Serving a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in northern France, southern Belgium and Luxembourg.

Monday, August 10, 2015

The dopest investigator?

I'll get right to it. So we're walking down the street, looking for people to teach, doing missionary stuff, the usual. Then this guy sitting on these steps gets our attention as we walk by and starts talking to us. Within 2 minutes, he's given us his number and set a rendez-vous for the next day. Uhh...ok! Yeah we can do that! The one thing he says is, "Text me before you ring my doorbell because so many people are ringing that I usually just don't answer." Uhh...ok. Yeah we can do that.
So we get to this guy's house the next day and he's not there. We call him and he picks up and tells us he'll be home in a couple minutes. So we wait there and we see him walking in the distance, but on like 3 separate occasions he stops to talk to someone before finally making it to us. He walks up and Elder Orton's like "You know everyone don't you?" And then he tells us, yeah, he's actually this hip hop artist whose music videos have apparently been on TV in France and Africa. Uhh...ok! We get up to his apartment and he shows us a couple of his videos and then proceeds to tell us that he used to investigate the Church, and it gave him discipline and values and he did well. He wants that again in his life. He said he knows that everything that the missionaries taught him three years ago is true and he wants to get baptized! Ok yeah, we can do that! So we're starting from the beginning with him. He's so chill though. Honestly one of the most receptive guys I've ever taught. And guess where he's from...Congo. Seriously, send me on a mission to Congo.

If you guys want to see a video of our new investigator, find the YouTube chain "2noble". (Am I allowed to advertise like this?) Then imagine me and another white kid sitting in his apartment teaching him about Jesus. It may not be like the time two missionaries tracted into Liam Neeson, but it's as close as I've gotten so far.

Here are some things that have happened to me in Belgium so far. Ready go!
- Remember how I was scared about becoming fat in Paris? Hah! If I were on a quest for fatness, Liège would be where I would go. Everyone in Paris is skinny except the tourists. Here, they have these fries that are fried in some special ultra-unhealthy fat that's apparently illegal in many places but that makes it taste super good. Then they dump that into a baguette with a deep-fried meat of your choice and add two layers of sauce and call it good. Even the pigeons here are greasier than French ones. Time to start running in the mornings again.
- An investigator who speaks very little English (and even worse French) offered to give us his son when his family arrives from Eritrea. And we were like...your son? We don't want him! After a few minutes we found out he meant "daughter." Which didn't really make it better, because he was still offering his 11-year-old African daughter for marriage. We politely declined.
- A man sitting at a bar asked us to sign his shirt with a sharpie. We politely accepted.
- A new investigator saw the sister missionaries and then told us over the phone that he saw our wives. -_-
- On Saturday morning, we saw some teenagers outside our apartment who had been up all night. We called an ambulance for the girl who was passed out due to substance abuse, because the other ones were not in the proper state of mind to realize she needed help. (I debated whether or not to tell this one, but at least now you see a little bit of some people's lives without the Gospel.)

- We were contacted by a beautiful daughter of God trying to get us to donate to save some pandas. Later, the zone leaders were contacted by the same girl, and then they ended up teaching her at the chapel. They win this round.
- Everyone in Liège has an adorable dog with them and I want to cuddle them all. There is also a big college close to us with many of our sisters in the Lord attending it. I don't know whether the cute dogs or the cute girls are more distracting to the missionaries, but voila.
Until next week! Loves!
Elder Stanford


 

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