Hooooo Howzit,
Where do I even start??? The rain doesn't stop and neither does the missionary work. Earlier in the week we extended an invitation to get baptized to one of our friends and she said yes, and got baptized a few days later on Saturday! But for real though the rain doesn't stop and if it does well it'll start back up again without a doubt. It's a never ending cycle of getting home drenched in rain and having our shirts and pants all splattered with mud from our vigorous bike rides and then doing our nightly load of laundry with everyone's dirty stuff from the day.
Eating... We've been teaching one of our friends for a while and he invited us over for dinner this past Friday. After eating three plates and being literally stuffed, like I wasn't expecting desert and literally stuffed myself because they kept saying Tamaa, Tamaa or eat, eat. After eating a lot they brought out gaufres. Gaufres are Belgium waffles with Nutella, whipped cream and chocolate syrup over everything. After we downed the first gaufre we started sharing about faith and they brought out more gaufres and insisted that I eat even more. I said a quick prayer and then connected faith to me eating another gaufre. I needed to press forward believing that I could eat this gaufre without throwing up, having a kanak attack at the table or just feeling too sick. I then said that I would eat the gaufre if he came to the baptism that we were having the next day and possibly church. He was quick to say yes and was eager to see me attempt to eat it. To his surprise I finished it even after my companion caked the thing with more and more whipped cream. He ended up keeping his word and it was so nice to see him at the baptism the next day and even more of a surprise when we saw him at church on Sunday.
We had a lesson with a friend who was a Jehovahs Witness or Teimonage Jéhovah as they call themselves here. Everyone is so nice but when we had our meeting with him he brought a friend and they both just started bashing on us. They weren't open to hearing anything we had to say and kept insisting on their points and would tune us out when we did share something. Luckily we also invited a friend, an older Papi or grandpa from the ward we are serving in and he was able to bring a nice spirit and insight to the things which we were sharing. Luckily for us that lesson was at 7am and the baptism for our friend was at 10am so we had a nice spiritually uplifting moment after that.
Thought for the week:
There is and will always be opposition in all things. Stars don’t shine without the darkness of night. We can’t smile without sadness, and we can’t heal without feeling pain. Embrace the opposition
"Vents favorables et mer suivante"
"Mata'i haumaru e moana mania"
"Fair winds and following seas"
Standing by,
Elder Ellis
