Miracles, Poverty, and Joy...

Jambo! (Hello!)

This is my first week of doing ONLY Swahili lessons. (We had our area re-arranged after last week's transfer, so we are no longer responsible for an English speaking congregation, just Swahili speakers.) It is very very busy still. It's amazing how we just keep finding Africans who want to talk with us about Yesu Kristo, it's so fun! 

Miracles:

Many miracles this week. It's amazing to see how much God wants this work here to progress. Literally just Wednesday, we were talking with a girl about our age who is so excited to be baptized, and we were supposed to be teaching her about Christ's commandment to love others and to serve. It's going pretty well, then this fully formed sentance in Swahili comes into my mind, which is insane on its own.  I felt so strongly that I HAD TO SAY IT! 

"Tukitaka kuwa kama Yesu, tunahitaji kusheriki injili ya Yesu Kristo kwa sababu Kristo alisaidia watu wengi kwa sababu aliwafundisha wengine kusianana injili yake." 

(Which is basically "if we wanna be like Jesus, then we need to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with others because Jesus helped many people because he taught them about his gospel")

So I say it, and then the girl starts talking about how she really wants to help us with our missionary work and knock doors with us and share her testimony with other people, and it was SO COOL!!!!  We were obviously like "Yes please!"  because she speaks Kinyerwanda as well as Swahili, which we really need!

Poverty:

Anyways, on a sadder note, it's been hard to see the amount of poverty of the immigrants here. We like to say in America that we have great infastructure for helping people get on their feet, but I don't think that's exactly true. 

The amount of people who are desperately and unsuccesfully searching for a job to feed themselves and their children is insane. So many parents we're teaching rely on us to translate food stamp paperwork and government forms, and even job interviews and orientations. Just today, we translated for a few friends for jobs at Deseret Industries. (It is a non-profit thrift and donation store our church runs. It also provides job training for people who would have a rough time finding work elsewhere. )  It took 2 hours out of our P-Day, but it was completly worth it.

Literally all of the African households I've gone to have no lights on at all. Ever.  At the start I was like, "Oh do they just really like the dark for some reason?" But it's because they want to save money. So even though all the appartments have overhead lights and lamps, they're never on.

Also, I've gotten an impressive callus on the side of my finger from opening plastic waterbottles that they all give us when we come to teach lessons. I'm not a real adult, I don't know if clean running water costs money, but it's just something I've noticed.

Spiritual thought:

Sing, O heavens; and be joyful, O earth; for the feet of those who are in the east shall be established; and break forth into singing, O mountains; for they shall be smitten no more; for the Lord hath comforted his people, and will have mercy upon his afflicted.   (1 Nephi 21:13) 

I love this verse because even though there's so so many issues in everyone's lives, we are all able to find joy and peace in Christ. Even though I've only been out in Idaho for a month, I've seen so many people's lives and vibes completely change as they study and learn about Christ, and I think that is so cool.

Sorry that there are no pictures this week  ):

Lemme add one at least.

This is a matching game that I made up and drew on stickynotes for the kids lessons this week. They had so much fun. Also, I'm so grateful that most of the Swahili kids speak really good English!