Missionary Perks

   Hello everyone back home...how are you!? The weather here is starting to warm up a little and I'm not liking it one bit! This week has been a really good one for us here in Pointe Noire! It was capped off with a baptism of Jean and his wife Leticia! I'll talk about that a little later, but it was just amazing! With how hard it is to be married here, with the "dot" (the bride price a groom pays to the bride's family...it usually takes several years to earn enough to pay it) and all, it was sooo lucky that we got to baptize this family! I would just like to thank all of the people who sent me an email this week I really appreciated it! I hope that you all had a good week and that this coming week will be good for all of you!

    But I have quite a good story to tell you guys! I forgot about it for the last 2 weeks but I thought that you would really enjoy it! As we came back from district meeting two weeks ago we went to catch the bus at Foncheche, which is a giant marche, (and it's really gross) but there went to catch the bus. And when we got there, there were no buses so we had to wait. After about 20 minutes of waiting a bus came. And it was all out war to get in! People were pushing and shoving and it was not was I was used to! And then everyone had got in, my companion was way in the back, and I was the only person who hadn’t taken a place! I didn’t want to be mean! But the guy who directs the buses, and everyone else in the bus, started yelling at one lady who had taken my spot and all I understood was "pastor" (because everyone was yelling in the local language: "key congo") but eventually she got out and I was able to get in the bus with my companion and head off to the sector! One good thing about being a missionary here is that you get a lot of perks! 

   But as I said, Jean and Leticia got baptized this week and it was amazing! But it was also really hectic. We informed everyone when it was, but when we got there Saturday morning no one was there. And we had to have one of the people from the branch presidency there to preside or we couldn’t have the baptism. So we were frantically calling everyone and nobody was able to come and we had to consider cancelling the baptism and doing it the following week, which was not what I wanted to do! But then we looked at the red handbook and we saw that if it is a convert baptism, then the zone leader can preside and luckily our zone leader was there so he was able to preside for us! And we had a really good baptismal service. Elder Bills baptized them both and after he did each of them sat there in the font and I don’t know if they were soaking in the moment or praying or what, but each waited about 5 minutes but we all just sat there with them. They seemed so happy and they both bore their testimonies after and it was just such an amazing and spiritual moment! It's times like this that I love in missionary work.

   The Friday before the baptism we taught this same family about the temple and how our families can be forever if we go to the temple and are sealed together with the priesthood for time and eternity. It got me thinking of the day that I went through the temple with my family and how lucky I am to have been able to experience that. I'm so thankful for the temple and for the ordinances that we can do. And I can't wait to go there with my wife so we can be sealed together for time and all eternity!

   But that’s all for this week guys! Once again thank you so much for all of you who sent me emails and I hope that I will hear from you all next week! For a challenge, I want each family to play an entire game of monopoly together!

Love

Elder Legerski

I Will Go, I Will Do

Ah, hello everyone in America!

  How are you!? Well this past week has been an amazing on! As for me, I am still staying here in this sector and I will be getting a new companion... Elder Museku and I should be going to the airport to pick him up any second now! But unfortunately, this means that Elder Larson and I are now separated. The Lord has called him to Gabon where he will go and do the Lord's will. It's very sad and we really wanted to go together, but as Sister Monga told me, we need to be apart to grow which is very true so we told each other goodbye and that we will see each other in a year!

The Zone as of the last transfer...
Elder Tchibanda, Elder Kabenga, Elder Bacera, Elder Waite, Elder Kabongo, Elder Legerski, Elder Larson, and 

Elder Kabasele

The Bills (our new Senior Couple:)

   This won't be a super long letter but I'll do my best with the time that I have. First off, I want to talk about an ami, Justavain. We started with her the first day with Elder Tshibanda and at first, it was really hard with her and she didn't talk much and didn't show much interest in the lessons. Her father and brother are members and they have been doing a good job encouraging her, but it just wasn't working. We didn't see her last week because we were so busy but she did come to church because of her family. And when we went to teach her this week with her brother, she was soooo different! She was smiling and laughing and she had read the Book of Mormon and came with questions for us and it has just been so amazing! It just shows how important church is for us all! But she said she will be baptized so we are looking forward to it at the end of this transfer! Also in our sector, we have Jean and his wife...we had to push back their baptism date because of the district conference, but they will be getting baptized this Saturday which will be such an amazing moment for this branch! 

   As I mentioned, we just formed the district and it was so amazing...there was so many people there for the meeting and we had 19 amis who came! It was such a privilege to get to see the creation of this district and it just shows how God's work is progressing on this earth. 

    As my old companion leaves and goes back to his home, I would just like to talk about the lesson that he taught me. As we went to the amis houses, they were always so happy to see him and they always talked to him. And I as I watched and observed, I saw that he just truly loved the people! Just with all of his heart. And as I saw this, I tried to do it myself because love is so important for us as missionaries. And I have a really hard time showing people that I love them. It's just how I am. But I want everyone back home to know that even though you may not know it, I love you all so much! I just can't express how much! But I know that as we have this love and we just go through our lives, loving that life will be a lot better for us and we will be so much happier. 

    But that's the end for this week everyone! Just wanted to say happy birthday to Megan and Rylee ( Bunny)! I hope you didn't have too much fun! Also to Leanna...I got all of the pictures and I danced with joy when I saw them! Thank you so much to everyone who sent me emails; I love you all! Also a special shout out to the family...thank you for all that you do for me...I can't wait to see you!

For homework go hug every person of your family and tell them I love you!

Love,

Elder Legerski

Mu zola beno

He Knows Your Heart

Hello everyone...how are you doing!?

   Everything is going really well here in the Congo! It's a little hot as usual but I'm loving it all the same! It sounds like you all got quite a bit of rain.  I have not lived through the rainy season yet, but hopefully I will get to experience one quite soon! I would like to say thank you to all of the people who emailed me; I can't tell you how much it means to me when I open up my email and I get to see all the people who emailed me!

   But as far as this week it went really well! We have a lot of solid amis who are doing very very well! Alex was just baptized this last week and it was a really good service that we were able to have! She was really excited and her Mom and Grandma were even able to come to the baptismal service! Also, we were able to talk with Jean and his wife and we had a really good rendez-vous.  Here in Pointe Noire the church is really badly understood and many think that people are sacrificed and were are a church of magicians; as we all know none of that is true! But Jean had a friend from a former church come and talk to him and say all of these bad things about the church and Jean told us how he told his friend that this church does not do those things and that this is the true church. He told us how when he talks with us and when he comes to church, he feels like he is at home and that he is really on the path that God wants him to be upon.

  All of our other amis are doing really well also! Our amis are kinda going down because we have been baptizing so we are on the search for people that God has prepared for us!

   But I thought I would share a little story today. It is a story that Beri Mon Ami shared in his talk. He talked about a young boy and how he used to pray with his parents every night. But when the boy was five years old, both of his parents died. But he still knew that he needed to pray everyday. As he went to school every day, he kneeled down in the same spot and he prayed to God, but when he spoke he said the alphabet.  He started with a b c d and said it all until z and then he got up and went to school. When he would come back from school, he would kneel down in the same spot and he would say the alphabet again. A man noticed this and one day he walked to the boy and asked him why he said the alphabet. The boy replied that his parents had died and they hadn't had the chance to teach him how to pray, so he kneeled down and said the alphabet. But he said that God will take these letters and he will make words and he will put these words into sentences because I know that He knows the will of my heart and what I feel and what I want to say to Him.  I really like this because it shows how we need to just pray with our heart and God will always understand

 

   Lately it's been a little tough for me. Sometimes the mission is a little tough and you gotta grind it out, but I found that as I took my time in personal prayer morning and night, that my days started to get better and I started to be happier. As I focused on my feelings and the people that I love, I find that I spend a long time on my knees.  But I'm not praying, I'm just talking with my Father who is in heaven.

   But that's all for this week folks! I hope you all have a wonderful week and I look forward to seeing you all next week! We will be getting out transfer letters this week so we will see how that goes, if I will go or if I will stay! I know I will be getting a new companion though!

   Someone go eat a grilled chicken burrito from Taco Johns for me!

Love,

Elder Legerski

Au Revoir to the Bailys...Bonjour to the Bills!

Dear friends and family,

 

   How are you all doing!? I'm doing really good here in the Congo! It's starting to get a little warm again, hot enough so that I sweat when I am in the sector and I'm not sure if I like it! But the work here is really going well!

   This week I got the chance to see the assistants.  That was really awesome because my trainer,Elder West, is one of the AP's so I got to go out and work with him and it was a really awesome experience! It's really cool how much we change in just a short time here on the mission! He is a great missionary but I see that he has grown even so much more and it's awesome to see! We had a lot of time to talk about the mission and the work and it was all really good!

   Also, this week the Bailys are leaving...at 9 tonight in fact! They have a blog but I don’t know the name but I'm sure that if you looked that you could find it and they have all of their info from the last 18 months here! But the Bills are here now and they are really awesome! Elder Bills served in France and he speaks super good French! I'm really excited to be neighbors with them for the next little bit! And also, we got the water problem fixed and we now have water! It makes me sure miss the US and how the water or power never goes out!

   This week was a really good one with the amis. Alex, who is going to be baptized, is doing really well. For the first few weeks that I was here, she did not understand the book of Mormon at all! But this last Sunday, we went and visited her she told us a lot of the story of Nephi and his brothers when they went back to Jerusalem and it was really amazing! It's just proof of how, if we want to understand and we let God help us, that He can do miracles! Also, Jean and his wife are doing really well and the baptism on the 18^th is looking very promising!

   This week was also one filled with lots of baptisms! This weekend between the 4 sets of teams we had 7 baptisms! And I just want to give a shout out to my good buddy Elder Larson who just had his first baptism and he was even the Jean Baptist! It was such a cool moment seeing all of the people enter into the water. I was asked to give a talk on the restoration and as I was thinking about that, I was thinking about how I was seeing this power that was restored through Joseph Smith being used. It was super surreal and it was just an awesome spiritual moment.

   But that’s all for this week folks! To my mom and dad, sorry about the lack of photos...the computers aren’t really trustworthy here and an Elder in the past put his card in and the computer erased everything so I'm just being a little cautious! Someone go eat a stuffed burger for me! I tried to make hamburgers for the 4^th but I totally failed! I love you all so much and I thank all who emailed me! Have a wonderful week filled with the spirit!

Love,

Elder Legerski