Upon the Isles of the Sea

8:53 PM

Soyez Toujours Joyeux

8:53 PM

Sunset from Uturoa, Raiatea Iaorana tatou! La vie est toujours belle à Raiatea. Sorry again about last week, we hiked Tapioi (on a cl...

Sunset from Uturoa, Raiatea

Iaorana tatou!

La vie est toujours belle à Raiatea. Sorry again about last week, we hiked Tapioi (on a clear day, you can see all the neighboring islands like Bora Bora) and so we didn't have as much time to email.

We had a couple more lessons with C. He did indeed enjoy church last Sunday and wanted to come again but he was sick yesterday. He finally started reading the Book of Mormon we gave him, but instead of reading straight through he's been studying topics from the index in the back. Classic C. It's hard to keep our lessons simple because he has too many deep questions! Apparently he's been reading up on the church online as well. I'm hoping he's reading the right stuff, but the fact that he asked us if we're a cult does get me a little worried. But he's a smart guy and is patient as we try to answer his questions.

Another of our investigators, P, came to church the first time though, and come to find out, the former ward mission leader is his cousin. I'm pretty excited about that because Frère A is awesome when it comes to missionary work. He sat by P all through church and explained everything. Lessons with P are funny sometimes because his sister (?) T is really bad at eavesdropping subtly. We've invited her to just come over and join the lesson but haven't quite convinced her yet. We invited her to come to church with P, and she said, "If I'd come to yours, would you come to my church?" And we surprised her by saying "We'd like to! We would if we could!" It's too bad that it would be a little weird for two Mormon missionaries to show up at the Adventists next Saturday.

On Wednesday Soeur K was sick, so we took things a bit easier. We haven't had much luck asking people if we can do service projects for them (they can do it themselves, thank you very much) so we took it upon ourselves to create our own. We picked up a bunch of trash in the neighborhood. About three seconds after we started, a man walked up to us and turns out he's a former member of the Church from one of the other wards and wanted to come back to church! On Friday we learned how many missionaries it takes to change a flat tire after our district meeting. That was fun. Turns out it takes 10, plus a couple of members because our jack wasn't tall enough so they brought theirs.

On Saturday we won the Tour de Raiatea. Haha there was some sort of cycling race going on and as we passed I asked Soeur K if we should take them on. I'd say we've got just as much training as any of them. Also we talked with one of my favorite papi's, Papi H. My first week here we talked to him by the docks (one of our favorite places to look for people staring at the waves, reflecting on the deeper meaning of life i.e. prepared to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ). He's still just about as crazy as he was then. He seemed to open up a bit after I switched to Tahitian and bore my testimony (about all I can say in Tahitian) but I can't be sure because then he started talking in Tahitian (which I still can't really understand). He was also pleased to find out that Soeur K is a Maori from New Zealand, but when she said she's from Wellington he said "Oh, Wellington... huh... c'est SALE!" (it's dirty!) He didn't want to take our Book or Mormon, but we "accidentally" left it on his backpack when he wasn't looking.

Yesterday we fixed a surprise baptism! Our ward mission leader has been wanting us to teach his nephew R, who's been avoiding us. But he came to church yesterday and we had a lesson with him and the ward mission leader's son. And he said yes when we asked him to be baptized! That was a really happy surprise, and now we're going to work really hard to build his testimony before his baptism.

My thought this week comes from some advice I shared with my cousin Elder Rollins, who is justing starting out in the field in Brazil. There's one lesson I hope all missionaries learn quickly. Don't complain! Be overwhelmingly, annoyingly, excessively positive and optimistic. It's a habit I'm still working on but it can fix a lot of problems; like comparing yourself, getting discouraged, criticizing others, homesickness, disunity, etc. If we look for the best in every situation and person, it's a lot easier to forgot ourselves and go to work because we worry less about what we want or think we need. And perhaps most importantly, we can change. On a mission (and in life!), changing and progressing personally is so important. But missionaries (and people) who tend to be negative just waste time being unhappy! To be fair, they often have things to be unhappy about, like a harder area or a harder companion or they don't speak the language yada yada yada. But all those things are actually opportunities in disguise to grow and learn. Look on the bright side and rejoice in every small victory! 1 Thessalonians 5:16 : "Soyez toujours joyeux."

Ua here au ia outou!

Sœur Ladd

A goat, as promised

Our secteur from the top of Tapioi

6:03 PM

Only 12 km A Day

6:03 PM

Iaorana tatou! I haven't got much time this week (we went on a cool hike this morning with the district!) but we had a great week! Our...

Iaorana tatou!

I haven't got much time this week (we went on a cool hike this morning with the district!) but we had a great week! Our amis are progressing well and tout va bien! A little tired from riding at least 12 km a day, but we're going to move soon to a house by our chapel, which is closer to where our investigators are so that's good.

C and his girlfriend came to church yesterday! It was cute, he called us Saturday night to confirm that he was coming and to ask what to wear. And then he called back 10 minutes later to ask if he should bring the book we gave him. He was worried because he didn't have any dress pants, but I told him it was fine. I think he enjoyed it! I played piano for Sacrament meeting so I wasn't able to sit with them, but they seemed pretty interested and chill. He's from a 7th Day Adventist background, and our class for investigators happened to be about the sabbath day (the main difference between Adventists and other churchs, they have church on Saturday) so that was interesting.

Dogs weren't working out too well for us so we moved on to goats. I'll send pictures next week.

Et voilà! I'll try and be more detailed next week, sorry. Je vous aime! Happy late birthday Grandpa Don, happy early birthday Jacob! Je vous aime!

Soeur Ladd

12:17 PM

All Dogs Go To Heaven

12:17 PM

Iaorana tatou! :) The work is picking up here in Uturoa. We're especially finding success with the local dog population. When we do do...

Iaorana tatou! :)

The work is picking up here in Uturoa. We're especially finding success with the local dog population. When we do door to door contacting, they are generally more interested in hearing the gospel than the owners, it seems.

Indeed, one even accepted to sit down with us for a short message about the gospel.

I'd say she's got a lot of potential. The language barrier is going to be pretty tough though.

(Soeur K teases me because all of the photos on my camera are of dogs and cats and pigs.) Haha all joking aside, we had a pretty good week! We found several cool new investigators. They all have awesome questions and seem to have a sincere desire to learn and find the truth. Even just how we found them were tender mercies.

For example, a week and a half ago we talked to a man on the street and fixed a lesson for the following Tuesday. I had my doubts that he would be there though, seeing as he was holding a beer when we talked to him. We kept our hopes up though and went to his house at the appointed time - and nope, he wasn't there. BUT, his brother C was. He immediately accepted that we pass another day to talk with him. He's already talked with missionaries before, Mormons and from other religions, but he isn't yet satisfied that he's found the truth. But he is willing to try again. We had a proper lesson with him on Wednesday, and he asks all the right questions (and some weird ones too, but that's okay). For example, we sat down for the lesson, introduced ourselves a bit more, and then before we could even start the lesson we had planned to teach, the Restoration of the Gospel, he asks "Is it true that there's a life after death?" So we're just like,"Um, well, yeah," and quickly change gears to talk about the Plan of Salvation. Long story short, the lesson was all over the place because as soon as we start to answer one question, he would ask another really great question on a completely different topic!

One of our other new investigators, R is a small miracle as well. Sister O, Elder G, and Elder P flew to Papeete last Thursday for the Conseil de Dirigeants (a monthly conference with President Bize for zone leaders and sister training leaders, which yes, our zone leaders and sister training leader FLEW to. Island missions are weird. Fortunately, they're the only ZLs or STLs not on Tahiti, otherwise that would be even more expensive.) Anyway, Sister O explained to us that as she was sitting on the plane reading the Book of Mormon and going through the internal debate of whether or not to talk to the man next to her (aka R) she read a verse about these things blessing her and those around her. (I think Alma 34:27) That gave her the courage to talk to him, and he accepted that Soeur K and I visit him another day! We were able to do that on Saturday and we explained more about the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith. He said he would read it and wanted us to come back and teach his wife about it too! Excited to see how everyone (and their dog) progresses.

Like Soeur O learned, the gospel can and will bless you, and all those around you: your wife, your brother, the guy next to you on the airplane, your dog! So open your mouth and share it. Take it from me, it might not be easy or natural, but it's worth it.

E mea maitai te ora, e parau mau te evanelia, ua here au ia outou!!

Tuahine Ladd

6:26 PM

My Sunsets Are Better Than Yours (and Other Pictures)

6:26 PM

Sunset near la Pointe Vénus, Matavai Sunset at Muriavai, Matavai (note: missionaries in Tahiti are allowed to wade a little way ...

Sunset near la Pointe Vénus, Matavai

Sunset at Muriavai, Matavai
(note: missionaries in Tahiti are allowed to wade a little way into the water)

Ocean from Ahonu, Mahina

Mahina has a rich investigator who lives on the mountain next to the clouds.

Waterfall selfies near Taravao from our tour de l'ile!

That awkward moment when your new convert finds your house on his way home from fishing and hands you a plastic bag of fresh dead fish and you don't know how to cook fish so you trade it with your neighbor for already cooked fish.

6:10 PM

Faraway Heaven

6:10 PM

Iaorana tatou! Happy 4th of July! We celebrate that here too. Or at least, 7 American missionaries do with their French, Tahitian, and Kiw...

Iaorana tatou!

Happy 4th of July! We celebrate that here too. Or at least, 7 American missionaries do with their French, Tahitian, and Kiwi companions. Our district is having a barbecue later ;) It's been a long week! But that's okay because I live on Raiatea. (Ra'i means heavens or sky, atea means far away.)

As I guessed, we did a lot of tracting this week. Soeur K and I are learning a lot about OLB - ouvrir la bouche, our mission's codeword for tracting and street contacting.

For example, Friday I was really trying to focus on "forget yourself and go to work." We were both pretty exhausted from a week of OLB and mediocre success, but since we didn't have any lessons fixed, we decided to just go out again and talk to whoever we could. We walked a ways down the road, and picked a street to do porte-à-porte. We started at the top so we could work our way down. When we got to the top though, we almost skipped the last house. Not sure why, but it just seemed rich and standoffish. Finally though, we looked at it and hesitantly yelled "IAORANA!" (Door to door tracting here doesn't actually include knocking. We stand at the gate and yell until someone comes out.) A dog came out to greet us/bark at us, but after a moment we heard someone. Long story short, the man invited us onto the terrace, and after talking to him for a bit, we find out he's inactive and his wife isn't a member. We shared a short message about the Book of Mormon and asked if we could come back another time and teach his family; he said sure, but he wasn't sure if his wife would be interested. So we just gave him our number and said to call us if they needed anything. As we were leaving, I felt like I should say something to his wife, who had been folding clothes on the other side of the terrace. Again I almost didn't, but I walked over to say goodbye and after the customary kiss by the cheek I told her that we'd talked to her husband for a bit but wondered if we could come by another evening. She said no problem! We'll visit them for family home evening next week and see how it goes.

Anyway, that pretty much sums up our week, biking around town and talking to whoever might listen. We do have a few potential investigators, the only problem is that everyone is busy with Heiva! It's a month-long festival every July. Traditional dancers, a carnival, sports. Apparently more important than listening to the missionaries and finding eternal life ;D

I was thinking a few days ago about Doctrine and Covenants 4. As a missionary, we recite this short chapter every morning as part of companionship study. In verse three it says, "Therefore, if ye have desires to serve God ye are called to the work." I used to think that that line just meant, if you want to be a missionary, be a missionary. Simple as that. But what it actually says is if you want to serve God, you have to do missionary work. See the difference? I didn't. If we want to serve God - as a priesthood leader, as a teacher, as ward pianist, as a Latter-Day Saint, as a human being - then we are all called to the work. We are obligated to share the gospel. The good news! Maybe that's obvious, but I hadn't thought about that wording before. Before that, in the second verse it says "Therefore, O ye that embark in the service of God, see that ye serve him with all your heart, might, mind and strength, that ye may stand blameless before God at the last day." Let me tell you, serving with ALL your heart, might, mind, and strength, is not as easy as it might sound. But I'm convinced that if we do, we will find ourselves with more heart, more might, more mind, and more strength than before. When you feel like you have no strength left, stick to that promise.

"The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?" (Psalm 27:1)

Love y'all,
Soeur Ladd