Saturday, January 2, 2010

Happy New Year Everyone!

Happy New Year also.. ! It was so good to see all those pics. Thanks... and it looks like Clint is getting fat...haha (it's a little ok cuz I'm getting kinda chubby also.. I think having a car is catching up to me a little.) We took a picture at the Johnsons last night and man did I look fat. It was good to hear about the family...
Anyway.. This week was awesome. I am so grateful for new beginnings and a new year and all it holds. Things went back to normal and we were able to go out and work and have had a really good week.
We started teaching this new lady from Uganda and will have a new guy from Uganda come to church tomorrow.
Also we were a little worried because Kadio, our most progressing ami.. told us in the beginning of the week that he was busy and that he would call us if he had questions and told us that he would just read from the Book of Mormon, and what not... so that usually means... "ya, I'm not interested and I will never call you." But about two nights after he told us that, he texted us and said, "Hey, I want to meet with you tomorrow. When can you see me?" So we fit him in and it was awesome. We got to the appointment and he had a paper with about 6 questions on it and they were just really simple questions. Things that people have been telling him about the church, and so he wanted to understand what we really believed.. So that was AWESOME.. because soooo many people bad mouth the church and tell our investigators that we believe this and that... and they have no idea what they are talking about and then our investigators just believe them and never want to see us again.. So it was nice for once to have someone like Kadio that took the time to truly understand what we do believe and learn for himself. It was sweet. And then he says to us, "Well things have been a little crazy with the end of the year, but next year I really want to sit down a make a schedule with you so that we can meet more regularly." THANK YOU HEAVENLY FATHER !!!!! It was sweet and he will be coming to a baptism tonight and we will talk to him about baptism... This guy is awesome..
Another cool thing is that last night we went over to the Johnson's house and we taught them about the Book of Mormon, because they don't have a huge understanding about that and not much of a testimony about it either... so we taught them and it was awesome and everythign and then Brother Johnson said "Hey we have a friend that has expressed that she wants to start coming to the church with us... so I want to give you her phone and also want to go teach her with you and you can bring her to the church with the trams.. " It is this little Nigerian family with a mom named Blessing.. (ironic uh?) and she has three little kids 5,3, and 2. Anyway, while we were there Brother Johnson calls her up and fixes an appointment with her on Sunday night for us to go over and meet her and teach her. He is going to come with us... Brother Johnson is a stud and has a strong testimony.. They also told us about all the opposition they have been having from all their friends... because there are a lot of unitellegent Evangelical and Pentacostal Africans here... and they know NOTHING about our church but they will not let anyone join the church.. They bombard them by saying, "Oh that is the church of Mormon they pray to Mormon and they don't believe in Jesus Christ..." etc etc... and most of their African friends listen to them and steer way clear of us... so Bro. Johnson has a TON of friends like that and all of the people in their old church have been telling him how he shouldn't come to our church because we worship Mormon.. etc. and he tries and tries to tell them that the the church is the true church of Christ and how we don't worship Mormon and all this stuff.. anyway it has been hard for them but they are staying strong and they know the truth. He said he has just been inviting them to come to church with him so they can see and learn that we don't worship Mormon. I really don't like ignorant people that stop others from joining the true church, because they have no idea what we believe or what our church is about. Oh well..opposition in all things..
That is what is going on ... next week is the week before Zone Conference so things will begin to get crazy soon...
I love you and will talk to you later...
-Elder J Von Simonson

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