Monday, June 12, 2017

"Je gaat naar huis? Maar je ziet zoals een baby eruit!"

Goede morgen iedereen!

This week has been an interesting week, today's my last full day in Suriname so that means packing. I hate packing, I'm not very good at it and it's even more stressful when you have to fly! But I digress, this week was fantastic. We worked really hard and we were able to find a ton of people that were interested in hearing more about our message!

The experience that was the coolest this week was also one of the hardest. A few days ago my head was pounding against my skull and it hurt just to get a drink from the fridge, after trying to tough it out and hope for the best, I eventually gave into greater wisdom (my companion) and called Sister Egbert for some health advice. She recommended things like certain medicine and what not so I did those before heading out. I loaded my proselyting bag with copies of the Book of Mormon since we were going to give them out and I put it on expecting pain from the weight but it felt very odd. It felt light and I couldn't exactly figure out why it felt like that. As we biked I let my mind wander and I remembered a scripture I read that morning in Mosiah 24:13-14
14 And I will also ease the burdens which are put upon your shoulders, that even you cannot feel them upon your backs, even while you are in bondage; and this will I do that ye may stand as witnesses for me hereafter, and that ye may know of a surety that I, the Lord God, do visit my people in their afflictions.

15 And now it came to pass that the burdens which were laid upon Alma and his brethren were made light; yea, the Lord did strengthen them that they could bear up their burdens with ease, and they did submit cheerfully and with patience to all the will of the Lord.

As soon as I thought about it, I knew that's why everything seemed more bearable, the rest of the day was a lot easier after thinking about it and I feel a lot better now!

We also had a really cool experience contacting, we knocked at this one house and this woman came out, we asked her where she was from and she said she was from the Netherlands. Oh, cool. We kept going, she mentioned how she had been baptized in a Christian church, we asked her which one and she replied that it was our church! Her family were non-members so when they saw us they sent her out as a bit of a "surprise" for her. She let us in, in her own words, "To give them a surprise instead!" Her husband was Christian and we were able to have a really good conversation about prayer. The woman, Sister Stolker, hadn't been to church for sometime because of some problems she was having but she told us that she still knew the Restoration of the gospel was true and that the Book of Mormon was the word of God. She and her husband were amazed at how, they being on vacation, we would just so happen to stop by. Little miracles are always my favorite.

Sunday was different, mostly because I had to say goodbye to people and take pictures, I'm not a big fan of the whole "Goodbye" thing but it's just how it is. In church, we had a class about how important the family is, we read about a prophet who shared that his family had helped strengthened his testimony through family home evening. Family home evening is essentially a night where the entire family comes together and spends time with each other to draw closer and talk more about the gospel. I thought it interesting the impact it had on his life since he started when he was a child and did it as an adult too.

Well, this will be my last time emailing as a missionary. It was certainly a blast serving the Lord for two years, I can't think of anything else I would've rather done with the time in-between. Thank you for all the support and love and I wish you all the best. I'll be seeing most of you pretty soon, if not this week, hopefully the next!

Lobi,

Elder Hardy

Title Translation: "You're going home? But you look like a baby!"

















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