Monday, July 25, 2016

(July 18th) Some days are diamonds...

...some days are stone (John Denver). This was perhaps one of the longest weeks of my mission.  It turns out that being with my new companion IS as hard and much harder than I thought. 
     I've learned a lot of lessons this week. I've learned that anger and raising voices is never the right way to solve things. I've learned even deeper that you can never judge people. No matter how people act we must treat those people and situations with love and kindness and prayer like Jesus would. That pretty much occupied my week. We did start teaching an entire family which is way cool and went to a horse race, but ya. Overall I'm happy with this week and I'm looking forward to having an even better one. I love you all and pray for you all daily. Read the scriptures and be like Jesus!
-Elder Clements


horse race, Tahiti has a horse track? it's in my secteur too


(July 25th) Trying times

This week was...hard. I'm not going to go too far into it but ya this week pretty much broke me.
     As far as some good news we have a member here that gives us a lot of help for doing missionary work and over the last two weeks we've started teaching two entire families with another coming tonight. I had another opportunity to go to the temple this week which was cool. I still absolutely love going into the house of the Lord and feeling his presence so strongly. It's amazing. 
     Even with a week that didn't go the best, I have had a great opportunity to get closer to Heavenly Father trough prayer and scriptures. I know he loves me and that he has given me a way to accomplish what he has called me to do. All in all, what don't kill ya makes ya stronger. 
-Elder Clements
Elder Clements sporting a new hair cut

Wednesday, July 13, 2016

Good news, Bad news


     Hello everybody. English is getting very uncomfortable to speak since I do it basically never these days. I'm officially the only american in the entire zone. There was a lot that happened this week. We had a lot of good lessons and we went to the hospital to give blessings so many times that I lost count! Which is where I can start the bad news. 
     The lady we blessed last week passed away on wednesday. Pretty rough because she has two young children but thus is the will of God I guess. More bad news is Elder Frazer is going to be transferred into a secteur with a car because of his operation. Figures, every time I get along with a companion he never stays long. I guess if I didn't have problems with my companions the mission would be way too easy. 
     The ultimately excellent news is that on saturday MICHEL GOT BAPTIZED!!!!! I actually got the news from Pascal (yes the guy that beat up the thief at Takaroa) He's here with his daughter for the doctor. He told me that President Bize just got to Takaroa and right as he got there, Michel asked him to baptize him that evening! And so...that happened. I kind of figured he wanted president Bize to baptize him because when President Bize was there last time he met Michel and told him "If you open your heart just the slightest bit, God can enter in and change who you are." Michel was very touched by that and always talked about it. I'm SO glad Michel finally got baptized!! Now his family just has to follow him.
     

      More good news is that I went to the temple on saturday for the first time in about 9 months. I was amazed at how much I missed it. That was an excellent experience being reminded of my covenants that I've made and feeling the spirit so strongly.
     So all in all I had a pretty good week. Today we're going sailing on a yacht witch I'm super pumped for! ok la famille que Dieu vous bénisse et que vous ayez du bonheur dans tout ce vous faites. nous on va aller manger
-Elder Clements

Tuesday, July 5, 2016

Jour de l'indépendance


#vivrelafrance

     Today is the 4th of July! Have a good celebration y'all. I'm the only american in the house and one of two in the district so...life goes on. We did however spend all of wednesday celebrating Tahiti's "jour de l'autonomie" (independence day kind of) which is slightly strange because Tahiti isn't independent in any form:/ We went to Pape'ete and marched in the parade with a bunch of other missionaries and members, in front of the governor and all. That was quite the deal. Président Bize showed up too.


 
Arue

     Funny story of the week: Our secteur is the one with the hospital in it so we often get calls to go down to the hospital and give blessings. We got one such call on Thursday at about 10:30 and decided to go in a couple hours because we were busy. All we had was a name. We went over, found the room and went in. It was an old lady and I noticed she didn't look well, and was asleep. We told the family (protestants and Catholics) about what we were going to do and got ready. While doing so, my companion asks "so, what's wrong with her?". The lady turns to me and says "Oh, elle est morte." (Oh, she's dead.) My head immediately snaps over to look and realize why she didn't look so great. I felt so stupid I had to keep my self from laughing. But because we had already said we were going to give her a blessing, we...um just gave old Sonia a blessing, well her body anyway. Of course we couldn't just bring her back from the dead so I just layed my hands on her icy head and basically said "welcome to the spirit world" but in nicer terms. That was quite a unique experience. Kind of like Nacho Libre but opposite.

The hospital of Taaone, cool huh?
     On a slightly more sober note we got yet another call to go give a blessing to a 25 year old woman that had fallen into a coma. She had had a heart attack and didn't get to the hospital in time and was alive only thanks to the machine. We met her dad there, who is and inactive member, and he told us that the doctors just didn't know if she would come back or not. After getting authorization and all suited up, we went back into the IC unit (or whatever that locked down area of the hospital is) to give her a blessing. Again He chose me for the second prayer and I have never been that nervous for a blessing! I've never given a blessing that could mean life or death. During the blessing, to my surprise and terror, the Holy Ghost strongly told me to say that she would be healed according to the will of God. With her inactive father watching that was one of the last things I wanted to say because that could either bring him a stronger testimony or the opposite. I took a leap of faith and said it anyway. I still haven't called to do a follow up of what happened after, but whatever happens, I know that I said the right thing because it was the Holy Ghost that said so. I acted on my faith. Anyway that was my week. My companion had bronchitis like I had that one time so we didn't do as much this week but I hope it'll be better this next week. Also he's going to have a hernia operation next week, so I'm going to get really familiar with the hospital. fun stuff. Ok, have a good week in the land of the free!
-Elder Clements