Bonjour! 04/14/2014
This past week has
been pretty good again. The work is still coming along very well also! We had
our baptism for Eric this past week, which was awesome to see. Along with that
we had two kids in the Ward that turned 8 and were able to be baptized as well,
so that was awesome to see! The baptism went well, and the following day we had
Ward Conference. The problem was when we woke up it was pouring. And when it’s
pouring here, its really pouring. Like the roads are flooded. So we were
worried people would even be at church, because when it rains here like
everyone shuts down for the day. So we were a little down, worried about our
three people needing to be confirmed, and the Ward Conference. Surprisingly we
showed up and it was already packed there at the ward building!! It was the
best to see the people here and how devoted they are to getting to sacrament
meeting, and renewing their covenants. I was happy to see that and it was even
a big example to me as well. With all of the baptisms we still have very solid
Amis coming along. One of my favorite has been the young man named Aquete, he’s
been an ami for a while, its the same one that had the struggles accepting our
message due to his family being voodoo, and also his poverty, when everyone
here is already in poverty. Along with that though he’s probably the most
humble person I’ve met here, and with that, there are many humble people, so
that shows how humble he really is. He’s really strengthened my testimony
though in that the Lord doesn’t judge us by our intelligence, or what we have,
but the gospel really is available to everyone. He bore us his testimony about
how he knows our message is true, and has even had dreams helping him see that
the story of Joseph Smith is true. I can see this is true as well in the
sacrifices he makes to come to church and follow us even with how difficult it
is for him. With how things are looking right now, he’s hoping to be baptized
very soon, so that will be exciting for sure!
The work is coming along well,
and I still love the work here. Usually I would hate the 45-minute walk to our
secteur. But it makes it worth it with the people we have over there. The Ward
runs pretty well also. I was impressed this past week when we were visiting a
member family, and I was talking with their 11 year old about what he learned
in Primary this past week. He started off and recounted the whole story of
Abraham and how he had difficulty having kids, all the way down to how the 12
tribes came about. Without any flaws... Ha-ha I was stunned seriously! I didn’t
really get that story till I was in seminary in high school. And even then its
awesome to see how even though the church is so new, things are already
starting to get going. Things are going well with my companion. He pointed
something out to me that I liked a lot in our companionship study. He had been
reading in Preach my Gospel and came across a part that talked about how the
only thing that can unite people in the world, from all different cultures, and
ways, is the gospel. And we started looking at how yeah; we are very different,
in just about every way. Ha-ha, but we have the same testimony, and the same
beliefs in the gospel... it made me think a lot about that how I’ve had the
chance to work with Malagash, French, Congolese, Ivoirians, and Togolese, and
even Nigerians, and we all have this bond between us being the Gospel. It’s
really awesome to see how the gospel has filled the world.
All in all things
are going pretty well. I read a little in my journal last week, from around the
start of my mission. I laughed a little seeing how bad I stressed with the
language and all of the other things at the time. But also saw how much I’ve
come along and how my faith has grown from each day on the mission, it’s been
the best!
Things are going really well though! I love and miss you
all a ton and hope things are going well there! Thanks for everything!
Elder Oliverson
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