All right my Family and Friends,
I got some news to share with you. I'm going
to break down the week as it happened. So to begin, we had stake conference. We
went to the Saturday evening session and I can proudly say I heard Elder
Tukuafu, (the Tongan Area 70) very clearly, say in English- laser. He said it
was a new word he learned in English and talked about having "laser focus”.
This is relevant because my dad always tells us when we speak in church to put
some funny word in, and laser has never been used before. I was quite excited
when I heard this. The next day we had the regular stake conference and there
was a kid's choir, which was really awesome. They were as good as the ward
choir back home; all primary kids. They would harmonize and everything. It was really
quite cool.
At one point this week I was really
ta'elata, which means homesick or not content. I was all doubting and kind of
frustrated, but then it all changed. We visited a family that we had challenged
to find an investigator. When we challenged them, they were kind of
noncommittal and not very excited and I didn't have much hope that they would
try hard to find someone. We bore testimony about the power of prayer
and asked them to pray for someone to find. When we visited them they were
very excited to talk to us and we found out they had prayed and looked for
someone and they found 2 people who they could work to and they were both very,
very good opportunities to share the gospel with. They remembered it was
because they had prayed and they remembered our testimony and it really warmed
my heart when I saw that and it made me feel way better about being here and I
wasn't ta'elata anymore. I love helping people come closer to God and that is
the greatest blessing I could get.
Another great blessing we had was the
opportunity to serve people. This week a lot of sickness went around and got
some people. We were asked twice to give blessings to sick people. I have a lot
of faith in a healing blessing, so it was pretty big to me. I was able to do
one of them and I remember afterwards just feeling so good inside and I have no
doubt that the person will recover. It
really strengthens my testimony of why I am here and what I am doing. The
person had the chikungunya virus or whatever the thing Bailey had. It's all
over the place and I’m not excited to get it. Mosquitoes love me so it’s only a
matter of time.
Another awesome experience I had was a pretty
simple one. We had a lesson at 10am one day so we went there right after our
personal study. During person study I tried to figure out what we needed to
talk about. I distinctly felt that it was important to talk about the priesthood
authority. When we went to the lesson, the guy had read all that we assigned,
and more. He had a ton of really good questions, and the priesthood and
authority came up in at least 7 out of 8 questions. There is no way I can call
that pure luck. It’s so awesome to be able to receive revelation and see it
work out how it should. It was exactly what we needed to talk about. Man, I
love this so much.
So kind of a quick note, this week I got
stressed out a lot doing office work. I think I’m taking over the office this
next transfer, so I’m preparing as much as I can to do it. I make a lot of
mistakes however and it’s really frustrating; hopefully by the end of the
office I’ll be a pro and don't have to worry about stuff like that.
Last, is the big news this week. So what
happened was, the AP's were doing a zone conference in Ha'apai (one of the
groups of islands) and the president was doing the other zone conference in
'Eua (island right next to Tonga). We had a storm this week; the weather was kind
of bad. The AP's were driving across a land bridge in Ha'apai and they asked a
police officer if it was okay to drive across because of the waves. The guy
said yes, but since the car was low to the ground they would have to get out
and move rocks that had washed in the road. They drove halfway across and got
to the rocks and 3 elders got out and started moving them. Then a huge wave
came and pushed the car and the 3 elders to one side. Two move waves came and
the car was halfway into the ocean. All of the elders bailed and ran back to
the shore but one of the elders broke his leg when the wave smashed him against
a rock. He's going to have to get surgery for his leg and so he's flying out
soon. This was way bad and it really sucks. Everyone else is fine and the elder
will be fine; the car is trashed. Anyways that's the big thing this week.
President got stuck on 'Eua due to bad weather and will arrive today.
There is also a mysterious rash going
around Tonga, Old people, young people, male, female and Tongan and white are
all getting it. I think it's from the mosquitoes, it stays and is itchy and red
and puffy for a week, then goes away. It's not contagious and our mission
doctor doesn't know what to think about it. I got it this morning; hopefully
it's not too bad. I got some pills to take the itching away, but there's something
fun to think about.
OFA ATU
Elder Sitaki
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