Well I've been in Zimbabwe for a month now... so that's weird. Time is flying by its crazy. Weeks are days and days are weeks or something like that lol. Sadly, I don't have that much to write about this week but I'll give ya a little taste of my last 7 days whadda ya say huh? Also hope you all enjoyed my title which is a parody of Ephesians 4:5, a scripture that we share at least 5 times a day.
We had some good lessons that made up for this disappointing experience. We taught 3 families and the father to all of them basically said the same thing to us this week, which was, "Guys I honestly just want to know the truth" Ahh so cool! So we are super excited to teach them! One of them is named Brother Unworried lol and he has 8 kids and 3 of them we could baptize with the parents if they accept! Super exciting. We had 2 other people we were hoping to give baptismal dates to and we couldn't meet with them this week but these 3 families that show a lot of interest give us a lot of hope! Also during one of the lessons, the fathers name is Brother Alfonso and we were teaching him about the pre-earth life (not always easy) and we showed him Jeremiah 1:5 which says "before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee" And he was still struggling with it and still believed life started at birth and then we showed him some other scriptures from the book of mormon and he still didn't understand and then Elder Till start going off in his broken english trying to explain it and I was like okay lets go back to Jer 1:5... How could God have known Jeremiah before he formed him in the belly, if there was no pre-earth life? and he paused and was like ".....okay that's a good point" hahaha, ahhh man some of these guys we just need to say the simplest of things and then they finally get it. Funny stuff.
So some of the "English" names that parents give their kids are so funny! Some examples
-Nomatter (female)
-Lovemore (male)
-Smart (male)
-Forgive (male)
-Unworried (surname)
And then they'll have like Robert or Bruce or something totally American hahaha
Also when you leave someones house, sometimes they say "Sharp sharp" which sounds like "shop shop" because of the accent but its how they say bye or okay hahaha. I've started saying it a lot.
We had 4 investigators come to church this week!! What?? crazy. 2 of them we were about to stop teaching so that was cool! One of the others shows a lot of promise and is young but very interested in the church. And the last one really didn't want to be there and always seems like she's about to murder someone when we teach her so we might drop her haha.
We also had a lesson with this guy who had a lot of internet questions this week and he was formerly a Seventh Day Adventist.... two ingredients that make a lesson just awful haha. And then we gave this guys mother a restoration pamphlet and she read the first vision page and just laughed and said very rudely, "Wow this is so false and not true!!" And Elder Till and I laughed back at her and then quickly got around to saying a prayer and leaving. As we walked away I looked at Elder Till and I'm like "I wonder if we'll teach them in spirit prison" hahahaha ahhh man these guys.
We taught this other 7th Day guy and at the end of our lesson he was like, "Okay next time, if you explain to me why you believe Sunday is the Sabbath Day, then I'll start to believe you guys are the true church".... If only it was this easy with everyone.
It's funny how many people feel that they need to teach us about the Bible because we claim that it may be unclear at some parts. They get all defensive and claim it is the word of God and the Bible is so clear and there should be no other books or no modern prophets and stuff and we're always like, "Alright, look around, there are countless churches that claim they believe the Bible to be the word of God and the only word of God... yet they have different beliefs, different faiths, and different baptisms....." hahaha then they just change the subject since there is nothing they can say after that to defend their ideas of the Bible. hahaha regardless, I still have learned a lot from the Bible and like every member of the church believe it to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly.
Also, I love the Book of Mormon. My goodness it is awesome. Whenever we have spare time, I read it and can see the wars and the stories playing like a movie in my head. So dope. Teaches me so much and I love sharing scriptures from it to investigators.
.... aside from everything, whoever said that cockroaches are invincible was a ruthless liar because there are a ton in my house and I have killed plenty of them with no struggle.
Also our goals are crazy, the standards that president set are 35 lessons every week, 4 baptisms every month, 5 investigators and 5 returned members to church every week. Man it is definitely a high goal. Hopefully we can get closer to the goal in coming months.
My companion and I are still doing good. he's a good comp and helps me a lot but I have ideas on how we can get work done better. Funny thing, we got money yesterday and pulled out 210 dollars from a machine, and i told my comp to put it away and then we could count it in the car, and then he's like "no its fine" and just whips out all this cash and starts counting it in front of a ton of people and I'm like duuuude!!!!! hahaha geeez. too funny. they all got wide eyes and just stared at his hands and started to get closer to us hahaha I'm like dude! I didn't just throw that idea in the air up for grabs, I was imperatively telling you to put the money away hahhahhaha ahhhh man
Okay now on to our next segment, Funny drunk guys this week
The first one we found on the side of the street and we were teaching him about how drinking is bad for you and how there are so many blessings that come from keeping the word of wisdom. He was very stubborn and kept saying he was already blessed enough haha. But somehow we got on the topic of prophets and we was saying how all the prophets here in Zimbabwe are fakes and started saying bad things about them. We then told him how there should be one prophet and he agreed and we told him how he could find the one, true prophet but he kept talking about drinking. So then we started talking to his friend that was sitting next to him and the first guy interrupted us and very loudly asked how old I was. So like I always do, I asked, "How old do you think I am?" and he paused and then said 19! And I said nope 18. he's then like "Oh it must just be that you're about to turn 19." I'm like "Well actually I turn 19 in a month." This guys jaw drops and he stares at me and slowly starts to smile and then screams, "I must be a prophet!!!" hahahaha immediately after our convo about one true prophet. Drunk guys. amiright.
The next one wasn't as funny but this guy came over to us and started accusing us and saying what we are doing is wrong and then he said I looked like this guy he knows. And he said "yeah that guy is an idiot." So I asked if he was saying that I look like an idiot. And he's like "...yyyyeah" pffff meanwhile I stand like a foot taller than this guy. I almost dropped him. haha.
Anyways I love this gospel and love being a missionary. I get hecka tired every night but its so worth it. Even the bad days have good things to talk about. I love what my dad said to me in an email last week. He reminded me to "touch the line". For those of you unfamiliar with this term, it refers to running lines or suicides as punishment during sports (running the length of the court or field), and if you don't touch the line each time, it doesn't count. Its a discipline thing that my dad taught me when I was young and now thinking about applying it to the mission has helped my mindset a lot. Touch the line. Wow that's my new life motto haha love it. But yes I look forward to becoming a great missionary and being as productive as I can. In President Mkhabela's weekly email to me last week he challenged me to make a difference in the mission this year. No pressure haha but I have faith I can get stuff done. Still diligently working for my first baptism. Hopefully by the end of this month I will be able to update you guys on that because our monthly goal is 8! Hope all is going well and I'm sad that I wont get to meet my new niece for two years! I'm doing fine in Zim so don't worry about me. Love you all and wish you the best. Like always, stay steady yeah? The church is true.
Stay Steady Grindin'
Sharp Sharp
-Elder Anderson
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