Rainy season? Jawel.

Fawaka alle mensen! This week was another spectacular week in good ole' Suriname. We are currently in the rainy season still, so we've been feeling it quite a lot! We started the week by going to this thing called a "Middag zegen"  or "Dankbaar dienst" basically people come together for someone's birthday and thank God for them. President Libretto, our branch president, conducted services. It was cool because it was a very on the spot type thing.

We weren't too sure what was going on so we just improvised! I ended up having to give a talk on a scripture so I talked about a scripture in Omni 1:26 and talked about faith in Christ and enduring in our faith, it was nice! Elder Rodas said the opening prayer and I conducted music, I also heard/ participated in my first blessing were Sranan Tongo was the main language. Quite a peculiar language!

We also found Sydney again! He's a less-active in Groningen so I'm very grateful! He has a ton of animals, so mentally I call him Noah.

This week there was also a baptismal service in Tamenga. Two people got baptized and it was a very spiritual experience. I'm glad we got to go because it rebuilt my determination to find someone who's ready for the gospel, so wish me luck!

This week was also the first week that I took Elder Rodas out past Groningen, the picture attached is taken very far away from home! It takes about 2 and a half hours from there to get back to our apartment! We went up there because we had some referrals to look for!

Anyways I hope you have a good week!

Lobi,

Elder Hardy

Rainy season!

Good afternoon/morning everyone!

This week has been quite a week! It's hard to believe that I'm back behind a computer again. This week we did some service at the church with the jongevollwassenen from Tamenga. We cleaned the Uitkijk church, it was pretty fun, we did a lot of cleaning! It was nice getting to know some of the other members of the church in Suriname.

This week was Zone Meeting. I love when President Egbert comes because we always have a wonderful time learning from him. This time we talked more about who God is and what our relationship with him is. We read from the scriptures talking about our status as his children and then we read Joseph Smith's First Vision account, we talked about all the things that we learned from it. The part that we talked about is, 16 But, exerting all my powers to call upon God to deliver me out of the power of this enemy which had seized upon me, and at the very moment when I was ready to sink into despair and abandon myself to destruction—not to an imaginary ruin, but to the power of some actual being from the unseen world, who had such marvelous power as I had never before felt in any being—just at this moment of great alarm, I saw a pillar of light exactly over my head,above the brightness of the sun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me.

 17 It no sooner appeared than I found myself delivered from the enemy which held me bound. When the light rested upon me I saw two Personages, whose brightness and glory defy all description, standing above me in the air. One of them spake unto me, calling me by name and said, pointing to the other—This is My Beloved Son. Hear Him!

As we talked about the vision we broke down the part about when God and Jesus Christ showed themselves unto Jospeh Smith. Everyone had a different part that stuck out them and often times for a different reason. Something that stuck out to me was how in everytime that the Father has appeared, his purpose has only been to testify of his son, why? Because He knows that without his son we couldn't return to his presence! It was a very spiritual experience, I love being a missionary!

I don't have too much time but I attached some photos! Elder Rodas and I are there as well.

Lobi!

Elder Hardy

Vermoord door chocolade!

Hey everyone, it's missionary time!

This week has been quite the week, this week I got to go to Groningen with Elder Rodas and we had an awesome time on our way. We found a lot of very cool people and quite a few Dutch people!

At one point Elder Rodas felt like we needed to go down this one road leading into the jungle (I'd never been down there before) so we decided to go for it. We went and it opened up into this huge clearing with this very large house and piece of property, there was a sign that said no unauthorized personal or something close to it, so we were trying to see if we could get someone's attention (we could see a Dutch couple and some workers) so a Surinamer pulls up and asks us who we are, we explained and he said he'd ask for us but told us we could come through.

We start talking with this older Dutch woman and she was very cool and funny, she was wondering as to what would possess us to trek through Suriname in a tie and dress pants but she was happy to talk with us. She said we could come by and her and her husband clear some land sometime and she said we could share more of our message as well, she seemed interested in it.

Her husband talked with us a bit and said that when we come by he'll leave the football game on for us if we want to watch, they were very cool!

Also, the reason for the title of this email is because this morning we rode for about half an hour to get some Dutch chocolate milk, "De enige echte!".

Worth it.

Love you all!

Elder Hardy

Mij week!

Fawaka Broeders en Zusters!

This week I've started working with Elder Rodas, it's been very fun and pretty interesting working with him, he's from Belgium so he's been helping my Dutch a lot, he's also very funny.

This has been the first official area of where I'm the one leading out, it's been quite the experience in a good way. There have not been too many times of when I have no idea what to do but when those times do come up, we pray and then we know where we need to go! We've had a couple of experiences of where before heading down a street, we pray to know if we should head down it and then we find someone who's very excited to meet us. I'm very thankful.

My bike's broke again and it's the gears again! I'm stuck in first gear so I basically have to pedal like a maniac just to go a decent speed! I told the Zone Leaders who deal with bikes and it might take sometime since they're having trouble finding spare bikes for those who have bike problems as well. It's not bad though, I told them not to worry too much immediately but hopefully it'll be fixed soon!

Today we did our transfer-annual choi's run and I got a couple cans of refried beans, tortillas, shredded cheese and enough taco seasoning to last me the rest of my mission! (probably) So I'm very excited about this transfer but not only because I have a mind to make a lot of mexican food but because Elder Rodas and I are going to do our best to find those who are prepared!

Well I hope you all are having a wonderful week, this week it'll probably rain more, so I'm excited!

Lobi!

Elder Hardy