Sacrament Talk

This week was another pretty good week! We got some more new investigators. The new family with 5 kids not baptized has been kind of up and down. At first they cancelled the FHE at the visitors Center so that was sad. We ended up having it last night though. Only the mom, and 3 of the kids came though. All 3 kids that came got a baptismal date for next month, and the mom wanted to be rebaptized haha. We explained there is just one baptism. The mom is super excited about getting back into church which is good, the dad not so much which is bad. But the dad is letting us teach his children. We are going to get the other two kids on date this week hopefully and get them all baptized together next month! We have 3 baptisms this Saturday with Asafo, Toa'i and Chelsey. I am super excited about all of them. We found a golden investigator this week, she accepted baptism for next month. Her name is Talalelei, only problem is she isn't married to the guy she is living with, and the guy needs a divorce. He is apparently getting the divorce this week though. She loves the gospel though!

The FHE last night we asked the missionaries who were going to lead it if there was going to be food, and they said no. So I talked to the Elder that does finance for the mission and he said not to worry about it. After the FHE they bring in tons of bags of McDonalds. Thank you Elder Loni.

I gave a talk in Sacrament meeting this week. The bishop told us 10-15 minutes and mine ended up being like 6-7 minutes haha and the other speaker was short so my companion had 20 minutes to fill. It all turned out well though. We were able to go to the temple again yesterday! We took Ace to do some family history names we finally got done. Even though he got baptized 4 months ago. The temple is always a good experience. Not a whole lot else going on, just keep progressing the Lord's work here in Lotopa! I hope everyone has a great week.

I hope everyone has a good Easter and remembers why we celebrate Easter! He lives! I know Jesus Christ truly is the Savior of the World. He is our older brother. He is our advocate with God the Father. I know he loves us more than we can comprehend. Jesus suffered for each and every one of us. One thing our President always tells us is if we ever think our lives are hard just think of how hard his life was. If we spend this time to remember our Savior, we will feel more gratitude for him and for his love. We are truly blessed to be have the chance to live again with our Father in Heaven, but it's only made possible through Jesus and his Atoning sacrifice. I hope you guys all have a great Easter and spend time to remember our Savior!

Elder Roberts

 Cool river thing

Path to Asafo's house 

Showed up at Asafo's house and this is what we saw:) 

Kiddos 

Temple with Ace

Transfers???

Monday morning we had our district meeting and then our Zone Leaders told us to be ready for transfers because President was going to do the biggest transfer he has ever done that night. So all day I was thinking my time has finally come here in Lotopa. Over 5 months here. That night we get a call from the Zone Leaders, they ask me to put it on speaker for my companion also. "Elder Roberts can you say a prayer for us". I was like dang it's actually happening. After the prayer they say they are calling about transfers and say "Elder Roberts, you're first. Nofo Oe." At first I was like where is Nofo then I realized that meant I am staying. I was like what the heck. Then they told my companion he was staying as well. We are like what are the transfers. Turns out the only "Transfer" is that we are losing one of our wards we cover. So now we only cover one ward. That only lasted a day and then Zone Leaders called us back the next day saying we are covering that ward again. So basically there was no change. But tons of other missionaries got transferred. Just not us haha. It's ok I really like Lotopa, I was just down to go experience something new.

We had our 2 baptisms last week with Si'u and Nansi! Those went well and the ward came in clutch with providing tons of food.

Soooooooo, Saturday when we visited all of our investigators we talked about the importance of coming to church and all that, and they all had plans set to get rides to church. We got a member and visited all of them Sunday morning anyways to just make sure they were coming, and EVERYONE DIDN'T COME. We were expecting 9-10 investigators and we had 2. I was pretty frustrated because the day before everyone was so ready to come. So ya basically a lot of the baptisms aren't happening. We have 3 for sure baptisms next week with Asafo, Chelsey, and To'ai. Chelsey and To'ai and siblings. Asafo is beyond set, he got married last week and he has been coming to church every week. We went and visited Aiga and Samuelu and their family yesterday. We sat down and then Samuelu basically told us he isnt getting baptized. Aiga was not happy at all. Aiga said she is coming to church every week with her kids, Samuelu said he is staying Methodist. The problem is Samuelu doesn't want to get married which means Aiga can't get baptized. So ya basically not what we want. Aiga was pretty upset I felt really bad for her. They just had a baby boy too last week. 

Last week we were just "knocking doors" (most houses don't have doors), and we ran into a family where the parents are both baptized from forever ago, but they have 7 kids and 5 of them are not baptized! When the mom said that me and my companion just looked at each other. We are bringing the whole family to the visitors center tonight as long as everything goes through.

Fun things: 2 nights ago a rat crawled over me while I was sleeping and I couldn't sleep for the next hour. The next night we set out a rat glue trap and caught it. It wasn't dead though it was just stuck in the glue. I didn't have the will power to kill it haha. I kept thinking of my dwarf hamsters I used to have. Good thing I have my companion because he wasted no time in getting a match and the bug spray and burning it to death. So ya. I ate Samoan Chicken and Lamb neck, both of which were really good. The neighbor kids have been coming over at night because they need help with their English homework haha. Its like kindergarten all over again it's fun.

Elder Roberts

Sweat

Chelsey and To'ai 

Doing Homework 

Si'u has tougue out, Nansi is standing by me. Their Baptism 

 Squeek

Soa and Ace(Baptism from November), notice the speaker on top of the car

Asafo and Alalafaga's marriage

Up's and Down's

This last week was good overall, had some up's and down's. We went to the temple with Noa on Friday which was just absolutely amazing! The spirit was so strong I love the temple. Also, probably the nicest bathroom I have been in in the past 4 1/2 months. But it was amazing seeing her be baptized on behalf of her mother and grandmother. We explained to her that because of her actions her mother and grandmother will be able to live in a state of peace and comfort. It was a powerful experience doing the confirmation for her mother. I am just grateful everything worked out and we could feel the spirit of the temple.

On Sunday we were expecting like 9-10 investigators to come to church and then our phone started ringing and everybody was cancelling. I was so frustrated because so many people had dates coming up that would now have to be pushed back another week. We were blessed to have 3 investigators come to church though. We are having two baptisms this week! The oldest sister is not being baptized this week which is sad but everyone has their own free agency. All of our baptisms for next week got pushed back to the 31st because of not coming to church. Right now we have 6 baptisms on the 31st but I am confident we are going to pick up another 2 tomorrow. We will see what the Lord has in plan.

Highlights from our investigators: Asafo is getting married tonight! I am pretty sure this is the first wedding I will actually attend in my life. It is just in the Stake President's office. He is all set for his baptism on the 31st. We started the Plan of Salvation yesterday and explained how the fall of Adam and Eve was a good thing and he was like "That totally makes sense! This church is so true!" I was hyped.

Aina, Samuelu, and Honey: My first family I am teaching! They weren't able to come to church because their 2 year old had to go to the hospital so their date is getting pushed to the 31st. They told us that since they were not able to go to church they all read the Book of Mormon together and loved it! I was hyped. Also Aina is giving birth like today so everything is kind of on standby right now.

So our phone ran out of minutes for the month on the 9th. So it has been a struggle. We have no minutes for the rest of the month haha. There are two phone providers here, Bluesky and Digicel. We have bluesky and all of our investigators have digicel. I had no idea when we call Digicel it uses wayyyyy more minutes. So ya not what I want.

Everything is going great here in Lotopa! The work continues to progress and we are seeing miracles everyday. I know God knows and loves each and everyone one of us. "Yea, come unto Christ, and be perfected in him"-Moroni 10:32

Elder Roberts

2 puppies and a GOAT

                  Bishop is the only person in Samoa that wouldn't just leave the dog on the side of the road

Temple with Noa 

 Not at all what this guy wants

6 Months!

1/4th of the way done. These last 6 months have actually gone by pretty fast for the most part. I am excited to see what the next 18 months have in store!

This last week has been crazzzyyyy busy. We have had so many people to visit. We cover a village on the other side of the area from where we live, its the village on the mountain. We have 6 investigators with baptismal dates in that village. So we basically start out the day walking to the mountain and then spend a lot of our time up there.

Update on our investigators: we have scheduled 8 baptisms this month, and will most likely be 9. We have 3 next week with a 15 year old girl, and her 2 little siblings who are 11 and 9. At first I was worried the 15 year old didn't want to be baptized because she was raised catholic and didn't want to change, I guess her mom has been talking to her though and reading the Book of Mormon with her and now she is wanting it. THERE IS POWER IN THE BOOK OF MORMON! We are teaching a family!!! This is my first full family with a mom, dad, and kids that will all get baptized. I am honestly so excited. They all came to church on Sunday. We went to go pick them up and I saw the dad getting ready for church, and I WAS SO HYPED. The mom and 8 year old daughter have baptismal dates but he didn't and when we first met him he was very hesitant to let us talk to his family, he was strong Methodist. Him coming to church was definitely a surprise for me. They all loved church though, it was fast and testimony meeting. After the meeting I quick talked to Bishop and asked if he could just fellowship them for like 5 min. Ya he talked with them in his office for like 45 minutes and the dad came out a changed man I guess. Apparently he wants to be baptized according to both bishop and the wife. But we unfortunately had to leave to go to our other ward, and then he went to his parents village and comes back tomorrow. So hopefully we set his baptismal date and they all get baptized on the 24th! The only problem is they need to get married but that is easy money here. Also the mom is pregnant and due on the 13th so everything is kind of on hold with really quick visits. Which brings us to our new investigator who I am super excited about...Asafo! So we get a call from a member Sunday night with a referral. She told us they were doing Visiting Teaching Visits and met him, he apparently wanted to start lessons and wanted to get baptized, but he is also not married to the woman he is living with. The woman is pregnant with their first child. He really wants to get married though. Then She told me where they lived....literally the house on the very top of the mountain...I legit almost cried. Anyways, we went and saw him Monday, brought him to the visitors center to do a tour, he is getting baptized on the 31st. Also, we met with the stake president today and he is getting married next Wednesday. We are also doing an FHE with the couple and bishop and his wife at the mission office together with President Hannemann so I am really excited for that.

My new companion is awesome, I have been speaking lots of Samoan so that's good. Just imagine what you think living with a native Samoan would be like, and that is exactly what it's like haha. It's a good time. Also, I did my first baptismal interview yesterday. It was a Tuesday at 8 am, probably the only time I will do one then. I asked him the question about if you have committed a serious crime and he talked for so long and he was mumbling a lot and I didn't understand anything. Then he was just looking at me. I was like uhhhhhhhh. I just asked him the question again and asked him to say yes or no and he said no so hopefully all is well. I also asked if he has ever been to jail and he said no. 

Other fun things: A member gave me a whole box of quaker Oatmeal, I was sooo hyped so now we have lots of oatmeal at our house, my ankle is doing better, still not 100%. WE ARE GOING TO THE TEMPLE ON FRIDAY! I am soooo excited. We are doing baptisms for the dead with Noa, she got some names to do. Last fun thing, last Wednesday we got a text from Tu'i (Woman we baptized in February) saying she was in the emergency room and wanted a blessing. We quick asked president for permission to leave our area and he said yes so we went together with bishop and it was such a spiritual experience for reals. We got home pretty late that night but I am glad we could help her.

Hope everyone has an awesome week!

Elder Roberts

Cool View

 These lizards are everywhere

 Random Horse

 First Baptismal Interview

My Beloved Oatmeal