hello again family.
this week has flown by so
fast! i'm not even sure what we did because all the days mesh
together. sounds like everyone is doing well back home. things are
going well here. we are finding lots of people, not all of them as prepared as
others but we found a young couple yesterday morning that is so awesome.
they asked so many awesome questions. we talked about the family, baptism and
prayer a lot. at the end the wife was like: you know this all sounds good
and all but i still have some doubts but i'll pray and we'll see. i was
like, sheesh, i don't think i would believe you if you told me that you didn't
have any doubts or questions, but i know that god will answer your questions
and give you an answer if you ask, in fact, i said, i think you've already
started to receive your answer. you felt something when we talked
about how much this can bless your family right? and they were like, yeah we
did actually; and i was like, yep that's the holy ghost. it was super
awesome! i hope all our lessons can go like that with them. we should have one
baptism this saturday. we were going to have another but she didn't come
to church yesterday because her mom was in the hospital, so we had to push it
back. but congrats trina! ill think of you at 4! [Note:
Elder Rybin's niece, Trina was baptized on July 27th!]
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| Elders Kognani, Rybin, Ndaye, Rakats |
at our apartment we all eat
alone now, and so i can eat pretty much the same if i want just depends on how
much energy i have to cook and make food. i eat oatmeal or eggs in the
morning and lots of rice and spaghetti for lunch and dinner and try to mix it
up as much as i can with little success. one elder rakats is from
madagascar. rakats is not his full name cuz all their names are stupidly
long so we all just call them by their first few syllables. his companion
is elder kognani from cote divoire, yep. even before i didn't have much
prolonged english speaking with any of my companions, unless we were
specifically trying during study or something. but now usually all french, and just no
english in the apartment. our branch has three secteurs. we have the sisters sectueurs and then kegue.
so there are two other americans in kegue that i see a couple times a week. its
good though, my french is improving a lot i feel like.
yep we had pizza and root beer for fourth of
july. ill send a picture.
other pictures this week
are a sunrise that i talked about, the four of us in our apartment (kognani,
me, ndaye, rakats) and then a little cute little kid.
Mom's french question: i was going to say what you
figured out. se rappeler is like recalling or reminding and se souvenir is like
remember. i just asked elder ndaye and he said presque le meme chose, eh
oui meme chose. so yep. benjamin how much french do you
understand. can you understand speaking or reading out loud or
what. you should write me in creole so i can see what i understand.
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| Yolande at her baptism |
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| stomach is bloated, but he's still happy and awesome. |
i love
the scripture d and c 101: 16 in french "soyez calme et sachez que je suis
Dieu". be
still and know that i am god. ponder on what that means, it's so
profound. especially connected to the statement by joseph smith when he
talks about how the first step to have faith is a correct understanding of the
nature of god. i never really understood that quote before but that
scripture helps, or it did for me. i'll tell you what i think next week but i'd
like to hear what you all came up with. so that's my challenge for this week.
tell me what joseph smith was talking about, why a correct understanding of the
nature of god is the foundation of faith. :) i love you all!
passez une bonne semaine!
Elder Rybin