Week 90 - Happy Easter, Shooting Some Hoops, and If Jesus Was Here

Selamat Hari Paskah! 

It was a beautiful Easter day yesterday here in Indonesia. A VERY HOT one, but still nice. If you haven't seen the Hallelujah video, I encourage you to watch it. If you are interested in hearing a little more of what Indonesian sounds like, the church has translated it and you can watch it here, https://www.mormon.org/ind/paskah. In our district meeting this past week, we watch one of the bible videos on Christ's Resurrection and then one by one shared our testimonies on Christ. It was an awesome spiritual meeting! I hope you all had a great Easter!

As for other events of the week, all sorts of things happened. My companion and I this past Wednesday went to the basketball court that is pretty close to our house in purpose to meet more people. There were a lot of people there. We played some basketball and met some pretty cool people. It has already been 7 months since I last played and did alright. Apparently one of the Indonesian national players was there. That was a pretty cool experience as well. 

Our most progressive investigator that was ready for baptism is now gone. :( We invited him to the ward activity on Friday and he responded that he was already in a different city on a different island. He had been accepted for work on a ship and left. It was so sad! His older sister, who is also a member was sad about it as well. He will be baptized, I just do not know when. I hope that he returns fast enough that I will still be here. I am however glad to see that he got work. He dedicated his life and education to get the job that we got. 

We do have a newer awesome investigator. It has been so interesting teaching him because he grew up Buddhist and is now Muslim. This past week he explained, "Elders, I don't know what it is, but I always have this feeling I need to be talking to you." We taught him about the Holy Ghost and how answers can come in answer to our prayers. He prayed for the first time at the end of the lesson and the spirit was so strong. At the end of the lesson, he accepted a baptismal date in April. It was an awesome experience. His faith in Jesus Christ is starting to grow and it is so cool to witness it. 

Friday we had a ward activity where we played some Badminton. I quickly learned that they play way different than the Badminton I'm used to in elementary school. It was cool to play with them and play an activity that the whole nation of Indonesia likes. We finished the activity at a members' home and had a short lesson there. Saturday was just a rough day for me. I picked up a head cold and had a headache for the day. All of our appointments fell through including our back-ups. Easter Sunday came around and I was already feeling better which was  a mini miracle. We had an interesting experience. This past week we received a referral from the church website. We called him and made an appointment for Sunday. Of course he lives way out there. We made the appointment but yesterday he was not picking up the phone. We went out to fins the house by ourselves. That didn't happen, once we found the street, then numbers went like this, 2, 54, 76, 3, 43, 1, 6, 6, 27..... and so on. Out of all of them, there was no number 24!! We searched up and down and finally gave in. We made our way back and when we were switching buses a person comes up and says, "You're Elder, I have some questions for you." We sat down and got his number and answered a few of his questions right there. While that was happening, my companion met like 3 other people that were on their way home from church. I truly felt that this was lead by the Lord. Even though we didn't find the first guy, He needed us there at the bus stop at that time to meet those people.

One last thing before I close. A topic of discussion this past week was, "If Jesus Christ were here right now, what would he teach?" We came up with the clear answer that he would teach his doctrine found in 2 Nephi 31 and throughout the scriptures. He would teach faith, repentance. baptism, the gifht of the Holy Ghost, and endure to the end. That is what we do as missionaries and our purpose, To help others come unto Christ by helping them receive the restored Gospel through faith in Jesus Christ and His Atonement, repentance, baptism, receiving the Gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end.

Love you all and have a good week!

Elder Hayes

BOOM!! Styling!

With the basketball gang!!