22 Nov. 2010

Family,

We've had a great last couple of weeks. We've been making a huge effort to meet with members and get some referrals from them, and it's been working out great for us. We haven't had a ton of referrals, but we have had some - which is more than we can say for the last while. We just began week one of the new transfer today, but we won't find out what is happening (who is getting transferred where) until Wednesday night. At least until then, we are still in a tri-panionship, and Elder Adams is the District Leader. This coming weekend we go to Guam again for leadership training, and then again two or three weeks after that for zone leader council, and then yet again two weeks later. Air fare for these meetings has got to be pretty ridiculous.

I think I mentioned the less-active man that we've been teaching, named Lloyd. He has just been doing great, and yesterday he came to church, and asked us to show him how to pay his tithing. He hasn't been to church in years, and now he's coming, reading from the Book of Mormon every day, asking questions, and paying tithing. His wife and daughter aren't too interested at the moment, but with his great example, I'm thoping that will change soon. On an unrelated note, his 13-year old daughter was trying to get her flirt on with my companions on Saturday during our lesson, it was pretty funny.

Our recent convert family is still doing great too. Ian, the father, has been talking to his neighbors and when we went over there on Saturday, he told us to follow him and we'd go talk to a Yapese family that lives near them. We talked to the mother and set up a return appointment. She was sick when we went back last night, but I was just so excited that he was willing to go with us to talk to his neighbor. Plus, he went out and got white shirts, slacks, and ties for his two sons, one is going to be baptized on Saturday. They all looked so slick at church.

A while back there was a less-active man that told another member (semi-less active) to tell us not to come visit him anymore because he "already knows the truth." I was pretty surprised to hear that because it was pretty out-of-nowhere. Anyway, we didn't go back for about 2 months, but anytime we saw any member of his family (there's a bunch of them that live there) they would ask us when we are coming again or why we haven't been by. We'd respond by throwing this other guy under the bus, "Oh, he didn't tell you? Yeah, he told us not to come anymore." They all got pretty upset. Finally, Saturday night we went to their house. His mother and his wife were outside and they asked us the same question, and we responded the same way, and they reacted the same. Later he came out and said, "Elders, I'm coming to church tomorrow, I don't have work." It was so weird. We're going over tomorrow to do some service on the old woman's farm/garden, and he actually did come to church yesterday, and even paid his tithing. It's crazy how things happen sometimes. I don't think him coming was a result of us sicking his family on him, but it felt good to know the rest of them still loved us.

This week is our Branch Thanksgiving Activity, which I'm excited for. The area produced a movie specifically for our mission called, "Do You Know Us?" It was filmed in Guam and has natives doing the voices for all the island languages. It's designed for members to show to their friends and family, and they're going to show it at the activity. I'm really excited because this activity is pretty well known around the area (Palauans love their food - especially when it's free).

I'll let you know how everything turns out.

Love,

Elder Barlow