Saturday, January 26, 2013

American's in Africa

Jan 21, 2013
Hello everyone!

Today is a great day and we had an awesome week! I am really enjoying mission so much right now. Last pday we went to a national park here that is about 15 minutes away. While we were waiting in a parking lot in the national park, I overheard some ladies in the car next to us speaking. I noticed they had American accents so I struck up a conversation with them. I was wearing my BYU shirt so they were wondering where I got it from, they thought I was from South Africa haha. Has my accent really changed that much?? They were from Seattle and they were super friendly. After talking to them for a while, I gave them some Family Proclamation pamphlets which happen to have a number to call for the United States. It was my first time talking to Americans since I have been here.

Yesterday we were supposed to have a baptism but it fell through unfortunately. We showed up early in the morning to fill up the baptismal font (this is a temporary little font that we store at our house and have to roll to the school) but the water wasn't working. We'll have to push the baptism to next Sunday. It was still a great Sunday though and quite a few people showed up to church. My companion and I have been able to reactivate a less active here in the branch. He is in his 20's and holds the priesthood so this branch could really use him. He is a powerful guy and has a lot of potential to be a leader in this branch. He has come to church the last 2 weeks, this was the first time he has come to church in over a year! There is nothing sweeter than seeing a less active member come back to church. He really wants to be active again and change his life back around. He says when he stopped going to church he saw a huge decrease spiritually and he really regretted it. One of my goals has been to really try and reactivate some of these less actives, I can say this is the first less active I've finally seen come back. It's a really great feeling.

We also started meeting with this golden investigator this past week named L_____. He comes to a members home to meet with us and he is super interested. He said he wants to revive his life spiritually, we taught him the restoration this week. After giving him the Book of Mormon we saw him the next day. He said he couldn't put the book down and he read until 2AM! He said the only reason he stopped was because he was too tired to continue. He reminds me of the story of Parley P. Pratt. He has a ton of potential and we really think he'll be able to move towards baptism quickly. He is being fellowshipped by a recent convert here which is really helping. This recent convert is named N_______, the guy is a character. When he first met with missionaries a year ago he read the Book of Mormon in 7 days! He read the whole triple combination in a month. The guy reads like crazy, everything we give him he reads. He is a very influential man here in PJ. He started the Anglican church here 30 years ago and he has translated many Bibles, he is helping us with missionary work a lot. I sent some pictures of the giant Bible home to you guys, he is the one that owns that giant Bible. It's an apocrypha and it's estimated to be worth $200,000! He said if he sells it he will give me 10% since I gave him the idea to go get a quote on it haha.

We are making a ton of progress with some of our investigators. The work is moving along great here and I have a feeling the branch in future years is going to be huge. If they can only get a chapel the work here will explode. People are so ready to accept the gospel here! The Lord is preparing so many people and this really is His church.

Love,

Elder Summers

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