Hey Mom :)
So I just want to let you know that I wrote you such a good letter
and it will be in the mail tomorrow :) If this letter doesn't make you
cry... then I have failed. This letter is legit. I loved writing this
letter. I love you so much :) There is one for Dad, too. I miss you all
so much!
So this past week was pretty good! It has been the slowest week out of
my stay here in Africa but it was still great! Elder Lamb and I have
such awesome investigators. We seriously bear testimony and people
just believe us. We left this one family with a commitment to read 3
Nephi 11 and they failed to do so, so we read it with them in our next
rendez-vous, and while we were reading it and explaining it, the Spirit
was so strong. And it was all in English :) At the end, we asked them
if they believed what they had just read and they looked at us like we
were stupid and said basically, "Yes! Of course we believe it! It's the
word of God!" Yup... only in Africa.
On Wednesday, we were at the church waiting for coordination meeting to start and we were talking to this young man named Junior and he was telling us how he was super
stressed with work and school and stuff and he asked us to give him a
blessing. He asked me to give the blessing, and I did. I have such
a firm testimony now that if you trust the Lord, He WILL put the words
in your head that you need to say. It felt so good. I love feeling the
Lords help so much. I love having the spirit!! I love my life!!! Oh,
and I met a guy named Carlos on Wednesday... that was random. We have
this awesome investigator named Nadeje and every time we leave her
with something to read, she reads all of it and when we meet with her
again she explains everything she read to us and gives us a very
detailed summary of what she read. She has so much faith and desire.
She is set to be baptized on November 5th. That is when we have our
next baptismal service. We have 3 set for that date and we have 5 set
for November 19th and we plan on adding 5 more for November 19th. Of
course, things never go as planned here, but we tend to stick to what
we have planned. I love this work so much!! On Saturday, we had our
"General Conference." Everyone went to the church and we watched the
Saturday sessions and then the men watched Priesthood. It was all in
French with no subtitles, so I understood barely anything. Aaand it
was in French French...not African French so that made it even more
difficult. So I just decided to write you and Dad letters. We get the
Liahona in a few weeks with all the talks and the Thompson's have it
downloaded on their computers so I am going to go over there and put
it on my iPod. The Thompson's are so awesome. They are such a blessing
to the missionaries here. I am soooo grateful for all that they do.
They really feel like my mom and dad out here. When MoTab was singing
everyone else would sing and it was pretty bad cause they totally sang
at different tempos... so the people here would finish one song and
the choir would still have like 2 measures left. And then there were
some key changes... that made things pretty funny. It was great
though! The people here have such an incredible spirit.
I saw some pretty crazy things on Saturday. We were driving home and we pulled up
into traffic and I was watching this lady walk by the car with this
huge bowl on her head when a car slammed into a parked car right next
to us! That lady was almost nailed! The car that was hit flew under a
truck and lifted the truck up... and I was right there! I was less
than 20 feet away! It was crazy! Right as I heard the noise I looked
at the car that crashed and I saw the guy bouncing around a little bit
in his front seat. Sucks for him. Then I saw a man walking down the
road and he had nothing on but a cloth covering his crotch... his butt
was in plain view. Oh Cameroon. And then we saw a man standing in a
sewer peeing... at least he didn't miss. And then Elder Lamb saw this
man changing and was completely naked. The guy thought he would change
behind a door...well the door had a fat window in it so the privacy
thing didn't work out too well.
On Sunday, we watched the Sunday sessions of Conference. It was great. I just finished your letter and the letter for Dad. We then went and taught this lady named Soeur Marthe. We actually call here Mama Marthe. She is so awesome. We were
so thirsty so we asked for some water because she has filtered water and
she didn't have any at the moment so she called for her daughter and
told her to go buy some. Elder Lamb tried to fight it and tell her to
not worry about it and to not buy things on Sunday and she turned to
him and said "I'm not baptized yet! I can buy water." It was pretty
funny. I quietly laughed... he then looked at me to back him up and I
said "Sorry bud, I am so thirsty right now" and then I smiled :) That
water was so refreshing. So that was my week!
I'm going to try to answer your questions. We had transfers 2 weeks
ago but nothing changed. All the new missionaries and their trainers
are on this new 12 week program that the big guys up top have come up
with. So I will definitely be with Elder Lamb my first two transfers
and hopefully for more. I love Elder Lamb so much. It is so easy for
me to open up with him and be myself. I am so blessed to have him as
my companion. No, no one has tried to pick pocket me yet. I don't
think I will run into problems with that. I don't carry my wallet on
me anyways or anything of great importance. Except for the Word of
God! And that will definitely benefit whomever steals it. So no worries
there.
I am so glad that Justin and Janalyn's baby is doing better. Poor
thing. They were in my prayers and still are. I hope Kurt feels
better. I'm scared to give advice because I don't want people thinking
"well you have it so much easier than he does because people just flock
to you in Africa." Whoever thinks that is wrong. No matter where you are you have so many struggles. They will all vary but we ALL have them. My advice for Kurt would be to always fall on
his testimony. The thing that picks me up when I am down is when I
think of eternal families. I always look at our family photos and that
always picks me up. I love bearing testimony that families can be
together forever. I haven't had the opportunity to read Kurt's email,
but that is what I would tell him. I'll see if I can shoot him a quick
email. I am so glad that he and I are out here together. I respect
him so much and really look up to him.
I can't wait to get the packages! I will probably wait to open them on
Christmas so I can actually have gifts! I can't believe that that is
two months away. Time goes by so fast! You should all send me letters
too :) Well that is about it for this week! I love you so much and I
pray for you everyday!
Love,
Elder Schmid
So I just want to let you know that I wrote you such a good letter
and it will be in the mail tomorrow :) If this letter doesn't make you
cry... then I have failed. This letter is legit. I loved writing this
letter. I love you so much :) There is one for Dad, too. I miss you all
so much!
So this past week was pretty good! It has been the slowest week out of
my stay here in Africa but it was still great! Elder Lamb and I have
such awesome investigators. We seriously bear testimony and people
just believe us. We left this one family with a commitment to read 3
Nephi 11 and they failed to do so, so we read it with them in our next
rendez-vous, and while we were reading it and explaining it, the Spirit
was so strong. And it was all in English :) At the end, we asked them
if they believed what they had just read and they looked at us like we
were stupid and said basically, "Yes! Of course we believe it! It's the
word of God!" Yup... only in Africa.
On Wednesday, we were at the church waiting for coordination meeting to start and we were talking to this young man named Junior and he was telling us how he was super
stressed with work and school and stuff and he asked us to give him a
blessing. He asked me to give the blessing, and I did. I have such
a firm testimony now that if you trust the Lord, He WILL put the words
in your head that you need to say. It felt so good. I love feeling the
Lords help so much. I love having the spirit!! I love my life!!! Oh,
and I met a guy named Carlos on Wednesday... that was random. We have
this awesome investigator named Nadeje and every time we leave her
with something to read, she reads all of it and when we meet with her
again she explains everything she read to us and gives us a very
detailed summary of what she read. She has so much faith and desire.
She is set to be baptized on November 5th. That is when we have our
next baptismal service. We have 3 set for that date and we have 5 set
for November 19th and we plan on adding 5 more for November 19th. Of
course, things never go as planned here, but we tend to stick to what
we have planned. I love this work so much!! On Saturday, we had our
"General Conference." Everyone went to the church and we watched the
Saturday sessions and then the men watched Priesthood. It was all in
French with no subtitles, so I understood barely anything. Aaand it
was in French French...not African French so that made it even more
difficult. So I just decided to write you and Dad letters. We get the
Liahona in a few weeks with all the talks and the Thompson's have it
downloaded on their computers so I am going to go over there and put
it on my iPod. The Thompson's are so awesome. They are such a blessing
to the missionaries here. I am soooo grateful for all that they do.
They really feel like my mom and dad out here. When MoTab was singing
everyone else would sing and it was pretty bad cause they totally sang
at different tempos... so the people here would finish one song and
the choir would still have like 2 measures left. And then there were
some key changes... that made things pretty funny. It was great
though! The people here have such an incredible spirit.
I saw some pretty crazy things on Saturday. We were driving home and we pulled up
into traffic and I was watching this lady walk by the car with this
huge bowl on her head when a car slammed into a parked car right next
to us! That lady was almost nailed! The car that was hit flew under a
truck and lifted the truck up... and I was right there! I was less
than 20 feet away! It was crazy! Right as I heard the noise I looked
at the car that crashed and I saw the guy bouncing around a little bit
in his front seat. Sucks for him. Then I saw a man walking down the
road and he had nothing on but a cloth covering his crotch... his butt
was in plain view. Oh Cameroon. And then we saw a man standing in a
sewer peeing... at least he didn't miss. And then Elder Lamb saw this
man changing and was completely naked. The guy thought he would change
behind a door...well the door had a fat window in it so the privacy
thing didn't work out too well.
On Sunday, we watched the Sunday sessions of Conference. It was great. I just finished your letter and the letter for Dad. We then went and taught this lady named Soeur Marthe. We actually call here Mama Marthe. She is so awesome. We were
so thirsty so we asked for some water because she has filtered water and
she didn't have any at the moment so she called for her daughter and
told her to go buy some. Elder Lamb tried to fight it and tell her to
not worry about it and to not buy things on Sunday and she turned to
him and said "I'm not baptized yet! I can buy water." It was pretty
funny. I quietly laughed... he then looked at me to back him up and I
said "Sorry bud, I am so thirsty right now" and then I smiled :) That
water was so refreshing. So that was my week!
I'm going to try to answer your questions. We had transfers 2 weeks
ago but nothing changed. All the new missionaries and their trainers
are on this new 12 week program that the big guys up top have come up
with. So I will definitely be with Elder Lamb my first two transfers
and hopefully for more. I love Elder Lamb so much. It is so easy for
me to open up with him and be myself. I am so blessed to have him as
my companion. No, no one has tried to pick pocket me yet. I don't
think I will run into problems with that. I don't carry my wallet on
me anyways or anything of great importance. Except for the Word of
God! And that will definitely benefit whomever steals it. So no worries
there.
I am so glad that Justin and Janalyn's baby is doing better. Poor
thing. They were in my prayers and still are. I hope Kurt feels
better. I'm scared to give advice because I don't want people thinking
"well you have it so much easier than he does because people just flock
to you in Africa." Whoever thinks that is wrong. No matter where you are you have so many struggles. They will all vary but we ALL have them. My advice for Kurt would be to always fall on
his testimony. The thing that picks me up when I am down is when I
think of eternal families. I always look at our family photos and that
always picks me up. I love bearing testimony that families can be
together forever. I haven't had the opportunity to read Kurt's email,
but that is what I would tell him. I'll see if I can shoot him a quick
email. I am so glad that he and I are out here together. I respect
him so much and really look up to him.
I can't wait to get the packages! I will probably wait to open them on
Christmas so I can actually have gifts! I can't believe that that is
two months away. Time goes by so fast! You should all send me letters
too :) Well that is about it for this week! I love you so much and I
pray for you everyday!
Love,
Elder Schmid
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