Week 1 in Paradise

Dear Friends and Family,

We had a super crazy week this week! Island life is awesome. The place where we live has about 40,000 people, which is the capital of the island. 40,000 people is tiny. Sanlucar (one of my other areas) had 60,000 and that was tiny; this is just a whole nother level (is it really written/said like that Idk). The members of the church here are so amazing! They understand what it means to be member missionaries, as almost all of the members were found by other members.

One might think that it's a super chill life on an island all alone but it has actually been pretty much the same as the rest of my mission! Trying to teach all the time and if we can't then talk to people on the street or visit people. We did a pretty big service project for our branch mission leader this week. We moved this massive pile of wood and rocks so it wasn't right in front of his bakery. Super fun and they fed us which is always a plus.

We're teaching a family from Colombia who are so prepared to baptized. It's planned for late October so we'll see how that goes. There's so many families here it's crazy. My comp and I decided that about 50% of the people in church are children under 12. I love kids so it's been super fun!!

I've been thinking a lot about this scripture from the Book of Mormon. King Benjamin had just given a speech about how we can be redeemed through the atonement of Christ, and how we should help others in this life as well. As his last words recorded in scripture, this prophet posed a piercing question:

"How knoweth a man the master whom he has not served, and who is a stranger unto him, and is far from the thoughts and intents of his heart?" (Mosiah 5:13)

Let us not forget that one of the goals of this life and eternity, as stated by Jesus Christ, is to know God and His son Jesus Christ whom he sent (See John 17:3). How can we know God if He is far from our thoughts? How we expect to know Him if we choose not to serve him? King Benjamin taught how we can serve God best: "When ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God" (Mosiah 2:17). We must serve others to the best of our ability, and through such service we will come to know God. I love how King Benjamin closes his mark in scripture:

"Therefore, I would that ye should be steadfast and immovable, always abounding in good works, that Christ, the Lord God Omnipotent, may seal you his, that you may be brought to heaven, that ye may have everlasting salvation and eternal life, through the wisdom, and power, and justice, and mercy of him who created all things, in heaven and in earth, who is God above all. Amen."

As we are immovable in our desire to follow God's commandments as well as always "abounding in good works", we will be saved in the kingdom of God. Elder Coleman

Pic1 - The nothingness, Pic2 - Puerto de Rosario,  Pic3 - Weird cactus fruit, Pic4 – Cat, Pic5 - Ocean everywhere

Canary Islands?

September 17, 2018

This week was super interesting because we didn't have any water for the first half of the week. Also we popped a tire... But other than that it was awesome! We talked to a lot of people and met with a lot of families from the church.

So the crazy news for the week is that we got a call on Saturday that I would be transferred to the Canary Islands off the coast of West Africa! I'll be serving on Fuerteventura, a small island in the Tenerife Sea (I've heard the water is pretty blue but I'm not sure if Ed Sheeran is a very reliable source). I've been told there's more goats than people, so either there's a ton of goats or not a lot of people I guess we'll find that one out... there's also camels and giraffes and other desert animals and also tons of volcanos. My companion is Elder Grappendorf, and we'll have the island all to ourselves. The weird part is that I'm going from Granada (a pretty big city with lots of other missionaries) to a tiny island where I'll only see other missionaries once a month.

I found a really cool quote this week by President Harold B. Lee, who was a Prophet of God that passed away less than 50 years ago. He said: "Too many of us put question marks instead of periods after what the Lord says. I want you to think about that. We shouldn’t be concerned about why he said something, or whether or not it can be made so. Just trust the Lord. We don’t try to find the answers or explanations. We shouldn’t try to spend time explaining what the Lord didn’t see fit to explain. We spend useless time." We are commanded to trust the Lord. He knows the way to the eternal joy that is laid up in store after this life. "Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding" (Proverbs 3:5). I know that, as we put our trust in God, we will receive strength to overcome any fear or trial.

Elder Coleman

(Nearly) Weekly Email

September 10, 2018

Friends and Family,

Sorry about not sending out an email last week. I would say it won't happen again but it definitely will happen again because I'm slowly losing motivation to email. Not much out of the ordinary happened over the last two weeks, other than we started teaching free Italian classes, and by "we" I mean I forced my Italian companion to take one for the team and offer his services. We've been looking for people to teach on Facebook which is really weird to me, but it’s what we've been told to do so we'll go for it. I guess our generation is much more likely to talk to us from their phones than in person, so we'll see if we have any success from that. We're still out in the streets talking to people but also dedicating a little bit of time each week to find people online too.

We had zone conference last week, and we learned a lot about repentance and how it is a joyful experience. It truly is an amazing opportunity that we have in order to change and become better through the Atonement of Jesus Christ. We were also invited to reread this really cool book called "Adjusting to Missionary Life", which I don't think I've ever opened so that was awkward... We have since made a goal to read it and I've learned a lot about how to be a better missionary.

Something that we get a lot as missionaries (I was told it this past week) is that there's no way for us to actually know that what we preach is the truth. Many say that there is no God, and that a being that we can't physically see cannot exist. Last time I was told this, a verse from the New Testament came to my mind. Many people after Jesus Christ's death accused His followers of following their imagination or invented stories. The head apostle Peter boldly stated: "We have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty" (2 Peter 1:16). God is not a myth. He is not dead. All the prophets since the beginning have testified of the reality of a God, the creator of all things. I declare, along with Peter, that this is no cunning fable; God lives. I am an eyewitness of his works among mankind. Miracles occur today; I have seen them.

Elder Coleman

Pic 1 - Italian Gelato with an Italian

Pic 2 - La familia Marchi