Surat Mingguan (Weekly Letter)

Hello Semuanya!

I apologize first off for not writing yesterday... We ended up going to Malang for PDay, playing futsal over there, saying goodbye to Elder Heiner who moved to Bekasi, and hanging out there. And Elder Hendro still came even though he was way sick. He ended up throwing up at lunch and he's been really sick ever since. We're hoping he gets well soon, but his symptoms are looking a little like Elder Mocodompis when he had dengue fever.

Other than that, last week was great! We got to teach MW again and explain more about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon and things like that. Even though he's got such an open mind, we're being really careful with him and making sure that he really is open to receiving Jesus Christ and the Gospel. We teach him Tuesday night, so keep your fingers crossed!

Not a ton of cool things happened last week except for maybe one: two weeks ago, while Elder Xiong and I went to Brother David and Sister Jayanti's house to teach them, we ran into three guys along the way who gave us their number and address and stuff and said we could come over sometime. We agreed and went on our way. I set up an appointment to teach them last week and when I arrived, it was just these three guys, William, Steven, and Howard. They are all Christian and going to school here in Surabaya. They live in this dorm-like room with maybe 10 other roommates and as Elder Hendro and I started teaching, the other roommates started filing in. At the beginning, there was maybe 12 people that we were teaching! Man, it felt like a regular Wilford Woodruff experience! The opportunity to teach more than 1 is an opportunity worth gold in Indonesia! A lot of them had to leave to places and couldn't stay the whole time, but we explained about the Restoration, gave 4 of them a Book of Mormon, and invited them to pray about it. I wish I could say through email how cool it was! They told us to come back and explain more and of course we will.

It's weird how acclimated I've become. We can get lunch off the streets at a street cart or "warung" of rice, fried chicken, vegetables, tempe, tofu, and sambal and a drink for 9000 Rupiah, which is about 90 cents in America. 90 cents! But I've become so used to thinking that's normal that when I went out to buy some "sate kamping", or like goat meat kebab, for Elder Hendro and the ibu asked for 18000 Rupiah, I felt like I was getting ripped off!! But only $1.80 cents for some really good meat and rice is a pretty good deal in America.

Um. Yep. My mind's kinda stuck on this week. And also there wasn't a lot of awesomeness that happened last week. So that's it! But there was one quote that I wanna share real quick from President Eyring in a Worldwide Leadership Training meeting in January of 2003. He said: "Because we love the people we serve, all of us want to do better in lifting our Heavenly Father's children tto the faithfulness and purity they need to have all the blessings of the Lord... You begin by holding up the Lord's sandards clearly and without apology. And the more the world drifts from them and mocks them, the bolder we must be in doing that."

Every member a missionary! Whether you're preaching the Gospel in Indonesia or not, through your example or your words, everybody can be a missionary.

Elder Barrus

Happy Birthday, Indonesia! And Baptism!

(This email was sent August 19, 2013)

Hello Everyone!

This last Saturday we celebrated what is known as Independence Day in Indonesia. I was expecting huge fireworks, big parades, and cool things like that. But it turns out that the only big thing that happened in Surabaya was the closing down of a lot of roads and streets. So it made it crazy difficult to contact or teach anyone because the main roads we usually traveled on were closed. But it made some good opportunties to open our mouths about our purpose as missionaries. 

Yet even cooler than Independence Day was Lidya's Baptism!!! I'm glad we made the decision long beforehand to have Elder Hendro baptize her because I later found out that her baptism was his first opportunity to baptize someone. I know we're not supposed to measure our success by baptisms, lessons, or numbers, and I'm not. But it was super cool to see one of our investigators progress enough and see her make the decision to fully enter into the strait and narrow gate through baptism. I was thinking about a scripture the whole time from the Epistle of James where it says "Faith without works is dead." We have so many investigators that love for us to come to their house, theoretically discuss the Gospel, and even feel the Spirit. But they're not developing true faith until they do something about the faith they've been learning about--come to church, read the Book of Mormon. Super cool!

Our Muslim Investigator, MW, is bagus sekali! Elder Hendro was stuck figuring out some things about helping Sister Yeni move to Sidoarjo, so me and Elder Murphy went to MW's house after English Class to teach him. We had planned to teach according to his needs, most importantly because he's Muslim, but also because that's what you're supposed to do as a missionary, so we sat down on his porch, ate some gado-gado, and started chatting with him. We asked if he had any questions and he asked some of the most golden questions a missionary could ever hear. He asked "where did this Kitab Mormon come from?" and "how did your church come about?" If those two questions don't kickstart a discussion about the Restoration, I don't know what does. 

Usually we start by explaining that God is our loving Heavenly Father. But I learned beforehand that for Muslims, it's not appropriate to use the word "Allah" for anything but worship services. Instead, we had to explain that "the Being who created us is known as our loving Heavenly Father." It's kind of weird to start, but after that, we referred to God as Heavenly Father, so it was chill. We explained about prophets, the purpose of the scriptures, Jesus Christ's ministry and establishment of the Priesthood Authority, Great Apostasy, Joseph Smith, the First Vision, and the Book of Mormon. The whole time we were asking questions if he understood or had any questions, but he really just took it all in. 

After explaining about the Book of Mormon, he did have a question which was "Now, what's the role of the Holy Ghost in all this?" Golden sekali! We read from Moroni 10:5 about the purpose of the Holy Ghost, reviewed about how God the Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost are three distinct personages. We then taught him how to pray and as Elder Murphy said the closing prayer, I thought the whole time how confusing this must be to someone whose been raised Muslim his whole life, never believed in Jesus Christ as the Savior of the world, never really prayed personally to God, has a different concept of sin than Christians do, and the whole thing about prophets. Yet, at the same time, how simply beautiful it must be to someone whose never felt like this before. We're going to his house this week to follow up how he did, but I have full faith in him that he can come to know for himself, not because we're convincing him, but because he can know the truth, no matter how confusing it may be, through the Holy Ghost.

I've been pondering a quote by Elder Oaks in the 2013 August Liahona where he says "I have learned that most revelation to the children of God comes when they are on the move, not when they are sitting back in their habitations waiting for the Lord to tell them the first step to take." He then shares my mission scripture from D&C 88:63 - "Draw near unto me and I will draw near unto you; seek me diligently and ye shall find me." I can pray every single day for investigators to come to us, for people to listen to our message, and for good things to happen. But they can't happen unless I'm outside, opening my mouth and trying to understand God's will.

Things are good in Surabaya! A big group of Indonesian elders just finished up their missions, so Elder Xiong and Elder Mendrofa moved into our Zone last week, and also there's another group of Elders taking off at the end of August too. Elder Xiong thinks there is a pretty big chance that there are going to be some Bule companionships in the next couple months until more Indonesians come in. That's pretty weird to me. The only thing I've seen so far in my mission is an Indonesian-Bule or an Indonesian-Indonesian. But then I think that usually in other missions in the world, it's Bule-Bule. Haha! Made me laugh for a while just to see how acclimated I've become since arriving almost 2 1/2 months ago! Can you believe it's been that long?? I certainly can't. Feels like yesterday. :)

Elder Barrus

Inside an Soviet submarine

PDay tour of Soviet submarine with district

Teaching Lidya a discussion outside 

Selamat Hari Raya Idul Fitri!

(This letter is the one Seth sent on August 12, 2013)

Bagaimana kabar anda semuanya!

Last week was probably the slowest week for missionary work in my entire three months of missionary service. Muslims are awesome! They finished up their fasting month last week with the beginning of a weeklong celebration called "Lebaran". It's where every single person returns home to the "land of their inheritance", wherever that is, and hangs out with their family. It's kind of a mix between Christmas, Thanksgiving, Halloween, and New Year. Christmas because of the family thing, Thanksgiving because they eat like crazy (especially after fasting for a month!), Halloween because there's this event on the first day of "Idul Fitri" where all the little kids can go outside, door to door, or just on the street, and people will hand them money, small amounts, like a Rp 2.000 or 5.000 at the most, but after about 20 people, it adds up, and New Year because on Wednesday (the day before Idul Fitri) everybody stays up super late, banging drums, lighting off fireworks, socializing together, and eating. Super cool holiday for Indonesians! 

But really slow week for missionary work since everyone was gone and didn't want us to come over. So we ended up biking an hour and a half to Sidoarjo and eating with a few people there. One was a member of the Sidoarjo unit, and another was a man's family named Pak Aji, who always comes to the English Class on Wednesdays and Saturdays in Surabaya. I tried this weird, but delicious, fruit called "pencit". It's a small, unripe mango that is picked off a tree, is kinda green, and tastes really sour. But it's weirdly delicious. That's pretty much how last week went. :)

Elder Hendro is my hero. We biked back from Sidoarjo one day and my bike has been making these super weird noises lately. So we flipped my bike upside down and took the back tire off when all the gears on the back fell off one by one. Dah.... It's time for my moment of regret: Dad, I wish I would have listened and watched you more to learn how to fix and handle bikes better. Luckily, Elder Hendro is a pro at bike care. After tinkering around with a few spare tires and other gears, we finally found a combination that worked with my bike! Because of that and also his continuing patience with me learning the language. 

I feel like I hit a plateau as far as language goes. I can understand most of what is said in Sacrament meeting. But I taught Priesthood meeting afterwards and couldn't understand their input that they had on the lesson. They still carried the lesson for me about missionary work, and I hope everyone was edified, but I feel like I'm starting to plateau. Which means there's only one cure: work and prayer! It's amazing how many problems and bad feelings can be overcome by the simple combination of Prayer and Work. It reminds me of something President Hinckley said one time. He said something like "When I have a question on my mind, I almost always go to the Lord in prayer. After my prayer, I stand up and get to work!" 

It's drilled into our heads as missionaries that we can't measure our success by how many baptisms we get. But the fact we have a baptism on Sunday for Lidya is a nice little thing for me to look forward to! We've been teaching others, and it's been fun to see their small spiritual progression, but it's super cool to see someone who embraces the truth whole heartedly as soon as she found it! I'll always be grateful for the opportunity to be a part of teaching her and helping her progress towards her first covenant with God. 

Love you all! Saya berdoa setiap hari untuk anda dan saya harap bahwa anda tahu berapa banyak saya mengasihi anda dan juga kerja ini! Dan juga berapa banyak saya suka ikan!

Elder Barrus

Apartment Inspection (passed!)  (Picture courtesy of Elder and Sister Anderson)

Welcome to the Hotel Surabaya

Selamat Sore Semuanya!

We taught English Class with the Andersons at this hotel in Surabaya last week. Hence the title. I hope everyone's had a great week! I really am grateful for your prayers and support all the way from around the world! That's the cool thing about prayer is that there isn't a distance restriction. :) 

I've started to sleep talk again, but this time in Indonesian! I don't know what it means, but hopefully it's good right?? I sat up from my mattress on the floor one night, turned to Elder Hendro and asked "Bagaimana saya tulis itu??" (How do I write that?) Elder Hendro freaked out for a second and then said "Anda tidak perlu Elder". (You don't need to Elder). I replied with a "Sip" (Cool) and went back to bed. I hope it means I'm improving! 

There was an experience at church yesterday that proved to me how much I've improved but also how much I'm still (and should always be) dependent on the Lord. Because it's Lebaron, a country wide holiday where everybody goes back to their lands of origin and parties with their family, we couldn't get any of our investigators to church. Lidya's family lives in Sidoarjo, and wanted us to come to the sacrament meeting there, but before that, we attended our meeting in Surabaya Timur. Elder and Sister Anderson showed up which meant I got to translate for them! I've found I enjoy translating more when there's one or two or three speakers, instead of the 13 or so during fast and testimony meeting, because I can get used to how they say certain words and things like that. 

I started off translating and felt pretty good until about 10 minutes left and this one good brother stood up and started speaking, but he speaks so fast and has such a strange accent to me, I can't understand a thing he says usually. After him, another lady stood up, who's originally from China, and shared her testimony, and the only thing I caught was "in the name of Jesus Christ amen". I got pretty discouraged about that, and apparently it continued into Sunday school too because there were periods of 10 or 15 minutes where I wasn't able to say a thing to the Andersons and I felt so bad!  I had kinda given up and felt frustrated with myself that I hadn't been able to help  them like I should be able to. Elder Anderson is such a saint though, he tried so hard to understand and follow along the lesson on his ipad. But I was of no help. It made stop and wonder why. Why couldn't I understand? 

I realized it was mostly because of my attitude. Instead of getting frustrated or flustered with myself, I need to calm down, say a quick prayer, and invite the Spirit into what I'm hearing and saying. I apologized to the Andersons and as we left, they said they would pick us up around 3 to head to the Sidoarjo unit for Sacrament meeting. The unit there meets in a hotel room they rent out and it's so small, and there's only about 13 members that attend usually, but the Spirit is so huge there! I was humbled. Who knows if it made me humble, but it was humbling. While the Sacrament was being passed, I said a quick prayer that I'd be able to translate. Not so I could feel good about how much Indonesian that I know now, but so I could help Elder and Sister Anderson. It's amazing what a difference that simple prayer made. Even though some people spoke really quietly or muffled their words, I was able to pick out the main point of every single sentence that was said. It was a 360  degree turn around and it's all because of a change of attitude and a simple prayer. The language here in Indonesia, Argentina, Europe, or anywhere in the world is nothing but a tool that the Lord to reach and help others. As soon as I realized that, I was able to help others out.

We didn't get to teach as much last week because of Lebaron, but I did get to go on an official companionship exchange with Elder Mocodompis, my District Leader who leaves in a week and a half. And I learned a ton! We didn't get to go contacting, but he taught me that when people ask me "Anda dari mana?" (where are you from?) I should take it as an opportunity to say that I'm from the Church of Jesus Christ and use a quick power statement. If the person is still interested in the message, they'll ask more about the Church and I'll be able to contact them. But if they're not interested at all, they'll usually follow up with "Bukan, anda asli mana?" (No, what place do you consider home?) I have to be super careful to never offend or push anybody too far, because I've found that Indonesians can get offended pretty easily. 

It's tough, but it's the most rewarding work that I can do. Especially when we find and get to teach people like Lidya!! She's luar biasa! Because she had that run in with her parents last week, she had a ton of questions when we met last Saturday. We had planned on teaching about obedience, but I think it was the Spirit that lead us as we taught her more according to her needs. As we started to do that, by reading passages of scripture and drawing upon our own knowledge and experience, the Spirit taught. Not us. Yah, we were the instruments, but I felt like it was the first time for me and Elder Hendro that we taught together through the Spirit according to the investigator's needs. That's really when missionary work begins. I shared a scripture from Joseph Smith History, I think verse 26 where it says that Joseph was confused as to why people hated him and persecuted him for saying he had seen a vision. He knew it, and he knew that God knew it, and he could not deny it. Even though we may face persecution, hatred, or even physical abuse for what we know to be true, it doesn't diminish the fact that we know the truth. And should stand by it till death. Lidya has been such a great example to me of that! 

Zone Training Meeting! The Elders here in Surabaya and Sidoarjo got to go to Malang, a city about three hours away, for ZTM! There we learned about the changes President Donald wants us to make, like how we get to use Facebook now for proselyting purposes (still don't know how that's gonna work), he wants us to carry around a Book of Mormon everywhere we go, and he wants us to look more modern by maybe buying and wearing a shoulder bag instead of a backpack. We also learned how important it is to give commitments to people while we teach them because it's such a key indicator as to whether or not they're serious and also to give them a choice to accept what we say or reject it. Yes or no. No gray area. :)

Saya tahu bahwa meskipun itu sedikit sulit kadang-kadang, itu paling harga untuk menemukan orang lain siap untuk menerima Injil ini yang Paling Bagus! Saya tahu bahwa kerja ini adalah kerja paling baik yang saya bisa melakukan untuk 2 tahun! Terima Kasih untuk semuanya dan saya masih berdoa untuk anda setiap hari!

Elder Barrus

Surat yang setiap minggu (Letters Every Week)

Selamat Pagi semuanya!

It certainly sounds like there were quite a few people who had an awesome time in New York! I hope you all wrote in your journal about that because what I'm learning is that as the days have started to run by, I slowly forget what I did the previous week, but going back through my journal helps me remember fun little details I otherwise would have forgotten. Journal writing is paling penting! 

Seriously though, the weeks are starting to fly by! Some days feel pretty long and tiring, but when I start focusing on the work and how happy the work is making me, it seems to fly by. :) Elder Mocodompis was finally released from the hospital last Friday, but because he was in there all last week, there were constantly new companionship exchanges that happened. On Monday, I got to teach with Elder Kyle in Surabaya Barat, Tuesday I was with Kyle in my area, and the rest of the week I was back with Hendro. But Murphy was switching in and out with Kyle, Hasibuan, and Hendro. Just a weird week. :) But a good one! 

Mom. If you had any worries about my safety in Indonesia, there's no need. These guys got my back. :) Haha! seriously though, we ran into these guys at the Park, walking around with AK-47's, and we just started talking. 

We got to teach Lidya about the Sabbath day and anything we teach her, she gobbles up. She had a really trying experience yesterday after she attended church where her parents faced her and started asking her a ton of questions about our church. There's a phrase that a lot of Indonesians say to me or others when they talk about our church, it's "itu sesat!" basically meaning that "it's a cult right?" or "oh, it's the fallen church." Lidya was so great because she stood up for her testimony in the face of her parents! She's still planning on being baptized August 18th and will go to the church unit in Sidoarjo every Sunday after she's baptized. She just works in Surabaya during the week and it's more convenient to teach her then. She's luar biasa! 

Her experience reminded me of a quote from President Spencer W. Kimball. He said "You have a testimony! It needs building and lifting and enlargening. Every time you bear it, it becomes strengthened. Just tell how you feel inside. That is a testimony. The moment you being preaching to others, your testimony has ended." So true! It doesn't need to be long, but I've come to learn that we need to share our testimony more with others. Either through what we say or what we do through acts of service or examples to others. The building and strengthening happens personally and quietly during personal study and worship and the testing and true enlargening happen during times of trial. 

Both her and Satria, our other baptismal investigator, came to church yesterday and both got to witness a baptism of an 8 year old son of another member. I really think that's going to be good for them. As far as other teaching goes, we're trying to make more of an effort to reach out to less active members here in Surabaya because there are a lot. :) I asked President Muliono for a list of names we could visit and he gave me 5 families to visit this week. I'm hoping that goes well! It's really tough to find new investigators and people we can teach. 

There's a terminology here called the "Fish and the Bobs". The Bobs are people, usually Muslim who we teach and talk to so that we can find and teach their Christian friends. The Fish are those we get to teach and usually progress. I've been struggling with a bit trying to be really careful talking to people about Christ because I want to tell them that He is their redeemer too, not just those that believe in Him. I was thinking about this topic one day when I came across a scripture in 1 Nephi 13:41 and it says "there is one God and one Shepherd over the whole earth." It doesn't matter if they're Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, Hindu, or Atheist. Every person will have to eventually decide if they're going to follow Christ or not. There is no other way because there's only 1 shepherd. I like that. :)

I also like that because we had the opportunity to teach a nice Muslim man, name is Mas Wahyu (funny tangent that "wahyu" in Indonesian means "revelation"). Anytime we teach a Muslim, we have to be really careful to only teach what they're interested in, and usually that's the family. We got to know him a little bit, he's 36, not married, is a product designer, and has a motorcycle. We know that because we got his information from the previous week's free motorcycle wash. We gave him "The Family: A Proclamation to the World" pamphlet and we read it together. He had some good questions and you could tell he was really engaged because he kept looking us in the eye and just seemed pretty interested. After we finished that up, he essentially asked "what else?" We took that as an "OK" to go ahead and teach a little bit more. He said that he had read the writings of Buddha, Confucius, Mohammad, and even the Bible. I asked him if he's ever heard of the Book of Mormon. He replied "belum" or not yet. We gave him a copy of the Book of Mormon, explained a little bit about it, gave him a Restoration pamphlet to read, and we had to leave because we had another appointment that night. I thought it was a tad ironic, but really cool, because we taught him just on his "porch" in front of his mom's house and just down the street were congregating Muslim worshippers at a mini-mosque. The whole time we're teaching him, there's this Islamic call to prayer and here we are teaching him about Jesus Christ. It was cool! He told us he wanted to meet again and we want to meet him again because he seemed like a light had been lit up inside of him.

Oh yeah! And last Saturday, we got to go fishing with the Members. That was cool. I didn't catch anything, but it was good for Satria and Lidya to be out interacting with members in a relaxed setting to see that we're not all crazy. :) Elder Hasibuan caught a couple and so did Elder Murphy but I can't tie a worm on a hook to save my life.

Last quick thought before I end. President Kimball also said that "forgiveness is the miraculous ingredient that assures harmony and love in the home or ward." Forgiveness in and of itself is a huge principle and there's a lot you can cover. But I've learned here to start focusing on the good of other people, especially my companion. Because I've also learned that it's the people we know best that we get most frustrated with. Most importantly though is that we have the same purpose. If we let small differences get in the way of the work, we can't be a successful companionship. I've grown to love Elder Hendro as a brother even though we're from two completely different backgrounds. We're all united in Christ.

Wadu. Long letter. The Gospel is always true! We aren't always perfect, and heaven knows how imperfect of a teacher I am, but the Gospel is always perfect if applied in every aspect.

Sampai minggu depan! Terus Maju!

Elder Barrus

More Pictures from Surabaya

Now that we're finished with the Hill Cumorah Pageant, I have time to post some more pictures from Indonesia

Bromo--a volcano in Indonesia--a PDay Excursion

Elder and Sister Anderson, senior missionary couple from Rexburg, Idaho

Elder Barrus and Elder Murphy teaching English at Swastika College

Teaching English at "Swastika Prima Entrepeneur College

BROMO!

(Note from Sharon: This letter is from last week. I'm a week behind.)

Selamat Sore setiap orang!

I'm writing this kinda late because we just got back from the most epic Zone Trip ever. But first: more important items that pertain to the Gospel. I told you about Pak Sugiamto before (I think) about how even though he's a forever investigator, he's still super cool! For our visit last week, we gave a brief overview of the Third Lesson from PMG and I felt like it really was guided by the Spirit. We both figured it had been a while since he's been invited to be baptized, so I began my course to invite him to baptism. I asked him if he wanted these blessings of being baptized. And he said yes! But! He said he's not ready because he "hasn't read the whole Kitab Mormon yet". His response reminded me of something Neil A. Anderson said in his April 2013 Conference talk: "We respect each person's choice and timing... A person's lack of interest need not diminish our bonds of friendship and love." I think this totally applies to him! And everyone! We can't force anybody into baptism. It's totally their choice, even if it is the true choice.

 Anyhow, we went on our way and didn't think anything about it, until Sunday rolled around and who should show up but him! It was really neat to see and talk with him! The theme in Sacrament Meeting was Temples and Elder Hasibuan was the last to speak and he did a fantastic job! Mostly because he speaks slow enough so that I can actually understand him, but also because he's a great teacher. His talk sparked a lot of questions in the next hour "Gospel Principles" class. Only problem was that the teacher was someone who can't understand Indonesian questions very well: me! Thankfully, Elder Hendro and Hasibuan helped me out a ton! And through the lesson too because I got to teach about a subject I can hardly teach in English: The Millenium. Needless to say, there was a lot of reading from the book, but I think it went well. That was definitely a tender mercy from the Lord this past week.

Also, Dad wanted to know a little bit about how a typical day goes. So I'll do that today! The four of us wake up at 6:30 every morning, eat, shower, lift, whatever until personal study at 8. At 9 until 11 we have companionship study. After that, I'm allotted an hour from 11 till 12 for bahasa study, which is much needed. After that, we usually eat, either out on the street, or in our apartment if it's the middle of Ramadhan, and head out! We usually schedule an appointment for 2 oclock, either Ibu Ema, Pak Sugiamto, sometimes sister Lidya, Satriya, or someone like that. In between appointments, and yah, we bike everywhere, we've made a goal to stop and talk to everyone who calls out and yells at me "Hey Mister!" or "hey Bule!" We've given out a couple pass along cards that way, but no referrals yet. Keep trying! It's definitely difficult, but I'm reminded of the scripture in D&C 18 where the Lord says that "The worth of every soul is great in the eyes of God... If you were to labor ALL your days crying repentance unto this people, and bring save it be one soul unto me, how great shall be your joy!" I definitely feel like that's my motto right now. 

When we contact people, we usually get to know them a little bit and by doing that, we can usually tell what religion they are. If they're Muslim, we invite them to English class, tell them that we also believe in fasting, that families can be together forever, and if they have any Christian friends interested in our message. The answer for me has always been a polite no. But I keep telling myself I need to continue trying in order to find the one. At about 5 or 6, sometimes we have another appointment, or teach English class at 6 on Wednesdays and Saturdays, and almost always after, we try to meet with one member family. The Branch here is awesome! But for some reason, they don't have a branch correlation meeting. So it's really difficult for us as missionaries to get help with investigators or receive referrals without going out ourselves. So we do!  We return home after that, hold our daily planning session at 9 until 9:30, shower, brush our teeth, floss (Dr Boseman can be happy about that) , pray and go to bed. Oh yeah, and dad- we do get to use a cell phone for missionary work purposes. :)

Everyone knows that my bahasa Indonesia is not yet great, but apparently, my English is pretty good because a Muslim sister who always comes to English class, Ima, got me, Elder Murphy, Hendro, and Hasibuan to come teach at her Entrepeneur College.  No joke, its name is "Swastika Prima Entrepreneur College." I'll send a picture later. Let me tell ya though, if you ever want to feel like a total rockstar, go teach English as a Bule in Indonesia. Seriously, we were trying to leave because we had District Meeting at noon, but everyone wanted a picture with us. Haha! It was awesome! Real quick, while teaching, Elder Murphy and I got asked a question that threw me off so bad. We were helping them know the difference between informal and formal questions, and they were asking us more informal questions. So I was expecting questions about my pets, family, and stuff like that, when one Muslim sister raised her hand and asked "How you feel about Indonesian women?" Ah man! It threw me off so bad! It took everything I had not to crack up laughing. Essentially, we both kinda avoided the question, said that all Indonesian people are great and that Indonesian women can cook really well. Yup.

Whoof. My apologies for the long email. But I want to tell you about BROMO!!! I hope this is cohesive because at 10:45 last night, we hopped into Elder and Sister Anderson's car and headed to Bromo! We made it to the bottom of the resort at about 3 am in the morning, took jeeps up to the pinnacle of the mountain and waited for the sunrise, which was supposed to be awesome. But instead, it was just flippin' cold and rainy. I never thought Indonesia could be this cold! But all the Indos made me eat my words that I wouldn't get cold. Dang. 

Anyway, because it was all misty and hazy and stuff, we didn't get to see the sunrise, so instead, we went to the next coolest thing there which was this volcano thingy that smelled like Yellowstone. We concluded our trip with probably the most beautiful and most epic hike into this waterfall!! I hope I have enough time to send pictures, but it was sooooo cool!!!! It started out pretty normal, little hiking there, crossing streams and stuff. My flip flops broke, so at about half way through, I was just going barefoot. Not too bad. :) But there was a point where we literally had to walk underneath some waterfalls. I put my batik shirt I had just bought for Rp50.000 over my backpack that had my camera in it. My shirt got soaked, but my stuff stayed dry. Points for me! We made it to the very end where there was this way wicked waterfall that dropped maybe 100 yards from the top of this green floral scenery. I'm sorry! I"m trying to paint as good of a picture as it was, but maybe you should just see the pictures. :) After that, we all went home, but I couldn't sleep at all since the roads in Indonesia are nuts and always bumper to bumper. So tonight might be the best sleep of my life! 

But going on the Zone Trip with all the Elders and SIsters in my zone made me appreciate the creations and things of this world. Yeah, we can plant seeds and cultivate and make sure it's given everything necessary to grow, but it really is a miracle that anything grows. I think that can be applied to life too. We can nourish, and plant seeds and cultivate and fertilize the ground as much as we want and give someone every opportunity to come closer to Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father, but we can't force them. That's their own choice. But that doesn't mean we don't try. That's why I'm so impressed with all the missionary work you're doingin Palmyra right now! I know the missionaries who receive your referrals will be exceptionally grateful! Even though they won't know you personally, God will know the effort it took to cultivate each one of His seeds. And you get to take part in that! There's my Alma 32 in a nutshell. I love you all! I love hearing your Palmyra stories and other things that are happening! Every aspect of missionary work is needed! Even if you aren't a full time missionary. Sampai Minggu Depan!

Elder Barrus

From a Surabaya Warnet