Area 1, Week 7 - Nasinu, Fiji 4/21/13

Dear Dad,

Thanks for the letter that you have sent me. It is really good to hear from you and how well everything is going back home. I cannot believe that in a year and a half we could have 20 missionaries out in a the field just from our ward. It is so crazy. Me and my companion are getting along very good!  We always have fun when we are trying to catch a big spider or a mouse. We have caught at least 5 mice thus far. Everything is going really good between us.

About the property in Lava, have you already taken the trailer up yet or are you taking it up this week? It is really cool to hear that the young men are going to camp up there.  It will be a good experience for all of them I'm sure.

Well this week Elder Ishibashi and I ran into a less active member and he gave us some advice. He was saying that Home Teaching is the backbone of our church. He said that if he would have had some one come and meet with him, he would still be active. He did not feel that he was accepted. He told us to tell the bishop how important it is!   So, remember how important Home Teaching is and it needs to be done!  It helps people to grow closer to all the members and to help them feel like that they are accepted. Don't let anyone fall away, everyone needs a friend.

I know that this church is true and everything about it is true. Christ will help us through out all of our trials. He is always there. The Book of Mormon is the true word of God and we should study from it every day.

It is good to hear from you and thank you for everything that you have done for me. I love and miss you tons. Thank you for everything.

Picture:  I thought that this picture was funny because of all the wires going into it. I think that OSHA wouldn't be too happy about this.  It looks like it is just a big jumbled up mess.

Dear Mom and Family,

We have only had a total of 8 lessons this whole week. We tried, but because of conference it took up alot of our time traveling to Raiwaqa to watch all 10 hours of it. It was really good to hear all of the talks. It was a really good conference. It is weird to think that I was once in that conference center and you and the family were in there for the Sunday session. I was looking for you but I could not find you. I thought I would be easy to find you within all of those people there. haha. I guess I was wrong. 

This picture is a picture of a less active family in our ward. Elder Ishibashi and I were walking down the road and the gentleman in the brown shirt told us to come visit him and his family.  We went to him and he said he, his brother and his wife are all less active members.  They were baptized in the 90's.  However, they can no longer go to church because his wife lost her leg. They cannot afford to get to church, so they dont go.  It is 3 to 4 miles away and costs $5 to $6 to take a taxi.  We will talk to the bishop about his family.

Elder Ishibashi, Eta and myself on Eta's baptism day 4/21/13

This week, we had a baptism!   I was the one that was able to baptize Eta. We were supposed to have another boy get baptized but his grandmother had just passed away and he was all tied up with that. We are planning on having his baptism on the 28th of this month. Well back to the baptism, it went really well. Me and Elder Ishibashi both talked about Baptism and the Holy Ghost. After we spoke, I was the one who got to baptize her. I was so nervous. They said that I said the words of the prayer fast and really softly (in Fijian of course). We baptized her in a font. Everyone here is sick of the ocean and would rather be baptized in a font (that's a bumber).  Man, I was so nervous. It really did go good though. I know now what to do and what to expect. After the baptism Eta bore her testimony, she was really nervous but she did an amazing job!  She was so happy for us to be able to baptize her. I will never forget her and my first baptism.

Elder Ishibashi's words about Eta:  I might've talked about these things last week, but we have this one investigator named Eta. She's currently engaged to a member, and she's been coming to church a whole lot. As we've been sitting with her, she's expressed many times how thankful she was that we took time out of our busy schedules to come and teach her about the restored gospel. She has been reading diligently from the Book of Mormon and has been writing notes down about the the great nations that fell and exactly the priesthood authority was, all before we even started teaching her! It's really been an amazing experience sitting with her, her heart is so pure and she's so loving. I actually had a real learning experience with her about never doubting a prompting. The week before last week, we sat down with Eta and had a great, spirit-filled lesson with her. At the end, I felt the urge to ask her to be baptized when she knew that this church was true. The impression to ask kept coming as I bore my testimony, but I ultimately just brushed it to the side. We left that day super happy, but I felt like something was really missing. This last week, the same thing happened We had an amazing lesson, and she expressed through tears how she knew this must've been the true church because we and the members are so full of love. That time, the impression to ask her to be baptized came at me. Hard. I kinda felt like something was just slapping me across my face, saying "Hey, hey, invite her." I couldn't push it away any longer. As part of the training program, I was to give Elder Grotepas the opportunity to ask our investigators to be baptized, so I asked him "if there were any 'questions' that he'd want to ask Eta". Because we practiced this the morning before, he knew what I meant, and invited Eta to be baptized in Fijian. She immediately said "Yes" and expressed how she so grateful that we asked. She told us that she was actually worried that we weren't going to ask her because we didn't last week. At that point, I felt horrible. I had made this woman worry, and I was soooooo so sorry for it. I kicked myself for the rest of the day for it, but I am extremely glad that we asked that day. Eta will be baptized sometime around April 6th. 

Well on the other end we had something that was really sad happen. Yesterday when we were walking on the street to go to the priesthood session, we walked passed one of our investigators' homes. The mother came to us and said the Tivita passed away. We had seen him about 5 weeks before and just gave him a Book of Mormon. He was in a different city for a while so we could not see him. We were so surprised and very saddened to hear that he had passed away. He was a young guy in his 30's. They invited us to come to his funeral but it is out of our area. The ZL's said that we might be able to get permission to go to the funeral. We are hoping that we are going to be able to go. It was so sad to hear about this and it totally destroyed our day.

I hope that your week has gone really good. How has the family been doing?  I want to let you know that I love you all and miss you all a lot.  Thanks for everything that you do.

Hello Heidi,

How is everything going? Everything is going really good here. We had a good week. With the flooding that happened, it did not affect us. It was over in Nadi on the other side of the island.

Well I think that I am getting used to the weather here now. Every time that we go into a room that has AC, I get really cold. We had conference this week at our Stake enter. It is AC'ed in there. It feels way good at first but we were in there for 4 hours. By the end of that 4 hours, I wanted to go outside and warm up. My feet were like ice cubes! Well thank you for all the pictures that you had sent me. It is really cool to see you and how much you have changed. You just need to stay the same and not grow up. I miss being around you and your laugh.  Who is using my ipad the most? Have the boys been driving my RC car or not?

Thank you for your letter and I cannot wait to get to talk to you on Mothers Day next month.

Love,

Elder Grotepas (Your Missionary)

A little Fijian girl and her baby brother at a musical fireside we attended

Me with one of our investigators baby puppies.  They call him either Dallin or Grotepas!  Named after me!