Week 70: A Week of 7's

From: Christian.garcia@missionary.org
Date: Monday, October 17, 2022
Subject: A Week of 7's

Bonjour y'all! Comment vous allez?? I'm back with another update for this past week! And let's just say that it was AMAZING! Let's talk about it.

So to start of this week we are going to head back all the way to last Monday evening/night. That's why it didn't get included in last weeks email. But Elder Ibanda and I went and taught a few families and we were able to fix 7 baptismal dates for the 30 of this month! When we synchronised our area book I thought that I had made a mistake but we went back and it was in fact 7. It was so cool to be able to see that work from others and from myself manifesting itself in these people who had the desire to follow the way that Christ showed us. 

Throughout the rest of the week we went out and we worked hard. We called lots of people, got rejected by a mama who only wants her kids to learn :( and found some people in the least likely places. 

The biggest stand out for finding people this week has to be Frère Kevin. On Saturday evening we went out to sector and we took the *newly fixed* bikes only to find out that both my bike and Elder Ibanda's bike tubes had massie holes in them and just needed to be replaced. We hadn't used them so it was funny to pump them up and then watch the air just go away as quickly as I was pumping them up. So we headed to a little "bike shop" which is basically 4 stand up logs with a metal roof on dirt. With lots of greese and oil everywhere. I will try and get a picture because my explanation doesn't really do it justice haha. We went there and didn't get servied for 45 minutes. There were people coming after us that got out before us so we finally asked the guy to help us. He did it all in 10 minutes and they work now. But while we were waiting there was a guy that came in with his little brother's bike. You know those little tricycles that are for like 4 year olds. This guy pulled up RIDING that and then explained that there was some problem with it. So while he was waiting and we were waiting we started talking a little bit and we gave him our contact information and a little message called The Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and got his contact info too. We fixed a lesson for Sunday and then went our ways. When Sunday came around we went and we taught him and the questions that he was asking were simple but profound questions. And with that we were able to teach him and resond to all of his questions. After the lesson I just kept thinking "wow, how did I know how to answer those questions?" The only response that I can give is that the Spirit was with us and because of that we were able to help this brother. By the end of the day Frère Kevin was our 7th new person found for the week. So we found 7 people and fixed 7 baptismal dates.

At church this week I was asked to give a talk on a topic that I felt would be good so I chose something that I myself am working on which is patience. We are never patient enough with not only other but ourselves. Especially when it comes to forgiving. Church was really good assistance of our friends that made it there! We had a total of 7 at church this week too. (We really had a week of 7's haha)

Lately the weather here in Togo has been interesting. Normally around this time of year we would be getting ready for the dry season because that starts towards the middle of December buuuuut it has been pouring rain throughout the week so can't really do that. But not all day has it been raining. Only the aternoons when we are coming back from sector. The rest of the day it is hotter and hotter than the day before. And when I say that we would be getting ready for the dry season I mean that we are starting to preapre ourselves mentally for the absolute HEAT that is going to be coming here soon. But we don't have to do that quite yet because it's still cooler at night which is a blessing in disguise. 

This week I wanted to share something that I have been studying recently. In the Book of Mormon in the book of Jacob in chapter 5 we read of the allegory of the olive tree or the allegory of Zenos (an old testament prophet). This chapter talks a lot about the love that the Lord has for His children in many ways but especially in the way that he takes care of his "garden." The Lord didn't want his olive tree to die so he went and grafted healthy branches of a savage olive tree so that the roots wouldn't die. And then he planted the other branches that he cut off and took care of them until they were strong and they produced fruit. And then we read more of how the Lord of the vine succors his trees so that they may all survive but He did have to cut off some of the branches. I love the symbolism of this chapter to our days, the latter-days, because it is just as Zenos prophesied, the Lord scatteres branches of His olive tree and grafted others on to save the roots and He is grafting the originals back onto the tree as to make sure that the good fruit is produced. We all have the ability and the opportunity to help the Lord in this mission. President Nelson talked a lot about it in April's general conference. "Dear young friends, you are each vital to the Lord. He has held you in reserve until now to help gather Israel." Now I understand that not everyone reading this considers themselves young but take a look at how old Adam lived and well... you are young :) President Nelson advised us that each of us has a role to play in the gathering of Israel and we each were saved by the Lord so that we could each use our own talents to do just that. 

Thank you for reading another email. Sorry if this one is a little longer today haha. I guess a lot of stuff happened this week. I hope that you each have a wonderful week!!

Beaucoup d'amour, 

Elder Garcia

Photos... ya need to be better at taking those. Sorry y'all