to take the sacrament every week. I wish I could help every less active we teach understand that. The sacrament is the main reason we go to church on Sundays, to renew our covenants with our heavenly father.

So there isn't much else to say about my week except yesterday. Yesterday had some ups and downs. A lot of people who said they would come to church didn't. On the bright side, one lady did!! Then after church we had 11 appointments planned. We had set up splits with our two active young men however one of them didn't come to church. So afterwards I asked a recently returned missionary named Fr Pascual if he could help us. He is awesome!! He finished his mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in October and got married a month or so ago. Fun fact about his wife I believe Wesley taught her. and he should know Pascaul. They used to be in Ampifilo I believe. Next week I'll have a picture. She says she has a picture with Wesley! Anyways he has a bicycle and that is how they get to church (its a 30 minute ride she sits on the center bar). So she came with us since she didn't have another way home and there wasn't time for him to go drop her off and come back. It was actually quite fun going with them. Of the 3 appointments we were supposed to go to together, only one was home. They are planning on going to the temple though just as soon as he finds a job and can save enough money for their passports. I'm way excited for them.

So it turned out that of the 11 times we had planned with two possible back ups, we taught two of them. It was a little discouraging. Right as our last one fell through we were ready to just go home and break our fast when this lady walked by and stared at us. Luckily Elder Liao noticed and he started talking to her. She thought we were Jehovah witness or bible teachers like a lot of people here do. She very quickly invited us into her house just around the corner. She lives with her parents and her husband (her husband wasn't there but here parents were), they were very accepting and interested and accepted a time for us to come back every Sunday at 6. It was way cool, I have never talked to someone who has seemed so ready for the gospel as her family. Elder Liao and I are really excited. We were absolutely shocked. I could not have asked for a better end to the week. Elder Liao commented about all the things that led to us being in that spot at that time and it is pretty miraculous. A lot of things had to fall through for us to be there right then, but it was way cool, way worth it!!!

Well I love you!!!

Word of the week is fotoam-bavaka which is how we refer to church services on sunday. literally it means time of prayer.

Random, not don't know if i already told you this but when asking people where they go to church you literally ask them where they pray.