"Now that's the mission!" Catching the wave (Vairao - week #16)

Ia ora na tatou paatoa!

Elder Pearson, Elder Tera, Elder Ball, President Bize

What a week, what a week! I have absolutely no idea where to start, since everything awesome happened. I guess I'll start with the fact that we were totally blessed to have Elder Pearson of the Seventy come to the mission to train us all. On Thursday we had a leadership meeting at President Bize's home and Elder Pearson assisted. It was funny since it was all in English. We did our normal zone reports (a little nerve wracking in front of a general authority, and it didn't help that doing it in English messes with your head) and then Elder Pearson taught us how to be good leaders and how to truly help and

Leadership Meeting

love the other missionaries in the zone. He also came by Friday and we had a mission conference, and taught us how to truly serve with all our heart, might, mind and strength. Definitely boosted our morale and pumped us up to get working. He's a truly powerful man, called of God, and it was a blessing to hear from him.

We also had an amazing experience this weekend. We had a temple trip that we've been planning for a few weeks now. A couple buses were rented to pick up investigators and their member friends for our ward and the neighboring ward Toahotu, and we went off to the temple where we had groups go into the temple garden for a tour, and other groups go into the visitors center for a small lesson from the sister missionaries. It was concluded by our stake president, and finally everyone feasted a well prepared meal. It was an absolute success! Between 40 and 50 investigators came, and the Spirit was absolutely powerful the whole way through. Some of our investigators, such as Pamela and Tuare, Karl and Arieta and Aranui were all there and were super touched. The whole thing fell into place, and it was truly a blessing to see that happen.

I'll end quickly with our experience for today. It is the middle of August in Teahupoo, and guess what that means? Billabong Pro surf competition, of course! Since such a thing would interest Elder Tera and I, we worked up the courage to ask President if we could catch a boat to go watch some of the competition. Surprisingly, he said yes! Under one condition... that we go in our missionary attire. Well, we won't complain! So we went with some other Elders, bought ourselves onto a taxi boat and headed out there to the spot. Oh man, when we arrived, you wouldn't believe the ruckus we caused. Everyone's chillin' on their boats with their shorts and tank tops and hats and bathing suits, and a boat pulls up with well-dressed men sporting black name tags. Everyone pulls out their cameras and starts taking pictures, and even the television crew on their boat pulls up to film us. Were all just laughing and waving all stoked to watch some surfing. A member pulled up in his boat and said to us, "now THAT's the mission!" We had an awesome time, the waves were so fat, its not often you see awesomeness such as that.

Found on surfingmagazine.com

We understand a little why President told us to go in our missionary attire. His goal is to make the church known to the world, and no doubt, we were well behaved in that boat, and we took every opportunity to talk to people about the message we carry. Just make sure to look in the next edition of Billabong magazine. Maybe you'll find a picture of a boat full of missionaries inside. :)

That's a little of the week. So awesome. I love you all.

Elder Ball