The Rescue

Dear Mom, Dad, Taylor, and Cami

Happy one more week! This was an absolutely crazy week. I should probably just stop saying that because every week is ridiculous out here. But, It was also a really really fun week. We were so lucky to have the AP's come in this week! They got here on Wednesday and they'll be heading back to the Marshalls on this coming Wednesday. Josh Sherman is one of our AP's here right now, so it has been lots and lots of fun to gt to spend time with him lately. We've gone on a couple splits, and it's been nice to have a familiar face to catch up with. Very Exciting. 

Highlight of our week was District Training on Thursday from the AP's. Elder Sherman gave an excellent training on prayer, and about how important it is to be sincere. He also pointed out that there are SO many promises attached to prayer. He then drew the connection that God is not able to lie to us, and so if he has given us a promise, then we can act in full confidence that that promise will be fulfilled. However, the extent to which it is fulfilled is dependent largely upon our willingness to exercise our faith. In Kiribati, the phrase "exercise your faith," is best translated as "Make work your faith," or kamwakura am onimaki. It's a good little reminder that faith always requires action, and we can't accomplish anything without taking the first step on our own. 

The other AP is named Elder Decker. He actually goes to Lehigh University, out in PA, so it was nice to talk to someone who has some East Coast familiarity. Decker gave his training on a new program that is being instituted all throughout the Pacific titled The Rescue. Basically, the program is being instituted because so many people join the Church and immediately fall away. There's no church infrastructure, if you will, so there's lots of people ready to do things but no one knows how or where, so they just give up. In our Branch at Christmas Island, we have 300 active members, and 700 inactive or less active. We've been tasked with finding each and every one and bringing them back. So our teaching pool just exploded :) The point is that President Weir wants this island to become a stake, and to become an example to the rest of the Pacific of how a stake can operate even in isolation. We've been approved to become a district, and President Weir will be coming in June to split our Branch into 3 branches and to install a District Presidency. But before that, our job is to find people and bring them back so we can be ready in June. Hence the Rescue. The Rescue is a branch activity once a week, where all of the branch leaders, branch missionaries, us missionaries, and members who are able to meet in the chapel. We all then essentially go on a giant companionship exchange, and go visit less active members and invite them to come back. It's like the parable of the lost sheep. A shepherd is willing to leave the ninety and nine to find the one who is lost. In our situation though, we're involving the ninety and nine in the process of rescuing. It's a really cool concept, and I'm excited. It's a big commitment, from everyone, and I expect it'll be difficult to install and get going. There's a lot of "cultural inertia" that keeps people from wanting to progress. However, the good thing though is that once it finally gets going, it'll have some real momentum (total physics analogy - I'm a nerd). 

Elder Decker also talked about keeping going when things are tough. He talked about the scripture that says that the Lord will embrace us and say "Well done though good and faithful servant." He talked about how important it is theat the word the Lord chose for those scriptures is "faithful" and not "successful". There's a significant difference, and we can  be good missionaries that the Lord can depend on without necessarily having every day be the most successful day ever.

We really took it to heart, and we had 20 less active lessons this week. I think that's just what we need to keep us busy every day, since our actual investigator pool is smaller than we'd like it to be. It's an excellent way to continue to fulfill our purpose, and to show the Lord that we love all of his children, and that no one is forgotten. 

Our very first rescue visit, I was a little skeptical of the concept. I was on a split with Tionimoa, one of our YSA's, and we went to visit a less active lady named Maima. The original plan was to teach a lesson on the importance of the Sabbath Day, since one of her obvious problems was not coming to church. However, before I went in to the lesson, I decided that was the wrong lesson plan. We sat down and just had a normal conversation, and I really focused on listening to her and seeing how her life is going. I asked her about how her prayers have been, and she admitted she hasn't prayed in the longest time. I knew just what to do. I have been really focusing on preparing myself for lessons, and part of that is topically organizing my Book of Mormon with tabs for every lesson and concept. For "Prayer" I have like 50 different tabs. I picked one at random and it happened to be Mosiah 18:24. The scripture talks about how God will always visit his people in their time of affliction when they are faithful in praying to Him. As we read the scripture, she totally started crying. She talked about how she had been having some very hard trials in her life lately, and that she had forgotten how important prayer is. We invited her to start praying again, and she agreed to. We also saw her at church the next day. I know that that lesson wasn't led by me, and I'm so grateful that I was given the opportunity to be an instrument in God's hands here on Christmas Island. I love being a missionary, and I am so grateful for the chances I'm given to grow. 

I love all of you and I can't wait to hear from you again next week!

Love Elder Seguine

*Also, the cats are safe and alive, they are almost cute now, looking more like cats than rats now. They are 8 days old, and we only had to kill one more crab since the first "incident". 

*ONE MORE THING: Tionimoa got his mission cal to Brisbane Australia! It came the same day as the AP's, and he's psyched. He'll do great I know.

Note from Mom:  It had been raining for 36 hours when he emailed us.  He said he is actually cold for the first time on the island.  He is sick with a sore throat, and didn't get his packages... but did get some letters!  He is excited to have actual letters to hold in his hand.  Hopefully some extra rest today on P-day will help him feel better for the busy week ahead.  Overall he sounds great and is excited to be busy working! He tried to send some pictures, but they wouldn't load due to slow internet.  We'll just have to wait a little longer :)