Texan in Tahiti

Hello Everybody!

I am so full of excitement after receiving the best email in the world from the best parents in the world that we are going to come back to Tahiti after my mission!! I'm so excited and grateful because I never thought I would be able to come back. I know that that will make leaving Tahiti just a little bit easier :)

This past week wasn’t our best but we made it through, huh? We had a lot of people cancel and the weather wasn’t the greatest so that made door-to-door contacting a little complicated. It rained almost every day this past week so we started off our week on Tuesday, SOAKING WET, on our bikes but we were laughing the whole day. We had to bike pretty far to get to a valley where we then had to bike super far into the valley (which was an uphill battle) to get to one of our lessons. When we got to our lesson we were wet, dirty, and tired. Sr Falesii was like, “are we even allowed to show up to lessons like this?” I was like, “uhhhh, no not really, but oh well.” After we finished our lessons we ended up going back home to change and then to the chapel for reactivation.

2 experiences to share from this past week:

The first was when we were going door-to-door contacting and we came to this house where this little French girl came running out to greet us. She was so cute when she asked who we were and what we were doing. We explained that we were missionaries who taught and invited people to come unto Christ. We asked if her parents were there and she said that they were separated and that she lived with her Dad. She went to go and ask her dad if he wanted to talk to us and sadly, he didn’t. But here's what really struck me. When she came back to tell us that he didn’t want to come and talk to us, she then proceeded to tell us very precisely where her Mom lived just 1 kilometer from her house. We took note, thanked her and went on our way. After we left, I had a strong impression to go and see her Mother at her house so we went to go and find the house with the directions that she gave us. Unfortunately she wasn’t at her house but we are going to keep coming back to her house until she is there! Ha ha, it was a cool contacting story because I know that there is a reason why this little girl sent us to go find her Mom. Maybe she's a potential investigator. We never know!

The second experience was when we went back to see a lady that we met contacting. She is very religious and believes COMPLETELY in the Bible, but she accepted for us to come back and explain better our message and why we are here. We taught her the Restoration and she listened and enjoyed the lesson but she had a hard time accepting Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon. She told us that maybe it’s true, but for herself, she believes and keeps her foundation in the Bible. It was a very interesting lesson for me because while she was talking to us about how we need to build our foundation on the word of God and that we need to be careful not to take a wrong path and be cautious that the devil is there for tempting us and everything, I really believed that she was trying to convince us that we were wrong and that we worshipped Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon. I think it would be normal for anyone to be a little intimidated (especially as she was talking/preaching to us slapping her hand on her Bible) but all I could feel during this lesson was peace. I felt sure and strong and I thought to myself, “thank goodness I have a testimony.” Thank goodness I know that all of this is true and that no matter what anyone says, I can never deny the answers that I personally received from God. I did get the impression that I needed to strengthen my testimony in the Book of Mormon and after our zone conference Wednesday with the 70, Elder Nielson, I made a goal to finish the Book of Mormon by the time that I finish my mission in February. I started last week and I have LOVED reading because I was determined from the beginning to learn and recognize new things in the Book of Mormon and it worked! I have learned so much and I know that thanks to these experiences that we've been living- my testimony will continue to get stronger and stronger every day.

We still are on the search for new investigators because even though we have a lot of activities, all of the non-members that come to the activities aren’t interested in taking the lessons so we are always stuck doing lots of contacting. But that’s okay! I like contacting. It’s always interesting to meet all of the different people.

Well anyway, that’s it for me this week. Love y'all!!