This week flew by due to our Tuesday P-Day last week. That will also make it a little easier to write about everything that happened, considering I don't have much time!
We did have an awesome week, always complete with some funny stories. After having a great lesson with one of our baptismal dates and his mom, his older sister came in with a baby right at the end to say a prayer with us. Imagine how my prayer went as, right after I addressed Heavenly Father, the baby starts ripping out the most outrageous farts!!! It was sooo funny, and everyone started snickering as I'm trying to finish this prayer that started off with such a bang. I just...babies. No respectors of prayer.
We had a rough Thursday when, instead of going to our first appointment, we continued doing studies and only realized that we were late 30 minutes after the lesson was supposed to start. It didn't help that we got lost in the quartier (for some reason I thought it'd be a good time to discover some new routes, and ended up getting lost through bridges over trash rivers and old mamans telling us where the road was). By the time we got to our appointment we only had like 10 minutes to introduce ourselves before we had to rush back to the church to meet our next investigator. After 30 minutes of no show, we called him and only then did he tell us he wouldn't be able to make it. Well, we went in to help clean the church while we waited for our next rendez-vous, only to find the church had already been cleaned in preparation of this building inspector from Kinshasa. Then we go out to wait for our investigator, but she only came after an hour - during our last rendez-vous. We somehow had a few minutes to talk with both her and the next guy, and all was well. In the meantime, I drew Elder Sperry as he was drawing me. Let's just say that I have a pretty good Clint Eastwood in missionary garb chilling in my planner on the 4th of September.
We made up for all that lost time on Friday when we left early to see our 57 year old investigator Maman Janette. From there we saw a bunch of other people, one after the other, with no ratez-vous, including our member friend Doretta (whose house I painted with Elder Brockbank almost a year ago). She confided in us her worries of not being able to have kids, and how hard it is for her while all these other women come to church and announce that they're pregnant, etc. etc. etc. It was heartbreaking, even just to put myself in her shoes for a minute. I would be distraught if I couldn't have kids, especially after having spent 2 years learning about the depths of the plan of salvation and God's goal for His own children. I just wanna help Him realize that plan!!! Alas. We got to pray with Doretta and make her feel better, and she promised to make us sakasaka if we come back for FHE in a few weeks. We gladly accepted.
While we were talking with Binta (Helena's older sister who's getting baptized on Saturday!) we went over obedience. I love the example of how people think they're happy where they are, without knowing the commandments. I realized it's like going to a party, where you sit down for dinner and get a ball of fufu, and you think that's it! Well, you're perfectly happy with your fufu, until you are presented saka. What?! More food?! Great! Out of nowhere they bring you some rice and beans, and now you're ecstatic. Imagine your joy when, around the corner, comes an ice cold Passion Fanta. You can't imagine being any more happy, but before you leave you have a slice of cake. All of these different courses are like the commandments...the more you receive, the more blessings become available to you! Why wouldn't you want to partake of ALL of the blessings?!? Why would you refuse ANY of them?! And yet, ironically, people deliberately disobey Heavenly Father. Incredible. Thank goodness He loves us so much that He's got an infinite stock of fufu in His bottomless pot, and He's always ready to serve!
I used the same example to talk about reading the scriptures. Why would you just eat beans all the time, when you could have rice, kwanga, and chicken?! Well why would you read Nephi all the time when you could have a little Alma, Jacob, or Mosiah??
On our way home we were stopped by a bunch of drunk guys, and usually I not as happy to give them the time, but thanks to a more charitable attitude I figured we could at least stop and give them some Word of Wisdom brochures. We ended up only saying hi, but they laughed about it, and on our way out of the bar this younger, sober guy who had been walking behind us caught up to us and was like, "Hey I have a friend in your church! I'd love to sit down with you guys some time!" So. I realized God gives us opportunity through various means. We shouldn't even refuse our lost, lost brothers!
Saturday was great. We got to go to a baptism for Mpaka, for a man whose interview I did a few weeks ago - Celestin. It was wonderful, even though when it came time to baptize them we opened the doors and woops! All the water was gone. 45 minutes and 30 hymns later we were ready to go again. We skipped out on English Class to respect an invitation we had from our old DMB Alain and his newly wedded wife to come over to their place. They had surprised us with a delicious dinner of rice, chicken, fried fish and kwanga. It was all super good. While we were eating, Alain shared us videos of when he was on his mission in Lumbumbashi (the second biggest city in the DRC) and when he opened Burundi (a county that shares a border with the DRC) for the Gospel. He had videos of Elder Holland's consecrating the country for missionary work. It was incredible. We had a great time together, and afterwards got to visit his paralyzed father, who was laying down in a bed watching a soccer game, surrounded by loved ones. He asked us to pray for him, so we kneeled down and I got to say the prayer. Afterwards I told him that God would heal in in munukutba, and they pretty much thought that was the greatest thing on the planet. I'm surprised papa Kizimbou didn't just jump up in bed and laugh his way down the street!
We had 22 investigators at church on Sunday, and almost half of them were there for the first time, having come with members. It was overwhelming, to be honest, because we literally don't have enough time in the week to see all of them together with our recent converts and less actives. But! We've got our faith that it will work out. Ok. 2 minutes.
Have a wonderful week, I love you all so much! Elder Garland
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