Medan Punya Kerengaya (Medan Has Terrain)

Selamat Pagi semuanya!

Elder Broberg is in Jakarta right now for MLC (Mission Leader Conference), so I'm with Elder Murphy and Marsudi until Wednesday. But this last week was luar biasa (incredible)!

We ran into a woman who was selling things on the street and she invited us over to her house sometime to teach her. Her name is Ibu R, and she's pretty much incredible. We taught her twice about Heavenly Father's love and then about prophets. She told us right off the bat that she committed some sins in her teenage years and never really was a religious person and never read the Alkitab growing up. That means we have to teach her pretty slowly. Which is fine because she eats up everything we teach! We invited her to church, had faith, but knew it was far from her house. However, yesterday, she showed up with her 6 year old son, Andreas, and sat right down. Afterwards, we asked her how she liked it and she replied with "I feel really welcome here. The members here are so happy and made me feel like I belonged to them." 

Even though the Branch here in Medan is pretty small, they've got huge hearts and testimonies. Also, we have another investigator who is really incredible to me too. His name is H. He's about 20 years old, works from 8 in the morning until 1, and then goes to his college from 2 to about 9 every single day. Except Sunday. He always wants to meet with us, so we've figured something out where we meet him at the church on Tuesday and Friday mornings to teach him for 30 or so minutes. He always comes to church, but doesn't quite have a testimony about the Book of Mormon. This last week, we read together from Alma 32 about faith and how even though he thinks his faith isn't as big as it needs to be, he has a desire to believe. And that's enough to just plant the seed of testimony. I gave him a baptismal commitment after and after thinking about it for a minute or so, he replied with "Right now?" Haha! He's not quite ready, but he's committed to getting ready for his baptism on the 27th of October. Elder Broberg and I are excited!

Last week, I think I told you about Ibu E right? She told us her well of water in her house is getting progressively dirtier and needed help cleaning it out. So we biked over last Thursday to see what we could do. She already had a pump taking the water out, but it wasn't going fast enough and didn't reach all the way to the bottom. So we stuck a ladder down in there and rigged up this bucket with string and started hauling up buckets and buckets and buckets of water, mud, and dirt. Man alive, it wore us out. But I'm glad we were able to help Ibu E in some way. She's been such an example to me of a light in so much darkness, I wanted some way to help. It also humbled me. Again. But it made me wonder why I have been so blessed to be born in a free country like America, be born into the church, have a completely intact, loving family, and have all of my needs and most of my wants taken care of. Yet, through the Gospel, we both get to experience the same happiness.

Last little thought before I sign off: I read from the September Ensign an article on how to prepare teenagers for their missions and the covenants they will make in the temple, and they quoted something from Elder Bendar that made me think. Remember what he said about Family History: "Your testimony of and conversion to the Savior will become deep and abiding. Your love and gratitude for your ancestors will increase. And I promise you will be protected against the influence of the adversary." Who knew that doing family history work would protect us from the devil? I'm grateful for the opportunity I had to do family history work in the temple before I left on my mission because it really has built my testimony. As I've testified to people about the Plan of Salvation, I feel more power behind my words. I'm also grateful that I'm sealed to the best family in the world! I love you all and hope you know that we're also one big family here on the Earth. That means we should love everyone. See you all next week! 

Elder Barrus

With Ibu E's brother after fixing her well.

With Ibu E. She's amazing!

Down in Ibu E's well.