A Great Week!!

Seriously such a good week this week. I love this area so much. It is so tiring and I have never been more tired in my life but it is all worth it. We've been doing a ton of contacting recently and have found tons of great people that are progressing really well.

Monday we had our usual P-day of relaxing. The only thing of note out of the ordinary was when we went shopping. There were two Chinese girls at the store and they kept looking at us at stuff and the one kept sneaking pictures of us with her phone. They left they store before us but were still out in the parking lot when we came out. So while we were waiting for a Bajaj, the one came over and spoke very broken English to us and told us they were from China vacationing here. She also asked if she could get a picture with us haha. That night we taught Liva and Hery and had a good lesson with them about the Plan of Salvation. They are such a great family and I love them so much.

TUesday we had a great day. We taught a ton! We taught Modesta about baptism and got him more motivated to find a replacement at work so he can come on Sunday. Our next couple times fell through  but we were able to contact into one lesson. It was an older guy with his wife. They can't read and haven't been to church in a long time and they are from a small village in the middle of nowhere. There son didn't know how old he was. It's actually a more common thing than you think. Then we taught a referral that we received from a member. She brought him to church. We didn't know exactly where he lived but we had his address so we just got a Bajaj and he took us there. Well it is wayyyyyyyyyy far. But he's diligent so we'll teach him. We had a good lesson with him about the Restoration; it was more of a review because that's what we learned in church. It was good though, he is way accepting. We got back and taught Bakary and Ali close to our house. Bakary was the only one home though so we just reviewed some stuff with him and read with him in the Book of Mormon. We taught Dada about Eternal Marriage and it was a good lesson. He liked it a lot but he is still not 100% committed. He wants to change but he has a lot of things to change and to him it seems insurmountable. He'll get there. Then we taught Ulrich about the priesthood. It was a good lesson for him. He is a less active Melchezidek Priesthood holder. 

Wednesday we taught a ton. We taught Timoty and his family about temples first and they loved it. They had never heard about the endowment before so we were able to explain that a bit and I used that scripture you gave me mom. It's a good one. We taught Emmy about the Sabbath day and she said she was going to come to church but she didn't... frustrating. We taught Ordance and Hanitra and tried to get them on track again to be baptized. They are just kinda sitting still, doing nothing right now and so we are trying to push them towards baptism next month. We'll see how it goes. We taught Theodore about the Book of Mormon again. He is having a hard time accepting that the Bible is incomplete. He believes it's perfect. But he also wasn't baptized by immersion in the church he is in right now. So kinda weird. But we taught Arlette after that which is on the other side of town. We were flying on our bikes to get there and just weaving through traffic, it was nuts. We made it there in like 12 minutes. Way fast for how far it is. But after the lesson with Arlette we had to go all the way back to where we were just before. Pretty exhausting. 

Thursday we taught Dorcia and he is doing so much better. He has been reading and he is understanding the lessons super well. We are still going slower with him just to make sure he understands and he is on date for the 31 of October. We taught Eddie after and he had not read at all. We explained it again, a little more in depth this time and now he is more motivated to read. We were also able to start teaching Vololona and Lala again. We happened to see Lala out and about and we were able to get a time with him and go and teach him and his family. Well all our times fell through after that and so we did a lot of tracting. We tracted this really nice house but it was full of people not quite ready to receive the gospel. Quite sad really. But we did find a cool family from contacting and the mom had actually learned from missionaries before when they first came to Mahajanga in like 2007 or 2008. Then we taught a less active named Patrick. He is 18 and he is super cool. One thing about the branch here in Mahajanga is that it is full of young single adults. Well we had a cool time with him. He said that at first when we started to come visit him he thought it was super annoying but now he really feels just happy when he knows we are coming and it just makes sense for him to put other things off so he can have this time with us to learn about the gospel. Really cool experience. He's been coming to church the past couple weeks. We went to teach the other Dada but he wasn't home and it was already dark so it was kind of a lame way to end the day. 

Friday we had a bit of a struggle at first. Most of the times that we teach are just women and all of our member help seemed to be busy. But it ended up working out ok in the end. Ordance and Hanitra had a visitor over so we were able to teach them about the Plan of Salvation. We taught Jackie and Eugette after them about the Plan of Salvation also. They are very cool and Jackie actually came to church last week. We went out to that referral again, Victor is his name. He absolutely loves what we have to teach. He told us that he believes that the Book of Mormon is true and that Joseph Smith is a prophet. We taught a couple of less actives after that, Bernard and Philibert's family. We taught Bernard about the priesthood and are trying to get him ready to receive the Melchezidek priesthood and we taught Philibert's family Alma 5. 

Saturday we had English and had a great turnout. Tons of people were there it was good. Kristian, Nickey and Krissy came. We taught Timoty and his family about the Atonement first thing and it was a great lesson. Timoty came to church yesterday. We taught a somewhat new investigator named Josefa after that and reviewed the Book of Mormon because he didn't remember anything. At first he had an attitude of, "I don't care really, just talk and you know, whatever" But by the end he was very intrigued and was excited to read and said he would. We taught Alex after that, another new investigator and he told us that he believed that the Book of Mormon was true. He could tell us the story of Nephi almost word for word. We had Nickey Krissy, Lalao, and Kristian after that and it was an awesome lesson! We taught the plan of salvation and talked about eternal families and eternal marriage. They absolutely loved it. They are also very concerned about how the world is now and how to raise their children so they will be strong. They asked us how we came to be how we are, since we really aren't all that much older than their son. I happened to have a "The Family: A Proclamation to the World" in my bag so I gave that to them and they loved it. The dad believes that the Plan of Salvation is true and said they are going to get a frame and put the proclamation on the wall. They are seriously the best family ever and I love them so much. They didn't come to church yesterday but it shouldn't be long before we get them in the water. We taught Dada after them about the Priesthood and how he can get it after he is baptized. He liked it but is still kinda iffy about things.

Yesterday was great. Church went very well. The past three weeks there have been people at church from 2 of my past areas and it's been good to see them. There were a lot of less actives that we have been teaching that have come back. It's been really cool to see. We taught Clemente after church about baptism and enduring to the end. She's super diligent and is preparing her papers to go on a mission. Our next time fell through so we taught a contact named Rija. We just shared a little spiritual thought with him. We went and taught a guy named Abdala, super Muslim. A very hard lesson but he's a great guy. Super smart. We gave him a Book of Mormon and he is excited to read it and have us come back and explain it. We taught Ordance and Hanitra after that and just reviewed with her some things that she had questions about. Then we went and visited Sr Hardy, the branch president's wife. We had a great little spiritual thought with her. We both just shared our favorite scriptures. I shared D&C 31:13 and Elder Heiden shared D&C 122:7. It just worked out perfectly and she bore her testimony to us about how true the gospel is and how she would be lost without it. She said that she gets thoughts all the time about her husband and misses him and feels way sad but always read the scriptures and it gets rid of the sad thoughts. It was seriously such a strong testimony and the Spirit was so strong. I can't even get close to doing it justice here in this email. But it was great. A great ending to a great week.

Thanks everyone for your prayers in behalf of Sr Hardy. She has such a strong testimony of this gospel and is a great example to me. She is amazing.

Elder Coleman