Week 57

First week eating with the Samoans and it was full off food!!

Monday was Elder S's birthday, and I didn't get him anything:( I'm such a bad companion. We did go to a Chinese buffet with some other elders to celebrate and there we told the lady that it was his birthday, so they brought out a little cake with some strawberries made into flowers, I am SO sorry I didn't take a picture, I think we were just laughing too hard the whole time it was happening. We then went grocery shopping and I bought a pie for pie day. We then went to Yogurtland because that is a tradition I have as a missionary as you know, and then we went to go and play some sports. Elder S is really good at sports and it always sucks when we are on opposite teams cause he is so much bigger than me! We dominated in soccer though. It was us vs. two Latinos and we killed them 10-6! It was so funny cause they were getting really frustrated too. After that we picked up our dinner because the member lives clear outside of the area (the Samoan Ward members) and we took it back to the apartment to eat. Yes that is a picture of it with the meatballs, rice, fish and spinach, and strawberries. They also gave us the gatorades. We then went to visit the C family. I had texted them earlier letting them know that it was Elder S's birthday and to both of our surprise they bought him a tres leches cake! It was so sweet. 

Tuesday we started the day off with L. She is an investigator and very close friend to the P family who are members. They told us that she was interested in listening to the missionaries and so we sat down and got to know her a little bit. She has pure intent. She really wants to be baptized for her own purposes, but she says she needs to understand more. We told her that at any time, ask a question and we will try to answer it. She is super cool and funny, chill, relaxed, she's awesome. We then had a chance to go and visit S and her mom A. S is 8 and she wants to be baptized. We taught the Restoration and the Gospel of Jesus Christ and didn't really pay attention to A (mistake on our part). Their neighbors are active members and really good fellow shippers. We saw N and had a lesson with her and her dad. She is scared that once she is baptized, she will sin. Her dad keeps saying that she isn't ready and he really isn't super supportive of the whole thing. We then had a little bit of time to go to the C family with our WML and read in the Book of Mormon. The mom, I, was the only one, but we read and she said that she had desires to read. Our WML bore an amazing testimony that he had about the Book of Mormon, so that was a good way to end the night.

Wednesday we had a lot of plans cancel, so we decide to go and contact some referrals and visit less active members in our area. We visited the A family. I have never seen them before at church, I don't know why they haven't come to church. We shared the Easter video and invited them to come to church on Sunday. We then went to go and see A and B (yes that is what his name is and what we call her). They are Samoan and she, B, is super Buddhist. There two kids have both been baptized and are really setting a good example for their parents. Their dad is less active and he has lost a little hope in his wife ever being baptized. He knows that he needs to be sealed to his family, but he loves his family. We told them about the Gladys Knight fireside and they seemed super interested. I think B will really like it, and hopefully as we start to go by, she will lighten up and start to feel the spirit work inside of her. We shared a video called "same jersey" and they liked it a lot. We then tried to stop by a referral and taught this nice old lady named E. She invited us back for Sunday. After that we had dinner at Hermana Peña's house and she made chilaquiles, which are super good. She put some meat with them and she made a salad, so that was good. We then had our coordination meeting at the church. Once that was done we cleaned out the car and made it look nice for zone conference.  

Thursday was Zone conference and we had to wake up at 5:00 just to get there on time. We actually arrived 5 minutes late to when we needed to be there because traffic is SO bad in LA in the mornings. At the zone conference a lot of things changed. In most missions in the US and Canada they have something in their cars called TIWi. TIWi is a device that makes sure the driver is not speeding, is buckled up, doesn't take turns too hard, goes over bumps, pot holes, all that stuff. If you do it says something like "slow down" and if you don't, it sends a message to the mission president. Any violation turns you to yellow. If you are yellow for 4 transfers than you lose all driving privileges. It's much more complicated than this, you could probably get more info, but let's just say I have Siri's robotic brother in my car and I am a very defensive driver now:) Zone conference was good, our car got a perfect 10 on being clean! Yes! We also took zone pictures so be sure to look for that. After that we went and saw A and S F. S is 8 about to turn 9 and neither of her parents, A and the dad, are members. Yes missionaries have taught them in the past. A is encouraging that S gets baptized, so we know that will happen. What we did though, is invite both of them to be baptized in the same day. In the past the missionaries pushed A too much and she didn't like that. So what we know is that if they both progress together, with the knowledge that A has and the desire that S has, they will both be baptized. It was an ok lesson, but hey, we got A thinking. After that we went to go and see N. We made her baptismal program with her and she really liked that. Afterwards her parent sowed up and we filled out her TMR or the thing that will eventually become her record of the church, pretty important. They gave us a Mc Chicken and that was that. We then had our dinner appointment with the R (Samoan) family. They are super cool. Their son just opened up his mission call and he is going to New York, New York English speaking... Woot woot! They have a big family and even more were over and you all know that I'm just a little nervous around lots of people that I don't know, so I sat there, eating my food. They gave us SOOOO much food. This picture is from all the food that we received TODAY. Talk about leftovers for weeks right? We told them about the Gladys Knight fireside and they seemed really interested. 

Friday was ridiculous. We started out good, but then it just went downhill from there. We were able to visit L. She is a single mother of 4 kids and she has been coming to church for a while. She is really interested in taking the lessons, but doesn't want to be forced into anything. She says that she enjoys talking with us and that she is learning a lot. She always talks about a "peace" that she feels when she talks with us or when she is at church (the Spirit in case you didn't know). She asks really good questions. She also told us that she wants her son to take the lessons too. We then went to go and contact some referrals. One of the referrals we contacted was a man named F. We knocked on his door and he let us in. He has two daughters and his wife who wasn't there. We talked with him a little bit, and showed him the Hallelujah Mormon message. He invited us back for next Wednesday. After that we had dinner with another Samoan family. They took us out to China buffet (the same one we went to on Monday ahaha) and they are super cool. The husband has Down syndrome and is hilarious, especially at the china buffet because he kept making fun of the waitresses and their Chinese. The mom is super cool. She served her mission speaking Navajo! She is upper funny as well. During dinner we received a text message from N's dad saying that they wouldn't be able to have the baptismal interview and that the baptism was canceled. !!!!!!!!!! We immediately went over to their house and started talking to N and she was saying that she no longer wanted to be baptized. She said she had talked to her dad and they said she isn't ready. The parents showed up and the dad was incredibly firm on the decision that she would not be baptized this week. He kept saying "she will be baptized in her own time" UGH!!! We then felt a little down and went to go and see the C family. V was the only one there and so we read with him in the Book of Mormon. 

Saturday we started out with a lesson with S and M. M has a baptismal date for the 16th of April and S is waiting for her dad to come back from working in Utah. They have already been taught the lessons, so we just go back over the lessons with them. We taught them the Gospel of Jesus Christ and invited them to church. It was a good lesson because they are learning, we just need to meet with them more often so that the principles stick in their heads! After that we had our weekly planning because of the Zone Conference that was in Thursday. After that we were invited by a member to eat at... China buffet. Ugh, I'm kinda sick of that place now. She had to go to a fireside so she just paid for us and left... Awkward! We left there and went to visit N to have a "do or die" type moment to see if we were still going to teach her. The feeling that her and her parents gave us was a cold one, so we invited them to church and left it at that. We decided that if they came to church, then we would continue to visit them, but if they didn't, then we would stop and give them to the Lord. Elder S then had some stomach aches that were pretty bad and we think it was the food at China buffet that did it.

Sundays really do make or break the week as a missionary. We had Ward Council I'm the Samoan Ward at 7:00 in the morning, so that was fun to wake up to haha. The whole thing was in Samoan! So I'm just sitting here not understanding anything. We actually got a legit referral from the Ward council so we will see how that turns out. We then had sacrament meeting and M and S (the two 9 year old Samoans) didn't show up to church... It was so sad! Church was all in Samoan so it's really hard for me to focus. After that we talked with E. E just got his mission call to serve in the New York, New York North mission! He wanted to talk with us about Preach My Gospel and other stuff, he is so excited to serve a mission! We are going to try and set something up so that he can come out with us to our lessons, because a lot of the lessons we teach are actually in English. We then had to rush to the South Gate branch meetings. It was so sad, the C family did not show up. A was injured on Saturday during a soccer game and so they were at the doctors. L showed up to church though! She seems like she feels comfortable there. We were really depressed too because a RC in our area named M (who is just hilarious and an awesome guy) went to Arizona to find a job, but he behaved badly there and he moved back here. So now we have to get him worthy to go to the temple to do baptisms for the dead. Right before he left we just helped him get the recommend! Sacrament meeting was about to start and N and her parents came to church! That was a tender mercy because I don't think they like us anymore. Church ended and we ate lunch with the 1st counselor in the Samoan Ward bishopric, brother L. They made us chicken, spaghetti, garlic bread, and a salad. We were so hungry because we didn't eat breakfast that we just kept eating like 3-4 plates of spaghetti haha. Then after she brought out panikekes (see picture). They are basically deep fried donut bites with sugar on top. We put butter and caramel syrup with them, so good!! We then went to go and see M G, the lady with a lot of health problems. We hadn't seen here for the whole week and she is having some serious health problems right now. We taught her the Plan of Salvation and that seemed to lift her mood. She really wants to get better so that she can go to the temple! We then stopped by to see M (cause they live right by each other). We sat down and talked with him about some stuff that he had questions. We planned some days during the week that we could visit with him and at the end he asked us for a blessing of comfort. It was a touching moment because you can see how Miguel really does want to have God in his life right now.

Love,

Elder Roberts