Monday, June 9, 2014
Shared 6/9/14 - New Hair Cut and Visiting Blood River
#NoHairDontCare! #AreHashtagsStillAThing?
Sanbonani!
So in the spirit of YOLO, I decided to learn how to cut my own hair last Monday. I guess since learning often times requires making mistakes (shoutout to Heavenly Father for giving us our agency!), it only makes sense that I'd forget I still had the number two attachment on the buzzer instead of the four as I went at the top of my head. That's one mistake you only have to make once. Eish... Ah but it's cool though. My hair grows fast, I don't have to worry about finding a wife for at least another year, and for the first time ever my arm hair is longer than my head hair, so at least I got that goin' for me. Enjoy the bald headed eagle pics this next li'l while as my head enjoys the crisp African winter breeze.
Man, what a week. So much going on...so many times the Lord is placing us exactly where we need to be. On Tuesday Elder Marumo and I needed to stop by the GIS department to get a big map of Newcastle to visualize where all the members and less-actives and stuff stay. So as we're there talking to the map guy, Sihle, he starts pointing at Sunnyridge and says, "Yeah you see, you follow this road here and you can find your church." We're thinking to ourselves, "Wait a second... How does he know where our church is?" As it turns out, he's actually the son of a member that stays just the street up from us! Small city, hey? So we got to meet him and invite him to church which was pretty lekker.
Wednesday marked my second district development meeting, and none of the missionaries in our district have apostatized and denied the Holy Ghost, so we're gonna call that a victory. Haha, but in all seriousness the district's doing great. We opened up a discussion on how we can make the 40 contacts per week Big Z's pushing for. Yoh, making us stretch a bit, but it's good. One of the challenges in Africa is finding priesthood holders, so were talked about how we can approach babas and stuff. Relief Society doesn't struggle, but priesthood... Yoh. Just to illustrate our shortage just a bit, Brother Gbenga is serving simultaneously as the branch mission leader, Sunday school president, and young men's president. Talk about consecration.
Oh! Speaking of Brother Gbenga man, yoh. That guy is power power power. He introduced us to a brother he's met and been sharing the gospel with by the name of Nkosinathi. We had our first lesson with him this week and he committed himself to baptism! He's at the point in his life where he wants to get serious about the gospel and make some changes in his life. Do they come more prepared than that?! Nope! Let's hear it for member missionary work!
So here's a cool story. Somehow we found ourselves in House and Home Fridaymorning teaching the whole staff about the plan of salvation. Lemme explain... A few weeks back, one of the employees asked about Sister Herrington's name tag and they ended up taking her a Finding Faith in Christ DVD. That led to some of the others wanting DVDs. So we went and visited them this past Thursday, and we were informed one of the managers had passed away last week. One of the employees said something in isiZulu to Elder Marumo, and as we were leaving the store I learned that we had agreed to come pray and offer words of comfort for them the next morning. It ended up being an incredible experience. We left about twenty pamphlets with them, and one of the managers, coincidentally named Steve Young, was so grateful for our visit. We were just glad that we could offer some peace to the staff after their loss.
But in addition to the spiritual, sometimes you get the wacky. We walked into the Mlambos' place on Saturday and found a new guy sitting on the couch. We shook his hands, asked unjani, only for Stretch to tell us his name was Emanuel and that he couldn't talk. He showed us a piece of paper they had been using to communicate. They were talking about food and the World Cup. Hmmm... So anyway, Buyi gave him a bag of food and then Emanuel left on his merry way. Finally Elder Marumo and I were able to ask the question burning on both our minds... "Da heck?" Apparently the guy knocked on the door with a note explaining his deafness and that he needed food. So they catered to him, served him a cup of rooibos, and treated him in a far more Christlike way than I probably would have. It's refreshing to see there are still good people in the world that are good regardless of how funky the situation may be.
So in the spirit of YOLO, I decided to learn how to cut my own hair last Monday. I guess since learning often times requires making mistakes (shoutout to Heavenly Father for giving us our agency!), it only makes sense that I'd forget I still had the number two attachment on the buzzer instead of the four as I went at the top of my head. That's one mistake you only have to make once. Eish... Ah but it's cool though. My hair grows fast, I don't have to worry about finding a wife for at least another year, and for the first time ever my arm hair is longer than my head hair, so at least I got that goin' for me. Enjoy the bald headed eagle pics this next li'l while as my head enjoys the crisp African winter breeze.
Man, what a week. So much going on...so many times the Lord is placing us exactly where we need to be. On Tuesday Elder Marumo and I needed to stop by the GIS department to get a big map of Newcastle to visualize where all the members and less-actives and stuff stay. So as we're there talking to the map guy, Sihle, he starts pointing at Sunnyridge and says, "Yeah you see, you follow this road here and you can find your church." We're thinking to ourselves, "Wait a second... How does he know where our church is?" As it turns out, he's actually the son of a member that stays just the street up from us! Small city, hey? So we got to meet him and invite him to church which was pretty lekker.
Wednesday marked my second district development meeting, and none of the missionaries in our district have apostatized and denied the Holy Ghost, so we're gonna call that a victory. Haha, but in all seriousness the district's doing great. We opened up a discussion on how we can make the 40 contacts per week Big Z's pushing for. Yoh, making us stretch a bit, but it's good. One of the challenges in Africa is finding priesthood holders, so were talked about how we can approach babas and stuff. Relief Society doesn't struggle, but priesthood... Yoh. Just to illustrate our shortage just a bit, Brother Gbenga is serving simultaneously as the branch mission leader, Sunday school president, and young men's president. Talk about consecration.
Oh! Speaking of Brother Gbenga man, yoh. That guy is power power power. He introduced us to a brother he's met and been sharing the gospel with by the name of Nkosinathi. We had our first lesson with him this week and he committed himself to baptism! He's at the point in his life where he wants to get serious about the gospel and make some changes in his life. Do they come more prepared than that?! Nope! Let's hear it for member missionary work!
So here's a cool story. Somehow we found ourselves in House and Home Fridaymorning teaching the whole staff about the plan of salvation. Lemme explain... A few weeks back, one of the employees asked about Sister Herrington's name tag and they ended up taking her a Finding Faith in Christ DVD. That led to some of the others wanting DVDs. So we went and visited them this past Thursday, and we were informed one of the managers had passed away last week. One of the employees said something in isiZulu to Elder Marumo, and as we were leaving the store I learned that we had agreed to come pray and offer words of comfort for them the next morning. It ended up being an incredible experience. We left about twenty pamphlets with them, and one of the managers, coincidentally named Steve Young, was so grateful for our visit. We were just glad that we could offer some peace to the staff after their loss.
But in addition to the spiritual, sometimes you get the wacky. We walked into the Mlambos' place on Saturday and found a new guy sitting on the couch. We shook his hands, asked unjani, only for Stretch to tell us his name was Emanuel and that he couldn't talk. He showed us a piece of paper they had been using to communicate. They were talking about food and the World Cup. Hmmm... So anyway, Buyi gave him a bag of food and then Emanuel left on his merry way. Finally Elder Marumo and I were able to ask the question burning on both our minds... "Da heck?" Apparently the guy knocked on the door with a note explaining his deafness and that he needed food. So they catered to him, served him a cup of rooibos, and treated him in a far more Christlike way than I probably would have. It's refreshing to see there are still good people in the world that are good regardless of how funky the situation may be.
We just got back from our district activity at Blood River, which was a battle site between the Zulus and the Boers (Afrikaaners) way back in the day. It was cool learning some history about the country we're serving in, and hey... The guys at the battle were even driving handcarts and had beards like the pioneers. I guess it's just unfortunate the Book of Mormon hadn't made it this far south yet. But hey, one day!
Lots happening this week. I've got this burning idea for finding people. We were talking with the GPS elders that are down here from Swazi, and with them being adopted into the Mozambique mission we got to hear some of the deets on their finding activities. I guess they're experiencing the most real growth out of any area in Africa, and it comes from the fact that the legal system in Mozambique makes the marriage process long and tedious. So the missionaries basically become legal experts on that, help couples get married, and teach them the gospel, and it' working. We started thinking to ourselves, "Ok, what do people in South Africa need..." The unanimous answer is jobs, but we unanimously decided we're unable to provide jobs. But I had a thought yesterday... We can provide training on how to find jobs. Teach something at the chapel about being proactive. And then you can tie it into the gospel when you teach how to pass a drug test...the Word of Wisdom...and then you relate Joseph Smith and BOOM they're Mormon. Stay tuned to see how this plays out. I'm super excited about it. And finally, our fireside with Big Z is happening this Saturday. We're gonna blitz the area and visit all the members and bribe them with food for coming and inviting friends. Wish us luck!
Sala kahle this week my friends. Stay positive, love your lives.
Much love,
Elda Johnson
Monday, June 2, 2014
Shared 6/2/14 - Moreson Ranch playing with lion cubs
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There's curry and biryani, but there's also chicken feet, liver, and tripe...
Sanbonani!
Eish... Tripe. Its scent on the stove smells richly of bum, and the taste is hardly any better. At least the time I had chicken feet the spices helped to keep my mind off of what I was actually eating, but with tripe? The flavor serves as a reminder that the organ you're consuming was once the first stop for food as it made its way through the animal's digestive system and eventually out its rectum. I say the animal, because I'm honest to goodness not sure if it was a cow, a goat, or an ox. Haibo... But! It's off the bucket list, and I'm another step closer to being a true African. Brother Gbenga keeps telling me I'm a black man stuck in a white man's body, so hey... My skin will catch up sooner or later! An outward expression of an inward change, right?
But anyway, I guess we can start with where we left off last week. The story of how I ripped my pants... So once upon a time, during our hike with Brother Classen, he told us the tale of Moreson Ranch, which is about an hour outside Newcastle. According to legend, there are lion cubs there you can play with for a mere fifty rand (five bucks for you Americanos). It sounded too good to be true, but after finding out Elder Akal was getting emergency transferred and that this would be his last p day, we decided to exercise our faith in Brother Classen and make the drive. Boy, did we receive a witness after the trial of our faith (aka the hour long, pot-hole filled drive). What an absolutely incredible experience. When you're in Africa, what you don't do is sit around at the boarding and play board games. What you do do is go let the lion cubs chase you around, scratch up your arms, and even rip a huge hole in your jeans. You rub their bellies, you dance with them, and you even give them piggy back rides. I guess the only thing better would be if we could baptize them... But I think they should be covered considering that blessed day when they shall lie with the lamb without any ire.
Enough of those guys though, on to the work of salvation!
Yoh, some weeks on mission are awesome and smooth sailing, but others are kinda...learning weeks I guess you could say. When three of your investigators get baptized, you kinda have to evaluate your teaching pool and ask yourselves, "Ok, what next?" I think it hit both Elder Marumo and myself that we need to make an extra exerted effort to find and talk to people. The question is... How? We have some great plans to work with members, but in the meantime, we've started working on some conversation starters to talk to everyone we meet in all sorts of situations.
Big Z's big thing this last week actually fits perfectly with what we want to make happen. He emailed the whole mission to let us know that our "service hours rendered" stat would be changed to "contacts made." The goal he wants us to work toward is 40 per week, and yoh, we're gonna have to stretch a bit to make it happen. But in a good way. President's absolutely incredible at helping us grow and reach our full potential. I guess if we don't push ourselves and make improvements in our lives every once in a while, how can we expect those we teach to?
Kindo's power as ever. We took him teaching with us on Friday, and I was blown away. He's usually a bit shy around new people, but he contributed to the lesson and bore such powerful testimony at our teaching appointments! He even shared his conversion story with another member family we were visiting. It's not just everyday you find someone like him. I feel so blessed to be a part of his finding the gospel.
Eish... Tripe. Its scent on the stove smells richly of bum, and the taste is hardly any better. At least the time I had chicken feet the spices helped to keep my mind off of what I was actually eating, but with tripe? The flavor serves as a reminder that the organ you're consuming was once the first stop for food as it made its way through the animal's digestive system and eventually out its rectum. I say the animal, because I'm honest to goodness not sure if it was a cow, a goat, or an ox. Haibo... But! It's off the bucket list, and I'm another step closer to being a true African. Brother Gbenga keeps telling me I'm a black man stuck in a white man's body, so hey... My skin will catch up sooner or later! An outward expression of an inward change, right?
But anyway, I guess we can start with where we left off last week. The story of how I ripped my pants... So once upon a time, during our hike with Brother Classen, he told us the tale of Moreson Ranch, which is about an hour outside Newcastle. According to legend, there are lion cubs there you can play with for a mere fifty rand (five bucks for you Americanos). It sounded too good to be true, but after finding out Elder Akal was getting emergency transferred and that this would be his last p day, we decided to exercise our faith in Brother Classen and make the drive. Boy, did we receive a witness after the trial of our faith (aka the hour long, pot-hole filled drive). What an absolutely incredible experience. When you're in Africa, what you don't do is sit around at the boarding and play board games. What you do do is go let the lion cubs chase you around, scratch up your arms, and even rip a huge hole in your jeans. You rub their bellies, you dance with them, and you even give them piggy back rides. I guess the only thing better would be if we could baptize them... But I think they should be covered considering that blessed day when they shall lie with the lamb without any ire.
Enough of those guys though, on to the work of salvation!
Yoh, some weeks on mission are awesome and smooth sailing, but others are kinda...learning weeks I guess you could say. When three of your investigators get baptized, you kinda have to evaluate your teaching pool and ask yourselves, "Ok, what next?" I think it hit both Elder Marumo and myself that we need to make an extra exerted effort to find and talk to people. The question is... How? We have some great plans to work with members, but in the meantime, we've started working on some conversation starters to talk to everyone we meet in all sorts of situations.
Big Z's big thing this last week actually fits perfectly with what we want to make happen. He emailed the whole mission to let us know that our "service hours rendered" stat would be changed to "contacts made." The goal he wants us to work toward is 40 per week, and yoh, we're gonna have to stretch a bit to make it happen. But in a good way. President's absolutely incredible at helping us grow and reach our full potential. I guess if we don't push ourselves and make improvements in our lives every once in a while, how can we expect those we teach to?
Kindo's power as ever. We took him teaching with us on Friday, and I was blown away. He's usually a bit shy around new people, but he contributed to the lesson and bore such powerful testimony at our teaching appointments! He even shared his conversion story with another member family we were visiting. It's not just everyday you find someone like him. I feel so blessed to be a part of his finding the gospel.
The week as a hole was a little bit difficult, but the Lord rains down his tender mercies as continue moving forward in faith. Sunday was a beautiful end to the week. One lesson in particular I really enjoyed. We were following up on a young guy we had found a couple months back, and we weren't able to find him home, but his mother was there. She invited us in, and we found out she's been going through a rough time, so we were able to share some comforting words with her. Brother Gbenga was even brought to tears. We came to realize as well that she works with one of the members that we had just shared a member missionary lesson a couple days back. The Lord sure has a good way of putting us in the right place at the right time.
We've got a little treat coming up in a couple weeks too. I don't remember if I mentioned it, but we talked to Big Z a while back about doing a member fireside while he's in Newcastle this transfer, and he loved the idea. We talked to him again this week to buff out the details, and I'm as stoked as ever. One thing that's true of church members worldwide is that they're more likely to come to things if there's the promise of food, so we'll be serving rooibos tea and biscuits following the proceedings (don't worry, it's herbal tea!).
We've got a little treat coming up in a couple weeks too. I don't remember if I mentioned it, but we talked to Big Z a while back about doing a member fireside while he's in Newcastle this transfer, and he loved the idea. We talked to him again this week to buff out the details, and I'm as stoked as ever. One thing that's true of church members worldwide is that they're more likely to come to things if there's the promise of food, so we'll be serving rooibos tea and biscuits following the proceedings (don't worry, it's herbal tea!).
After all our adventures the last few Mondays, we're finally taking a little break today. Gonna take care of some shopping, gonna make biryani, and I'm even gonna try and learn how to cut my own hair! Woo! Wish me luck... I'll have pictures next week. Prepare to be either blown away or to laugh really really hard. Let's hope for the former.
Sala kahle, my friends. Stay positive, love your life.
Much love,
Umdala Johnson
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