Sister Elizabeth Banks: Week 28 in the West Indies

Chere famille et amis,

It has been a long, but awesome week here! Yesterday we had Zone Conference with Elder Cornish of the Seventy. It was amazing and I learned so much. Martenique and Saint Marten skyped in. We talked a lot about member missionary work and the atonement. Elder Cornish is awesome and has an amazing knowledge of the scriptures. That was the awesome end to our week, but a lot of other stuff happened too.

Tuesday we finally got to work with one of the really cool members in our branch, Sister Felicite. It was a great day and we set another baptisimal date with Fedler. We finally got the Mormon Message called The Story of the Book of Mormon on our thumb drive to share with our investigators. We were so excited because it explains the Book of Mormon very well and bears a powerful testimony of the Book of Mormon. We are already seeing it help our investigators.

Every other Wednesday we work with the senior couple, the Richmonds. They are a funny little Tahitian couple. We have a sister in our area who is stuck at home because she has had a few surgeries on her leg, and she can't walk right now. She also lost her sister last week. We went over to lift her spirits a little in this hard time, but her spirits were already high. She has amazing faith! Her sister was not a member but the day before she died she asked to learn more and showed a desire to be baptized. After her sister died Sister Miath knew she had to prepare to do the ordinances for her sister, because she knows her sister is ready. Sister Miath is stuck in bed right now because of her leg, but she said she knows the Lord will prepare a way for her to go to the temple in October to do the work for her sister. She doesn't know exactly how, but she knows it will happen because it is the Lord's mission for her. Her faith was a great example for us especiallly as we are teaching so many people who are lacking that faith to put all of their trust in God. I wish we could bring her to our lessons.

Thursday was Sister Dorsan's mission year mark! So we ate banan peze to celebrate! It is crazy that today is my 8 month mark for my mission!! Time flies!

Friday we spent the day shadowing our zone leaders in Morne a Leau. We contacted for most of the day. We met some people who could be really cool potential amis for them. It is always nice to work with other missionaries and learn new ways of teaching from them.

Saturday was a busy day; we started out the day in Point a Pitre, which is not actually our area but a member gave us a referral of his girlfriend and wanted us to teach her. It was a great lesson and he had already taught her a lot about the church, but she still has a lot of questions. She had already started reading the Book of Mormon and taking notes on it; she said she had not been able to read very much, but she was in Mosiah already! We were surprised and pleased. We are excited to go see her again next week! That evening the sisters of Moule had a baptism. We went and Emilio was able to come too. The guy getting baptized was so excited! I had taught him a couple times on exchanges and was so happy to finally see him get baptized. It was an awesome baptismal service.

Zone conference yesterday was great. This morning President and Sister Mehr came to our apartment to do interviews; we have the best Mission President! I will be sad to say goodbye to them in June. I learned so much in my interview as we talked about Zone Conference and about prayer. We only get to see the Mehrs one more time at their last Zone Conference before the mission splits. Time flies.

It has been a great edifying week. Sister Dorsan and I are going to keep working hard because these are probably going to be our last two weeks together. Know that I love you all. Have a great week!

Bisou,

Soeur Banks