July 26th, 2010

So i hope this email will be decent. Really i'll just update you overall on how the week went probably. Time is limited as it always seems to be unfortunately. We're pushing to go bowling and we've been writing reports for the past hour + and it's been pretty hectic. But hey, i dont wanna leave this email out so i'll at least write a little bit. The week ended a lot better than last week. We had like no one at church last week, but yesterday we had a bunch of investigators come. It was great. Obviously we planned to have more come than those that actually did, but it's still alright. We had a family of 5 come to church. It was pretty dope! They were friend shipped quite well and got a warm welcome from everyone, and even stayed all 3 hours. it's a family from Rwanda. Father is named Celestin, etc etc. I dunno their surname. But yeah, very nice! Others also showed up, including mama mudapakati, the ma that should be getting baptized soon but yeah, still not ready. Also had Deng! Idunno if you'll remember me saying anything about Deng, but before the world cup he was progressing great. For holiday he went back to Sudan and visited family, and just got back this last week for school starting. He's going into Civil Engineering and is way cool. We saw him friday for the first time back and he's just so ready to be baptized. We gave him a baptismal date for the 8th of august, and of course he said yes. He's so humble, but very wise. One day i'll show pics of all these people...But yeah then we saw him saturday, and he of course came to church...he's sweet. So yeah, he's really our only baptism coming up now...Also had some others come to church...but yeah... Elder Moorcroft and i are doing just fine. I think we laugh too much...every situation we find something to laugh about after. People are just crazy...whether it's the people themselves, the fellowshipper, whatever whatever. That's what's making a good companionship for the two of us. We just get along fine and it makes the work a lot more fun. We're finding a lot of success as well as we're finding and stuff. I went on two exchanges this week...one going back to Cleary with Elder Tanner in his area. I got to see some familiar faces of those that i was teaching when i was there, as well as some members. Including Gine and Tiffany...the recent converts...they're sweet. At least they wont forget about me when i'm home...haha. I built a good friendship i suppose when i was there so it's always great to see them again. I also had Elder Masika, just here in the district in the Lorraine ward, anyway we went on exchanges and it was kinda interesting. He's a good man from Kenya. Yeah he's good just kina young on mission and pretty quiet. Nice guy tho. Oh we also had Zone Conference on Thursday and it was fine. The focus is on "working to strengthen relationships with stake and ward leaders". And we did a workshop about how to make a more effective progress record...which went just fine. It's a long day as usual...and got pretty tiring but it was still nice to see some people. It was a combined zone conference with P.E. and Kwanobuhle zones together. There were lots of things discussed so i wont bore you with that stuff... Our days are getting more and more full and we've just been teaching like crazy it seems. Already our week right now is full til Thursday...almost every hour of the day is packed with appointments...which is a good thing but it can get tiring as well. But we're doing fine. I'll just look at it like a good thing no worries. K idunno what else to say...i'm drawing a blank. I'm enjoying myself....my comp is chill and we get along as i said. No problems nor anything out of the ordinary except random people not wanting to see us for various reasons, rejection, slammed doors, dog chases, sickness from eating greasy egggs that my comp made for me and now i feel a bit weird, yup yup all the usual. I'm good and that's all for the week. Sorry it's a lame one...but Bowling is what we're going to go do and i've been here for wayyy too long already. Peace Elder Devenney

July 19, 2010

Well here it is...Another week is starting and i have to now think about some of the interesting things that have happened in this past week...hmmm It was actually a pretty decent week for the most part. Monday started off so great with another great FHE at the Mendu's and we had the Moyo's there again. Yo it was so funny, my comp and i were rolling on the ground when we played 30 seconds. (idunno if you've played that game, but it's great!) Tuesday we were pretty booked up in the evening time but found it difficult to find effective things to do in the early afternoon. The assistants came and at about 6 o clock started our exchange with them. I went with Elder Msimango, he's from Durban, and it went pretty good. Saw some good people...although had to resolve some major concerns with our baptismal canidate...who is basically being a joker and not doing what she's promised to do...She accused us of just moving her bdate back just because we wanted her to wait longer...i dont think she really understands what baptism is fully about so i wont be surprised if we dont move it even farther back becuase she didnt even come to church this sunday. On exchanges on wednesday we had a good time. We did some early afternoon finding and ran into some crazy guy that spoke about how this guy from zambia was a "new Christ" and that he just came out and was getting some followers. Now this is like a pretty well off white guy, who is following this "father Christ" guy from Zambia what what. Apparently this zambian guy is soooo humble, has been writing some books to clarify the Bible, and there's only about 10 people in the whole world that know about him. But he did say something that was interesting, that he doesnt go around to tell people about this zambian guy, but people come to him that want to know, and it's their choice if they want to believe it or not...kinda an interesting take on that. but over all we laughed pretty hard...talk about false junk that's out there. There was more to our conversation but yeah, you get the point. He wasnt too interested in wanting to hear our message...but we were invited back. The rest of the exchange was fine, Elder Msimango and i got along fine, he's in my transfer group but we've hardly ever served around eachother. So it was good bonding time for sure... Thursday we saw some lady in the hospital...saw the Rodericks later that night, and had a way good lesson on obedience and scripture study. We planned to give them a baptismal date if they came to church on sunday...but they didnt show...lame. But yeah, they're a freakin awesome family that we hope will come into the church soon. We saw some members later on and did that stuff...but nothing too much to tell ya... We did find this cool family last saturday who we went to again on saturday this week, and right when we got there the father was all "Oh hey elders..." lets go inside. My comp and i were like...hmmm...no one calls us elders on the 2nd visit...this guy must be a member or something...or been taught before...but yeah we taught his son, and his sons gf, and him, about the plan of salvation. The father was like...yeah this book talks about a lot of good things...i even read about the gifts and stuff. Basically made it even more like...hey this guy knows more than he's telling us. I think we'll try to get more info out of him when we go back next saturday...but we totally think he could be less active or something. but anyway, his family has tons of potential and are pretty smart as well. They're named the Canturbury's. I totally wanted to send a pic but i dont think he's going to happen because i dont have a attachy thingy to yeah...send. So, again...no pics...but we'll see if i find one before i 'm done. I dont think you've seen any pics for about 4 months. Cuz my card is full but ive been way lazy to send it home and it's got pics from when i first got to Cleary like over 4 months ago. As for my comp, Elder Moorcroft. We bonded quite quickly. He's hilarious and we always get to our boarding laughin our heads off about the day...we have fun...we knw when to be serious...but laugh tons and make jokes. It kinda sucks cuz we're both pretty sarcastic...especially around other missionaries...and idunno if they all understand our sarcasm. But whatever i guess...We're doing just fine. It's been pretty nice weather this past week. And uh...i heard that the Springboks have been getting their trash kicked out of them in New Zealand by the All Blacks. Idunno if anyone really cares about rugby...but yup. No other real big news happening right now...things are fine. Just doing really good. We've found lots of new investigators this week again so i just hope we'll hold on to them and keep them progressing. That's it. O and the Billabong surf pro was in Jeffery's Bay and Bishops wife, who is awesome, went down with her fam, kids and all, saturday and got a bunch of posters signed and stuff by the pros...and totally might give me one. She's so cool. She phoned us this morning and let us know that the comp was over and that we shouldn't go to Jay Bay because it would be a waste...it's just outside of PE and i think we wouldnt have been able to go anyway...but it still would have been freakin awesome! Kelly Slater and all them were there apparently. Thanks for everything! That's all i have to say! Enjoy the week! Elder Devenney

July 12, 2010

Alrighty, so this week has been a bit hectic at times but it's going much better now. We had an awesome combined Family Home Evening at the Mendu's (a sweet married couple who are members, mother from zim, husband from sa, they have a cute little baby named luthando) with the Moyo family and we played a cool game and they really enjoyed it for sure. So that was a good start to the week. We saw them also later on in the week and it was a good lesson as we finished the Gospel of Jesus Christ....we would have totally given them a baptismal date but didnt because sis Moyo is going back to the UK at the end of the month..total bummer. So yeah, lame, but it'll be ok. Transfer news came on wednesday morning and found out elder Wall would be leaving me to go to Mdantsane just back in East London. He had been there before, but not to that particular area. He'll also be training a greenie so yeah, pretty good news i guess for him although we were killin this place and getting along so great. But whatev, i'll see him again in a few months so no worries. So wednesday we saw a couple of people and then thursday we took him to the bus station at 6:45 in the morning. Hectic! So i was basically organizing all the transfers by myself for the elders incoming and going. Had to make sure elders were getting on planes and arriving and going to the right places...it ended up alright although at one point, Elder Msilayse took a car key with him from here in PE to East London on a bus, and we were stressing of how we were going to get it back in time and what what. I took an elder and we headed to Gramstown quick quick to catch the bus, got about 30 kms out of PE and then realized that there was no way we'd be able to catch it. We had to get a lock smith to unlock the car, which he made tons of money in about 10 seconds unlocking the car (not that i'd have to pay for of course) just so we could get an elders' luggage out of the car and get him to the airport to head to namibia. So that was the only little upset that we ran into...luckily elders coming to PE from East London which is about a 3 hour bus ride grabbed the key from the elder that took it and we were able to get it back the same day. Anyway, everybody ended up going where they were supposed to and it all worked out fine. My companion is named Elder Moorcroft and he's from Edenvale, Jo-burg. A pretty cool guy. He's been in Paarl (my greenie area) for the past 7 1/2 months. So we had a few things to talk about right off the bat. He's very afrikaans but it's cool...maybe he'll teach me more since i've forgot so much. We've already been working hard lately and the future looks bright for us! haha. It rained hard core yesterday and so there was hardly anyone at church. Our baptism didnt happen because we realized the lady needs probably another month to prepare...her testimony just isnt fully there yet so we'll continue to work with her. We only saw the Rodericks on tuesday and Bro Roderick said a prayer right at the end and it was awesome. That's what we spoke about, and even tho he expressed not being comfortable praying in front of everyone, he did it anyway and it was so cool to hear. that's something that i love, is hearing an investigators first prayer in front of us, and doing it correctly. So sweet! Other than that we've been doing a bit of finding and being kinda successful so far. Having a good time knockin on some new doors in different parts of our area that we havent worked before. Although we've found some crazy people who have their views about the "mormons" we usually just laugh it off. Things should be alright tho this transfer. So yeah, i'll keep ya posted as you know. Thanks for everything! Elder Devenney