2015 was good to me

December 28, 2015

Well family... if I could express how wonderful it was to talk to you in an email i would.. but i'ts impossible. that was the fastest and best 1.5 hours ever... even though you all made fun of the way I talk;) haha didn't know my accent had changed too much. While you're away for 6 months you realize what matterse to you most... and that is the gospel and your family! But it only made me trunky for like a day... haha, because it is a good motivation. WE ARE SO LUCKY TO HAVE A FAMILY THAT LOVES EACH OTHER AND LOVES THE GOSPEL. so many people don't have that, so many missionaries don't even have their family emailing them. I am sooo lucky. It motivates me to try to help families down here come together in the gospel. 

okay this week was great. Sam asked for specific names of people to pray for.. and that made me laugh because I give specific names in all my emails but maybe sam just doesn't read my emails;) just kidding i'll tell you exactly what i need you to pray for. 

Alice: She really wants to get baptized, and her best friend is a member in another ward. She has a 7 month year old son and she lives with her aunt. She is on date for the 17th but she is struggling with coming to church. she will come like every other week... so we'll see, but pray for her:) 

Donald and Malala Kabaso: this is the family we are teaching and same thing as alice. CHURCH ATTENDANCE IS A PROBLEM. most because they live really far away from the church and they have a 2 year old son. but they are so great, and wonderful, and they love the message and want to be baptized. He is very busy with work and so he has had to cancel a lot for our appointments lately. 

But we had some amazing miracles this week!! We were flipping through the area book to try to find some old investigators that we could try meeting up with again, and we found Virginia and Precious. They are very interested and they ask wonderful questions... I really think they show some serious potential. 

We had 3 people show up to church who we have never taught before. One is a young man named moses who we are seeing on thrusday.. he has come to church twice. and the first time he came we were the worst missionaries ever and forgot to get his number but HEAVENLY FATHER GAVE US A SECOND CHANCE. and he came again yesterday! another guy that came has come twice as well but he doesn't live in our area. and then the third guy is a guy we met last week who is deaf and so he wants us to teach him in sign language.. haha I can do the church's name and some other gospel things in sign language.. but yeah we'll see what happens with that. 

We also met a referral from elders in FINLAND, who is very interested. We taught him the Plan of Salvation and committed him to baptism. His name is chipulu. We had really been trying to find new investigators this week and heavenly father definitely answered our prayers. 

OH AND another girl named Esther is SO PREPARED. she was a referral from a young women and we taught her the restoration and all of her questions went perfectly with the lesson.. it was crazy. like I started laughing at how prepared she was. 

but after all that we still had no investigators at church.. haha because everyone is away for holiday. 

The Stake president had us over for dinner and MAN IT WAS THE BEST DINNER I'VE HAD IN FOREVER. Rice, chicken, vegetables, bottled water, and dessert. wow. amazing. 

Christmas: So christmas day we went and visited a young couple who the wife is a recent convert. (Ruth and Daniel) then we went over to the Mupeta's home.. where Faith and Natasha (daughters) are members.. we are teaaching Michael the son and the mother Grace... (who is an eternal investigator) but they had us over for lunch and it was special. I cooked some soup (cut up some tomatoes and boiled them.. by the way mom... you're not gonna like this but I cut vegetables in my hand. no ones got time for a cutting board.) but yeah and we had pasta and rice and potatoes. and even Chicken. it was amazing i will include a picture. And then we shared with them a movie and got to skype our families. We had more lessons planned for the day but people kept calling and cancelling.. which makes sense it was christmas! 

but yes! many miracles this week, and it truly is special to spend christmas as a missionary. Definitely keeps you focused on the true meaning of christmas. I'm so grateful that my savior Jesus Christ was born on this year 2000 years ago, and I know he came with a mission, and he was exactly obedient an stayed true to his purpose. I hope we all strive to become more like him this next upcoming year. 

Merry Christmas BANJA LANGA

December 21, 2015

hey hey hey. It's Christmas time!!! Except it's really hot/or pouring rain so it doesn't really feel like Christmas or anything.. BUT we get to celebrate the greatest birth in the histroy of the world. Time to celebrate!

We have been focusing on Christmas with our member visits this week and we invite them all to choose one thing to give back to Christ this christmas... whether it's reading your scriptures every day... or forgiving someone... or fufilling your church calling more fully. Christ doesn't expect a wrapped gift from us... but all he wants is for us to become more like him.. so that's my challenge to all of you:)

I'LL BE SKYPING HOME AT 16:30 ZAMBIA TIME = 8:30 AM UTAH TIME. SUPER STOKED.Can't wait to see all your beautiful faces. tell the kids i say sorry if it ruins present opening. 

Okay good good week. I only got lost a couple times this week and we were able to meet with some more people. We're learning the area which means we are teaching more people and more lessons which means we're happier and more productive missionaries:)

Big news first and then on to the people.

Zone Conference/Christmas party:

So friday/saturday was zone conference/a  christmas party for all the Zambian missionaries.. so the copperbelt missionaries drove/bussed down to Lusaka which means I GOT TO SEE SISTER BINGHAM. happy day. and my whole mtc group was together... They've all been serving in Zambia.. but I was off in Malawi so this was the first time we have all be reunited and they have all become such wonderful missionaries. hey so proud of all of them.

Then... THE BIG ANNOUNCEMENT WAS MADE THAT THE NAME OF OUR NEW MISSION PRESIDENT IS PRESIDENT AND SISTER KUPU FROM TONGA. They will arrive July 1st and hey my poly companion is STOKED. haha poly power. It's gonna be a weird adjustment because I love the Ericksons.. but it will be good.

Zone Conference changed my life like always. We focused on repentance and really studied the parable of the prodigal son. ahhh REPENTANCE IS AMAZING. and over the Christmas season.. it was just powerful. We discussed how sometimes as missionaries we help our investigators gain faith... and then we get so excited that we just baptize them without teaching proper repentance... So we're really gonna focus on it now.

then we had a super fun Christmas party where we had dinner and a white elephant exchange and we watched Christmas Carol! cool stuff.. ya know watching a real life movie.

okay back to real life missionary stuff.

RAINY SEASON HAS STARTED.

"satanist": so every single person in Lusaka thinks of our church as "the satanist church" and that we crucify people... or they think of it as the muzungu (white person) church... and so there is MAJOR OPPOSITION here for many of the members and investigators... it takes a lot of courage for these people here to join the church. 

kabaso family: Wonderful family with 3 kids. They are so sweet, adn they were taught by the elders and malala recieved a priesthood blessing from them and she was healed and so it totally changed their attitude towards their churhc... but now we are just working on getting them to come to church. But we're putting them on date for January 17th.

Grace Mpimpa: SHE IS POWERFUL MAN. she is on date for the 17th as well. But she is facing major opposition from her landlords about investigating the church. but she has read both brigham youngs and john taylors books and she will read anything in teh book of mormon. She is a complete book worm, adn she wants answers to everything haha.. but she is really loving the church and she is finally accepting that she doesn't need the answers to everything.

Sakala Family: we are having FHE with them tonight, and they are less-active but their son is POWERFUL and leaves for his mission next month. But the father came to church on sunday!!!!!!! Emmanual (their son) has really asked us to work hard on activating his family while he is gone... and we're gonna do it:)

I'm really starting to love the people here. They are all wonderful people, and we are recieving referrals and it's just a happy time to be a missionary. 

So much more happened this week but I can't think of anything right now. but hopefully when we skype i'll remember stuff to talk about:)

sign language: so this guy found us in the distribution center today and told us he wants us to learn sign language so we can translate for him at church... and then he wants to be baptized... uhhhh well that is a big task. But I learned some things and we're gonna try it out... I dunno wish us luck!

funny stories:
1. so we were teaching this recent convert Emmanual (stake presidents nephew) and we showed him pictures of our family and he was like "wow... having a big family would be so nice because then when one of you dies it doesn't really make that big of difference... and there will for sure be people at your funeral" hahah whaaattt? Sister Solomone and i were just dying (fact: almost everyone from down here has had a sibling or parent pass away to some disease) 

NO BETTER WAY TO SPEND CHRISTMAS THAN BY TESTIFYING OF CHRIST. I miss my family of course.. but this is my only Christmas as a missionary so I shouldn't spend it by being trunky.

LOVE YOU ALL KWAM BIRI. talk to you soon:)

Muli Bwanji from Lusaka

December 14, 2015

heeeey my friends

You know you're in Lusaka when....
1. you're emailing in a super nice internet cafe with a diet coke next to you.

2. You speak the native language to the people here and they ask you to speak English instead.

3. There's an indoor shopping MALL

Okay.... this was maybe the craziest week of mission so far... and I HIT 6 MONTHS ON MISSION.

Monday: took a nice 5 hour bus ride up to Lilongwe.. drove through some villages.. cool stuff. Sat next to some SDA missioanries from America who were doing humanitarian stuff.. it was weird to teach to Americans haha... I didn't even know how to approach them. But they were nice. We spent the night in the sister's flat and we had to re-arrange our luggage to be under the weight limit so were up until midnight eish... too late for a missionary. 

Tuesday: woke up at 4 to get to the airport... then while waiting we met this really nice American named JOhn who was flying home for the holidays. Any who.. you ready for this? I go to immigration... hand them my passport to quickly find out that I HAVE BEEN IN MALAWI ILLEGALLY FOR THE PAST 3 MONTHS. they had put the temporary permit stamp in my companions passport.. but not mine. and so the person told me I couldn't go through... We didn't have a phone or anyone's numbers... luckily the nice american let us use his phone and then I found my bus ticket which had the Blantyre Zone Leader's number on it (tender mercy of the Lord) and I called them and Elder Rugumayo told me to just talk it out with them and he would call the Lilongwe ZL's to come. We talk it out and the people just told me to pay 15000 kwacha and they would let me through... to this day we're not sure if that was policy or an "under the table" approach... but it got me on the plane:) 

ZL's pick us up in Lusaka and we go straight to Zone meeting... it's weird to be serving with new missionaries that i've never met before. But it will be a great change. Then I was supposed to drive sister's to the bus station... but Sister Erickson said no to that (thank goodness) because I had to get my driving approved first. So I gotta spend all day driving around Lusaka trying to learn the area with the AP's. fun stuff. We met one member family who is just wonderful!!! The Zulus!!!

Then the brand new sister got here straight from the PROVO MTC and she spent the night in our flat. Sister KiniKini and she is soooo excited. She will be serving in Blantyre and man I got a little jealous... Blantyre is the best and I miss it so much. 

any who sleeping at night is SO HOT. heeey there is no AC or fans and i sleep with a wet towel to keep me from dying haha.. but I got up in the middle of the night and we hadn't yet put our clean water on the filter thing and so I drank from the tap and maaaaan... bad mistake. I got so sick. Zambian water is mavuto. 

Wednesday: we had to drive Sister kinikini around to orientation with President, and to meet her new companion so it was a slow day and we only got to teach a lesson at the end of the day. But we taught a less-active named Jane and her husband (recent convert) named Oscar. we taught them about Faith and Jane said something really cool... she said "we read in the Bible how we can have faith to move mountains... but i think today we use our faith to move past the trials that come our way." I thought it was a really cool comparison. But this day I still felt soooo sick... during planning i was just laying on the bed and would just agree with everything that Sister Solomone would say haha. DON'T DRINK BAD WATER.

Thursday: We got sister kinikini and her companion sister motsi off to the mission home to head to Blantyre Malawi and we finally got to focus in on our area. BTW I was mistaken last week... i'm not actually in Lilanda.. I am in Munali. And my companion and I cover the whole ward. So we have a really big area but it's okay because we have a car now:)

The Area: It's wonderful. We have a wonderful branch mission leader who took us around to many of the people and showed us where they stayed. He leaves for his mission in Februrary to Zimbabwe. Some people that we have met: 

The Zulus: a STRONG family who's daughter just got married on saturday to an RM and they leave tomorrow for the joberg temple <3 

The Mupetas: Faith is a recent convert, and her brother Micheal is 8 and we just started teaching him, and the mother Grace knows the church is true but she can't get herself to leave her church. 

Grace Mpimpa: she is an investigator who is SOLID. we need to put her on date... but she loves learning and she is truly investigating. she has a sincere desire and she asks really good questions. 

Alice: She is an investigator who has a baby and lives with her aunt who has a 3 year old son named Chawa. he reminds me so much of Mae... the second we walked in he took me around and showed me his whole house and all of his toys. He is so cute.

and then we had 3 people confirmed on Sunday: Margaret, Duncan, and Ngila... and they are all very solid Recent Converts. We were able to meet with all of them and they are so great. Love them lots.

Anywho... there is much work to do here, and I'm excited for this time I have to serve in Lusaka. I love the adventure of white washing and getting lost on the way to every. single. appointment. A lot of gas money was used this week.. but i'm repenting for it and will do better this week. We are having a christmas party this week and the missionaries from teh Copperbelt are coming down... which means I get to see SISTER BINGHAM! it's gonna be a wonderful reunion.

I also got to give a quick shout out to my bestie Hermana Fowler for returning with honor this past week... Costa Rica will miss her kwam biri i know it.

anywho... after a long long email. I made it to lusaka... it's so hot here. and i miss blantyre.. but i'm slowly loving Lusaka:) 

Christmas is next week ahhhhh so exciting.

LOVE YOU ALL AND NEVER FORGET IT.

Sista Thuey

Transfer News

December 7, 2015

Faith Tchongwe!

Khumbo!! 

Frasier with his bike that he rides to church 

 Irene!

Charles, a professional futbol player

My mother here in Blantyre.. sister Naledi.. a recent convert

So transfer news came on Friday.... "you and your companion will be transferred to Lusaka" yes. Who knows if this has ever happened before in the history of ever, but Sister Solomone and I are getting transferred to a different country together, and staying companions hahaha. it's wonderful. Then came the other unexpected news... "you will serve as sister training leaders" 

So we're going to Lusaka... white washing (again) and we're serving as STL's... and let's just say I feel very underqualified to be an STL. but it's going to be a great experience and a great learning opportunity! We will be serving in the Lilanda area which was previously an elder's area! 

It's pretty funny because we came to Blantyre... white washed an elder's area (which was a struggling area) and now we are doing it again in Lusaka. Fun stuff my friends!! A greenie and an elder who just finished training will be taking over our area... we left kwam biri sticky notes in our area book about people they need to see and things they need to do haha.  

Travel Plans: We take a 5 hour bus ride from Blantyre to Lilongwe tonight, and spend the night in Lilongwe. Then we will take a plane to Lusaka early in the morning, we get there and go straight to zone meeting haha. Then from there I have to drive to the bus station and pick missionaries up from the Copperbelt. STICK SHIFT WITH LEFT HAND BABY... oh and driving on the left side of the road. PRAY FOR SISTER THUESON. 

Anywho... I'm very sad to be leaving Blantyre. I'm going to miss Soche mountain, and the crazy mini buses, and random people yelling out my name (after 6 months you get to know everyone) I'm forever grateful for the 6 months that i've had in Blantyre, but after praying about it I really feel like it's time for me to leave and to have a change. I'm excited for this new experience! 

Yamikani: Yamikani PASSED HIS INTERVIEW and will be baptized next week!! he is just so great. but I never got a picture with him:( i can't believe I forgot. but I'll have the elders send a picture from his baptism to me and send it to all of you!! Khumbo will be baptizing him, so it will be a great experience for KHumbo to use his new priesthood. 

Tenson: Okay so this is big news... you know Tenson who was confirmed just last week? We had coordination with our Branch President this week (who is newly called and doesn't have counselors yet) and he feels very strongly that Tenson should be his second counselor. PRETTY CRAZY RIGHT? The district presidency hasn't approved it yet... but we'll see what happens. He needs the priesthood first. 

We got 3 new referrals from Mike, and we were able to teach them!! Linda, Lillian, and Mercy. They have some real potential! 

Irene: Irene is home from village, and we were able to teach her!! She is progressing very well... we forgot to put her on a date, so we'll leave that up to the new elders!! 

Other than that the week was mainly filled with saying bye to the people that I love so very much. It was sad saying bye to everyone... but for some reason I can't grasp my head around that i'm leaving. It feels like i'll just be hiking up these mountains my whole mission. many people gave us small gifts to remember them by... but I truly don't think I'll ever forget these people. 

I'll let you know how Lusaka is next week!!! I've heard the language is similar to Chichewa so hopefully it's not too big of an adjustment! 

Anywho.. I love you all, and I love this work. I forgot my journal today so I can't really remember many cool experiences or anything... but they happen everyday:) 

KEEP WORKING HARD, AND BEING HAPPY. 

Love, 

Sista Thueson

reporting for the last time from Blantyre. 

GRATEFUL to be a missionary

Maswera Bwanji Banja Langa? Well this week was good.. I'll say that ever week I think though. First off.. Happy Birthday Sam and Jeff this past week. Hope you had a wonderful wonderful birthday. oh and Happy birthday to the best roomie... SJ BEAR.

Ponderizing scripture of the week: "verily verily I say unto you, if you desire a further witness, cast your mind upon teh night that you cried untio me in your heart, that you might know concerning the truth of these things. Did I not speak peace to your mind concerning the matter? What greater witness can you have than from God?" D&C 6:22-23

I picked this one because lately Sister Solomone and I have really been focusing on getting people to PRAY and to RECOGNIZE answers to their prayers. When we ask people if they have ever had their prayers answered... they always tell us that "of course.. one time I was sick and then I got better, or I did good on a test, or we found food when we didn't have money." many people don't realize that God can answer prayers of knowledge. And that's why i'm grateful for JAMES 1:5 because it talks about lacking WISDOM, and then asking God. and so prayer is something we are really emphasizing. 

I know you don't care about this, but I'm trying to improve my teaching skills, and these are the things i'm working: 

1. asking more questions. I need to talk less and have investigators talk more. 

2. powerful and direct baptisms invitations. 

3. Always read the BOM intro with investigators when introducing it. 

4. Teach them HOW TO PRAY and most importanly how to recieve answers throught the Holy Ghost. 

5. APPLy what i'm teaching to their lives.. "how can the gospel help their situation?"

6. Always state our purpose... We're not there to have bible discussions but to help people make covenants with Heavenly Father. 

7. Give BOM chapters as commitments as often as possible! 

none of our investigators came to church... which is the first time in a looooooooongggg time... so that was kinda frustrating. but the rains came down,and the floods came up, and I think that affected it. well i'm just telling myself that haha:) 

okay now that I bored you to death I will get into our week. 

Tenson: Tenson was confirmed yesterday!!! Which is great and he seemed very happy... we went and taught his family lesson one this past week, and only one daughter and his wife sat in on the lesson... which they have always done but we tried focusing on them. WE taught them the restoration and we're not sure if the wife understood because she doesn't speak english but she can hear it? yeah but we tried committing her to pray and hahahaha she would not give us an answer. We asked her maybe 5 times if she would pray about what we taught and she would just look at us, and we even asked it in chichewa so we knew that she understood. soooo that's fun. 

Kabutu Banja: sooooo this is kinda a sad story. So this is the most wonderful family in the world... they were a referral and the 8 year old daughter comes to church almost every single sunday, and so we started teachign them. They live next to one of our recent converts.. but they stay in the guard house (rich people down here have gates, to gate their house in and they have guards...and normally there is a small house in the back for them to stay) but no one has been living in the main house... the owner has been waiting for someone to come and rent. (the owner is an azungu) anywho... so someone finally is renting the house, and we were there on Thursday and we were about to start our lesson (we teach them in the backyard on the porch) and the owner (a old white man) walked to the back and asked us what church we were from... Me, being super excited because I thought he was interested, told him "The church of jesus Christ of latter-day saints" and he just said... "you're not wanted on this property... you should leave." uhhh okay. so we just got up, said bye to the kids and left. And now I guess the owner doesn't want the family as the guard because there are too many kids... so sad. now they have no where to live:( 

but any who... the take home of the story is: of course the first time that I get kicked off of someone's property is by an old white man... haha. 

Lamilton: haha he is this 24 year old guy who is in medical school down here... REALLY smart guy. He is SDA and knows his Bible better than the back of his hand. Like i'm pretty sure he can quote the whole thing... we have taught him maybe 3 lessons and ask if we have even taught him anything. The whole lesson he just sits and quotes bible verses to us. The thing is... is he will come to church, and so we feel like we need to keep teaching him. and he hears stuff in gospel principles that he doesnt agree with and then we have to hear about it in lessons... like salvation (aka everyone being ressurected) But last night we taught him and he quoted bible verses for about 30 minutes until he said (so where do the people go who aren't free from sin, and don't have faith in jesus christ) and i just totally jumped in and wouldn't let him talk haha and whipped out my plan of salvation pamphlet and tried to explain the 3 degrees of glory. he didn't agree with it... but i tried my best. he's an interesting one.

Thanksgiving: ahhhh Elder and Sister Beal are the BEST. Well first of all we were teaching our recent convert Naledi right before Thanksgiving dinner... and all of a sudden she decides to feed us... and we can't say no to food. Especially becuase no one even knows what thanksgiving is so we couldn't explain it haha. So we ate dinner at her house, and then we went to thanksgiving dinner and had the BEST food. Sister Beal made mashed potatoes just for me, and stovetop stuffing, and pumpkin pie (her kids came to visit her a couple months ago and brought the ingredients... trust me they don't sell these things down here) and the best part of the night was the 2 African sisters didn't like pumpkin pie and so they gave their pieces to me and sister solomone:)

Electricty: so electicty goes out every day pretty much... and we found out that there is a set schedule of when it goes off and on.. but it changes every day. but the reason why is there isn't enough water in the dams to generate electricty... so the rainy season needs to come soon because cereal for dinner is getting a little old haha. 

Well we are on week 6 of the transfer... Transfer news come this week and rumors are spreading that Sister Thueson is headed to Lusaka.... stay tuned. 

also... everyone go look up "Safety for the Soul" by Holland... but you have to watch the video. I watch it maybe once a week and almost have it memorized haha.. it's the best. 

I AM SO SORRY FOR THIS LONG EMAIL THAT NONE OF YOU WILL REALLY CARE ABOUT BESIDES MY PARENTS. if you read it, congrats:) 

LOVE YOU ALL, LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY. so grateful for every experience that i'm having down here.

Kutenta KWAM BIRI

heeey my friends it's sooo hot. like I could go into graphic detail about how sweaty I get while we are proselyting.. but i'll save you from that picture. But it's all good:) 

TENSON WAS BAPTIZED YESTERDAY!!! It was wonderful, he was very very happy. and his daughter even came to the baptism which is exciting, we have taught her a couple lessons, but the goal is to teach the whole family now! We have tried in the past... but we think now that he is baptized they may be more willing. 

Ponderizing scripture: "If any man will DO his will, he shall KNOW of the doctrine, whether it be of God or whether I speak of myself." John 7:17

funny stories: 

1. We were teaching Frasier with the Beals as usual, and right after I said the opening prayer frasier was like "Breaking News.... these 2 azungus from Baltimore moved in just across the street." and they he took us there to go meet them hahahah. It's like a reallly big deal when white people live in Malawi. 

2. I was walking and I ran into a car that wasn't even moving. it hard really bad. i'm a klutz. 

3. I was talking with a RM in our area Mike... and he is trying to apply to go to BYU and of course I'm trying to get him to come because it would be a party to have a friend from Malawi there, but he told me that he is going to win the ladies there through his chess skills. hahahaha I died. If he goes to BYU we're gonna have some long chats on how to win the ladies.

Investigators: 

Yamikani: HE IS BACK AND BETTER THAN EVER. he has read his Liahona diligently. and underlined everything, and we taught him chastity last and he found an old conference talk about chastity and man he just is a firm believer in it. It's great haha. He was at church and he will be baptized on the 13th! 

Junior: He came to church!!! wahooo if he keeps this up he'll be ready to be baptized on the 13th as well! 

Willard: Same thing as Junior... we taught him Word of Wisdom last and he has been going around to everyone at his school telling them that they are sinning if they drink tea haha gotta love it. 

Recent Converts: 

Khumbo: sooooo we had a major heart to heart with Khumbo. He has recently started going to school and he has been putting school before reading his scriptures (I felt like such a hyprocrite teaching him the importance of putting scripture study before school work because let's be honest... did I do that? no....) but any who, and he has been late for church the past 3 weeks so he hasn't been able to partake of the sacrament. He told us how he hasn't felt the spirit in his life lately and he seemed really down on himself. He is trying to prepare to go on a mission but he has this idea in his head that you have to be perfect before you go on a mission, and have a perfect understanding of the scriputres (which looking at me we all know is not true) and so we just let him talk it out, and we just explained that we would be here to help him and that he needs to read his scritpures no matter what and partake of the sacrament and that life would be better... since then he has seemed much happier. \

Mandela: He got the Aaronic Priesthood yesterday and will pass the sacrament next week:) we have been trying to help him memorize the sacrament prayers and ahhh he tries so hard, i'm excited to hear him bless the sacrament. 

Less Actives: 

Bridget has come to church 2 weeks in a row! Miracle! 

Pretty much life is just wonderful. We had 6 investigators at church yesterday, and they all seem to be progressing towards baptism. 

Random Thought: Something i've been thinking about is how much these people i'm teaching can consume my thoughts. It's almost impossible to be homesick when you have so many people down here in Blantyre to worry about haha... Family I love you kwam biri, but these amazing people are who are on my mind almost all the time. I never thought that would be possible... but it is. 

I LOVE YOU ALL KWAM BIRI!! 

Sister Thuey

5 MONTHS!

November 16, 2015

 Sister Dlamini our wonderful STL who leaves in a few weeks :(

Matching dresses....ADORABLE

I hit the big 5 months mark this week... next month is 6 and aish that is crazy... that means 1/3rd and ahh i'm not ready for that. no no no. People always ask me how much longer and I always say 15 months... I keep forgetting that nah it's only 13 months left. 

PONDERIZING VERSE FOR THE WEEK: JACOB 1:7... laboring diligently:) 

Okay funny stories: 

This is how you wash dishes my friend.
You take some dirt and soap and scrub
until the charcoal comes off.

1. We had zone meeting and I get a call from our zone leaders in the morning asking me to conduct the music... now normally this isn't a problem, but we don't have pianos really down here so the person conducting the music has to give the tune and sing the first line, and normally I make my companion do it, but Sister Solomone made me face my fear and sing... in front of the whole zone. and it went awful.... i'm never doing it again hahaha. 

2. So we are teaching this YSA Willard... and it's interesting. But we can't teach him without a women and normally he brings his friend from school. And so we teach him and her together... but she was too busy this week and so we weren't able to teach him and he got super super frustrated... and he had met Sister Frimpong (one of our STL's) earlier in the week and he told us "just bring that African Sister and it will be okay..." because he thinks that we need an African women because neither of us are African... hahaha I don't know if you'll laugh or even understand this but it was funny. 

3. "Lucy in the sky of diamonds" came on while we were driving in the mini bus and I got sooo stoked. 

4. Power ndi callibe. Seriously the power has been such a problem. Almost every day it is out either in the morning or at night. 

Tender Mercies: 

1. Tenson passed his baptismal interview and will be getting baptized on Sunday:) And I've mentioned before how we have tried teaching his family, and how his daughter is interested but his wife wants nothing to do with it. BUT... she told us she would come to his baptism on sunday.... PLEASE PRAY THAT SHE DOES. I think it would really soften her heart to start taking lessons. 

2. KHUMBO DOESN'T BELIEVE GOOGLE. IT'S A MIRACLE. ahhh he told us that he knew it wasn't true and that he won't ever leave the church. 

3. Mike's mother gave us cold mangos on a hot day. ahhh wonderful. it was even on Friday the 13th.

4. 2 different people bought us drinks this week because they could see how hot and sweaty we were hahaha. Africa's heat aint a joke people. 

5. Mandela got interviewed for the priesthood and he'll be recieving the Aaronic priesthood next week:) We're very happy for him and he is VERY VERY EXCITED. 

Exchanges: We got to go on exchanges with the STL's this week!! good stuff... I got to go to Ndirande which means "rob me" in chichewa hahahaha it's the ghetto's but it's a wonderful place to be. I was with Sister Dlamini (her name is super hard to say... i've been here 5 months and can barely say it) But it was cool to be in another area teaching other people besides my own... but i quickly discovered that i'm going to have major separation anxiety when i get transferred haha the whole day I kept stressing about the people in our area, and how the lessons were going... Sister Dlamini probably thought i was crazy. But we had a really great lesson with a less-active... they had never met with her before and her name was Chisomo... and we just did some good ol BRT and talked about how much Heavenly Father loved her and she just started crying... the spirit was realllll strong in that lesson. We just let her cry for a little and ended the lesson while the spirit was strong. She didn't come to church I guess, but I still believe that it touched her. 

Investigators: okay soooo we got a new investigator this week! Irene! She was a referral and she has a 7 year old son, and her and her friend Memory came to church this week. blessings! We are really trying to look for new investigators... many of our previous ones have stopped progressing. sooo we're gonna get some new ones... but no more tracting so we have been really getting buddy buddy with our members for hopes of referrals:) and MIKE PULLED THROUGH... he said he has two girls that are just finishing writing their exams who are interested who we can start teaching this next week. 

Yamikani: has disappeared... seriously we have no idea where he has been and why he hasn't been to church. really nervous and stressed about him. 

Kabutu Family: Didn't come to church this week.... ahhh they're so great, so we're not giving up on them. 

Frasier: didn't come to church this week.... we are going to just give him some space... I think we really scared him, and so we'll just give him space and if he wants to get baptized he can call us.. because he is completely ready... it's now just his turn. 

I think that is about it for this week.... 

I'm happy happy happy:) I love everything about Blantyre... I wish I could explain how much I love these people... even when they disappoint me, don't keep their commitments, or reject what i'm saying ahh I still love them. I know for with a surety that I was sent to the perfect mission for me. It's not a perfect mission, nor is it easy.. but it's exactly what I needed. 

Keep doing the work you are doing where ever you are in the world. Heavenly Father loves you and I love you all:) 

NIMA KU KONDA

SISTER THUEY

Mission = Roller Coaster

November 2, 2015

With Hospin

With Charity

Hello my family!! So this week had it's ups and it's downs that's for sure!!! 

My ponderizing scripture for the week in ALMA 37:33!! just in case you would like to know:) 

So I'm just gonna start with the disappointment of the week... sorry to be a debbie downer but I need to let you all know. 

1. We went to go teach Frasier on Wednesday to go over the baptismal interview questions because he was supposed to be interviewed yesterday... but then he just drops this bomb on us that he doesn't think he can be baptized without a wife. (he is a 72 year old widower.... and his wife died about 12 years ago) He told us that he'll never get to be married again once he is in the church because he wouldn't be able to find someone that was a member... I seriously was speechless. and I think Elder and Sister Beal could tell that i was just devastated so they came in and tried to save the day. They went on to explain that President Monson is a widower, and Elder Scott never got remarried and how he can be with his wife again and all this good stuff and he said that he would be interviewed, but that he might be leaving for Botswana before the 8th... but then he didn't come to church on Sunday. soooo... we're trying to figure it out and i'll keep you updated. He keeps all of his commitments and already wants to pay tithing soo.... we have no idea what it is. But he seriously is in my thoughts 24/7... so pray for him:) 

2. Sister Thueson is a klutz as we all know and the rains came POURING DOWN on friday and I was not prepared at all. And so we were running in it trying to catch a mini bus and I biffed it HARD. Mud was everywhere and we were on our way to a meeting that we couldn't miss... and then I look down to find my foot bleeding haha hooray. you all remember the scar on my foot??? yep it got re-opened hahahaha THE SCAR WILL NEVER BE HEALED. Seriously it's my new trademark and I think during the resurrection i'm going to ask if I can keep it. 

Okay now into the tender mercies: 

1. Malunga Family: (Fonson/Daniel/Eunice) Okay so this family they live in Kandjeza which is wayyy far from the temple and it is 250 kwacha for transport (50 cents but hey that's a lot) and so they've never been able to make it to church, but we feel like we need to keep teaching them and so we do. So this lesson we decided to focus on the Atonement, and show them the video of the end of Christ's life. But at the beginning we just did our usual followup on the BOM chapter we gave them last time which was Alma 34, and the Father (Fonson) just stopped and was like "The whole time I was reading this, I just kept thinking that you had read my mind... it was exactly what I needed to read. I was so depressed and I read this and it made me feel so much better... especially verses 40 and 41.... how did you know I needed this?" It was a really really cool experience. Because I don't even remember thinking too hard about what chapter to give him last time, and it shows that sometimes we don't realize promptings by the spirit until after we have already followed them. It was a wonderful lesson.

2. Yamikani... So last time I mentioned how Yamikani had a word of wisdome problem. And so we followed up this last week to see how he was doing and he told us that he hasn't taken tea or coffee for the past 2 weeks and that he hasn't had alcohol since the first time he came to church!! ahhhh he is a miracle. He will be getting baptized on the 22nd if he keeps this up:) 

3. The Gopane family: Okay so this family has been a member for a couple years and the wife and the kids don't speak any english but they come to church every week, and the father is a police man so he can't come every week... but they are getting officialy married on saturday and then sealed in February:) But Brother Gopane is a police officer and he bore his testimony yesterday about how he followed the spirit. Background story: So 2 weeks ago 2 police officers were shot by some robbers in our area because they were transporting kwan biri money, and one died and the other is in the hospital. Any who Brother Gopane was supposed to be one of the police officers but early in the morning he had the feeling to tell his boss that he needed to take another shift... how crazy is that?? the spirit works in amazing ways. But they are wonderful and they have asked Sister Solomone and I to be their wedding photographers... hahahhaha I'm learning so many life skills. 

Funny Stories: 

1. Sister Solomone had a snickers in her backpack and while we were teaching a lesson... someone who was just sitting in looked in her bag, grabbed it, and just started eating it... I couldn't hold in my laughter. Who just does that? I love these people. 

2. Sister Solomone and I were doing an ab workout and half way through she said how she could feel it in her back... She had no idea it was supposed to be an ab workout... I just burst out laughing and just ended the workout because I thought it was so funny (given this is at 6:30 in the morning so things are funnier)

and yeah that's my life...  Don't worry looking back on this week I was able to see the tender mercies and get over my frustration and disappointment. Life is full of ups and downs and as Sister Marriot said in conference: "COME WHAT MAY AND LOVE IT" and that's truly how we have to look at life. 

LOVE YOU ALL and I LOVE MALAWI and I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY. 

ps. Halloween isn't a thing here so that was lame. 

Cooking Nsima... this picture was definitely posed. I'm still not good at cooking nsima but my investigator wanted my family to think that I can do it haha. 

oh and our Muslim family is doing well... We met with the family this past week but the father wasn't there so we just had a pangono lesson about Faith and invited them to church... but sadly they didn't come:( But we're gonna keep teaching, inviting the spirit, and giving them the Book of Mormon to read!