Tuesday, July 29, 2014

Book of Mormon Classes

Hello Ol Family!

Mother, sorry sorry sorry soo much that I have not emailed in awhile! P-days go by way too quick! I hope that you will forgive me!! It sounds like you all have been having a great time and are doing well!I love seeing all the pictures of what you all are up to! I cannot
belief that all of these young men in our ward are heading out..man I am old!! I am excited for each of them as they will have experiences that will change all of their lives! Ben is getting way too big! Tell him to stay young!! Sheesh!! Thank you too much for all of your encouraging words week in and week out, they make for a good pick me up after some rough weeks out here.

Well...where do I start? This week was transfer week and guess what? Sista Brown will be staying in Litz Litz again! I am actually really glad.  The area is really rough, but I LOVE the people here! We have been working really hard, super busy trying to find people that are ready and willing to change their lives.  So these last few weeks we have just been hitting a brick wall with each of our investigators. We have been fasting and praying just asking Papa God what we need to do for our area.  I have often found myself asking Papa "what more can
I do?" One day in particular we came home from a really really rough day.  That night during some extra study I was just wondering "Papa, what can I do here? Just tell me what I can do" I was reading in a church magazine when I found a quote that answered my question completely! It said, "Don't just ask God what to do-put in some thought, analyze resources, come up with a plan, and then go to the Father and ask Him if the plan is okay-after pray for miracles."  Papa God is too good to His missionaries.  He will never let one of His
children that is earnestly seeking for truth remain confused. Sometimes He will remain a little quiet so that we can learn to make decisions for ourselves, but he will never leave us.  After reading this quote I decided that I was just asking, but I was not trying to come up with a plan myself.  That night during daily planning my companion and I mapped out new plans of how to help our area come on top.  We decided that we would go into a new area to make some finding.  We made the plan, and then prayed to ask Papa God to see if
the plan was okay.  After our prayer we felt pretty good about it. The next day we went ontop to Provinces.  We saw miracles.  We were able to find Papa Roger and Papa Noel and his family.  They are so ready for the gospel.  Papa Noel has even receieved lessons from the
missionaries some years ago.  When we met him I had no idea what we were going to teach him.  Sista wamura was giving the first prayer and I was just praying saying, "Papa I have no idea what to teach" When the prayer was finished the restoration pamphlet opened up to profits. We taught about profets before and how we have a living profet today. Papa Noel was stunned.  He couldnt even speak.  He just kept looking at the picture of President Monson and saying, " I am really interested in this man, he is alive still? Just like moses?"  We are now teaching his whole family.  Miracles happen.  But they will not happen without fervent work on our part.  Papa God gives us resources so that we can help ourselves. Just when you think that He has left you He will manifest himself through some way or another. Blessings come, but you must work work work first.

Last week my companion and I started teaching a Buk Blong Momon class every Tuesday and Thursday evening at our church house.  I noticed that many of the members in our branch either have never read the buy blo momon or they do not understand or remember any of the stories. Since the buk blong momon is the keystone to our religion we thought
that going through it as a branch would help build up the faith of our members and unify the members.  We were a little worried that no one would come but we organized it and started with how the buk blo momon bin kam.  Each class we give a reading assignment of the japtas that we will discuss the next class.  It has been such a success.  Last week every adult member in our branch came! That is a record! As each of them was able to bear testimony of the Buk blo momon the spirit was so strong.  At the end of the class the members kept asking us if we could have the class every day.  We are seeing a lot of progression in our branch.  Baby steps people.  Faith and baby steps.  I am grateful to see even the smallest of miracles in this area.  There are no such thing as a small miracle in the mission field.

So let me explain some of the pictures i sent.  The one of me scrubbing pots on the beach is actually how we clean sauce pans here. When you cook over the fire the pots get really really dirty and so we use sandbeach to clean them.  it is hard work a little bit, but it is
kinda fun!  The one of the church house is of our current church house...or half church house.  we are currently building a new church house and so we took out half of the current one..but no one thought about.."Well now where will we worship??" On sunday we
worshiped in a half church house..the sun was strong and some people wore their shades..hahaha.  And on Thursday during our buk blo momon class it started to rain..manwan! When the rain started coming we all just quietly shifted onto the other side of the church house..haha. Island life!! The other one is my companion and I making a mat with
two mamas! haha.  the other one is a bunch of pikininis on Children's day on Thursday! The other one is of me and all the members building our new church house.. it is harddd work!! I spent 3 hours leveling ground and filling up holes with a shovel...don't worry
that is not a skirt..but we are not allowed to wear trousers in the village and so we fasten calico over shorts every time we do service! :) haha.  nice fashion! I am sure Sarah will love it!! ;) Mama I will even let you put these up on the blog! :) haha.

I hope that you all have a great week.  I am grateful for the opportunity I have to be out here serving the Lord.  I am so happy.There is no place in the world I would rather be.  I know that as we continually apply the gospel in our lives we will always have peace.
In a world full of confusion and contention, but gospel is where we can find peace and hope.  We can never go too far away from the Lord.It doesnt matter how far we go away from Him, He will always be waiting with outstetched arms for us to come back.  No man is exempt from the Atonement of Jesus Christ.  I love each of you!!! :) :)

Love,
Sista Brown


Sunday, July 6, 2014

Pictures from Maleuka

Some pikinini lo eria blo mi! haha. manwan! 
I made that bow and arrow! And yes that is a leg of a bullok with it's tail.
I went around the garden with one of the pikininis and picked up the cocoa plants. We put them in a wheel barrow, empty them out, cut each one open and carry out all the cocoa beans inside.  After I let them dry 2 days in the sun and then clean them and set them out in the sun for a few days back again! Now I have chocolate!