"The holiday season is wonderful as a missionary!"

Hi Everyone!

This week has been a really good week! We had a lot of really good experiences. It has been very interesting.

We have some investigators and member who are struggling, so pray for them!

We went and talked to Widlyne, who is 20. She is the one who has been smoking and doing all of that stuff. She is super busy and it is hard to get her to sit down with us. She has school every day and she has work a ton, many weeks on Sundays. We saw her twice this week: once on Wednesday and once on Saturday. We saw her on Tuesday and she said that she is not doing well on quitting with smoking. She also admitted that she hasn't been trying super hard. She knows the doctrine and reasons why it is wrong, and why it won't make her happy, but she still has a hard time giving up the habits. We talked about God's plan for her and how we will all be able to live with our families and a spouse who loves us if we just do what God asks us to do. She told us that smoking is taking a toll on her health too. She doesn't feel as good, and her throat hurts more and more lately. She was even coughing up blood the other day. She has been smoking since she was fourteen, so it is hard for her to quit. We were talking to her brother Junior, who is a baptized member, and he told us this week that she had gone over to her boyfriend's house for the night.  She hasn't been doing too well. When we went over on Saturday, she told us that she had just finished smoking a cigarette before we had come. I asked her if she had any more. She said no, but as I kept on asking, she eventually said that she did have some left. She brought them out, and we asked her if she would rip them up. We dug a hole and buried the ripped up cigarettes in the ground. Junior keeps on telling us that trying to get her baptized is a waste of time and that she doesn't want to change. He doesn't have the confidence in her to believe she can, but we always point out that he used to be in that situation at one point and he overcame it. We are trying to help him be more supportive of her. Edeline, their mom, is very supportive of her. Edeline is a recent convert too.

Wow, the Creole part of the ward has grown so much since I got here. Mesidor, Moisena, Peter, Isenada, Claudia, Junior, Edeline, Vely, and Jaleel have all been baptized by the four Creole Elders since I have gotten here. And there are many more from when Elder Anderson and Elder Bolz were together. The hardest part is retention though. Some of the Creole members don't have cars, so they don't come to church. Or some of them like the church a lot, but they get caught up in other things that are going on in their lives. There are a ton of Creole members though. There was one week when we had 25 people in Creole class, which isn't even everyone there. We have a lot of good Haitian members. Anyway, Widlyne hasn't been reading her scriptures or praying, so she won't be able to succeed and overcome these problems unless she does that. She told us that she feels horrible right now in her life. We testified of the atonement and how Jesus Christ can help her overcome all of her temptations, because he felt them and overcame them too in the Garden of Gethsemane. She said that she wished she could do certain parts of her life over again. We told her that she could have a new start through the suffering of Jesus Christ. I know that is true. The atonement is so powerful and far-reaching. If we used it to the full extent it was meant to be used, Satan would be done for. I heard someone say that the only principle you have to be perfect at is repenting, because if you repent every day and truly turn to God, he can help you have that change of heart and turn away from all darkness. We also told Widlyne about staying in good places and not getting into situations where she can be tempted. She said that she bought cigarettes with extra money that she had with her. We told her to only bring enough money to take the bus to work and take it back, so that she wouldn't be able to. If she did, she wouldn't be able to get home. She told us that she smoked 16 cigarettes in one day. That is a ton! Please keep Widlyne in your prayers. She is in great need of help.

We have also been working with Jener, who is a 21 year old Haitian who is trying to learn English. He speaks it well enough to get by, and his vocabulary is pretty high, but he has difficulty remembering things. It is really hard for him. I think he has dyslexia too, because it is super hard for him to read, and he mixes up letters in a word. He loves learning English with us. He has been coming to the English class at the church every Tuesday night. He goes to an English class in a local college so he can learn too. It is hard, because he can't read French or Creole at all, and he can hardly read English, so he is not getting in his daily scripture study. We took some lessons to read out of the Bible and the Book of Mormon with him, but he can only read one or two verses. We just help him with his pronunciation and help him learn more vocabulary in the scriptures. Being able to read in the scriptures will help him so much. We tried one lesson where we read the scriptures to him in Creole. I think that helped. We will probably do that more. He doesn't like that though, because he loves practicing English. He is a much more visual learner. We shared the restoration DVD with him, and he remembered a ton of details and the overall story just because he saw the DVD. He remembered it almost better than any investigator we have ever taught. We are going to bring visual aids to the lesson to talk about Faith, Repentance, and Baptism, receiving the Gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end. We are also teaching his friend Lionel now. Lionel is very interested in what we have to say and was interested in the restoration and how God restored his full Gospel back to the earth. He said he had noticed how so many different religions say so many different things.

The holiday season is wonderful as a missionary! We have many ward activities, which are helping the members to socialize and help our investigators. We are going to have a relief society dinner program on Thursday. Hopefully we can get as many of the Haitian women as possible. Edeline really wants to go. The problem is that she lives in Coral Springs and all of the members in Coral Springs go to the Coral Springs Ward. All the Haitian members who are out of the Ward boundary, but still in the stake boundary go to our ward, because it is one of the four magnet wards in the mission. There is one in Fort Lauderdale, Boynton Beach, Miami, and Coconut Creek. The problem with that is that most Haitians don't have cars because they can't afford it. Many Haitians we meet don't even have jobs. There are so many unemployed people down here.

The mission is having a ton of meetings and devotionals this month. I can't remember all of the dates, but this week we won't be out Procelyting as much because of it. We are having a mission luncheon and we have a Sunday night devotional with a special speaker.

Last night was the First Presidency Christmas devotional when the Prophet and his two counselors speak. President Hale said to only go if we had an investigator. None of our investigators said they could go, so we were both really sad that we wouldn't be able to see it. But then Wendy, one of our investigators texted and said she could go to it. It was almost 8:00 when the devotional was about to start. We were happy because she would at least be able to see 40 minutes of the program that was being broadcast to the church. We taught someone yesterday that Elder Anderson found while he and I did splits. We had two members of the church with us, so I went and taught Jener with Brother Poor, who owns Chick-fil-a and lets us eat their for free. :) Elder Anderson was with Peter Septembre, a recent convert. The people that Elder Anderson had found were four obnoxious Haitian girls. That was such an annoying lesson. They were not taking us seriously at all. Elder Anderson was irritated too. It wasn't completely horrible though. They did listen some of the time and learn some stuff. They also had satellite and BYUTV, so they watched the whole Christmas devotional at home, and they texted us back and said that one of them wanted us to go and pray with her one day. It was pretty awesome. But anyway, Wendy went to the church, and we left Mama Julien's house (Mama Julien is a Haitian member who makes food for the missionaries to take home every Sunday night. She is so funny and nice. All the missionaries call her Mama Julien.) We were at her house and helped her find the place on LDS.org where the devotional was being broadcast. We made sure it was in the right language, and then we took the food and headed off to the church. (The Broadcast was live in tons of languages, including Haitian Creole and French. Except the Creole one didn't have visual and the French one did. It was kind of weird. Many Haitians speak both French and Creole, so it works. French is the official Language in Haiti, but you don't hear it out in the streets at all. Not every Haitian speaks French. Many don't. French is formal and is only used in the schools in Haiti. You have to speak and write in French in the Haitian schools or else you get punished. Many Haitians read French because Creole wasn't a written language for a very long time. For a long time, the spelling wasn't set. But Creole is more used in certain parts of Haiti and more and more people have come to read it. But Creole is so much fun! Elder Anderson went to eat at Burger King before a lesson we had, and there were two Haitian women working there. We talked to them for a long time and they thought it was awesome. There are a few Creole sayings that we tell many Haitians and they laugh really hard. They think it is funny when we tell them the Geography of Haiti and all of the Haitian food that we know and like, especially considering that we are American and have never been to Haiti before. There are several streets in our area that are mostly Haitian. One of the ones that we spend the most time on is Riverside in Coral Springs. Peter used to live there. Everyone has seen us and knows that we speak Creole. Many of the Haitians there wave to us. There are certain people that will ask us for money. Many Haitians ask us for food or money. We have to tell them that we can't. Some of them will ask us for money every time we see them.

Anyway, Wendy came to the Christmas Devotional which was being broadcast at the church, but the sound wasn't working because of technical difficulties. We decided to teach her a lesson with Sister Hindman. It was good.

Here is an excerpt of my letter to president. I am adding it because it tells some more of the stuff that is going on:

We have had a very successful week. We have been doing many AMT's and have been helping many of the recent converts. We have started sending out scripture texts to our investigators and members to help them get more of the Book of Mormon into their lives, and also to remind them to read. We have seen how we have been able to increase many people's faith. We are also striving to find members to come out with us not just for the sake of raising numbers, but also to find someone who can meet the needs of a specific investigator. Seth Poor, the Elders Quorum president came out with us to see Jener Louis and his friend Lionel. I went with brother Poor, while Elder Anderson went out with Peter Septembre, a recent convert. The double exchange went very well. Brother Poor was able to connect well with Jener and Lionel. Jener now has his phone number, and Brother Poor will come with us again to see them on Tuesday. Plus he lives really close to Jener's house. We are hoping that this can create a lasting bond with them.

We have had trouble being exactly obedient to certain rules, but we are striving to tighten it all up and make sure we are doing better as a companionship. We are especially trying to make sure our day to day activities fit into our purpose better.

Elder Anderson is a great missionary! He loves the Gospel, relates well to everyone we meet, and knows what things are most important. He is an obedient, hardworking missionary! He understands his purpose well and I am learning a lot from him. I am so grateful for the two great companions that I have had out in the mission field so far. I love the Coconut Creek ward! The members are so wonderful, and God is greatly blessing us with much success! It isn't perfect, but there are good things happening.

We are helping an investigator, Widlyne, to get baptized, who is the sister and daughter of two of our recent converts. We are helping her overcome addictions and helping her overcome them through the power of the Atonement. We bore testimony to her on how we can always change and how the Atonement creates a new start in our lives. We told her that reading the Book of Mormon, praying, and going to church will be the key to her conversion and change, because those things will help her have the spirit and added protection of God necessary to overcome her horrible habits.

Well, I have to go now. I will talk to you all later. Bye!

Love,

Elder Seamons

P.S. Grandma and Aunt Laurie, and everyone! I did get all of your packages and cards. Thank you so much!