Success Stories - Feb 9

Here is what some of the West Indies missionaries have been up to lately:

Elder White - Trinidad
We received a referal from the elders in marabella to a wonderful family who decided this year to make things right. The husband comes from a christian background, the wife (common law) comes from a hindu background, but she wants to become christian and is very humble about the whole thing. The children are a little rambunctious, but the older one (ten) listens. we came back and asked them if they had prayed, and Anna replied that she was not sure how to pray-- we taught prayer again, and it was interesting how the husband assumed that he knew how to pray already, and how the wife was always belittling herself about how little she knew because she didn't grow up "in a church" while explaining how to pray, we asked her to tell us about things that she was greatful for and things that she wanted help from God with. Then we invited her to pray, emphazing that she was just talking with God and not to worry about how fancy her words were--- what followed was one of the most conversiational prayers I have ever heard. Her voice didn't change in tone, she just talked to God about the same things that she had told us about. she was humble enough to teach, and she was able to learn and to grow. it made me think about how much we miss because we "know it already".

Elder Lang - Guyana
Success story: This last little while has shown to me that the Lord answers prayers. I prayed that we could find men to teach, and out of nowhere we met two adult men that are accepting and ready and who are to be baptized this weekend. I know they'll really help the branch.

Elder Biver - St Vincent
This week we had a hard beginning of Sunday afternoon. None of our investigators came to church and all our appointments for the beginning of the afternoon fell through... We were trying to keep our energy and continue to teach people. We visited members in the area and one of our investigators, and had a really spiritual lesson. Just after that, we decided to visit somebody else and on our way, a young boy waved at us. I waved back and he asked what we were up to. We said we were teaching families about jesus Christ, and he said to us "you need to visit this house!". We asked for direction, and he led us directly to his house. We met his sister and his mum, who was really nice. She had a great smile when greeting us, listened carefully to our message and said she would be happy to let us come back the next tuesday to visit the whole family. We felt so good after that, and we could really saw that the Lord had helped us find a receptive family.

Elder Holtz - Suriname
This week we've been able to see the work of the Lord and his many blessing he gladly gives to his children. We've got an investigator now that is preparting to be baptized this weekend that has a very difficult life. He makes basically enough money to survive on, lives in a very old broken down house and still his got the faith to count his many blessings. Money is hard to come by for him and yesterday we decided right before the lesson to switch things up and teach him the Law of Tithing and the many blessings we can receive if we are faithful. We taught a spirit filled lesson and when it came time to commit him to live the commandment he said that he would gladly live it because he knows that the Lord will take care of everything if he did his part. The confidence in his voice when he said that and the assurance he had were amazing to hear!

Elder Young - Guyana
last night (sunday night) elder green, myself and bro. *** were standing outside of a supposed appointment, (having been scamped by a contact the day before) adjusting plans for our next step. elder green and i frankly wondering why we had felt so good about the individual who scamped us. we contacted a man coming home with groceries and in contacting him asked if we could come visit his family and share more. when he said yes we then asked how about right now?
we met with the family and i felt so great in their home, we had a wonderful brief lesson and will be returning tonight. i am confident that we were meant to find them, i believe they have been prepared for the message. i know the proximity principle is true- if we are doing everything we can do, God puts us where he wants us.

Elder Brenkmann – Guyana
Well, this week we baptized a mother and two of her children. The family is really cool and loves church. For a few weeks we've been trying to get ***, the husband, to church. He's always had to work. Last week we were finishing up a lesson and were extending another church commitment to ***, when Sister ***, his wife, starts to go and bear testimony to him on the importance of families and church. We didn't even have top ask her too, she just started testifying and extended the commitment for us. It was great to see someone, who isn't even baptized yet, catch the fire and go with it. She wants to share her joy with others. *** didn't come to church, but Sister *** brought his mother, 2 nieces, and her sister and kids, to church Sunday and wants to help them all get baptized.

Elder Packer - Guyana
My success story this week is that our members in this area are just fantastic. we went by one of the recent converts in the branch (sis. ***) and as we were about to knock on the door we could hear her voice inside "...so he read a scripture in James 1:5 - if you lack wisdom ask God" what? she was teaching the restoration to her neighbor! it was so cool. We gave him a date and we want to go see the rest of his family too. The Lord is blessing us very very much.

Elder Shakespear - Suriname
Our success story for this week, we contacted a guy, and set up an apointment. The apointment was a fake. The family that was home invited us in and we shared a les. They were in church sunday. Wonderful!

Elder Koenen – Suriname
normally the rain will prevent people from coming to church, this time it didnt! it brought an entire family to church! sis. *** got baptised and was about to be comfirmed on sunday. Her husband allways goas to the market to sell cd's. We prayed to let the rain stop and i guess her prayers where more important and the rain felt down harder! because of that the man could not go to the market and finally he went with her to church and brought there two kids from 13 and 9years old. They could all support her and feel the spirit feel the church when she was confirmed! sweet blessings! the little girl felt so good and wants to be baptised also. The work is not ours! It is His

Elder Olsen – Guyana
Never underestimate anyone! This past week there was a twelve year old boy named *** who attended one of our lessons with a friend. He wasn't super attentive, but still participated. I told him during the lesson that he would be really happy the next day and it would be because he was going to pray about our church. Imagine my surprise when *** runs up to me on the street and gives me a hug the day after. He told me that he'd had the best day and knew it was true. That kid is a machine! He's reading up to ten chapters a day and gotten his mom, neighbors and friends all involved. WOW!!!!

Elder Barton - Tobago
this week as we have been stressing our 20 contacts every day, the Lord immediately blessed us. while walking down the street, a man came up to us and began asking about religion. in a nutshell, the man began asking about the history of the truth and that he did not believe that there was only prophets toward the middle east around the bible but what about russia, africa, asia, and over here in america. the Carribs and amerindians. well ofcourse we taught about the Book of Mormon and he is really "thirsty for that book" as he said. we are planning on giving it to him next visit. really cool.

Elder Julian – Guadeloupe
well because of the stike me and elder roberts didnt have alot of things to do and he wanted to know the members, so we went to a recent converts house. we rang the door bell and her son answered and invited us in. when we went in there was a visiter and she was talking to him with all her recent convert things. after we asked what she was doing and she said this was her friend from her old church and he is interested in what he can learn. then she told us she gave him the first lesson and we finsih and answered questions she couldnt. we set up a RDV for saturday to talk more. that saturday he asked about baptism and wanted to be baptized. we answered all his questions and set a date with him for the 21 of feburary and he is as golden as anyone could be. the fruits of the lord are coming to help us in our time of need in this strike.

Elder Chambers – Guyana
This week it was raining something terrible in the morning, foolishly I had in my head "no one is going to be at church today because of the rain". As we went about picking people up and checking on them my fears seemed as though they were going to become a reality as people kept saying they could not come to chuch because of this thing they call rai n. I thought we were going to get two and if we were lucky three people at church. Well this is were is was proved to be foolish in my thinking. Once again the Lord streached down his arm and helped out when we needed it most. We ended up with eight investigators at church it was awesome.