Week 41 - Tarawa, Teaoraereke (Companion: Elder Graham)

No email this week due to belated Mothers Day Skype Call!

Week 40 - Tarawa, Teaoraereke (Companions: Elder Smith, Johnson, Whitehead and Musser)

Email dated: June 20, 2016

Yo,

Soooo, first of all happy birthday old man! 45!! haahaha, I bet that scares you a bit? How is the mid life crisis? Love you Dad.

This week has been busy, but really good for both work and zone leader stuff. Right now I have 4 companions, Elders Smith, Johnson, Whitehead and Musser... All 4 of which are going home this Thursday. You would think that having 4 elders who are about to go home would not be good for getting work done, however, we have all been working like crazy. So right now our area, Teaoraereke 2nd, is doing so well, but, after Thursday things will slow down as its back down to 2 zone leaders.

By the way I have some exciting news, Elder Graham (MTC companion) will be Zone Leader with me! Originally he was meant to be training a greeny on an outer island but he got injured in the MTC. And I was meant to be with Elder Grant (from Perth) but Elder Grant went out to Banaba (first time elders have been there) a couple of weeks ago, and they are stuck there until end of July... if the boat comes. So yeah, Elder Graham and I will be learning to be Zone Leaders together. 

We had 4 baptisms this week! Nei Tereaua, Nei Kaaua, Nei Beni and Nei Tyty. Really good baptism and really got to know them all pretty well. But out of the 4 of them, Nei Tereaua was just something else, she is straight up gold. She was so excited for her baptism, she would take notes in our lessons, has some really good questions for the Book of Mormon all the time, her testimony is beautiful and really has found joy and peace in Christs gospel. She just got married this Wednesday as well and her husband (Konorio) is a story in its self. Konorio back in the day was in the branch presidency but his old wife cheated on him and after that he fell pretty hard into drinking and smoking. but then he met Tereaua, they stayed together, Tereaua started taking lessons and he gave up drinking and smoking and is now active again! And I can already see them going to the temple. No doubt. 

So yeah, work here in Teaoraereke is pretty ridiculous, so many people are just golden... We have 27 investigators right now! Will tell you more about them through out the weeks. Its sad that zone leaders work here so investigators don't get full attention all the time but will have to learn how to prioritise. 

And for your new friend at church... I have learnt a lot about prayer, priesthood blessings, fasting and things that involve asking favours from Heavenly Father. Blessings really do come from these things, praying for those that are in need of comfort, fasting for help in our problems, priesthood blessings for people that are sick. And if its done with faith in Jesus Christ, I know first sure all these forms of asking can be answered straight away, through the comfort of the Holy Ghost. However people will miss these feelings if they expect their  physical answers in the manner they expect. 

I feel like we need to remember that Heavenly Father's will is whats best. And we need to remember the example that we should follow, Our Savoir, Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the perfect example of doing the Fathers will. I'm not saying that we should stop asking Heavenly Father for things in prayer. Even Jesus Christ, when in the garden of Gethsemane, asked the Father if there was another way for him not go through what he went through, but still faithful to his Father in Heaven and said, not my will but thine will be done. 

So the true pattern of prayer, does include asking for blessings, however, it also includes seeking for the will of the Father. This might seem harsh, but in the end its whats going to bring us true peace of heart. Wish I was better at using a language to express my thoughts but hopeful it makes sense. 

So yeah, also, I'm really sorry and it really sucks but, since not having a camera for so long I don't have that desire to take photos anymore if I see some thing cool. I'm sure i will relearn but for now I'm just grabbing everyone else photos. 

So thats about it love y'all

Love Elder Berends

Week 39 - Tarawa, Teaoraereke (Companion: Elder Smith (Canada))

Email dated: June 13, 2016

Was up!!

Gaia, so yeah first week in Teaoraereke! So much work here and not enough time! Really missing Temaiku and I haven't heard what's going on over there with the Sisters but I'm sure they picked up all our investigators fine. 

Yes, Me and my companion work as zone leaders together, my companion is Elder Smith (Canada) and he has been zone leader for a couple of months but he finishes his time in 10 days! so he's giving me a good run down on what I'll be taking over. Elder Smith is so cool, he was one of Elder Millers favourite companions so I had heard a lot about him. He is such a good worker and hasn't let the fact he's going home soon get to him.

Teaoraereke 2nd area is huge and is more populated then Temaiku, it so populated that you have to walk through peoples house to get to other peoples houses. Never in my life have I walked so much into the middle of people showering, especially older people, they just don't care who sees. Its not a pretty sight. There is so much work here as well, random members off the street will come up to us and have people they want us to teach, its ridiculous. What's sucks is that zone leaders are working this area so, as I said before, not enough time for all the work. 

Having a car helps, as not much time is wasted going from lesson to lesson, however missionary needs can take up a lot of time, especially with bike problems. So it's a little frustrating that we miss lessons but we are helping others areas get their work done. However the last couple of days have been really good, we have some Elders who just came back from outies (Outer Islands)and are waiting for their flight back out to a different outie so they staying with for the this time. Which means 2 Elders get the car and phone to teach when they can and do Zone Leader stuff and the other 2 walk around doing missionary work. So I got a day this week to do normal missionary with Elder Ellis from my intake! It was so much fun teaching with him. 

Zone Leaders, AP's and sister training leaders had a really good meeting on Tuesday, we talked about what was coming up in the mission in the year and things are getting exciting (and scary). So new mission president is coming this month, we are working on getting everything ready for him and as AP's will be going back to Marshall's, the new president (president Larkin from Australia) will be turning to Zone Leaders for advice so I need to suck up as much information as I can get. 

Also in the next couple of months we will have a lot of new missionaries, 20+, coming straight from the MTC. So we will be setting the expectations of the mission higher which seem like a hard thing for missionaries already here but if everyone has the right attitude it will be the normal for the new missionaries. All very exciting stuff and we are really pushing to get a temple here is Kiribati!

It will be the best day of my life if I'm here in Kiribati and a Tarawa, Kiribati temple is announced. you now how crazy that will be for missionary work, it will convert the whole of Kiribati. 

We just heard stats that the "Mormons" (which only just came to this country not even 40yrs ago) has more members than the KUC (been hear since the beginning). It's ridiculous, and the gospel is shared through inexperienced 18 yr olds claiming that a 14 year old boy saw God and Jesus Christ... somethings up here... the church must be true. 

So yeah stuff is exciting here on Tarawa, hopefully I'll stay in this area longer than 3 weeks. 

aight, ti a bo!

Love Elder Berends. 

Week 38 - Tarawa, Temaiku 2nd (Companion: Elder Neeti)

Email dated: June 6, 2016

Kam na mauri!

Ngaia, so this week has been so good with some lame news to finish it off. Temaiku 2nd is doing so good now! All of our investigators are legit, had a lot of them at church this week even one at a Preach My Gospel class! and all of our investigators have people fellow-shipping. One of my favorite is Teteta (sent a photo of him me and Neeti), he is so legit, The questions he has makes me so happy, you can really tell he is searching for the truth. Missionary work is the best, so rewarding, especially when we start from nothing.

However, missionary work is the worst sometimes, so yeah you know how I said there was speculation on me moving to Zone Leader. So just this Friday it was confirmed, but not sure when I was leaving Temaiku, then Sunday we were told that we need to pack our bags because we are moving out Monday (today).

So now we have moved out of Temaiku, leaving behind all of our sweet investigators, new friends and members. Its leaving Kiritimati all over again except here we don't get a chance to say goodbye... ma iai ibukina (but there is a reason for it). So I'll be working Teaorareke (west side of Tarawa) as Zone Leader with Elder Smith from Canada and Elder Neeti will be heading to Makin (an outer island). 

It's not all bad, some really sweet sisters are taking over our area and I've been told the work is really good in Teaorareke... when there is time to do so :P. but yeah exciting changes, back to driving a car again and a chance to serve other missionaries. 

Really funny thing real quick, talking to Elder Neeti about things out side of Kiribati is the funniest. So when he was in New Zealnd for the MTC and went to Maccas and the way he described the drive through was so funny, he was so shocked when the box you make the order through talk back to the driver. And when he was in the MTC he was so intrigued with the vending machine this is how he described it:

"te titoa are uarereke ma akea te aomata are mena inanona ao ko a karina am money ao imwiina, e bwaka kanam" 

(a store which is small but no person which dwells inside it and you make enter your money and after, it falls your food)

Its so funny. Funny guy.

So yeah that's about it, didn't even make 3 weeks in Temaiku and I'm gone, but I love missionary work so much. Happy 17th birthday Rhys, for the week aei! And yes get him his own clothes hahaha, I'm literally going to have nothing when i get back, half of the luggage I brought over has been given away. Hey and maybe could send me some deer jerky once you nail your recipe, oh and thanks for the parcel with camera and stuff, thanks so much but yeah I'm still really bad at remembering to take photos, those 5 photos I sent are literally everything I've taken. Anything in particular ya'll want to see?

aight, love you all

Love Elder Berends. 

Week 37 - Tarawa, Temaiku 2nd (Companion: Elder Neeti)

Email dated 30 May 2016

Hello, 

So dad finally got something!! looks sweet! have you eaten any yet? are you going to jerky it? (in reference to Mark's latest hunting trip) 

This week here has been pretty good, getting things going with our area. A lot of our investigators from before are children (9-13), but I'll try and encourage their parents through them. Also got a bunch of new investigators and picked up some really old ones that I found in the area book that seemed to be forgotten. Then we tried our luck with tracting and picked up 2 really solid investigators from the same house. A 17 year old guy, Teteta, and this lady, Tirirake, who actually had lessons way back in 2013, was close to baptism but her Elders were transferring and she was told that the new ones would come to visit but they never did. 

It's pretty sad, I've seen that a lot in this area, investigators just stop getting visited because new Elders come. It has taught me the importance of the Area Book. Except its really hard to understand the area book sometimes, especially when it comes to the directions to the investigators house. Because there are no street names its "the house 2 houses down from so and so's house" but the problem is Elder Neeti and I are both new to the area and we don't know anyone yet. So finding people is fun, ahaha. 

I'm learning a lot from Elder Neeti and it's so sick that we can both say we are from Kiritimati.

District Leader really isn't that busy of a job, just on Wednesdays (District Meeting) and Sundays (Baptismal Interviews). So yeah, on Wednesday we had district meeting, a lot missionaries are new to the district so I had everyone introduce themselves. Then I really wanted to set some goals for our district so I had everyone suggest things that we should be doing to ensure that our investigators are experiencing real conversion. Things like fellow shipping, prayerfully extending commitments, etc... and then from there we set weekly goals for our district that will help us and our investigators to real conversion. All done in Kiribati as well and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. 

But Sundays are kakua (to make tired). So most the day was spent interviewing baptismal candidates and then biking to the sister's area and doing their interviews. I really do like doing the interviews but it takes up all our time for teaching and Sundays are the best for teaching because everyone is home. But yeah, district leader isn't too scary. 

We have some sweet members here, this really sweet lady made mum a necklace and earrings and dad a necklace. By the way mum, you have a lot of stuff made for you from members and investigators in Kiritimati, but dad... e tibwa reke 1 am bwai (it just gained 1 your thing) hahaha. 

Ngaia, that's about it, yes the whole zone actually gets together for pday at Moroni High School. So that's where I'll be heading after emails, hopefully the parcel is there. 

Love Elder Berends

I found my self a cheap camera that no one is using, so I can take photo's again... but since I haven't had a camera for months I've forgotten that taking photos is something I should do... sooo... I've only taken 1 so far and it is of Ataniwi's baptism.