Letter Home - Week 34

This week I read some really cool things about the Christlike attribute of love. As I was studying I came across a verse that really stuck out to me. It was in Eph. 4:15 and it says, "But speaking the truth in love...". As I've examined and looked back on my teaching I realized that at times I may be so focused on the truth that I forget to love. Even if it what I'm saying may be the truth it doesn't help if it's not done in the spirit of love. I read other passages like Moroni 7, D&C 121, 1 John 3, and 1 John 4 that were powerful. Developing the attribute of charity is something I'm really striving to do. I've thought about it and it's been something on my mind for a long time. I know it's what I need to do. Knowing is good doing is better. I came across another verse in John 13:17 where it reads, "If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them." I was thinking how I can really learn to love and not just studying about love but actually going about loving. I prayed to know how I can develop more love. I was prompted and led to PMG where on the first page in the chapter on christlike attributes it reads in big, bold letters, "How Can I Develop Christlike Attributes?" It was an answer which came immediately after I prayed. It was a cool experience for me. This week I've been feeling a lot more love for those around me. I'm still working on it but it's cool to know that I have a loving Heavenly Father who cares about what I'm going through and is there to help me along my way to greater peace, happiness, and love.

Kevin: We found that he is having a hard time forgiving himself of past experiences. We taught and testified of the Savior and his Atonement and how we can become completely clean though repentance and forgiveness. We are helping him through the repentance process. He is still super faithful and comes to church each week and loves coming out with us teaching. We found him on the day he first came to church. He had stopped other missionaries who were walking in town and they talked to him and told him about church. He came and that's how we met Kevin. Kinda cool that he had the faith and courage to stop the missionaries. I'm glad he did.

Villia: We met at her home. We were walking by and stopped to talk to her as she was sitting outside her home.

Kim: We have only had two lessons so far but already committed her to baptism. She is ready I believe and she really wants to change her life. The only problem is her boyfriend. He doesn't believe in God and doesn't like her to meet with us. She too stopped other missionaries.

Joan: We contacted her house and talked with her mom. After we were about to leave Joan just arrived home from work. We talked with her as well. She has a little girl and a boyfriend who doesn't live with her. Her mom stays with her. We had a good lesson this week on the restoration. We watched the restoration video with her too and she enjoyed it.

I'm running out of time.... ahhh. What I'll do though for you is write down information for you during the week and give it to you all next week. Sorry about not writing as well as I should've. I know I need to do better. I'll work on it for you guys. Thanks for the push to do it. I know it's important and I'll be thankful for it later.

I love you all so much! Thanks for writing and telling me about your week!

Take care!

 

Love,

Elder King

Letter Home - Week 33

The weeks are flying by! This week we did a lot of travel arrangements and immigration stuff. It was fun. Everything worked out pretty well. We also helped another member move. This week we have "moved" since our bedroom has been destroyed. We had to take everything out of our room and live in Elder Hardy and now Elder Merritt's apartment until they fix the tile in our room. It's fun. We love hanging around them. We had a DL training that we were a part of that the AP's taught. It was about counsels. I learned a lot from it. We went over a talk by Elder Ballard about it. I learned about leading with love. I'm trying hard to do that and to really love the people that I serve. There was a baptism up here in Castries for Elder Powell and Elder Wallentine. Elder Powell is the new DL up here in Castries. Her name is Shernice Montlouis. She is 21 and the service was really nice. It was great to see how happy see was. She had a big smile on her face. We've been teaching here lately a young lady named Odellia Amadee around the same age as Shernice who is a recent convert since back in August. She is great. She is going to help friendship Shernice. Some of the people that I mention in an email we end up stop meeting with them for a variety of reasons or it's just hard to get in contact or find a time to meet so there may be some that I talk about and then don't talk about because we haven't seen them in a while. I wish it worked out that we could visit every single person but sometimes it just doesn't work out. I am trying to write about the main investigators that we have but I can do better for you guys. This week we taught Kevin. We've been teaching and helping him with the commandments and also gaining for himself a testimony. We had a great lesson on forgiveness and repentance. He has had a hard time with forgiving himself for past mistakes and so we watched a Mormon message called reclaimed. It's great. It helped him. We are helping him to truly repent so he can feel the spirit more in his life and when he does he will be baptized. He has a strong desire and already considers himself a member. He is great. We also had a great couple of lessons with a lady named Joan. She is prepared to hear the message of the gospel. She wants more peace in her life and has had an experience, after teaching a lesson on charity, of applying that principle of the gospel and it bringing that peace into her life. She wants more of it. We then taught a powerful lesson on the restoration and invited her to be baptized and she said that it's something that she needs to do and accepted that invite. We hope things continue to go well with her. We also had an FHE with a lady who hadn't been to church in a long time. She works on Sundays and it's hard for her to go. She has been taught recently by Sister Maico and Sister Conrad and yesterday she came to Church! After we had the FHE and we had a fun lesson about Lahonti and read in the Book of Mormon. I love you all so much! Have a great week!

 

Love,

Elder King

Letter and Pictures - Week 32

Hey guys!

It's great to hear that Jay found a job! That makes me happy! It's been a great week. We got transfer calls this week and Elder Moli and I will be staying together again! I'm glad to serve with him again :) I'm learning a lot about loving others because of him. He has taught me a lot. With the senior couple we will be teaching them how to do all the immigration stuff with the new missionaries coming in tomorrow. The flight to Barbados is 30 minutes and the planes are smaller to travel from island to island. Elder Martinez talked about goals and planning. The talk was addressed by President and Sister Herrington. It was great. Emily will go to Argentina. You can tell her so she doesn't have to worry about opening her call. It was straight revelation that I had. I have no doubt haha :) He learned himself from cutting his own hair. He is the one from Samoa. He did a good job. Sometimes we go to a barber. In Vieux Fort that's what we did. With interviews for Christina, Johnathan, and Sancha they were all in Elder Moli's old area before he switched and became companions with me. All three were the DL's baptisms. Sorry but I'm out of time. They are kicking me out now... Until next week! Love you guys so much! Hope you enjoy the pictures!

Love,

Elder King

Elder Moli taking on the jungle! haha There was a lot of tall, think grass. We cleared a pretty big area.

We did service this week. We helped Sister Sarah move and we also helped the Branch President cut down some grass around his home.

I made Elder Moli mad..... oops ;) No I'm kidding for some weird reason in our tile floor in our bedroom during our nightly planning started to crack and pop up on its own. I don't know why.

Hiking in the jungle with Elder Hardy and Elder Johnson! Most of the zone went on the hike including the new senior couple that came in this week on Thursday. Their names are the Leavitts and they are so nice.

It started in one place and then spread through the rest of the room.  Evil spirits are coming up from the ground... ahhh

We hiked the pitons yesterday for p day. It took longer than expected yesterday to get back to Castries so that's why we are emailing today. It was an awesome hike. Way worth it. The view was absolutely incredible from up there. It was super steep and long. It took 2 hours up and 2 down. It was way fun.

This is the view from the other side of the pitons. The picture doesn't show as good as it was. It was amazing.

Elder Moli and I with Elder and Sister Martinez at the mission home. They are awesome :)

Lion power! Reunited again :)

Us and the Sister Training Leaders in St. Lucia at the mission home for MLC. Sister Maico and Sister Conrad.

It was late at night waiting around for interviews with President Herrington to be done. They were tired.

Elder Kuru from Austrailia who came out with me and Elder Odhiambo from Africa who was my trainer here in the mission home for MLC. We are so spiritual we just radiate light! ;) haha

Letter Home - Week 31

This week was crazy busy with MLC and Zone Conference. We only taught like six or seven lessons this week when we usually have around 15. It was a great week though. It was full of learning and good times. I enjoyed it. No senior couple yet. They come this week on Thursday. This is the last week of the transfer so we find out at the end of this week where we go. Kevin we are working towards his date of March 5th but he will be pushed back a little bit because we need to teach the rest of the lessons to him and he needs to gain a testimony.

Monday: We went in the morning to go get a haircut by Elder Ropati (one of the Samoan Elders) before the activity. We then went to play some football and basketball at one of their playing fields. I think because of my shoes or something I kept slipping and falling while playing football. It made it difficult. We taught a guy named Josh about praying about the Book of Mormon. We also had a lesson with Kevin. He was struggling with prayer but after helping him understand more about it, why it is important, and inviting him to pray to receive an answer and then following up with him he has began praying to receive a confirmation from the spirit.

 

Tuesday: Today we had to run around in the morning to print off and get everyone in the zone conference talks to study from for zone conference before leaving to Barbados in addition to a lot of other errands. So we weren't able to see anybody before we left for MLC. We got in to Barbados and were picked up by the AP's(Elder Pape and Elder Stewart-Johnson). They are awesome missionaries! It was still early so we went on splits with Elder Odhiambo and Elder Kuru. I haven't seen Elder Odhiambo for four months. It was great to see him. We grabbed some KFC for dinner and then went back to their apartment to wait to be picked back up by the AP's to take us to the hotel. They had a lot of missionaries to transport and they came in at different times so they were running all over the place. 

 

Wednesday: We had some breakfast at the Mission Home provided by the Herrinton's. After we had MLC. Elder Martinez of the Seventy was present at the mtg. with his wife. They are really cool people. The mtg. was great. We were asked to study a talk by Elder Bednar about the enabling power of the Atonement. It was something I had never really understood before. It talked about instead of asking for our trials to be removed to pray for the strength to face our trials. It was really good. We lunch during the mtg. and then came back to the mtg. We were at the mission home for the whole day. After the mtg. there were interviews going on and so there was a lot of waiting around talking with the other leaders in the mission. It was fun. Elder Kuru and I watched some Mormon messages while waiting. We had dinner and the a little devotional by Elder and Sister Martinez. It was such a spiritually uplifting day. Went back to the hotel.

 

Thursday: We flew back in the morning but our flight was delayed for several hours. We got some breakfast and hung out until the time to leave. We got back late. We had a branch council mtg and then I had a baptismal interview to perform for Christina's daughter Sancha. It was a great experience for me.

 

Friday: We were supposed to have zone conference at 11:30 but because the Herrington's flight got cancelled we didn't have it until 4:30. We had lunch and went proselyting for a couple hours. We taught Kevin about his pathway to baptism. (The things he needs to do before he gets baptized to prepare himself) We then went back to have the mtg. It was good. It's always great to hear from President and Sister Herrington. They are such a delight and teach me so much each time I hear them. Elder Moli and I taught a section in the mtg. about the importance of making the baptismal pathways for our investigators. It's something new that has been brought up in the mission. I like it. I believe it really helps our investigators understand not only the end goal but the path to get their. We then had our interviews by President and took everyone home. We didn't get home until way late. We got home around 1:30am.

 

Saturday: We then had to take President and his wife to the airport at by 6:00 and wake up at 5:30. We then got to pick up my luggage that was lost for a time at the airport but I got it back. President said we could go back and sleep for a couple hours to make up for lost time. That was nice. We cleaned the church after. We then went back to our apartment and got ready and studied. We had Sancha's baptism today that went really well. She was really happy. We taught this new investigator named Kerry John at the end of the night with Kevin. We contacted her and gave her a book of Mormon and invited her to read. We went back for the first time today and she read the introduction and up to the middle of chapter 3. We had a good first lesson with her. I'm excited to continue to teach her. We were led to her by the Lord. I'll tell you more next time on how we met her.

Sunday: Kevin came to church but no one else. We are trying to get the others to come. We just keep doing what we can. We gave the sacrament to an older lady named Sister Alene. We also had a lesson with a recent convert named Odellia who is 20 or 21. She is the only member in her family. It was a really cool lesson as we were able to give her hope and help her with a challenge of depression that she has been facing for a couple years. She is a really great person and has a strong testimony. We also had a lesson with Shana and Stephanie and a few of their friends and family. We talked about the book of Mormon and helped them to understand what it is and where it came from.

I had fun this week :) Lots of good times! I love you guys! Hope you have a great week!

 

Love,

Elder King