Great Week. Saturday we baptized Hanitra, Lalaina, and Anita. Everything went smooth and the spirit was strong throughout the entire service. I haven't felt the love of the Lord that strongly in a while. I couldn't even hold myself together during the talks. That was definitely the highlight of the week. On Sunday we taught a man named Raymond for the first time. He works for the U.S. embassy and speaks english pretty well. We started teaching him about the Godhead and we asked him who God, Christ, and the Holy Ghost were. He gave us a long explanation of how he feels that churches have completely distorted the doctrine of the Godhead and he thinks they are 3 seperate beings. That was a first. Our lesson with him was very spiritual and exciting because he is so ready. We have been so blessed with cool people to teach who progress. The three who were baptized on Saturday couldn't even name a prophet from the bible and now they are bearing testimony about the restoration, the Atonement, and the living prophet. I love seeing the gospel change people. We released transfer news last night and the complaints are coming in hot today haha. Guys have been calling us and chattin' and shmoozin for 3 months now and they apparently didn't get what they wanted as far as transfers go. It surprises me how representatives of Jesus Christ can be so two faced and fake. I'm glad that I have never been that concerned about what area I'm working in. People must forget that they are in Madagascar, and that any missionary in freezing cold North Dakota would love to work in the worst area in Mada. Actually I take that back North Dakota elders are probably know who they are and know what they have been called to do regardless of the area. ANYWAYS, We made some good transfers and the work is going to really progress. I know that because the Holy Ghost told me so in our last transfer meeting haha. Elder Steele and I have a busy 2 weeks coming up. We now have to actually move everyone to their areas, pick up the 6 new elders, orient them, train the trainers, send 4 elders home, and then prepare Tamatave's zone conference and then drive there and do it. We won't be doing as much teaching as we would like to, but I'm very excited to see the elders in Tamatave. We picked up Elder Fryer from the Tamatave bus stop this morning and he ralphed all over himself during the ride down here. He's a champ haha I wish we could send other people home and keep hardworkers like him. Thats about all I have for you this week my friends. I love it out here. I love you all! Bonne semaine!

Elder Barclay      

Hey,

Good week :) Hanitra, Lalaina, and Anita have bap interviews tonight. I'm not sure how they'll do but we'll see. We spent a lot of time this week setting up video conferences in other areas of the mission. Skype and Webex are pretty neat. We also taught a lot. We had two lessons on Sunday evening that made me want to scream. First was Miora and Manjaka. We have been teaching them every Sunday for about 4 weeks now and every lesson is us disproving their "logical" reasoning with the bible and then laying into them with testimony and begging them to pray. The lessons have been so slow because they object to every single little thing we teach because they have no clue what is really in the bible and they have been blinded by false churches and have no idea who God really is. When they come up with all their objections I want to slap them and say, "Well what in your mind allows you to be a member of the Catholic Church that is not even close to abiding by the doctrine of the Bible?" The Pope just quit if I'm not mistaken! Does that not send up a red flag in anyone else’s minds?! HELLFIRE DAMNATION!!! AHHHHHHH!!! REPENT!!! haha I think I was supposed to have been born around Joseph Smith's time and preached in the streets of Wales with Dan Jones. Our other lesson of blood boiling frustration was with Johnny and his family. We had another round of the dumbest questions and flat out stupidity. I stopped talking because I was getting so mad. Voangy asked why I wasn't talking and I said, "You don't listen when I talk." I don't mind when people don't understand and we have to re-teach them 3 or 4 times but when they are screwing around during our lessons and daydreaming and then make sarcastic comments about what we've said, the red hairs in my beard stand on end and the Barclay fury is unleashed. Not really, I just say bad words in my head while Elder Steele teaches haha. I'm scared to drop people when I'm mad like that because I feel like it might just be a result of my impatience. They asked us to give them a chapter to read in the Book of Mormon and then for us to come back and help them understand it. So if they haven't read... MATY. We had some positive experiences also, in fact everything about this week was rad. Sunday night just chapped my hide a bit :) Sunday afternoon we were walking by frère Jose's house when his once LDS turned Adventist wife waved us over. We have battled with her a few times haha so it's kind of awkward. She asked us if we had any medicine because her teeth hurt. In my mind I knew right away that she wanted a blessing, but my pride got to me and I said, "Yeah... sorry we don't have any." Then we chatted a bit and left. We were about halfway through the rice field when I told Elder Steele we had to go back and give her a blessing. He didn't hesitate because he had the same things going through his mind. So we went and offered to give her a blessing and she continued to play dumb and said, "Oh, like in the house? Yeah sure that works." haha. She was healed instantly and smiling from ear to ear once the blessing was finished. The blessing was also pretty straightforward about her need to read the Book of Mormon and get back to church. It blows my mind that people can have miracles performed in their lives by the priesthood and still deny the Restoration. On Thursday we had a similar experience with an investigator. Her teeth were also bothering her. No one owns a toothbrush. So she asked for a blessing also. I gave the blessing and she also was healed instantly. We teach her and her husband and they have been pretty reluctant as well, so hopefully that miracle will help them to really read the Book of Mormon and pray. Who needs a dentist when you got the priesthood right? We played basketball with the Malagasy guys this morning even though I told myself I never would again the last time we played with them. They played hack-a-shaq as usual and almost successfully broke my back. I'm pretty sore. I took a good nap afterwards though and now I'm good to go! Have a great week! Mi aim à Zot!

Elder Barclay

Well thank you all for updating me with all my flight plans and release interview information. Will we have enough time to stop by Crown Burger before my interview? Thinking about home is horrible on the mish. It's kind of like sinning, I feel good while thinking about the family, music, food, ladies, and naps. However once I slap myself and look at my planner to see where our next appointment is I feel the guilt for my selfish day-dreaming haha. I'm pumped though, we have 6 baptisms coming up and they all are sure. If we can get Alicia's family to pull their heads out of the clouds and actually learn then we could tack on 4 more. Yesterday we drove President Adams and one of his old mission buddies to the airport. I got to drive President's ballin Toyota Fortuner (no I did not misspell that). While we were loading their luggage Revenaldo's mom (I baptized Revenaldo in Betongolo) came out of the church and told me about how she and all her other kids are getting baptized now! I love it. On Thursday we picked up Elder Mkabela, who is a seventy, from the airport and took him to his hotel. He is South African and speaks 7 different African languages. We picked him up again on Sunday morning to take him out to the Ambohibao ward for church. When we got to the hotel we went in to pay for the room and Fabrice Gonthier from Reunion was there! I gave him a big hug and mumbled out some French and caught up with him. It's crazy how much you love people out here. So we all went to church and Elder Steele and I had to translate for the both of them. Elder Mkabela spoke in sacrament meeting and taught the elders quorum lesson. Elders quorum was intense haha. On Wednesday we went on splits with the Ivandry elders. I was with Elder Wilson in my area. Elder Wilson was in the MTC when I was there and he goes home February 27th. We did a ton of finding all week and the first couple of days were dragging along. We ended up having 11 investigators show up to church and we weren't even there. So the work is going good and time is flying. I broke one of my teeth today while eating lunch woohoo! So I'll probably just suck it up for a few months. My glasses are falling apart too so I'm back to contacts. Elder Tregeagle just called me and told me that he got punched in the eye last night hahaha. Elder Cusick also texted us today and told us that his pre-mission girlfriend is getting married and as for Elder Barclay, he has rampant irritable bowel syndrome and hasn't had a full nights rest in four months because of it haha wooo! Mi aim à zot!

Na trouv

Elder Barclay

 

Hellllo

Great week woo! We went on splits with two elders who work out in Tanjombato. I worked in the other area with Elder Horne who just finished his first 12 weeks in the field. We had fun and slapped bap dates on people for February 23rd! I love splits. We did a lot of teaching in our area as well this week. We had a really good lesson with Lanto and his daughter on Friday. The second counselor and his wife taught faith and Elder Steele and I taught repentance. The ward loves them and they have a bap date for March 9th. We had a great lesson with Alicia as well. She taught the plan of salvation back to us perfectly and did a decent job explaining Lehi's dream. As the lesson was ending someone knocked on the door and I turned to see who it was. Alicia's friend who happens to be a model was who it was. Great. So we said a prayer and bounced ha but the member that was helping us said to the girl, "Where do you live? Do you want to learn with these guys? They'll teach you, we can go to your house right now!" In my head I said, "Bruno, la ferme." After that lesson we went to another member’s house to teach his fiancé. She was sick and so I asked what was wrong. "Oh... just a headache..." haha Elder Steele and I looked at each other and smiled and said "Izany... (really...) well why are you sick?" a detail that I have been leaving out in past emails is that this investigators stomach has doubled in size. So we kept asking questions like, "Well... that's weird why do you have to keep going outside to spit?" finally one of them said, "Yeah she's a little sick to her stomach..." hahaha "Really? Why does her stomach hurt?" "Well because there is a baby in there." haha we had already had the Law of Chastity lesson a while ago and we have been working on that, but they just finally let us know she's pregnant. It was pretty funny :) We'll just do some repenting now and get baptized a little later. They're so solid. I love all the people we teach so much. Last night we had a lesson with Johnny and his family. Last time when we were on splits Elder Steele and Elder Hansen taught them and laid it down! They told them very plainly and clearly what we are here to do. So this lesson was a little tense. We started teaching and it turns out they couldn't even remember who Joseph Smith was. Wow. It was one of the most frustrating lessons I've been a part of. By the end I hated them. They were so rude to us. They kept laughing about stuff we taught and weren't taking it seriously at all. They are getting one more chance before we dust our feet off and drop them. It was crazy how much they changed. They were my favorite family and I was always so excited to go see them. So pray for em. This week we will be doing a lot of teaching again. I'm excited. Our area is doing well. We have three baptisms planned for February 23rd and two, maybe three for March 9th.

Oh yeah! On Thursday President had us create a facebook group for the mission and we had to get on my account to do it. Holy macrole... I didn't recognize any of the girls names I knew from high school because they're all married. A lot of my buddies look like rough scary guys. It was a slap in the face. I'm not coming home. Ever.

Love Jeff