31 May 2010

Family,

I know I still haven't sent any pictures of the church or our apartment yet, but I'll get around to it.

I feel like we had a pretty successful week finally. We have been working with one member in particular named Joel. When I first got here, he was completely inactive. A few weeks later, he started coming teaching with us and coming to church, but we've moved on and started working on a few issues that he has. His wife wants to be baptized, but we found out that she isn't really his wife. They have been living together for maybe 20 years or more, and have 4 kids together, so they have nothing against being married. Unfortunately, Joel is still legally married to a woman who has since moved to Saipan. Divorce papers cost about $50, which is a lot when you only make $3/hr. We decided we'd show him how much money he could save, if he would just stop chewing betel nut. It came out to be like $23/week. He hasn't chewed since. We're super excited for him. His "wife" isn't doing as well as he is, but it's a start.

Also, we have this super studly woman in the branch named Evangeline. She has been a member since the early days of the church in Palau, but her entire family (besides her kids) is less-active, and her husband is not a member. She is the perfect example of what the members will be like in Zion (except that she married this guy, but you get the idea). She asked us to visit a young man that she works with at the college (she teaches English to the Uighur terrorists). We tried to visit him several times, until finally he was home. His name is Mesikt, and studied theology in the Philippines. Needless to say, he knew the Bible really well. We had a really good lesson with him about the Restoration, and it seemed to make a lot of sense to him. Having studied theology, I expected a bible bash type of experience, but it wasn't at all. He was very open to everything, and said that he had a lot of questions for us when we come back. Elder Shular made it very clear that we weren't there just to discuss the Bible, but to show him Christ's church, have him learn on his own that our message is true, and then help him to be baptized. His response was if we can teach him something he didn't know before, that he believes, he has no problem following it. I can't see him not getting baptized. I'm super excited about him. I'll keep you posted. We were supposed to see him tonight, but we forgot about the new P-Day, so we had to reschedule to Thursday.

On a different note, Thursday night a member of the branch presidency asked me to give a talk that Sunday (yesterday). This guy is actually from Mexico, in his 20s and a relatively new member. We decided that he and his wife were talking one night and she asked who he asked to speak on Sunday. Only then did he realize that he had not made any assignments. 'Dang, who can I ask to give a talk on short notice...one of the missionaries...and Rodney (recently returned missionary).' I don't know if that's how it went, but it seems like a pretty good scenario. Anyway, my point is, I gave my talk in Palauan. It took me a couple of days to prepare, since I had to not only decide what I want to say, but also how I'm going to say it with my limited vocabulary. I only spoke for about 6 or 7 minutes, but I thought it went really well, and people seemed to be impressed. I overheard two members talking (I heard my name so instantly I perked up) and one of them said (in Palauan), "Elder Barlow has only been here for a few months and he already speaks like he's Palauan." It made me feel pretty good. Someone else came up to me (the wife of the guy that asked me to speak) and asked me how long I'd been here, and I told her. "It must be a missionary thing. My husband can't say anything." So all in all, it was cool, even though I was nervous beyond belief.

We also had our first Sunday school completely taught in Palauan. It was so great. Even though there are now two Sunday school classes, we're hoping the Palauan one will dominate the English one and phase it out. We had less active members participating and answering questions, whereas before the only one that would say anything (other than the teacher) was the white Elder's quorum president. It was such an amazing Sunday, even though all of the people we were expecting didn't show.

I better get going, but I love you all.

Elder Barlow