July 24, 2011 - Pioneer Day

Dear family,

Sounds like you are all doing well! church yesterday was crazy! There are

three wards in Gabarone, two of which meet in a different chapel. due to

construction on that chapel, the two wards joined us on our side. It was

basically chaos! there were so many people. It sort of reminded me of being

at home. our ward started at 9, the ysa ward at 11 and the other family ward

at 1. plus, there were baptisms after church and our poor new investigators

had no idea what was going on... neither did we... which probably added to

the confusion. what i do know is that this church is amazing and it is made

of people who keep the commandments. that makes people happy so it is made

up of happy people who keep the commandments, and it shows in their faces

and how they act towards others. our investigators did feel very loved and

fellowshipped which was great, and the spirit was strong in sacrament

meeting, and at the baptism. i love the baptisms here because there is

always a lot of singing, the ward here has a great way of taking the hymn

book hymns from so-so, to incredible gospel music. i mentioned in an email a

while ago how the music is, these people sing parts, and it comes from their

soul. Africans feel the music deep inside of them and it is powerful. these

people are amazing. The saints are so devoted to the truth and they do an

amazing job at bringing everyone along for the ride.

another advantage of having so many people at church was that the MTC

president and his wife, and all the other senior couples who normally work

in South Africa came and visited, and all of the missionaries got to see

them! the mtc president and his wife also spoke in the ysa sacrament

meeting. listening to them really took me back to the days in the mtc. i

remember sitting there (in the mtc) listening to their words and thinking it

would be hard to find more excellent people in this world, they really got

us so excited to kick the door down with both feet and baptize the whole

country. hearing them again stirred those feelings of love i had for them

and for missionary work. We are excited to go and kick all the doors down

and baptize these people! i can only imagine how they were feeling as the

missionaries they helped train were in the congregation, sitting with their

investigators, once again being taught from them. the president is just as

funny as ever, he said this statement that is my most favorite one yet,

"so do you believe in the bible?

well sure we do, it was members of our church who wrote it!"

love that man! he reminds me a lot of my own dad!

anyway, i hope my rambling made some sense.

until next week, we will keep working our buns off, don't worry.

sister blum

mom, sadly, my watch broke. and i was wondering if there would be a way i

could get some more cd's like the pride and prejudice cd, the emma smith

soundtrack, selections from august rush (not all the songs because some are

not missionary approriate) maybe selections from other amazing movies like

master and commander, forrest gump, etc. etc. even brown sugar... love you

with all my heart, please let me know if you want anything from here.

Birthday Week

dear parents, family and friends,

 

i am not sure if i have ever taught obey and honor the law so much in my whole mission than i have this last week. For sure, it was a hectic and awesome week. God has been blessing my companion and i so much. our area took a huge hit from a nuclear bomb and it is slowly recovering. with our super hard work and good laughs things are looking up. this sunday was a long needed boost of confidence as we had many investigators at church. It even rained and people still came :). There are a few things these people are afraid of, cold weather and rain. when those two things are combined we have close to zero church attendance. yesterday was no exception. it is the middle of winter and therefore it is cold, and it rained like i said before. we were blessed yesterday.

 

i was asked what the hardest thing to teach the people here is, i would like to answer by saying...

 

1. adam and eve in the plan of salvation

        basically, there are SOOOOOO many churches here, it is a christian country and because of that they all have their crazy beliefs about the plan of salvation. the thing that always takes the most time is Agency and the fall of Adam and Eve. a couple questions frequently asked are, "what was the fruit?", "does adam have a belly button?", "how many feet did snakes have before God took them away?" and so on. It always takes the longest to teach.

 

2. prophets

       basically every other person in Botswana is a prophet. We meet so many people, in fact once we were in a first lesson with a family of five and we began to discuss prophets. they told us that the youngest daughter (she was about 16 years old) was a prophet, she can tell peoples future and she can speak in tongues. when we asked the father to close with prayer for us, he called on his daughter... for sure, i have never heard a prayer like that before, my companion and i just looked at each other and didn't really know what to say. just a bunch of jiberish and swaying back and forth... it was interesting. 

 

3. speaking in tongues is always a common concern

 

4. do we have deliverance services and how often are they held?

       they have a belief that spirits of animals can possess us, therefore when you are possessed by an animal spirit you must go to the local prophet and he will deliver you from the evil animal spirit. most churches hold deliverance services a couple times a week. traditional doctors will even prescribe different prophets for the ill person to seek deliverance from. 

 

this place is awesome. basically God knew what he was doing when he sent me here. i was thinking about that this morning, for sure, i love this place. it is almost as crazy as me, only i don't believe in all the crazy weird things a lot of people do here. this is one of the reasons why the gospel is going crazy right now. people are thirsty for truth, there are so many who, when they hear the gospel, instantly know it is true and cling onto the iron rod with all of their heart. it is amazing to see how thirsty they are. To be able to take a huge jug of testimony and watch them fill their glasses and drink, is the hugest blessing i have been able to receive. they really are such choice and amazing people

 

this church is true.

 

mom i got the package long time back. thank you a lot. 

i am happy (and sad) that my truck was sold. good thing, but sad because i loved it. it will be nice to have some dollars when i get home though.

 

sounds like the party week was crazy. good to hear you are all well still.

 

i am glad that you were able to have so much fun with the Pugh family. they really are great, i hope they are doing very well. speaking of which, i need their address, can i get that somehow? did you play cranium with them?

 

my favorite scripture is 3 nephi 30:2. it puts the whole gospel into a nut shell. i also really like Mosiah 4:9

 

the adventure continues, until next time.

sister blum

 

July 4, 2011

for sure i loved the story about the woman who bore her testimony in sacrament meeting, thanks dad. it is comforting, there is a less active family here that we have been doing a little bit of work with. their story is a sad one. in short, they joined the church and were as golden as gold could be. they advanced very quickly, the dad quit drinking and smoking cold turkey, they joined the church, the husband received both the aaronic and melchezidek priesthoods, the wife was very active. their teaching records said they were very powerful forces in the ward, they were the cause of introducing many (now very solid) families to the ward. From the day they gained a testimony of the Book of Mormon to the day they left the church, they faced so much opposition. never have i heard of so much persecution in these days for one family, they lost all of their friends, were disowned by their family, almost kicked out of their home, the husband was threatened with the loss of his job, and many other things. i guess it was too much for them, they failed to overcome it and it overcame them. he still has his job, and they still live in the same house but they have banished from their mind forever the testimonies that they once had. 

I guess it was too much. It makes me wonder what things God had in store for them if they would have stayed faithful. it was painful to sit in that lesson and hear them deny completely that they ever had a testimony of the restored gospel. the wife attends some happy clappy church now and the husband stays at home. the lack of the spirit in that home is so apparent. we asked them if they were happy and they said they have never been happier, but i know it was a lie. 

they will come back someday, sadly, the road is far more bumpy where they are going than it would have been if they would have just stayed true. they have denied the testimony that they have, but they can't deny the truth forever. someday it will come back to them and they will change again. the story you shared with me makes me have so much more faith that they will be back. 

sister clendon and i are having a great time and are finding many people, our joy is preaching the gospel and we are preaching it a lot! mom, i think i got the package unless there was another surprise one. thank you for the ensigns, everyone was so thrilled. the coconut one came, and the other one too. but if you want, you can send me another !!!! i will never say no to a package. 

be sure the family knows we pray for them too, love you all, thank you for being christlike. 

peace and blessings
sister blum

we need miracles here, please pray for our father led families! they SERIOUSLY NEED as much blessings as they can get.