Message in a Bottle: Mataiea

This secteur is definitely not at Faaa. Not as many people, a lot greener, and missionary work isn't the same, but we're making it work. I came into this secteur having for investigators to teach. Not a whole lot. But we've had some cool experiences with these investigators.

We had one lesson with an investigator who loves to talk. A member came along who also loves to talk. We didn't even start teaching until forty minutes after we got there, and then the investigator kept talking. Then when she was done, the member started talking. The conversation was a little weird, so I wrote down a few quotes. In the end though, the investigator really like the lesson, so it's all good. I don't know if she's really potentiel, but we'll see. Here are a couple of quotes from the conversation:

Investigator: Les missionnaires sont là pour expliquer les bêtises qu'on ne doit pas faire.

Well, that's missionary work in a nutshell haha!

Member: La religion est une cuisine spirituelle.

I have no idea what he was going for there. I was completely lost. Always comparing things to food.

We also had another investigator that accepted baptism before and got an answer to his prayers to know if the LdM is true, but he doesn't think he's ready to choose a date. We'll see how that goes too.

The best part of the week was sunday. At church we had three investigators come to the secnd hour. One of them we already talked to, and he already told us that he wants to get baptised. He lives in Temarua (my first secteur) and has talked with a member from my first secteur whose parents live here. That's how he got interested. So we were going to refer him to the other missionaries, but then on sunday he said that he was living now with this member in our secteur, so we're going to be able to start teaching him. He's super cool. His name is Eperona*.

Another person that came was an investigator who we started the lessons with this week. She asked her member friend what to do in order to take missionary lessons, and her friend called us right up. She has tons of good questions, and she told us when she came to church for the first time that she had had a really spiritual experience. She's super nice and sincere. She lives alone with her two kids, and I just know that this gospe will help her a ton in her life. Her name is Manava*.

The last person came with her friend to church and she chose the topic for the lesson (Our DMP told us to do the lesson last minute and then left). She chose the topic of baptism. After the lesson we asked her if she wanted to continue, and she said yes. Her friend and her were scheduling when they would do it and her member friend suggested that they do it before they go to institute on tuesday! What! She's already going to institute! Her name is Poenui*.

So those are our three new investigators that already have a desire to live the gospel and come unto Christ. I can see that they want to be happier, and the Lord has led them to where they can be happy.

That's all for this week. It still amazes me how much God blesses me each day. This is a secteur known for members not helping the missionaries and for very slow work, but in one short week we've seen the opposite.

Okay, bonne semaine tout le monde!

Elder Lewis