Week 50 - Tarawa, Teaoraereke (Companion: Elder Grant)

Email Dated August 29, 2016

Hey Everyone !!

This week has been waaayyyy busy, so we had some emergency transfers go down. So the whole of Tuesday was spent driving up and down Tarawa... sucked so bad, had so many lessons planned for Tuesday. And Wednesday was also a day where we had to drive sisters up and down Tarawa, and only got time to teach 3 lessons... Throughout the rest of the week things were normal until Saturday and Sunday. 

This week we had Stake Conference because in both the East and West the Stake's were getting new Stake Presidencies. So we had Elder Johansson (Member of one of the 70's), Elder Cardon (councilor to Elder Halek) and the Fiji Suva Temple President come and do the stake business. 

So for this conference Elder Grant and I were asked to translate from Kiribati to English for people who don't understand Kiribati. We were given a headset so we could listen in Kiribati and a microphone to translate on the spot and everyone who didn't understand Kiribati were given a headset so they could hear us. 

So thats my new experience for the week, on the spot translating for 70's and other important people, it works your brain so hard especially when grammar concept are completely different on Kiribati. If you where to translate a Kiribati sentence word for word to english, it wouldn't make sense. So yeah lots of our weekend was taken up by conference.  

Our investigators are great, working with the ward is going really well, almost all of our lessons are taught with a member present and this effort of getting members involved has really showed in the amount of investigators we are getting to church every week. 

The Pentax camera is awesome I've taken about 8 photos so far... and my photography game has stood up a little bit. 

So for my birthday could you think of sending Almond M&M's, pistachio's, Macroons(that NZ biscuit), more film 200 speed just 1 or 2, those Lint chocolate things that are soft in the middle, maybe some dope new ties, a Japanese Book of Mormon and Liahona if you can get it in time, really I don't know... what ever...

Alright that's it, I'll try and write some personal emails now...

Love Elder Berends. 

 

 

Week 49 - Tarawa, Teaoraereke (Companion: Elder Grant)

Email Dated August 22, 2016

Hi,

So no email last week because no internet... all well, yes Elder Grant and I are still companions and looks like I'll be his companion until he finishes his time. Investigators are progressing well, I'd love to introduce them all to y'alls. We have some sweet families as well, one of these days I'll take a photo of all of them and name the photo so you can put a face to the people I'm talking about. 

Old leaving and new coming... So all the old have pretty much left except for a few but no more big intakes going home till next year so we are just waiting for the huge intakes to come and then work will be going crazy here.

Its been a really good last 2 weeks, the baptism was really good, Nei Orebwa was way to ready, this Sunday's talks where done by the family she's living with right now so right after she was confirmed she bore her testimony been apart of that house. it was really cool. also Nei Kammari, the recent convert who was just baptized, she gave a lesson in YSA yesterday, its good to see that recent converts and given opportunities to serve straight away. 

We had good church attendance in the last 2 weeks, last week 10 investigators at church and then this week we had 7, the only thing that is now stopping alot of our investigators now from being baptized is marriage. they all need to be married and thats really hard when they have been married before hand so we have to sought out divorces, and that gets really hard when the ex-partners is living on a different island. 

As for Vaughan's talk on religious freedom... I read this thing in the newest Liahona by that new apostle, just look in the September Liahona and you'll find it, i thought it was really good. but what the heck is going on over there in the world of being politically correct, it sounds scary. 

So that is about it and I'll think about what you can send for my birthday. 

love ya'll

Elder Berends

Week 47 - Tarawa, Teaoraereke (Companion: Elder Grant)

Email dated: August 8, 2016

Mauri, 

The camera came!! Thank you so much I'm so excited to use it, and thanks for the lollies and other stuff.

Those films sound like they would be pretty funny, especially, the camp one and preparing for a stake dance. (we had a Stake Film Festival on Saturday night that I told Elder Berends all about).

Nei Emi is going really well, she has a baptism date for the 3rd of September and we also have some sweet members present, return missionaries, helping so that's been a lot of fun. 

Orebwa, is another investigator, she goes to Moroni High School, and really needs to be baptized as soon as possible. She is way smart, and way too easy to teach, so she will be baptized on the 20th of August. 

Teannaki and Rerei are so legit also but... Rerei has already been married to someone else and hasn't been divorced therefore... she can't get married to Teannaki until she gets a divorce. And to make things even worse, Rerei's ex-husband now lives on Tamana... one of the only islands that don't have missionaries, so getting that divorce might be a bit difficult. But we will pray hard. 

All of our other investigators are doing well but I'll find some other time to talk about them.

Pdays, are spent playing volleyball, and yeah, sometimes we go to the guns in Betio where the battle of Tarawa went down. If you guys want me to I could ask some kids to go look for bullets and stuff from the battle and they find them everywhere. No fishing here, the fishing is alright but for missionaries on Tarawa its not allowed. 

We had 3 new Elders and 2 Sisters come in. All Elders are going outer islands, 1 sister is staying and working in Betio and the other sister is going to Kiritimati! One of the Elders is from NZ, Elder Tiakia and is actually Amani's cousin. So it was cool talking to him a bit before he flew to Aranuka. 

And as for that lesson that you had in Relief Society, we have really been trying to help Nei Emi understand the atonement of Jesus Christ and it all reminds me of a talk called "His Grace is Sufficient" by Brad Wilcox. It's a really good talk. 

So that's about it from me, 

Love Elder Berends. 

Week 46 - Tarawa, Teaoraereke (Companion: Elder Grant)

Email dated: August 1, 2016

Hi,

So things got way exciting this week, you know how I was telling you about how we were going to start working with the ward more, preparing prospective Elders for the Melchizedek Priesthood. So there are three recent convert/less active men that we decided to work really hard with. Taake, Memen and Kabunaree, all have a wife and children but havnt come to church for the whole time I've been in this area. They are all really cool guys, but have fallen pretty badly back into smoking.

So our first thing was getting them worthy to receive/ or if already received, worthy to use the Aaronic priesthood. They were all very excited but had lots of concerns but we helped and were blessed to see our work pay off with in a week! all three of them, Taake, Kabunaree and Memen and all of there families came to church! And they all had a talk with bishop!

Also we had Ward council on Thursday night, we are trying to get home teaching set up which does not exist in this ward yet. but we let everyone know what our vision was and they got really excited. although we didnt get home teaching going just yet as we need to talk to high priest group leader but we had a list of every Less Active that we knew and a couple of investigators that we would like fellowshiped and that list became the goal for everyone who was in that meeting. and once we have people in that list coming to church, we will work with another list.

So this Tuesday night I'm going to go on rescue/home teaching visit with Bishop and his wife while the other missionaries staying with us will work with others from the ward. even though we haven't done this rescue visit something has changed in the ward since team working with the ward.

On top of the 3 potential elders that we are working with we had a tone of less actives come aswell as investigators! there was so many in church. our investigators are really good as well, Teraimoa will not be getting baptized anymore, she is actually already baptized, we just found out but its all good she reactivated and no longer a smoker.

 Nei Emi now says she believes in god and feels as if her prays are being answered and she now has a baptismal date for the 3rd of september. should be having some other baptisms this month aswell, James, Tetoa, Orebwa, tourakai. ill try and get picture of all of them.

Missionaries that are now living with us is Elders Dinsdale and Kaririki. Dinsdale is really hard working and a really cool guy and way good at the language, he was actually in Kiritimati the same time as me when i first arrived. He is waiting for his companion from the MTC to come and then theyll head to an outer island. then there is Elder Kaririki who is Kiribati who is from an outer island called Beru. he is way cool one of my favourite Kiribati Missionaries.

So thats about it, im doing well, this week is going to be really busy with a new intake coming in but im excited.

 love Elder Berends