Hope everybody had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday!
As for us, we were informed that we should not celebrate Thanksgiving, as it's not a recognized holiday here, and that normal proselyting would continue like a normal day. We all figured that's what would happen anyway, so it wasn't that big a deal.
Unfortunately the week started out a bit bad on my side. I got sick, food poisoning is what i'd imagine it was. I must have eaten something and it ended up making me feel horrible. So both Tuesday and Wednesday we didnt even go out into the area. Just hung around and tried to get some rest and get over it. Tried to drink lots of water, etc etc. It was a bit boring, but we ended up going on some nice walks (because being stuck in the boarding all day blows big time, and we found a nice lake/reserve place and we chilled up there for a while. It was way pretty. O and we had some problems with our electricity. It went out, so we went to go get some more (we have to buy our electricity when it gets low, well mission pays for it, ya know...) So we went to Pick N Pay to get some more (local grocery) and they said we were unable to buy it becuase it was blocked and a whole bunch of other stupid reasons. So we called the office, called the landlord, trying to figure out what to do. Needless to say we were completely out of electricity and they couldnt solve it that day. So we ended up spending the night with some other elders at their place. Same thing happened on Wednesday, still couldn't get any. So we had to sleep over again. But we did finally get it on thursday, which was great to have. Thursday i was feeling a bit better so we went back into the area. It was a slow week for us...but we stayed busy.
On Saturday we went to the chapel for our class that we teach, but found that the YM/YW were having an activity. It was a dance activity. So we hung around and helped out, ate a bit of food, that sort of stuff. It was pretty fun. They were learning how to dance...idunno what kind of dance...and then half of it just reminded me of high school becuase they'd form a bit circle and then random people would jump in for 30 seconds at a time...ya know...and then hop back out. Of course only most of the girls were brave enough to go in. A lot of the guys were even too scared to ask any of the girls to dance. It's funny...doesnt matter where you go in the world, guys are always more uncomfortable and shy when it comes to dancing and what what. So i have now made it a goal of mine that when i get home, i want to take a dance class. haha...but anyway, it was fun and ended up being a great activity for how small the branch is.
Sunday church was really good. Elder Mkhize and I spoke in sacrament meeting. I was the concluding speaker. It went really well...other than the chapel was hot and we only had fans in there...but it went really good. Our theme for sunday was Jacob 3:1,2 and Alma 57:27. It talked mostly about being Firm and Pure in Heart. So i talked a lot of about the stripling warriors, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, and of course the Savior. I kept my time of 15 minutes and overall i think it went really well. I tried to focus my talk on how to have a Firm Testimony and how to live to it til the end of our lives like many of these men in the scriptures...But other than that church was good.We had a few appointments and just ended our day. A window of teaching has again presented itself to a PM family, Mama Matiso's family. I think i told you we're teaching her daughter Vuyokazi, as well as her other daughter. Only 2 out of the 5 are members if you remember me saying. But now the husband, although he struggles with english, has expressed how he might want us to visit him as well. We've been praying for fatherled families as this is our main focus. So hopefully this will be a father that we can bring into the church that will be strong support to the rest of his family.
Other than that...not much. Just keeping on going. Thanks for everything everyone! hope you enjoy the holidays!
Elder Devenney
Monday, November 30, 2009
Monday, November 9, 2009
Nov 9th, 2009
Well because of last week i'll try to make up for it by saying a bit of what you would have heard last week, as well as this week...
Starting last week i wrote about one of our investigators named Vuyokazi. A 23 year old Part member family member. Her mother and sister are both members, and now she's getting interested as well. Even the father of the family came to church for the first time yesterday...So There's mama Matiso, (mother) and amanda (other sister) who are both recent converts probably within the past 4 months or so. But are active and excited. So anyway...with Vuyokazi...we've been visiting her for just a couple of weeks now and she's come to church maybe 4 times or so, maybe more. She's a fashion designer, has her own shop here in Queenstown. It's a new business for her tho, so she just started. We talked with her a little bit about faith a few weeks ago and challenged her to act on her faith and do something to increase her faith in the Saviour. We gave her til the next time we saw her, which would just be a couple of days, then we'd follow up and see how it went. Anyway, to make a long story short, she expressed how truly she saw how her prayers were making a difference. She had been praying sincerely that people would come to her store so that she would be able to have enough money for rent, etc, and her prayers were answered. Her business is going well...even with how new it is. I think there's also some issue with her and her father...but i'm excited to find out her thoughts about him now that he visited the church yesterday...Also something else that she told us was that some lady came into her store and told her how nice she was and how great her work was and the lady ended up asking Vuyokazi what church she goes to, surprisingly enough she ended up saying the LDS church. (previously she had been going to a happy clappy church, ya know drums and all...but i know she hadnt learned anything there) and when the lady heard her say that she said "why!? how could such a good girl like you go to THAT church" "why dont you come to my house and i'll tell you all about those mormons and what they believe in". Good thing Vuyokazi ended up sticking up for herself and told her no thanks, even when she's only come a couple of times and at that point we had probably only sat down with her 3 times with short visits. She could have easily found some anti stuff through this lady, but we were glad that she stood up for herself and what she's been feeling and was able to deny that lady. I was happy to hear that. But she's doing well nonetheless. We'll see what happens with that family in the future. We're slowly getting them all to church one by one...
Last week for our book of mormon class we taught about how to introduce the book to people in a sit down situation. Had some practice role plays, evaluated, repracticed, it was pretty intereting. The Ym and Yw have been doing a lot of missionary work for us, going out and talking to people about the gospel, and even tried to teach for themselves...which is something they shouldnt do without us, and luckily we corrected them...but they're really finding joy in missionary work. And they've given us a lot of referrals which was great to see. So this time for our BOM class, this past saturday...we focused on Pass Along Cards. How to talk to a random stranger on the street and invite them to take the card, etc etc. We kinda did the same thing, practiced, role played, then took it to real life and had an activity to give away pass along cards to those walking by the chapel. Everybody was so scared at first, but once they started they realized it wasn't that bad and would want to give away more. We had huge success with it. Including referrals from the contacts they made, with some we've already visited yesterday. The branch is becoming more and more focused on missionary work through classes, as well as the Family Mission Plan of which i've spoken about in past weeks...
As for this week...things are going just fine. We've been having a lot of success in bringing people to church. I think my first couple of weeks we were only getting maybe 2 or 3 investigators at church, now we have usually 8 or 9. So we're feeling good about our efforts on that side.
Silindokuhle, our RC, was ordained to the Aaronic Priesthood yesterday which is good to see. He's a solid young man.
O on saturday night we had a nice dinner with the Ndlelo's, 1st counselor in BP, and YW pres...i'm sure i've mentioned them before. I had promised to make them a chocolate cake, so that was half the reason of going over there. Which we did by the way and it was fantastic as always. Then they made us some pop and pork and stuff...pretty nice meal.
O yes, we had workshops and interviews this past week which i almost forgot about. On the 18th of this month we're having Elder Hinkley, (Pres. HInkley's son) come to our mission and tour it. Well almost this whole transfer, but on the 18th is our Zone Conference in which we'll see him. The focus for this transfer is Chapter 3 of PMG, all the basic things that we teach. So for ZC when he comes, one companionship will have to teach him The Plan of Salvation in 15 minutes...i'm hoping that we wont get picked for that one. haha. It would be a bit intimidating yeah...So that's what the workshop was on. And that's what we're going to focus on in District meetings and so on...just to prepare for that. How to better teach these lessons...Should be interesting.
Other than that there's really not much else going on. Things are good. Ilinge is fine. No big news there i suppose. Just teaching and having a good time! Hope that was a good update for ya...
Thanks,Elder Devenney
Starting last week i wrote about one of our investigators named Vuyokazi. A 23 year old Part member family member. Her mother and sister are both members, and now she's getting interested as well. Even the father of the family came to church for the first time yesterday...So There's mama Matiso, (mother) and amanda (other sister) who are both recent converts probably within the past 4 months or so. But are active and excited. So anyway...with Vuyokazi...we've been visiting her for just a couple of weeks now and she's come to church maybe 4 times or so, maybe more. She's a fashion designer, has her own shop here in Queenstown. It's a new business for her tho, so she just started. We talked with her a little bit about faith a few weeks ago and challenged her to act on her faith and do something to increase her faith in the Saviour. We gave her til the next time we saw her, which would just be a couple of days, then we'd follow up and see how it went. Anyway, to make a long story short, she expressed how truly she saw how her prayers were making a difference. She had been praying sincerely that people would come to her store so that she would be able to have enough money for rent, etc, and her prayers were answered. Her business is going well...even with how new it is. I think there's also some issue with her and her father...but i'm excited to find out her thoughts about him now that he visited the church yesterday...Also something else that she told us was that some lady came into her store and told her how nice she was and how great her work was and the lady ended up asking Vuyokazi what church she goes to, surprisingly enough she ended up saying the LDS church. (previously she had been going to a happy clappy church, ya know drums and all...but i know she hadnt learned anything there) and when the lady heard her say that she said "why!? how could such a good girl like you go to THAT church" "why dont you come to my house and i'll tell you all about those mormons and what they believe in". Good thing Vuyokazi ended up sticking up for herself and told her no thanks, even when she's only come a couple of times and at that point we had probably only sat down with her 3 times with short visits. She could have easily found some anti stuff through this lady, but we were glad that she stood up for herself and what she's been feeling and was able to deny that lady. I was happy to hear that. But she's doing well nonetheless. We'll see what happens with that family in the future. We're slowly getting them all to church one by one...
Last week for our book of mormon class we taught about how to introduce the book to people in a sit down situation. Had some practice role plays, evaluated, repracticed, it was pretty intereting. The Ym and Yw have been doing a lot of missionary work for us, going out and talking to people about the gospel, and even tried to teach for themselves...which is something they shouldnt do without us, and luckily we corrected them...but they're really finding joy in missionary work. And they've given us a lot of referrals which was great to see. So this time for our BOM class, this past saturday...we focused on Pass Along Cards. How to talk to a random stranger on the street and invite them to take the card, etc etc. We kinda did the same thing, practiced, role played, then took it to real life and had an activity to give away pass along cards to those walking by the chapel. Everybody was so scared at first, but once they started they realized it wasn't that bad and would want to give away more. We had huge success with it. Including referrals from the contacts they made, with some we've already visited yesterday. The branch is becoming more and more focused on missionary work through classes, as well as the Family Mission Plan of which i've spoken about in past weeks...
As for this week...things are going just fine. We've been having a lot of success in bringing people to church. I think my first couple of weeks we were only getting maybe 2 or 3 investigators at church, now we have usually 8 or 9. So we're feeling good about our efforts on that side.
Silindokuhle, our RC, was ordained to the Aaronic Priesthood yesterday which is good to see. He's a solid young man.
O on saturday night we had a nice dinner with the Ndlelo's, 1st counselor in BP, and YW pres...i'm sure i've mentioned them before. I had promised to make them a chocolate cake, so that was half the reason of going over there. Which we did by the way and it was fantastic as always. Then they made us some pop and pork and stuff...pretty nice meal.
O yes, we had workshops and interviews this past week which i almost forgot about. On the 18th of this month we're having Elder Hinkley, (Pres. HInkley's son) come to our mission and tour it. Well almost this whole transfer, but on the 18th is our Zone Conference in which we'll see him. The focus for this transfer is Chapter 3 of PMG, all the basic things that we teach. So for ZC when he comes, one companionship will have to teach him The Plan of Salvation in 15 minutes...i'm hoping that we wont get picked for that one. haha. It would be a bit intimidating yeah...So that's what the workshop was on. And that's what we're going to focus on in District meetings and so on...just to prepare for that. How to better teach these lessons...Should be interesting.
Other than that there's really not much else going on. Things are good. Ilinge is fine. No big news there i suppose. Just teaching and having a good time! Hope that was a good update for ya...
Thanks,Elder Devenney
Monday, November 2, 2009
Oct 26, 2009
Good morning everybody! It has been another week here in South Africa where the weather has been up and down. Rainstorms, overcast, sunny and hot, it's been it all. I hope you're all enjoying the weather back at home...whether that's hot or cold i do not know...
Yesterday Silindokuhle entered the waters of baptism! It was really great. He's such a good kid. Monde, one of the other Priesthood holders who fellowships with us on a regular basis did the baptism. It was great actually, neither my companion or i got chosen to do any part of the program. Didnt even have to give a talk. haha. I think it's the best like that. If the members can do the baptism and confirmation and what what, then as soon as we Elders leave it's not a big deal for the investigators getting baptized. Yesterday was a rainy day tho...so i felt bad for those getting into the water...it couldnt have been too warm. As we all huddled around the outside baptismal font, with some watching from the inside, Monde had to dunk him 3 times because Silindokuhle kept floating to the top. haha. It was a pretty funny scene. But it worked out in the end on the 3rd try. :) He'll be confirmed a member of the church this coming sunday by Bro Patha, our 19 year old young mens president who comes to see Silindokuhle quite often with us.
As for other parts of the week...It's been off and on with good things happening and what not. Some days almost everything would fall through...and it would be hard to find productive things to do in the mean time. We did however do some good service this week at the Branch Presidents house, President Mjiba helping him "transplant" grass to another location...it was funny. He's a hilarious man. Then we also helped another member at the local clinic in the garden diggin around some corn, or mealie as they call it. It was good to get out and get dirty a bit.
We've had some really great Lesson 1 lessons this week with investigators. One in particular using an object lesson and at the end she said that if we're telling her the truth and as she finds out about it, she'll have to join the church because she hasn't felt like she's coming as close to Christ as she should have been, but if she does what we've challenged her to do, she'll be making the right step toward Him, she said. It's a mother and a son who is a referral from Monde actually. Just taught the mother, but we feel pretty good about it. We also did see the Nunu Family again, watched the Restoration DVD. There was one case where we tried to watch that dvd with a Recent Convert this past week...unfortunately for some reason half the sound wasn't working...but it was quite pathetic when i could quote the whole movie. I wish i knew how many times i've watched that DVD in the past year...i remember i went on an exchange with this elder in Namibia, and we watched it 5 times that day...sorry just a side note...
So lets see what else...We got that frisbee...and played that and rugby last monday...idunno if i told you or not. But that was freakin fun! I miss playing regular sports...and it's sad that i get winded within the first 5 minutes of playing. I'm still so out of shape...
I'm thinking of something exciting that i could tell ya that's happened this past week but i'm struggling...so i might just leave it at that. Just know that life is going fine...nothing too much has changed. Transfer news will come tomorrow. I'll let ya know if anything major happens...Nkosi!
Mdala Devenney
Yesterday Silindokuhle entered the waters of baptism! It was really great. He's such a good kid. Monde, one of the other Priesthood holders who fellowships with us on a regular basis did the baptism. It was great actually, neither my companion or i got chosen to do any part of the program. Didnt even have to give a talk. haha. I think it's the best like that. If the members can do the baptism and confirmation and what what, then as soon as we Elders leave it's not a big deal for the investigators getting baptized. Yesterday was a rainy day tho...so i felt bad for those getting into the water...it couldnt have been too warm. As we all huddled around the outside baptismal font, with some watching from the inside, Monde had to dunk him 3 times because Silindokuhle kept floating to the top. haha. It was a pretty funny scene. But it worked out in the end on the 3rd try. :) He'll be confirmed a member of the church this coming sunday by Bro Patha, our 19 year old young mens president who comes to see Silindokuhle quite often with us.
As for other parts of the week...It's been off and on with good things happening and what not. Some days almost everything would fall through...and it would be hard to find productive things to do in the mean time. We did however do some good service this week at the Branch Presidents house, President Mjiba helping him "transplant" grass to another location...it was funny. He's a hilarious man. Then we also helped another member at the local clinic in the garden diggin around some corn, or mealie as they call it. It was good to get out and get dirty a bit.
We've had some really great Lesson 1 lessons this week with investigators. One in particular using an object lesson and at the end she said that if we're telling her the truth and as she finds out about it, she'll have to join the church because she hasn't felt like she's coming as close to Christ as she should have been, but if she does what we've challenged her to do, she'll be making the right step toward Him, she said. It's a mother and a son who is a referral from Monde actually. Just taught the mother, but we feel pretty good about it. We also did see the Nunu Family again, watched the Restoration DVD. There was one case where we tried to watch that dvd with a Recent Convert this past week...unfortunately for some reason half the sound wasn't working...but it was quite pathetic when i could quote the whole movie. I wish i knew how many times i've watched that DVD in the past year...i remember i went on an exchange with this elder in Namibia, and we watched it 5 times that day...sorry just a side note...
So lets see what else...We got that frisbee...and played that and rugby last monday...idunno if i told you or not. But that was freakin fun! I miss playing regular sports...and it's sad that i get winded within the first 5 minutes of playing. I'm still so out of shape...
I'm thinking of something exciting that i could tell ya that's happened this past week but i'm struggling...so i might just leave it at that. Just know that life is going fine...nothing too much has changed. Transfer news will come tomorrow. I'll let ya know if anything major happens...Nkosi!
Mdala Devenney
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