On Fire, The Cute 9 month old and The Staff Sergeant and the Investigator Born the Same Week as Me

Man is it really monday again? We had probobly one of the most amazing weeks of my mission and definitely the most successful, by far. Our companionship is on fire and we are really working hard and reaping the rewards. We were blessed to have two baptisms this week. They were both very special to me because they where people that Elder Ketchum and I started teaching back in September and now they have come so far and seeing the people they are now as they come unto Christ.....man it's beautiful to be part of.

 Looking back this week im still wondering how we did it because we taught an insane amount of lessons and we were just pumped full of the Spirit all week we would like run to each lesson we where so jacked up to teach it was great.

We had a great zone meeting on tuesday so maybe we had some extra spirtual charge with us. We have met a lot of familes lately, which is great. This one family has this super adorable 9 month old baby girl who is super active durng our lessons. Anyway we sit down and I go to say Hi to her and that quick little devil...i mean angel, grabbed my favorite pen from my pocket and starts going to town on it with her new tooth. My comp tried to nagotiate a deal by giving her a peice of candy and her eyes get huge. Candy and my pen to suck on at the same time! Man that was one satisfied little girl just looking at me with her cute stare while i'm trying to teach. So she's got a new chew toy now. We had a great lesson with a family we are teaching and they told me that they want to serve as missionaries like us one day. Love finding those great, humble, noble souls that just want to give the Lord all they have. I'm super excited! we met a great guy who is the husband of one of our investigators he's a Staff Sergeant in the Malawian Army and the two of us instantly bonded and had a huge talk that reminded me of me and my boys at home talking all about Army life, PT and how he had been deployed across Africa on peace- keeping missions and even had worked with U.S Specail Forces. Just some good ole grunt talk but he's super interested and as a man who lives a life of discipline and duty I think he would be a great future leader for the church here in Lilongwe so I am really praying that he will progress.

 Another thought i had is we are teaching a great young man who was born the same week as I was. Two people born the same time on opposite places of the world, raised completely different and now our paths are crossing because of the gospel...man Our heavenly father's plan is amazing. Meeting this guy really made me refelct a lot on my life and how different it has been up to this point. You know the world's an interesting place and the more i've seen how different things are it's funny because the people are still the same. These people are great. They have a lot of problems here and life is not easy but i am seeing what the love of the savior can do and it's increadible.

We have a busy week ahead with a lot of people to see, we really want to go out and rescue all of the less active people here (there are man) and bring them back we also got authoriziation to help our branch begin English classes so we will be helping them run that.

 Funny moment the other night we where relaxing before bed and i was watching 17 Miracles and of course that movie always manages to rip your heart open so im sitting there all teary eyed and then the Zone leaders stroll in to drop off some teaching materials and they're like wooah Elder did you just get a dear John. man funny moment we all had a good laugh. So yea all is well here and I love you a lot

with love from the muddy streets of malawi

Elder stefan Lusk

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AL

Audrey Lusk <lusk.family@outlook.com>

Are You John the Baptist?, If I Can Just Get to Shore, Goats, She Gave it All In English, I Love My Mission, Over the River and Good Old Times

Hey family! Man, did we have a week full of miracles and tender mercies! It was the type of week I came on a mission for. As we have been praying and working hard to get our area back up to being productive,  i've seen so many prayers answered. We taught more lessons this week than i've ever taught in one week on my mission. We met more people in one week than I ever have. We had a baptism and two people interviewed for next week! Let me slow down a bit and take it from the beginning.
 First, we had a very powerful lesson with a man who has changed his life A LOT since we first met. The first time we met, he was supper drunk and thought I was John the Baptist.......yea fun times but now I see a humble man who's coming to church and changing his life to follow the Savior...priceless. And because of his example we are now teaching his neighbor. One miracle leads to another.
We had a big break through spiritually with a man  we had been seeing for a long, long time and now he's being baptized next week.
 We had a man tell us of the dream he had where he was drowning than saw a man holding the Book of Mormon on the shore and he thought if he can get to the book he will live...is our Heavenly Father cool or what?
. We had an investigator tell us how he had given his grocery money to a beggar because he felt thats what Jesus would do then come home to find his cousin from the village had come and brought a whole goat for dinner....Blessed are the kind for they shall receive unexpected blessings.
 Finally, the little girl we had been teaching was baptized and it was so sweet. She came out of the water just laughing and giggling and I saw this little daughter of God the way He see's her. Then she supersised me with a sweet gift: she stood up to bear her testimony and gave it all...in English! She hadn't spoken any English the whole time I taught her but her uncle told me she had been practicing for days so she can say her testimony so I could understand....man when I heard that i was almost brought to tears.
 Don't know if i've said this yet but I love my mission. It's great. Sure there are plenty of frustrations, dropped lessons, drunks calling me Mzungu everywhere I go, flies going crazy, and endless miles in my already worn thin shoes but I love every second of it....ok maybe not in the moment but it makes for good laughs later.
 So, funny story this week: we were going to the far end of our area and needed to cross a bridge (dad here's how engineering is this side of the world)  and due to all the rains this all wood bridge now over a high fast moving river is little more than some thin worn, bouncy, half missing boards. looks like something out of Indiana Jones cool eh? Wrong. When you realize...thats the only way to my next lesson. Elder Chawaguta spent like ten minutes trying to tell me to go on the bridge while im saying he's crazy, looking in vain for another way to cross, and considering dropping the appointments and getting laughed at by all the malawians sitting around enjoying the entertainment. Finally  he hit my pride with "hey I thought youre like this tough future American soldier captain america man"...yea good old pride and patriotism can get me pretty passionate so I hand him my bag and sprint across the bridge as fast as I can. it was bouncy and going side to side bending under my feet as i go all the while my comp calmly waltzes across shaking his head and laughing...good old times.

well as I said faith and action brings miracles

so take it easy back home and dont take things for granted

love Elder Lusk

Off We Go, Building Bamboo Fences, and "Never Let Your Prayin Knees Get Lazy"

Hey fam! We had another great week here in Lilongwe. First of all it rained a lot this week starting last Monday when our whole zone was stuck inside a tiny internet shop waiting for the rain to stop. On Tuesday we had a zone Family Home evening with the Kupu's and the Hull's. It was a total blast that included a pretty goofy game of dares where I ended up having to act out an African animal. The night was a blast and ended with a proper American BBQ (best burger I've had in a long time). Super funny moment  when President Kupu stands up and is like "so when we sang Families Can Be Together Forever I noticed that everyone was smiling ear to ear when we sang about being married in the temple......Elders lock your hearts,,,," man i've never seen a room bust up laughing that hard before!  fun times.

 Teaching wise, me and Elder Chawaguta seriously put in some work this week. Our area had been super busy but then dropped off the last few weeks due to transfers and holidays and we were seriously in need of lessons and new investigators...lots of them. So off we go hitting the muddy streets of Kauma. We had been praying hard to find people and man did we find. We met 10 new people this week and have several more we need to contact. We contacted everyone from sitting on the bus, calling old names in the area book, and meeting extended families of recent converts. The real blessing came with one of them we met. He was a referral from some other missionaries and we met him and his lovely wife. They are so kind, they speak English and absolutely love the gospel. As we taught the first lesson, the father just had this look of complete peace and love on his face and kept asking questions then saying quietly to himself "its true". man we are so excited for them it's great. We also had a great visit with one of my favorite members and his family where we talked about the blessings of uniting our families through prayer, scripture study and service..great time i love the strength this man has. We also got to do some service as a district and built a bamboo fence at the home of one of our members which was actually a lot of fun. The week ended nicely with four investigators coming to church and then our branch discussed the 2017 Africa southeast area plan which has a big emphasis on service, reactivation, and temples.

 Last night me and Elder Chawaguta had a good time eating his huge dinner (seriously Zimbabweans cook like crazy I had to up the intensity of my morning workouts because it was showing on my waist) and watching our collection of cheesy 80's seminary videos. We have another busy week ahead with atleast one baptism planned...maybe two...we'll see. But yea lot's of work to do and the way time is flying it seems sometimes like there is not enough time to do it all. Lots of love here "stay chill, have fun, keep the commandments, be humble and kind"-Tim Mcgraw and" never let your prayin knees get lazy and love like crazy"-Lee Bryce (had to throw some country music references in there

love

Elder Lusk 

Hosting the Mayor of Lilongwe, Pledging their Support, 17 Baptisms on Christmas Eve and Johnny Cash

Ok here it goes what a week it has been. The whole week was pretty crazy. Still trying to juggle three combined areas as a tripanionship but we had some good lessons despite the crazy schedule.

Most of our time was spent preparing for the Christmas open house that we hosted on Christmas eve. We cleaned the entire building and had to empty the pool out so we could refill it with water for baptisms bucket at a time and we all got sun burned in the processes. We then spent another couple hours decorating the place and filling it with the Christmas spirit . The activity itself was a huge success we had over 200 people come enjoy music, food, games, and a santa visit. We also hosted the mayor of Lilongwe and his press who pledged their support to our missionary efforts here which is a really great opportunity for the church in Malawi.
To top it off we, as a zone, we had 17 baptisms as a gift for the Savior. I was very privileged to baptize our own Christmas miracle in the kindest and most loving man here who had been investigating the church for over five years. It was just amazing to be a part of. then after words me and my companions went crazy and blew through some dough on junk food and had a merry little Christmas Eve.
On Sunday morning we had a very small turn up at church but there was a special spirit as we sang and I got to speak to the faithful few at our branch.Then we went out to the senior couples house for a celebration and had a lazy Christmas Sunday afternoon were I ate way too much (I need to as i'm going back to my old flat that never has power) and I ended up sitting with Elder Hull our senior missionary as he strummed the guitar and we sang a ton of old Johnny Cash.
As far as transfer news: Turns out i'm staying here in Lilongwe and Elder Tidwell will be heading to Blantyre. I haven't confirmed it but I think my new companion is Elder ketchum's previous companion so im excited i've heard good things about him he's from Zimbabwe.
 Anyway I love you all sooo much! may this next year bring all smiles, laughs, and many good memories. I know i am looking forward to my only full calender year out on a mission and all the miracles that are in store.

with love 

Elder lusk