Week 32

Monday call!

He saw a hawk on the tree outside his window. It is on top of the first tree. 

This is the church building for his area.

He made the sauce arachide with the peanut butter he got and the recipe Bryan sent him.

Random fire. 

Yummy Fanta!

Soccer game!

Caleb had to take his companion to the new missionary training and a whole bunch of elders gave Caleb their pagne material to give to the guy that makes the ties. He had to carry these all back to his apartment!

Eek!

This was a two engine propeller plane. He doesn't usually see many. 

These are bugs they swept up from their apartment. He said they stink too🤢. 

Random freight boat that some how made it into the lagoon. 

He made some more sauce arachide!

His email this week:

Bonsoir

This week felt like a long week, but it doesn't feel like it should be p-day. Last p-day we went pagne hunting as usual. I also learned how to make sauce arachide. It's basically a peanut sauce that they eat here in Africa. It wasn't perfect, but it was pretty good.

On Tuesday we had a district council. As we were talking about our key indicators one of the sisters had an idea. She said the four sisters would compete against the four elders to see who could find more “new people currently taught.” That means you contact someone, teach them once, and then set up a second appointment. Whoever lost would buy the others ice cream next Tuesday. We don't know who won, but it was fun making contacting more of a game.

On Wednesday we went to the Selmer Stake center for the new missionary training. Because there were 27 new missionaries, plus their companions, it felt like a massive zone conference. It was cool though. I knew basically everything they shared, but still got some cool notes. After they gave us lunch which is always really good. I also lugged about 7 bags of pagne back to the apartment to give Frere Koko.

I then went out and got us a taxi. The guy was stubborn and wanted 2,000f, but I refused because I knew the price was 1,500f. After talking a little bit he still wanted 2,000f. (In the US 2,000f is about $3.25, but I wanted it to cost $2.5 haha) I said something like no worries you can go and then I took a couple steps back. After a few seconds he looked out the window, slightly upset, and said 1,500f get in. Dude it felt incredible to out negotiate an Ivorian. I just smiled the whole drive back.

Wednesday night Elder Mayele and his companion came with us to our sector to do baptismal interviews. First we did a lesson with a lady. Other elders had told me about how there is this lady that refuses to accept the prophets and how every time it's just a bash. Well as we were talking I realized it was her. It wasn’t bad, but it got to the point where Elder Mayele chastized her with Titus 3:9, among some other scriptures. After we went and did the two baptismal interviews. They both passed which was great.

Thursday, Friday, and Saturday were good days. We had a lot of teachings, but also a lot of them that fell through. A lot of people say they will be there, and when we show up they either lie that they aren't there or they left to go to the market. It’s also pretty hard to get member lessons when you take the member to the lesson and then the friend isn’t there. After one lesson this lady's husband, who is a member, asked me to bless some oil. I wondered why he didn't want to do it, and asked him if he had the Melchisedek Priesthood because it would be almost useless to bless it if he couldn't use it. He has the priesthood, but just wanted me to do it. I blessed it in French which was cool. 

Sunday was kind of unfortunate. We were supposed to have two baptisms, but the DMP (the ward mission leader who is the one who deals with the baptisms) did not tell the bishopric we had baptisms. During the week I gave him all of the information, and he had told me that he was going to call everybody and get it set up. He was just really busy so it slipped through the cracks. The bishopric was okay doing it though so we kept filling up the font. We kept filling it up until the power went out at the church and the water got cut off. We didn't have enough in the font so we had to bump the baptisms to next week. It works out better though because we have a baptism next week too. There was probably a reason behind everything but who knows.

This week should be a standard week, and hopefully we'll actually dunk some people this week.

Spiritual Thought:

This week I read the story of the women with a blood disease in Matthew, Mark and Luke. One thing I loved was how much faith she had. She says, “If I may touch but his clothes, I shall be whole.” Then it says straightway after she touched him “she felt in her body that she was healed of that plague.” Jesus then says “thy faith hath made thee whole.”

In the MTC, the MTC President said that we need to have faith not that it can happen, but that it will happen. That completely changed my perspective on faith. This woman had faith that it was going to happen, which is how she was healed. I hope we can all try to have faith that miracles will happen in our lives.

Thanks for your prayers, I hope you guys have a great week!

Elder Robinson