Transfers

Hey everybody! Hows it goin! Its goin good here in paradise! 

 

Elder White left yesterday for Papeete. He'll be home in Provo by Wednesday. My new comp is Elder Palombo from Spansih Fork Utah. He's awesome and he will be finishing in August and then going home. This week was awesome! We taught a good amount of lessons and we have some really cool investigators! 

 

Firstly, we had Manutea's baptism Saturday. It was amazing! The Spirit was really strong and his family is interested in the lessons now. They said is was so much better than the baptisms they've gone to before for people of other  religions. Elder White got to baptize him in the ocean. Lucky dog! 

 

We fixed a baptism with Moerava one of our other investigators. She's getting married in july so her baptism will be in august. She's become a really smart and hardworking investigator. She reads everything she can get a hold of on the gospel Library app. She even read a little bit of Preach My Gospel. 

 

Everything's going really good here. It's really cool to see people recognize the different spirit and atmosphere of this Church. Its sometimes hard for us to recognize the Spirit cause we are so used to it but people who have rarely felt it get hit with extreme amounts of joy and peace. It testifys to them that this is the true Church. 

On a different note, some of the things my family was asking about when we skyped on Mother's Day were: 

Where do you live on the island? 

We live in a little house on the more populated side of the island. We don't have air conditioning and we have to keep all the doors and windows shut tight because people like to look into our home and for security reasons. It makes our home extremely hot and humid inside! We don't have a shower inside the home so we shower outside with a hose. There's and old Chinese man that watches us, but whatever! 

How big are the branches on the island?

There are two branches, the Avatoru branch and the Tiputa branch. We have to take a boat to the Tiputa part of the island everytime we go over there. The Avatoru branch has about 100 members, but only 40 attend church. The Tiputa branch has about 20 members and 10 attend church. When we're at the Tiputa branch it's like the "LDS elders show". We bless and pass the sacrament and then we give the talks in sacrament. Oh, and I also play the piano for all the hymns. We're going to ask President Bize to send some "senior couple missionaries" to that branch to help build up the priesthood leadership.

Are you always sweaty?

YES! We are constantly wet and sweaty!! There's no avoiding it. It rains everyday and it's hot and we're in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. 

What language do you speak the most of on the island of Rangiroa?

We mostly speak French, but we also speak Tahitian to a few people. The younger generation of French Polynesia doesn't know how to speak Tahitian as well as the older generation. What you'll find in a family is that the children only speak French, the parents speak mostly French, but also Tahitian, and the grandparents mostly (or only) speak Tahitian, with a little French. 

Those are just a few of the questions I've been asked. 

 

I love you all! Talk to you next week!!!

Love,

Elder Porter

   Me and Elder White at the airport saying goodbye as Elder White flies home to Utah!

Mother's Day

Hey everybody! This week went by super fast! We got Standards of Excellence again, but barely. It took all Saturday to find one more new investigator. We had a lot of really cool lessons this week. We have a fixed baptism for this saturday and he's doing awesome. During a lesson this week he asked us if he could come with us to lessons and bear his  testimony to the other investigators. How cool is that!! He's not even baptized yet and he already wants to share the gospel. We met another investigator who was super interested in the Bible and Book of Mormon! We gave him a Book of Mormon and some brochures and he's been reading alot. People are rarely this excited for the Book Of Mormon. A lot of our investigators are doing awesome and its cool to see how much the gospel changes people!

 

So I didn't have any super spiritual expériences to share this week, but since its Mother's Day I'll try to be emotional instead, since I know my mom likes that. I rarely cry during lessons, however, it has happened before. The only time I really tear up is when we talk about the sealing power of the temple. I have a strong testimony of that. When we teach about the temple I usually start off by telling the investigators about how my two little sisters are adopted and how I got to go to the temple to watch them be sealed to my parents. The spirit witnesses to me, and hopefully those I teach, that these things are true and I tear up when I express my gratitude for the temple. And for the blessing of being sealed to my sisters and family forever. Happy Mother's Day Mom. This is the best present I could think of. 

Love, 

Elder Porter

    My sisters.

Standards of excellence.....with lots of hard work!

So this week was killer! We got Standards of Excellence again.....with a lot of hard work of course! Our ami (investigator) with a fixed baptism had his interview yesterday and he's good to go! He's progressed so much! He went from doubting prophets and the book of Mormon to testifying of them to other investigators! His baptism is the 16 of May. We are so excited! We also found a new investigator yesterday. His name is Teanuanua. He accepted the lessons readily and within the first five minutes he looked at our badges, saw the name of Jesus Christ and then told us that the Mormon church is the true church because its the only church that bears Christs name!!!! How cool this that? He knew just by the name that this is the true church. 

The other day we met a lady who worked in a boutique store. She's a Sanito or member of the Reorganized church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. She told us she went to BYU Hawaii for college and has had all the missionary lessons! She was super nice and wants us to teach her boyfriend. So cool! 

We had a faatamaaraa, or meal, with a member family. It was really good fish and he told us that his family has a secret way to prepare and cook Fugu or blowfish. Its really hard to prepare because of the poisonous sack in the stomach but his family are the masters of preparing and cooking Fugu and he promised to make us some!!! 

Yesterday we met some tourists from my home town of Mesa! They were on a cruise. The husband taught Seminary at Gilbert High School. I think his name was Brother Welsh or Welch. They were really nice but it was weird and difficult to speak English. 

Love you All!!! Talk to you soon!!!!

Elder Porter

Me and our investigator Noarii at the marina right after a lesson.

Tons and Tons of biking!!!

Alright so this week was super tiring! We did so much biking!!! We had to go to the other end of our sector six times this week!! Plus me and Elder White have been sick. There's another weird sickness going around and we got it. It's not chikingunya though. I've never worked so hard or been so tired! But we had a killer week, lesson wise! We made standards of excellence again this week which was awesome! So tuesday we were super sick and extremely tired, So it was rough, but we had 5 lessons planned that day and we did them all! Not a single person canceled which is a flat out miracle! Then Wednesday....still sick and tired....5 lessons planned....no cancellations! We were amazed! Thursday was our day of planning, studies, and rest because we were exhausted. We then had to ride back to the other end of the sector Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Saturday we had a primary baptism of a kid named Nephie. He wanted Elder White to baptize him and me to give him the gift of the Holy Ghost. It was an amazing experience! This week was sort of uneventful, just a lot of biking and some good lessons. One of our favorite lessons this week was with a couple who are very adventist! We had a really cool lesson with them about prophets and the original church of Jesus Christ. They just need to know how to find the true church because there are - major churches in Rangiroa; Mormons,  catholics, protestants, Jehovahs witness, Adventists, and Sanitos ( Sanitos are the nickname for members of the Reorganized church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. For some reason that church has a super strong presence in French polynesia!) Anyways We had a very spiritual experience with them and we hope to show them the true characterisitcs of the true church of Christ!

I love you all! Talk to you next week!!!

Elder White, Nephie, and Me

Elder White walking Nephie out to be baptized. 

Baptism in paradise!!

Umm...just to freak my mom out...this is a shark feeding frenzy. Look real close at the pic and see how many sharks you count.

Random hermit crab. I named him "buddy".

Everything is Awesome!!

Just Hey everybody...;.my grammar and spelling are gonna be terrible cause I don't have a lot of time!!!

This week has been awesome!!! We achieved standards of excellence which are number goals you try to get. We had 14 lessons, 2 fixed baptisms, 6 new investigators and, 8 investigators at church! It was awesome! We have one investigator right now who is super ready to get baptized. He only needs one thing, a witness that Joseph Smith is a prophet. That's something we can help with!! He's awesome!

We had one really cool lesson with a mom and her two daughters. The lesson was mostly for the two girls but the mom decided to join. At the end of the lesson she started crying because she has had a lot of struggles lately and she's really wanted the presence of Christ in her home! The Spirit was really strong and the two daughters started crying! The dad is inactive but he was touched by our visit and the family made the member friend promise to bring them to church the next day!! It was such a testimony building experience for me. 

 I don't think I've ever worked harder in my entire life than I have this week! We discovered that to get from one side of the village to the other side is about 18 kilometers and we ride that 3-5 times a week! Back and forth! It's tiring but soooo worth it! Especially when you get to look at the ocean or eat raw fish for dinner!!!! That's the best!!! I LOVE the food here.

P.S. This will make my mom and dad laugh. When I arrived on the island last week, everyone knew me immediately as the elder who can play piano. My comp, Elder white, had told them before I arrived so they were all waiting for me!!! Apparently there hasn't been anyone to play the piano in over a year...so guess who's the branch pianist in both branches?!?! For years I complained when my mom asked me to practice the piano. She told me that I would probably need to know how to play on my mission. I didn't believe her. Big mistake!!!

Love you all,

Elder Cole Porter

Rangiroa

So I'm basically in heaven here. Rangiroa is so beautiful!! The water is so clear and there's so much life. We walked to a part of the beach and in the water I saw crabs, parrot fish and all sorts of tropical fish, sharks, and sting rays..its awesome. So I don't really know the investigators that well yet so I'm just going to describe what its like here. 

Firstly there are coconut trees everywhere!!! Like everywhere! Secondly, you can see the ocean basically at all times. You are never more than 10 min away from the ocean. Thirdly, it's extremely hot here and the sun is intense! Lastly there is a lot of biking!!! 

There are three main parts to Rangiroa. There's the village of avatoru where mostly everyone lives. There's stores there and the airports there and the chapel too. Then there's Ohotu where the big docks are and the taxi boat. A lot of members and investigators live in Ohotu. Then there's tiputa which is entirely separated by ocean. You can only get there by boat. There's a branch there with their own chapel. We take a boat to get there and visit the branch.

We live at one end of Avatoru....it takes half an hour to bike to the other end where ohotu starts....then its another half hour to get to where people live in Ohotu....then its a five minute boat ride to get to Tiputa which is another half hour to bike across...a lot of cardio...everyone here loses weight! 

So for personal study this week I've been reading Jesus the Christ...and I love it so much! I've learned a lot from reading this book!!! Something I noticed that I haven't thought of before was how in the book Of Mormon its very easy to see the pride cycle. The people get rich and then think they're better than everyone else and then they fall. But its not as evident in the old Testament. In Jesus the Christ it talks about the Jewish pride and how they thought they were better than everyone else because they were the chosen people of God. They hated all other peoples and were then recipricolly despised. Sometimes Pride takes different forms and we have to be careful to stay away from it all times.

Anyway thats about it...the members here are awesome and its amazing here!!! My new companion is Elder White and he is the best!!!! Love you ALL!!!!

I took this picture as the sun was setting. I'm no photographer but this pic is beautiful. I'm pretty sure it's impossible to take a bad picture here!!!

Picture of how crystal blue the water is here.

General Conference and saying goodbye to faaripo.

Ia'ora'na Tatou

Hows it goin? Everythings going good here in Faaripo. I'm leaving
tomorrow afternoon for Rangiroa! I'm so excited. I've gone through
this whole week in nervous anticipation. I can't wait to start working
there.

This week was a little dissappointing number wise. Almost all of our
investigators were out of town. It was extremely difficult to get a
lesson. However we did have one or two really awesome lessons.
Firstly, Tumata and Jean-Claude finally picked a marriage date. They
are planning on getting married the 21st of July! Now we can finally
plan the baptism.
We also had a lesson with Janita and her family. Some of her daughters
are investigators and her niece is our other baptism, Moeata. I told
them I was leaving and so they made us a big lunch. It was so nice!!
I'm going to miss that family.
Today we fasted for Yanki so that he can receive the okay to get
baptized. He's an awesome man and we ate super good bbq chicken at his
house. He's helped us learn a lot of Tahitian because we do lessons
with him in tahitian.
I loved listening to conference!! It was kind of difficult getting to
hear it in English but it was worth it. I loved the talk by Henry
Eyring during priesthood about prayer. I think sometimes I
underestimate the power and importance of prayer. I love the promise
in D&C 10:5 that promises us protection from Satan if we pray always.
Personally, I need to learn to pray more fervently and more frequently
so as to be better protected and better guided by the Spirit.

 I love you all. 

Talk to you all
next week from rangiroa.

Me and Elder Warren. I'm going to miss him. He's been an amazing companion.

My district