6 Months, 1/4

 Howdy y'all!

This week was an interesting one, and I apologize for the late email! I'm finishing this up today!

Monday: Last Monday I don't remember much. What I do remember is that the other companionship in our complex has Elder Legodi, and similar to Elder Redondo in Limpopo, Elder Legodi has become a great friend of mine. We worked out together and had some pretty fun conversations.

Tuesday: The workweek begins! That day we only taught two lessons. Both of them went very well, but both went a little too long. Due to this, the rest of the things we had planned for the day didn't end up happening, which was a bummer. That night we had our call ins and Elder Bester, our DL always likes to talk to me. It's a shame that he goes home next week. I'm gonna miss him.

Wednesday: Nothing special happened on Wednesday. In fact, the opposite happened. We got up, prepared, and headed out with lunches packed up. Once we got to the chapel, we sat down and ate our food. Once that was all finished up, we helped some ward sisters with the printer and computer things the headed out. After about 10 minutes of biking, my companion got a pain in his stomach so we stopped to rest until it went away. After that we started biking again but this time it only took 5 minutes to come back. We called the necessary people and were sent back to the flat, after being instructed to buy medicine and rest. So on Wednesday we only did about 30 minutes of actual work.

Thursday: We started off strong, the rest helped immensely and we hit the ground running for Thursday! We got to the area and went to visit a few less active members. After that we stopped at a gas station to buy some lunch and continued back to the chapel for lunch. After that we headed out to our first lesson for the day and taught a very kind brother. Unfortunately, he doesn't seem to want to come to church... we'll see how long we keep him around. After that we tried and tried to get a video call lesson but the friend we wanted to teach just ignored us. Heartbreak. After that we headed to the same family we've been teaching and then finished off the day there.

Friday: Friday was a day well spent. We went out to try to find some lost members who's addresses are wildly inaccurate. We had no luck. Then we tried to find a media referral. Also no luck. This finding portion of the day took around three hours so there wasn't much time left. After that we taught a friend of a member family who seemed very interested and promised to come to church. Unfortunately, she did not attend. After that, we taught one of our recent convert's little brother and then headed home.

Saturday: We ran out of water! On Saturday morning we ran out of water so we had to wait for the landlord to send us a token for water to put in our meter. Due to that I couldn't shower for way too long so we were a tiny bit late to the area. Because of that we had to take a shortened lunch and the head straight to our first appointment. We went to try to find that same media referral from yesterday and actually succeeded! The problem with him though, is where he intended to meet us was 30 minutes walk away from his actual home... and that means his home was around 2 hours walk away from the church. If this guy was closer, he would be golden! He loves the message that we shared, and is extremely excited to learn. We just hope he can come to the church at some point. After that we left his house (which is on a mountain by the way) and on the way down the wind really picked up and blew dust everywhere. For the duration of the ride I was pretty much blind going down this mountain. Then we heard thunder and decided to head to the nearest friend's house to wait out the storm. It turned out to be that same family so we taught them a lesson while we waited and then left at the conclusion of the storm.

Sunday: We woke up feeling good, and got to church way early for ward council. After that we went to church, but it started pouring rain and not very many people decided they wanted to come to church. As each minute passed with no sig of our people, we began to feel a little discouraged. Eventually one sister and brother from that family showed up, and we asked where the rest of them were. The answer was devastating. The rest of them had been drinking before we showed up the day before and were sleeping it all off that morning. We had never expected this from the most progressing people we have! It was so sad and sort of left a lowlight on the day. After church we taught a very nice sister scheduled to be baptized on the 15! After that we went to our meal appointment and found that they were extremely welcoming and treated us like family! It helped boost our spirits quite a bit before we went home.

Spiritual Thought: In Galatians 5:22-23, the fruits of the Spirit are listed as follows, "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance against such there is no law." These fruits are evident every time the Gospel of Jesus Christ is shared or taught. These fruits are obvious whenever you're feeling happy, and are in the company of those who live the same standards. However, these fruits are not strictly restricted to spiritual experiences. They can be felt just as strong, if not more powerful whenever you're just simply having a good time with those that you choose to be around. After the discouraging day on Sunday, I was able to feel love, joy, and peace at the meal appointment from the family who hosted us. It helped relieve the intense burden upon my shoulders and gave me time to relax just like I was at home. What a blessing it is to be apart of such an amazing ward family!