WEEK 80

SALUT LES ENFANTS. COMMENT ÇA VA? Je vais bien:) j'ai passé une très bonne semaine qui était rempli des miracles et les expériences spirituelles. Combien nous sommes béni en tant qu'aux enfants de notre père céleste! Cette semaine j'ai pu voir qu'il y a beaucoup d'entre vous qui prie pour mes ami de l'église et moi, et pour cela je suis très reconnaissant:) ça m'a touché cette semaine de voir comment le seigneur répond à nos prières. Ça m'a frappé cette semaine que mon anniversaire c'est le moi prochain! Et donc je voulais vous prévenir, je vais vous demander tous, au lieu de m'envoyer les colis pour mon anniversaire, je vais demander pour l'argent haha parce que j'ai que 5 mois qui reste en mission et je veux acheter les vêtements français pour attirer les filles;) lol mais oui! Donc ça c'est ce que je veux pour mon anniversaire cette année:) merci à tous!! Voilà ma semaine!  (HI CHILDREN. How is it going? I'm well :) I spent a very good week that was filled with miracles and spiritual experiences. How much we are blessed as the children of our Heavenly Father! This week I have seen that there are many of you that pray for my friends of the Church and me, and for this I am very grateful :) it touched me this week to see how the Lord answers our prayers. It struck me this week that my birthday is up next! And so I wanted to warn you, I'm going to ask you all, instead of send me packages for my birthday, I'll ask for money haha because I have 5 months remaining on a mission and I want to buy french clothing to wear for the girls;) lol but yes! So that is what I want for my birthday this year :) thank you all! This is my week!)

LUNDI SOIR

well there isn't too much to tell about what happened tonight. The Mazy's were sick today and yesterday so not only did they not come to church, but they didn't come to family home evening either. And because of that, Claudette was not able to come either:( Emmanuel has school every Monday and Wednesday night so he can't ever come, but Claudette came last week cause the Mazy's went and picked her up. So that was a bummer that neither of them were there:( but we had FHE still and it went well. Elder Nelson gave us a lesson on Christlike attributes and then we got a ride home with the Badoux's! When we got home we were planning for our day tomorrow and we called Emmanuel and Claudette to see how they were doing and spent a good 10 minutes talking with them and laughing. They're pretty much like family haha they spent the time asking how our families were doing and how our day was and when the next time we could come over was. #friends4ever

MARDI

today was a blast! So a few nights ago we got a call from our district leader informing us that they changed the way we were going to do district meeting. They told us that district meeting would now be held at every ville in the district at least once a transfer, and that after we had eaten that the rest of the district would spend the rest of the day in that ville and do some work! Which is awesome, just in case you are wondering haha cause can you imagine having one area with 8 missionaries??? Haha I was pretty happy about that! So this morning we woke up and got ready to head out to catch our train to Nivelles. When we got there me and Nelson had to go and buy bread for our side dish for the meal and do we went and did that and then got to the other guys apartment and we were assigned a new companion for the day and we went out and did some work until lunch time. I went with elder McDonald and again, like always, we had a blast. Hahah I just love that kid! The whole time we were laughing and having fun. I was telling him how weird it was that all my soeurs went home and he was telling me how weird it is that I go home in 5 months.....haha we had a blast though. We talked to a lot of people and I was honestly surprised how many people actually knew who we were! A lot of times people either think that we are the Jehovah's Witnesses or the Amish, but today every time people were like ya I know who you are, they were like, you're the Mormons! Haha so that was sweet. We then went in for our lesson for district meeting and elder McDonald told us that our district was leading the mission in numbers! EVERY companionship has 1 or more investigators with a baptismal date and so that was fun to know!! He gave us a lesson on baptism and why it is important to help our investigators plan and prepare for it now and it was really good. Then we ate and went out to work again. It was cold and rainy and because of that there was next to no one in the ville and so me and elder McDonald decided to go and do some afternoon porting. We went and knocked doors and during the whole afternoon we were talking about Reims cause he served in Reims, just after I left, for 6 months and we both LOVE it there. Apparently they had quite the fun apartment too....I guess all the elders were like best friends and they all had a blast all the time together and so I was a little sad that I missed that, but oh well. I STILL LOVE REIMS!! We then went and got kebabs for dinner and while we were ordering I got a call from the ZLs and they were telling us that they were very impressed with the numbers that we got last week, (like our lessons and all that stuff) and they wanted to tell us that they were proud of what we were doing. So that was cool! Then we went back to their apartment and we ate and then me and Nelson had to go and catch a train home for the night. We contacted our way back to the apartment and planned and then I called Emmanuel and Claudette to see how they were doing and we talked and there is a funny thing to tell, and a cool thing! Funny thing: Emmanuel asked if we had eaten fries today and I said I hadn't but elder Nelson did and that I got a kebab and Claudette goes, 'LIBBY. That is not good for your health.....' And Emmanuel responds, 'it's ok!....... We all are going to die.....' HAHAHAHAHA lol. Cool thing: last night while I was praying, I asked HF to help me know how to help Claudette find a new job and immediately the grocery store just in front of their house came to mind. So I asked Claudette if she'd ever thought about working there, to which she responded, 'That is a GREAT idea!!! I didn't even think about that! I'm going to go in tomorrow to see if they are hiring!' Hahah so we'll just have to see!! The Lord will answer prayers!!!

MERCREDI

Well today was a decent day!! I love it when I see that I've been able to help people out and see the spirit work in people. It's just a great feeling, and if you haven't experienced it, I highly recommend that you find someone and let it happen. So today we had to get up and have our studies.....or at least some of them! Haha we had a rdv with this potential investigator that we met a few weeks ago who is a lawyer at the university here. He told us he works and the only time he would be able to see it would have to be at his work during the morning hours. So we went out and met with him. We got there and he invited us into his office and we started to talk. We asked him all about how he had met with the missionaries before and he had the Book of Mormon to prove it! Haha he said that he'd read a little bit but that he thought it was a bummer how there was no proof of the plaques still on earth. He was all, how do we know that this Joseph Smith didn't just make this story up?? Haha I was all that's where your faith comes in brotha. Anyway we asked him if we could come back and have some more rdvs and tell him more about our message, and he said that he wanted to read and that work is super stressful for the moment and that we could call him around the end of March........so we'll see what happens. We then came home and had somewhat of a comp study and figured out what we needed to do for the day and then we went off to lunch with Patrick. It was really fun today. Honestly eating with him is something that I honestly look forward to every week haha. It's such a blast and the pasta really is the best pasta in the world!!! Anyway, after lunch with him we had to go home cause we needed to call the ward missionaries and ask if they could come to a rdv with our recent convert and they needed her address so we went home and found that and then we went and contacted until our rdv with her. We got to her house and the ward missionaries showed up and then we walked up to her apartment and got to her place and walked in and guess who was there??? Chung......haha he had come to sit and drink some drinks from her and ya.....so we were like ummm ok. So there were 5 of us in her apartment to teach her....so we tried to talk about our life on earth and the atonement, but we couldn't get past our life on earth cause she kept talking hahah so after about an hour and a half, we left her to get home for dinner. We came home and ate and then I got a feeling we needed to go to this one area to port. So we went and hopped on a bus and got out to this one area and started knocking doors! During the time we were porting, we got: 2 lessons taught, 4 passbacks, and 2 new investigators! The 2 new investigators are a married, middle-aged couple who were super nice!!!! They let us in and were asking questions about Joseph smith and it was super cool!! As we were explaining prophets, the wife was like like, 'that makes sense. God needs a prophet on the earth. That is totally true.' And I was like WOOOO!!! Then they asked us about church and how it worked and so we explained it all and when I explained about priesthood and relief society and how in the family men and women have different roles, again, the wife goes, 'I LOVE that! I totally agree and I want to come and see that. I can't this Sunday, but I am coming to see that.' Haha! We are going to see them next Wednesday:) the lord prepares souls!!

JEUDI

today went by so fast. We had so many rdvs and it went by so dang fast. But that is how you have a good day and I'm always grateful for busy days. So this morning we got up and we went running haha........then we got home and we started our studies and for the first time this whole week, we got a whole session of NORMAL studies!! Haha that honestly is the best, you all have no idea. We got all of our studies out of the way and then we went contacting. We went on this one road and contacted like everyone and got a couple numbers and even got to pray with one lady on the side of the street!! So that is always a good day. We contacted this one girl who was on her way to the pool cause she was a swimmer and I was like hey I was a swimmer for 10 years before my mission and she was all well come with me and we can go do some laps in the pool!! I was like.....haha I wish......words can't explain how much that pool misses me and how badly I just want to jump in somewhere and start to swim again!!!! AHHH THE TEMPTATION IS SO REAL. Anyway, we got home and ate lunch and then went to our rdv that we had with our new investigator from last week, Virginie! Her and her boyfriend were both there today and so it was cool to teach them both. We just re-taught the restoration and it went well. We also answered all their questions and then they told us that next week she is starting an internship and he is going to be looking for a job so we couldn't fix an exact rdv for a next week, but we'll see when we see them again if that turn out to be anything. After that, we went and contacted and then had another rdv with this investigator that we found a long time ago and had always forgotten to fix a rdv...but we finally got one!!! So we got to his apartment and taught the restoration all the way up to Joseph Smith and asked him what he thought and he told us that he was convinced that that was true! He said that everything we were saying to him rang clear and that he had no questions!! Then....we asked if he'd be baptized if he came to know the truth and he didn't say yes or no....he said that for the past few years he'd been thinking of baptism and so he'd been thinking about it and then left us off like that. So we'll see next week when we go back!! Then we contacted until dinner and came in and ate and then went to Emmanuel and Claudette's for the night. They had heard something about some missionaries writing their testimonies in the investigators Books of Mormon and so they asked us to do that and Claudette told us that she was keeping that in her 'Heritage' which I think means like personal affairs and she said she's gonna keep it forever and pass it down to her children when she dies. It was honestly kind of touching haha. We then taught them tithing and explained why it was important and why we do it and they both accepted and said that they were excited to be able to get the blessings like members when they pay tithing. It was a good rdv! It touches me how they are so willing to change. Claudette always tells us, I know it's true, so I'll follow it. It's amazing! Miracle of the day!!: thanks to YOUR prayers and the help of our Heavenly Father, another prayer has been answered and a new opportunity has arrived!!!! This whole time, we have been praying for Claudette to find a new job, cause Emmanuel isn't yet legal in Belgium, so he can't work. He found, from a friend, an agency that took refugees and put them through a training for a few weeks, and then guaranteed a job, if they qualified for the training! So he went and looked into it and starting March 7, he starts training and gets a guaranteed job in this program after a couple weeks of training!!!!!!!!!!! That's not even the best part. Because of this, Claudette can quit her job, they can BOTH come to church on Sunday's, AND his training pays him, covers travel cost, AND will support a nursery so that Claudette can go and get a job when she needs to!!!!!!!!!!!! God is too good!!!!!!!!! Thank you all for the prayers on their behalf. I can't tell you how great it is to see the lord preparing their way to enter into his church here on earth!!

VENDREDI

Today was a day full of planning.....hahah so that was fun I guess....weekly planning is not always something that I look forward to. If you haven't been able to tell from the past year and a half haha! At district meeting this last week, we were told that president Babin wanted us to go through our area books and update everything and put ALL old information into one area book and make an area book for 2016. So we were to have 2 area books. So me and Nelson decided that today was the day that we did it. So not only did we weekly plan, but we got our area books started.......but anyway we got up this morning and we did some studies and then we bounced out to go and try to do some work for the day, cause we knew that besides our rdv with Emmanuel and Claudette we would be inside the apartment all day haha. I was determined to find someone!!! Sadly we only got a couple of phone numbers, but you can bet your bottom dollar that I am going to call them!!! On the way inside, elder Nelson decided that he wanted to run to the little convenience store behind the apartment and get a baguette for lunch. So we went and did that, and as we were checking out, you will never guess what I saw..... Haha I found a French version of AIRPLANE!!! Haha so OBVIOUSLY I couldn't not buy it. And plus it was only 5€ so...It's currently sitting right next to my bed. Lol don't worry I won't watch it til I get home! So we then came in and ate some lunch and then got to weekly planning. We had a really good session and got all planned for for this next week that we needed to and we are going to have a great week. We then went in and started to attack that MONSTER of an area book! I kid you not. Cleaning out that thing was close to death haha! We had to sort through EVERY paper, looking to see if there was an address or number, seeing if it needed to go in the new or old area book, sorting through old investigators and new, and recent converts and less actives, trying to find baptismal records..........AH. It was fun. I would totally go back and do it again. And lucky us! We didn't even get to finish cause we had to go down and meet up with the Mazy's for our rdv with Emmanuel and Claudette. Tonight we taught the word of wisdom and we were really worried about this one cause we know that they drink tea and coffee and so we were worried, but thankfully the Mazy's were there and were able to testify along with us of how much it helps and why it's a good law! They told us they'd start to live it:) after the rdv they mentioned going to get frites and I was all oohh! We'll come with you guys! And they were all ok! We'll buy since you guys have bought the past couple times! Haha so we went and got frites:) it was a fun night. As we were walking in the door elder Nelson goes, 'this is getting to be a problem. It's getting to be that I don't even have to pay for frites anymore. They just come!!!' Haha I died I thought it was hilarious.

SAMEDI

Today went by like a blur!!! Haha it was really good though. I guess. Haha now that I think about it, we just had one lesson, but that's ok haha #everbodyhasthosedays #namethesong haha well anyway we woke up this morning and got our studies done and then we went and did some contacting. So during studies today we heard a BANG. And we turned around to look and see and it just so happened to be that my bag had died. He lived a good life. My bag was a saint. But he's in a better place now. We felt a little sad and mad at first so we made a crime scene out of it and left it for the rest of the week. Gotta have fun sometimes eh??;) We had to go and renew our bus passes for the month of March, which is super weird. Can you believe that I've already been here in Namur for 2 months?? That is so crazy! So ya we went and did that and then we went and contacted home and came in to take lunch. After lunch we had fixed a rdv with Emmanuel and Claudette and the Mazy's and today was the fun lesson;) haha we used the BIG BOY words today, cause we were teaching the law of chastity, and I told Nelson that he could use them if he wanted;) (for those of you who don't know, the big boy words are things like pornography and masturbation and stuff like that, cause we need to explain to them that those things are against the law of chastity and the first time explaining it is REALLY awkward saying those words. Now I just think it's fun;) lol) so anyway elder Nelson told me he wanted to try it;) HAH ITS SO FUNNY. I know I'm like 2 years old. Anyway we had a really good rdv with them and taught them the law of chastity and talked about priesthood as well. It went really well. A couple days ago, we had told them about the movie meet the Mormons on YouTube and so today they told us that they had watched it and that they loved it and Emmanuel was talking about Gale Halverson and how that was his favorite story and how he thought it was really cool how he threw the chocolate out the airplane and then he goes, 'then he got the idea to put the chocolate in parachutes! THAT is an idea from god if there ever was one!' I died. So anyway after all that, we taught the law of chastity and we got talking about the importance of the priesthood and Emmanuel and Claudette are just getting so excited for Emmanuel to have the priesthood. Haha Claudette is so excited to be able to ask for blessings. It was a great rdv! We then came home and we went and tried to get all the area book cleaned out but it didn't really happen.....we were so close, but yet so far! That thing is a beast. So after we'd been doing that for an hour or so we went and had dinner and then went out to go and port up a neighborhood. It was alright tonight. Haha there was this one lady who yelled at me through her door telling me that I was a crazy for being out so late....it was 8:05 hahaha we then came home for the night.

DIMANCHE

Well today was ward conference and it was really well! We almost missed the bus this morning when we were headed out to church, but we ran! Haha we looked at the phone in the apt at 8:25 and the bus passes outside at 8:30 so we ran! Lol we got to church and Emmanuel and Claudette showed up early and we went and got our seats and then conference started. It was a great conference and we had a really good talk given by our stake president. It was great! It's been 6 years since we got a new bishop and so we all kind of thought that we were going to get a new bishop today, but that didn't happen. So church went really well and we had some good lessons throughout the day. In the investigators class we learned about obedience to the commandments and then in priesthood we went and had a lesson on the temple and it was really good as well. After church we were talking to members and got a few of them to invite of over this week! So that rocks haha. I really do like the members here. It has been so much fun to be here! So anyway after that we went and got a ride home with E&C and then came in and took lunch. We weren't really that hungry, so instead of eating we watched a bunch of the 12 steps to change videos that I had downloaded on my iPad during church. It was fun haha then after we got changed and then headed out to go contacting until we had fixed this rdv with this potential investigator at the gare and so we went and waited there for about a half hour and tried to call him a couple of times but he never answered and so when we'd waited for such a long time, and nothing, we just left and I guess we'll wait to see if he calls back another time. We left and hopped on a bus and went out to a neighborhood to go porting in this one neighborhood where we have a less active that we'd met once before and so we went and knocked on his door and he didn't answer and so we just went and knocked on some doors! We weren't really having any success and then on the last door we knocked on this last door we had this one guy answer.....IN HIS WHITEY TIGHTIES! Hahaha I was all this is going to be great, and then he let us in to pray! Hahaha and then, him and his wife invited us back next Saturday! Hahaha so that is going to be really fun. We came home and I made a few calls tonight cause I wanted to:) I called Sylviane, Jean Parfait, and Soeur Foutrein from Dunkerque. It was fun to be able to hear from them all. They are all doing well! Jean Parfait's papers were all accepted and he's getting through a big internship where he's going to be a firefighter/ambulance dude! He's so funny. As soon as I was like its elder Libby, he goes, LIBBY!!! YOU LEFT ME FOR A WHILE! What's up?! Lol I died. He's a great guy and was SO happy when I told him of E&C haha!

Bien! C'est comme ça. Une semaine est déjà passée! Il est un peu difficile à croire! Ceci est déjà la troisième semaine du transfert ... comment cela est possible! Eh bien merci encore pour toutes vos prières et votre soutien. Le temps passe! Continuer à garder la foi :) souvenez vous que notre Père céleste vous aime. J'ai entendu une citation qui me plaisait aussi. La région où j'ai commencé ma mission, Metz est dans une région appelée la région Lorraine. Les gens là-bas sont connus pour être froid et difficile à se faire des amis, mais j'ai entendu une citation qui dit: Vous n'êtes jamais seul dans la vie si un Lorrain vous aime. Haha sachez donc que ce Lorrain vous aime!:) passez une bonne semaine! :) (Ok! It is like that. A week has already passed! It is a little hard to believe! This is already the third week of the transfer... how this is possible! Well thanks again for all your prayers and your support. Time passes! Continue to keep the faith :) remember that our heavenly father loves you. I heard a quote that I liked also. The region where I began my mission, Metz is in a region called the Lorraine region. The people there are known to be cold and difficult to make friends, but I heard a quote that says: you're never alone in life if a Lorrain loves you. Haha so be aware that this Lorrain loves you! :) have a good week! :)

Elder Libby

 

      

WEEK 79

Je vais commencer en disant que c'est TROP bizarre de ne pas avoir tous mes sœurs missionnaires en mission.....LOL. J'ai reçu quelques mails d'eux et c'est bizarre de les voir avec leurs familles à l'aéroport....haha je vais vous dire que ça me fait TRUNKY!!! Par les uns d'entre vous qui ne parle pas missionnaire, ça veut dire que ça me fait penser beaucoup de chez moi et quand je vais rentrer;) mais je vais continuer!! J'ai encore 5 mois et demi!!:) mais bon voici ma semaine!! C'ÉTAIT INCROYABLE!!!!!  (I'll start by saying that it is too weird to not have all my Missionary Sisters in the mission... Laughing out loud. I have received a few emails from them and it's weird to see them with their families at the airport... haha I'll tell you that makes me TRUNKY! By some of you who don't speak not missionary, I mean that makes me think much of my home and when I'll return;) but I will continue! I still have 5 months and a half! :)  okay here is my week! IT WAS AMAZING!

LUNDI SOIR

So on the way home tonight we got a call from the mission office and the referrals manager told us that she had a referral from us! He lived right behind us and so we were going to go and contact him tomorrow! We got home and hurried and made some cookie dough cause the members here LOVE my cookies! They keep asking for more every week at FHE. We got to the church and had our weekly meeting with our DMP and then we started FHE. Claudette even came!!! Emmanuel had school and so we knew that he wouldn't be able to make it, so it was so good that she came:) No one had told us that they had been assigned the lesson so, us being the prepared missionaries that we are, we prepared a lesson for us:) we used the story of the horsemen that picked up pebbles cause they were commanded by a voice saying if you do it tomorrow you will be happy and sad. The next day they reached into their pockets and found that the pebbles had turned to diamonds and they were both happy and sad. Happy they had diamonds and sad they didn't have more. We had a great discussion on it! It was a super great family night.

MARDI

Today was alright. Nothing too exciting happened. OH WAIT! EMMANUEL AND CLAUDETTE HAVE A BAPTISMAL DATE! Hahaha it was such a great night and we finally got a date with them!!!!!!!!! It was an amazing rdv and it was all because of YOU and YOUR prayers and the help of the amazing members that we have here in Namur. We are truly blessed! But I'll get to that story soon. I have to start at the beginning of our day. Today we got up and had our studies and they went well. We practice taught for our lesson tonight. We had figured that we were going to be at a members house for dinner with them, and the Mazy's were coming as well and so tonight would be the best night to challenge them to a baptismal date. Then we went out contacting and talked to some interesting people, but that happens daily;) haha this one dude that we stopped was an army guy and he was telling us that we needed to prepare cause the Third World War was coming in like 2-3 months and that its all getting heated and yadayadayada....I was like ok well I don't like thinking about that stuff and so we left him with a prayer and then got going. We came in and ate lunch and then we had decided to head to the church to look at all our referrals and try to figure out how we can get to others and stuff. We found this one dude that was a Dutch speaker (we didn't know at first) and we had texted him and he texted back in Dutch and do we went to google translate!!;) haha we tried to have a conversation with him through that, but that didn't work out....he never responded after we said 'Zijn de Missionarissen van de Kerk van Jezus Christus van de Heiligen der Laatste Dagen. We kregen uw verwijzing en we wilden een ontmoeting met u. Maar we hebben geen nederlands spreken. Spreekt u Engels?' Lol don't worry I understood everything too........ha. So after we'd tried to contact them all, we headed out and contracted for the rest of the afternoon. When we'd finished we had to come into the apartment really quickly to grab some things for tonight and then we went to go and get Emmanuel and Claudette to head to dinner tonight! We got to their house and they got all ready and then we headed out the door to the Badoux's house. On the way there Emmanuel goes, 'Libby! You've gotten skinny since you got here!' YES. #LIBBYFORDAWIN we got into dinner and the Badoux's had invited the Mazy's and us and Emmanuel and Claudette and little baby Yannick:) haha we started off by eating and then we went into the lesson and it went really well. We talked about our life on earth and the atonement of Jesus Christ and elder Nelson shared a personal experience about his dad and we set the tone for the spirit. The members were then telling about how they've experienced blessings of the atonement in their lives and then Claudette shared an experience of how when the last elder left Namur they were interested/nervous about who would come in and so when I first came into their house and we were 'already friends,' it was that much easier for her to get her testimony of the gospel. She then told us all, 'I know it's all true!' To which two of the members laughed and said, 'so why aren't you baptized yet?!' And that lead into me and elder Nelson telling them that after prayer and thinking, we know they could be ready for baptism by March 20! And they looked at each other and said ok! They said they were going to work towards that!!! It was incredible!!!! Keep your prayers coming! They sure do need them still!!! A lot can happen in a month, so keep them coming! They are also talking about soon getting their daughter who is still stuck in Rwanda because of legality issues up here soon. PLEASE PRAY FOR THEM!!!! When we got home, I made my last phone call to Claire, or Soeur Walton as I sometimes refer to her;) haha we had a good time talking and got a lot cleared up. I'm super sad their all gone! But life is like that and we just have to learn and move on.

MERCREDI

today went well. Haha it was transfer day and so it went by super slow for me haha! Staying in a ville and no changes is weird....especially when it's just two of you elders! We get a little bored sometimes;) but none the less today went well. We woke up this morning and we did some studies and then we went out to go contacting. Honestly nothing too crazy happened. Except one lady told us that we could come to her house tomorrow and so we are definitely going to try that!! Hoping she didn't give us a faulty address haha! We found some other people and got a lot of them to give us phone numbers so they better watch out cause these two Mormon missionaries are going to get them;) LOL. I AM TOO FUNNY. Ok well we then came in for lunch and I was fasting so I didn't eat. I just went and wrote in my journal and smelt the food elder Nelson was making and wanted to eat some so bad haha!! We then went out and contacted until we had our rdv with Josiane our recent convert. We were just walking around and then slowly made our way to her house. After someone is baptized we have to teach them all the lessons again and so with her we are in the middle of the the plan of salvation. And she is a talker hahah so we don't get a ton taught or anything while we are there, but it's still good cause she calls us her angels tells us how thankful she is for us every time. She is a nice lady. We then went with brother Chung to this guy that didn't live too far from Josiane that he had found for us to possible teach. We went and stopped by his house and did a little type of introduction to who we are and why we actually want to come and see him and he was like ok I'll come to church sometime. Hahah so after we left we went and decided to go porting to finish off the night. We went and found an area that we hadn't been to in a while and we went and knocked doors. It really surprises me how much people are just like, no! So you even know what time it is? Haha like we are usually porting between 6-8 and people are like hello it is too late to be asking to pray with people....it doesn't make sense...haha! We then stopped by the friterie on the way home and we got some fries for dinner. I am gonna tell you that I am going to miss that so much!! Just going to a friterie and getting a cornet of frites for dinner! It's gonna be sad to not have anymore!

JEUDI

Today went by fasssttttt! Haha it's so weird to me how fast it goes...the sister missionaries that I came in with made it home today...that was weird to notice. Around 11 I realized that they were on a plane and around 8 I realized that they had landed....so weird!! So today we wanted to go to Emmanuel and Claudette's tonight with a member who had asked if she could come teaching with us, so we were trying to call Emmanuel all morning but he wasn't answering and so we just decided to go and knock on their door and ask. So we did that and they were all ya come tonight;) so we went and contacted until we had our rdv with PATRICK!!!! Haha long story short, he tried to cancel on us today because of meetings, but we worked around it and got our weekly meal with him. I honestly just love meeting with him!! He is so amazing haha! So we ate and had a good time with him and then we went out contacting until we had a rdv with the lady we met yesterday! We made our way to the address she'd given us and we knocked and she answered and let us in! We got to know her first off and she told us that she wanted us to come back and teach her more cause she's heard lots of things about the Mormon church and she wants to know if all the rumors are true or not. So we taught her and answered all her questions about the restoration and then she told us we could come back. It was a good rdv! We then left and went and contacted for the last little bit that we had until our rdv with Emmanuel and Claudette! We met up with Soeur Dewagne and we went and taught them the rest of the plan of salvation. These two are SO interested in this plan! Haha like I can't get over it. It is all they ever talk about. They keep saying things like they are finally content with knowing where they come from and why they are here and they know the goal of this life and it is just so cool to see the spirit work in them. They are so interested in this little plan that God had made for them. We then came home for dinner and ended the night with some fries and chicken

VENDREDI

Today went by in the blink of an eye....lol not kidding!! It was so fast. And it went by super fast cause we only did a couple of things today, but they took up the entire day. So I'm sorry, but just like the rest of the days this week, today will be short! We woke up this morning and had our studies and during my language study.....I ate a whole bottle of salsa.......haha thanks mom;).....#FATTYFORLYFE anyway after I had finished eating, I mean studies, we went out and we went contacting. We had found 2 more less actives that lived decently close to us and so we went and decided to go and try to find them and see if they lived there. 1 had told us he moved and the other told us that he didn't want anything more to do with us....so we told him to write a letter to the bishop and so we'll see. We then contacted all around until it was time for lunch and so we made our way in. After lunch we had to start weekly planning. BEST part of the week.....LOL I CANT EVEN SAY IT WITHOUT FEELING BAD. I am totally kidding. I do not like weekly planning. Haha we went into the study room to do it and we were in there for 4 hours. AND WE DIDNT EVEN FINISH. ahhhhh. So anyway while planning we made a list of all the less actives that we had tried to go and find during the past few weeks to give to the ward missionaries, our ward mission leader, and the secretary so they can do what they want with them and we also planned HARDCORE for our lessons next week. We are planning to go in depth with Emmanuel and Claudette and teach them the 3 big commandments next week: Word of Wisdom (which is really the only one that we think we'll have a problem with), the law of chastity, and tithing! So keep those prayers coming!!!! When we had finished we had to get going. We invited the Mazy's to come with us tonight and they told us they were going to try, but they had something else planned, so we didn't know to expect them or not. We brought my Oreos from mom cause I thought that would be fun to play the game where you put the cookie on your forehead and you have to get it down to your mouth without your hands haha! We got there and as soon as we got inside the Mazy's called and said, we are coming!!! We are stopped because of a train but we'll be there! So they came and we had a fun night! We played the Oreo game and we watched elder Nelson and Emmanuel box for a minute! Lol it was fun. We then taught repentance and it went really well. During the lesson e&c and the Mazy's asked me what my story was behind coming on a mission. So I started at the beginning and told them how it all went down and how after talking with HF, my parents, and my bishop about all my thoughts because of what happened my senior year in school, I knew I wanted to be able to save people. It was a good rdv!!! The Mazy's then gave us a ride home. It is so cool to see the spirit in these people!! I can't even explain it! They said it themselves tonight. They said, 'what you're teaching us is like a quench to our thirst. We are just thirsty and we NEED more!' It was so cool. These 2 are changing me.

SAMEDI

Well today went well as well. Honestly these past couple of weeks have just been great. There really hasn't been a day that hasn't been 'good'. I've been pretty blessed. Today I kind of felt like we didn't use our time to the fullest and we could have done more, but it wasn't necessarily our fault...the weather was nasty and we misunderstood when we had a rdv...so let me get to that. We woke up and had our studies. After we had finished, we looked outside and saw that it was nasty rainy weather and so we decided we'd finish up our weekly planning. So we did that and after we had about an hour left until our rdv. Or so we thought.....we got outside and contacted to the church and then waited for our rdv with a potential investigator named, Emmanuel;) haha so we were waiting and he never showed up, so we called him and he goes we said TROIS heures. On the phone, if you aren't really paying attention, TROIS heures (3 o'clock) sounds a lot like TREIZE heures (13 o'clock... Yes they use the military clock here, but sometimes don't at the same time....confusing I know) so we had thought he said TREIZE when he said TROIS, so we were at the chapel 2 hours early. He told us that he was sorry and he'd get there as fast as he could. So we had a while before he said he'd be there so we decided to clean the church! We swept and mopped and vacuumed and it was good. He then finally got there and we taught him a lesson on the restoration. It went well, but then we asked him if he'd be baptized if he came to know what we taught was true and sadly he said no. He told us that he was not set on the idea of one true church and that he was a part of multiple churches cause he likes them all. So that was a bummer. So we left and made our way home and by this time is was like 3:30 and we hadn't eaten since this morning and so we just cooked up a HUGE pot of pasta for lunch haha! We literally ate until our stomachs were sore. Then since it was raining still and no one was outside we just stayed in and made some calls...someone has to do it so you might as well when no one is outside right?? Anyway we were still sick to our stomachs when we saw we needed to leave for Emmanuel and Claudette's. We then realized we had told Claudette we would bring frites to our lesson tonight and she said she was going to make us all dinner! And we weren't even hungry....in fact we both were about to explode haha! So we went and got frites and then made our way to their place, and while doing so, we got SOAKED by a car who drove past us in a puddle........thanks. It was a noteworthy experience. We got to their place and ate til we about exploded and then taught them baptism, the gift of the Holy Ghost, the sacrament and enduring to the end. Claudette pretty much quoted 'Is It Still Wonderful to You?' She was all, 'enduring to the end is super important. Like there are probably so many people who make excuses like, 'I don't need to read the scriptures cause I know them all.' Or, 'I don't need to go to church cause I've learned everything.' I'm always going to stay cause I know I'll always be able to learn something knew each time.' I literally was just amazed. THEY ARE SO GOOD. And during our entire lesson I was holding Yannick cause anytime E&C tried he just cried. #babywhisperer #stillgotit #whosyadaddy

DIMANCHE

Sunday's are always a blast when you're serving the Lord!! Haha Sunday's are such a great day. Even when we are working the whole time, I still feel like Sunday's are a different kind of work. It doesn't feel like the rest of the week. Honestly, Sunday's are LITERALLY a day of rest! Haha funny how that works isn't it?? But today went well. We got up this morning and got all ready for church and then headed out and caught our bus. We got there and they had told us that we were going to have a ward council for a few minutes before church started and during it we told our ward mission plan, to have 7 baptisms by the end of the year, and told of Emmanuel and Claudette fixing a baptismal date. We had originally planned to have 12 baptisms this year but......anyway someone changed it. (Chung) hahha sorry. We then had good meetings!! Last night at Emmanuel and Claudette's house we had explained a little bit how the church meetings go and why we raise our hands to sustain things and stuff and today when the 1st counselor announced that we were going to have a baptism for Emmanuel and Claudette, they hadn't gotten to church, but after they got there, elder Nelson told them that they had just announced them getting baptized, Claudette goes, 'Oh no!!! We didn't get to raise our hands!!!' I died. Anyway the rest of church was really well. We had good meetings and then Emmanuel and Claudette's offered us a ride home and so we left with them and got home to eat. Today we didn't make a huge pot of pasta, but we made a ton of crepes cause like we didn't really have anything else! Haha so that's what we ate and it was good. I still haven't mastered them....I KNOW. IM TERRIBLE. 18 months in the land of crepes and I still haven't gotten it. Same thing with baguettes too....I still need to figure out how to make those. After we had finished eating, we did some paper work cause we had a ton of things to fill out and it had been forever since we updated the potential investigators paper. So we spent a good 45 minutes doing that and then had decided to go out to this one neighborhood that we'd ported and try and find this one potential investigator. This was like the 3rd time we'd done that and so after she didn't answer we just decided to leave her on the potentials list and not take a whole ton of time on her. We then spent the rest of our time porting and then we went and caught a bus back to Emmanuel and Claudette's house. We invited the member that took us to Chinese takeout the other week, the Paulus'! He served his mission in SLC and he speaks English and it's always fun with him. We taught the 10 commandments and the sabbath day tonight and the only problem that we found out was when Claudette gets off of maternity, she has to go back to work, and she works every Sunday, MANDATORY. So she asked us to do one thing. PRAY SHE CAN FIND A NEW JOB. So I don't wanna ask to be greedy, but if you all could start praying for that, that would do wonders for us! We're currently trying to figure out what we could do to help them. Anyway after the lesson, we went and had dinner with a couple members and it was a fun way to end the night.

Je ne peux pas croire que ça fait déjà 18 mois.... C'est TROP bizarre....mais c'est la vie LOL. Merci pour tous ce que vous faites et pour tous ce que vous êtes. Je vous demande de continuer à prier pour mes amis de l'église et pour moi. Avec les avancements que nous avons fait cette semaine, je sais que l'adversaire va continuer à travailler plus dure. Ils ont besoin des prières. Je suis très reconnaissant d'être un missionnaire pour mon père céleste et le Seigneur. Merci encore! N'oubliez jamais que je vous aime!!  (I can't believe that it's been already 18 months... This is too weird... but it's my life LOL. Thank you for all that you do and for all that you are. I ask you to continue to pray for my friends in the Church and for me. With the excitement that we have this week, I know that the adversary is going to continue to work hard. They need the prayers. I am very grateful to be a missionary for my heavenly father and Lord. Thanks again! Never forget that I love you!)

Elder Libby 

  

 

WEEK 78

BONJOUR MES AMIS! Comment ça va?? Nous avons appris que moi et Elder Nelson vont rester ensemble ici à Namur!!! Cette semaine c'était un peu bizarre pour moi. J'ai appris que la vie est quelque chose de précieuse. J'ai appris les mauvaise nouvelles de Sœur Sadie Wells, une amie de lycée, et elle et sa famille était dans mes prières toute la semaine. J'ai pris beaucoup de temps de méditer combien je suis béni. Je sais qu'elle est en paix. Je sais qu'elle continue son travaille en tant que missionnaire sur l'autre côté du voile. Je vous demande de continuer de prier pour sa famille. Cette semaine j'ai décidé que je vais faire une VINE chaque semaine jusqu'à je rentre chez moi, parce que pourquoi pas?!;) j'espère que vous allez tous pouvoir le voir, et que ça vous amuse bien;)  (HELLO MY FRIENDS! How is it going?? With transfers, we have learned that me and Elder Nelson will stay together here in Namur! This week was a little weird for me. I learned that life is something precious. I learned the sad Sister Sadie Wells news, a friend from high school, and she and her family was in my prayers all week. I took a lot of time to ponder how I am blessed. I know that she is at peace. I know that she continues his work as a missionary on the other side of the veil. I ask you to continue to pray for her family. Also, this week, I decided I'll make a VINE every week until I get home, because why not?;) I hope that you all can see it, and it amuses you well;)

My address is:

 

Les Missionaires

Elder Tanner Libby

25 Avenue Golenvaux

Namur, 5000

BELGIUM

 

LUNDI SOIR

Tonight was so good! We had our family home evening tonight and it went well. After our emails today we went home our cookie dough and then head over to the church for family home evening. We were going and accidentally hopped on the wrong bus and so we got to this random place and had to walk to the church and try and figure out on our maps app how we could get there cause we were legit in the middle of nowhere haha!! So we did that and got to the chapel and in walked Emmanuel and Claudette! They came and it was so good!! They said that they really enjoyed the fun night that we had and learned a lot from the lesson that was given. They even had me take some pictures with their little baby;) I LOVE THEM

MARDI

Today went super well!!!!!! It honestly was a super good day for the most part. We got up this morning and had to get all ready for our train into Brussels. We had all decided that we wanted to do district meeting in Brussels at the site where Jeffrey R Holland had dedicated the land of Belgium for missionary work and the progression of the church here and it was super cool!! So we all got into Brussels this morning and there was an elder in our district who has a cousin in the military who is currently deployed in Qatar, but she is on forced leave for 2 weeks and so she decided to come to Germany and Belgium to visit and had got into contact with the missionary and she came and hung out with us in Brussels for the day! Haha so that was fun to get to know someone new like that. It was also pouring rain so we went to this place to have district meeting and it was in the pouring rain and so we were just all huddled under the umbrellas that we had and it was just perfect;) lol my feet were freezing, but it is true that there was a special spirit there. It was super cool to be able to be there. We then went and had lunch at this kebab shop and as we were walking down this street to the right one, all these kebab shop owners from around the block that came outside and we're all like, 'ELDERS COME HERE!!! ELDERS COME TO MY SHOP!' Lol #missionariesownthemkebabshops it was hilarious!!! They were all like come on! And finally one of the elders were like, sorry we are going here and they all got mad that we wouldn't go to one of theirs. Lol!! We went and ate and the elders cousin was super nice to buy all our food and it was super nice!! Then we went and got some Gaufres as well and they were delicious!!! Haha I love food. Did you all know that?? We also were right next to the mannequin pis which is literally what it sounds like. It is statue of a little boy peeing and I was just dying laughing cause I don't understand art lol but it was a cute little statue I guess? If you find little boys peeing cute?? Haha!!!!! We then went and caught our train home and on the train ride I DIED. I was completely out cold. Haha! So anyway we got home to Namur and we had a rdv with our recent convert and that went well for the most part. It was good to see her. She seems to be doing good! We talked a little bit about the plan of salvation and then headed out. We came home to drop off some things at the apartment and then we went out contacting until we had our rdv with Emmanuel and Claudette. When we got there, they had 3 questions for us. 1) can we eat at people's houses? 2) can we come over and eat on Thursday night to eat with them? 3) what was the gospel principles class that they were in on Sunday? Haha!! they were all what is it and why don't all the members go to it?? So we had to explain that it is simply that. The gospel principles class. It was funny! They are so fun! They told us that they are grateful for me and Nelson and that they have a testimony that me and Nelson together can convert the world;) haha they were super cute. Then Claudette tells us, you two are going to be the ones to baptize us. She goes, 'I will come to Utah if I have to. I won't let anyone else do it!;)' haha it was too cute!! We then had to get going to make it home on time, but I left them with the thought to keep praying about a date and what they think and I offered to give them both a blessing and they asked us to do it next time we come over. Thank you all for your prayers!!!!!!!! PLEASE KEEP THEM COMING! 

MERCREDI

Today went by so fast! Hahah it was good and we even got to play a little:) so first off as usual we woke up this morning and we got our studies done. Towards the end of studies, we got a text from our recent convert telling us she was sad and depressed that her baptism wasn't valid yet and that she wasn't a 'Mormon' yet....SO let me back up and explain. Yesterday I got a call from sister Redd at the mission office, BDE, and so I answered and she told me that on the baptismal record of our recent convert, there was not a year put for when she was born. Ironically we just happened to be at her house and so I hurried and asked her and she told me and then I told sister Redd and then went and talked with her for a minute;) haha when I got back into the room I went to explain what just happened when she said that elder Nelson just explained it. So, either things were misunderstood or something because she was under the impression that her baptism wasn't valid yet and she wasn't a Mormon yet.....she said she hadn't slept all night cause it was bothering her. So after about a 15 minute phone call and a little explanation I think (and hope!) I calmed her down....haha. So anyway we then got going and had some contacting to do and this morning it was cold. Haha and then it got rainy. Bummer deal eh? Then elder Nelson offered to buy me lunch haha so I'm not going to pass that up;) so we went off to get some fries. We came back and ate and then went to a rdv with Luis. Today it was kind of an awkward lesson...we kind of had a slam down and it was a rough one haha. I told him that our goal was to make him change for the better, but that he needed to try. I told him he needed to keep reading and praying and come to church. He told us he'd try....haha so we'll go and see him a couple more times and see what happens. I'm not really sure what to do next. BUT we will cross that bridge when we get to it! We then went out and contacted and tried to get to a few different less actives. We had planned to go and try to find 3 but because one of them lived so far away, we only got to him and he still lived there!!! He told us that he works nights and that we had just woken him up from his sleep, but that we could come back on Sunday! So we will do that. Then we didn't have anymore time so we caught a bus into town for dinner and since we had a big lunch, neither of us were hungry so we made my new weekly vine! hope you all enjoy!;) I decided to make a funny vine once a week from now on and so that will be fun for all you to watch hopefully! I'm hoping it can be emailed around haha so keep your hopes up!! Then the funnest part of the day happened. We went and waited for Emmanuel to come and pick us up and we went bowling with the Elders Quorum!! It was a blast! Emmanuel had never been bowling and so it was fun trying to teach him how to do it. We decided that we needed to come back with Claudette one day. It was super fun!;) I actually didn't suck it up this time!;) then Emmanuel gave us a ride home.

JEUDI

Today was a decent day haha. It was super weird cause today was the day I got the emails from home telling me about the girl in my grade who was killed in a car accident on her mission. I didn't know her all that well, but we had some classes together and to know that someone I know, again, has passed on, is still a weird concept for me to handle. I spent a lot of time today thinking about life, and just how precious it is and how I really am so blessed. I spent some time on my knees today, praying for her family. Like I said, I didn't know her that well, but it's still sad news:( times like these make me extremely thankful for the gospel! I am so happy I am going to be able to see my loved ones again. Today we had our weekly lunch appt with Patrick and it was great as always. Haha! That man gives me so much hope! I always leave realizing that there is a possibility a girl might fall in love with me one day. Haha he tells me all the time that I will get home and all the girls will run after me, so it always gives me hope;) after we had finished lunch with him, we had 20 minutes of lunch left and so we ran into the store super close to the pasta place and I bought a new belt because mine was starting to die haha then we went and did some less active searching. We found a lake with some ducks and swans and I took some pictures. We all know that I love those ducks!;) it was a really long time searching for those guys and going contacting so we decided to go in and take a 20 minute breather and that's when I got the emails. I spent some time on my knees and just realized how precious life is. We then had decided to try and go out to see a potential investigator in this neighborhood that we met the other week and got out to the neighborhood and she wasn't home....so we just did some porting and prayed with this older couple who let us in and gave us some orange juice but in the end told us no thank you...so we went and caught a bus and made our way to our dinner appt with Emmanuel and Claudette! We had a party with them tonight. Not literally, just a figure of speech;) haha we got there and Claudette had made us a huge African meal and they were so excited to be able to sit down and eat with us. It was such a fun night. We then had the spiritual thought and I went to sit on the couch and she layed their baby right down next to me, and so I was like rubbing his arm and he smiled the cutest smile and so I pulled out my iPad and tried to get a picture but.....it didn't work....haha he's still pretty cute though! We shared the Mormon message 'Waiting on the Road to Damascus' and it was really good. We were supposed to give Emmanuel and Claudette blessings but me and Nelson forgot.....but they didn't! They asked if we could do it next time cause we didn't have time tonight. They are AMAZING! Seriously. I can't even explain it.

VENDREDI

well sadly I don't have a ton to explain about today. It was an interesting one and we didn't do a whole lot because of weekly planning. But that normally takes up the whole day haha. Anyway, we had a ward party tonight that was fine, but honestly after me and elder Nelson got home tonight, we really wondered if it was like the best thing we could have done as a ward. Not that it was bad or anything, but like the music was so loud and they all stayed so late and everyone was all over the place. Haha we don't really know what was up with it. But I'll get to that later. We woke up this morning and we did our studies and then we went out contacting, which is just like any other day #amirite? Haha! We talked to some really interesting people. As I've said before, people are so interesting. Their beliefs are so contradictory that I just can't understand why they believe what they believe. How can you say you know Jesus created a church on earth and that the 12 apostles were called to preach his gospel, but then now, today, as we are standing here in Namur speaking, you and me, us and the whole rest of the world DO NOT need a church because men are the creators of church and whoever created churches wants to be paid and is not called of God? Hahaha it doesn't make sense! Anyway sorry for the rant. It just isn't logical to me lol. We came in for lunch and then after we finished we made our way to weekly planning. I went to go make my planner cover, but I realized that I had left my tape and scissors in Dunkerque. I KNEW I LEFT A PIECE OF ME IN THAT VILLE!!;) lol jk but ya I was sad I couldn't make a cover yet. Then we got weekly planning over with and we were having a CARNIVALE party tonight! Haha carnivale is kind of like a Halloween but it's European and it usually lasts a whole month and goes every weekend and it's pretty much just a reason to dance and drink. Thankfully, we had just the dancing part tonight. Yes there was drinking but it was juices, no alcohol. Europe isn't the US but we still keep all gospel standards;) we were asked to dress up and we decided to dress up as normal people haha so that was fun;) you'd be surprised how many people were fooled by us! When we got there we helped with what we could to finish setting up and then we started the party. When the bishop got there me and elder Nelson were assigned to be the DJs haha! So we were sitting at the computer for a while controlling the music and what we were gonna play. It is weird to be in charge of stuff like that when I haven't heard all those songs for over a year and a half! But then Emmanuel and Claudette showed up so we went and hung out with them and then when they were ready to leave it was 9 and so they offered us a ride home. We told the bishop we were leaving and he said already?! He then told us he had planned to be there till midnight..so as we were leaving, ward members were still showing up! It was crazy. Anyway we were home and in bed before they had even thought to end the party!

SAMEDI

Today was an interesting day. We found out transfers!!! Me and Nelson are staying together here in Namur! So I'm pretty happy to be staying here:) we'll get to that story soon though. So this morning we got up and had our studies and then during language study, we got a BUZZ at the door. Elder Nelson went and answered the phone and said, '3rd floor? I don't know him sorry!' And then hung up...so I was all huh? He said it was some guy looking for someone on the 3rd floor and I was kind of bummed cause I wanted my package from mom. Then like 3 minutes later our doorbell rang! It was our building manager who had taken my package yesterday! So I got my package and I was SUPER happy!! Haha so I opened it and had all I ever wanted;) #mercimama it was great to get that. To this day, I HAVE YET TO LOSE A PACKAGE;) so then we went out contacting and I got a call from Jorgy saying, 'Have you looked at transfers?!' Apparently they came out early and so while we were out contacting, they had sent it out. He told me that me and Nelson were staying together. Let's just say that Elder LIBBY was ok with that news;) the rest of the day was a little difficult cause someone was upset. But it's all good. We then got home and looked at transfers and ate lunch and while eating, this member appt that we had fell through. Which was a bummer cause it was rainy and cold outside. So we sat and figured out what we could do and we decided to go to this tiny ville named Dinant that is outside of Namur. So we caught a bus and headed out and caught our train out there. We had some less actives that live out there and we had also received a referral from the church headquarters that was out there and so we decided we'd go contact as we were searching for them. So we got out there and contacted around until we had found the less active (no one answered) and found the referral (who told us it was a mistake and that she actually wasn't interested). So I had it in my head that since we were out there, and it had only been an hour that we were going to go and do some work, so as I asked where we were going to elder Nelson, he said home. Lol so we went out and then came right back....it was fine cause like we contacted that one referral, but also not the best use of time lol. So we got on a train and came home. When we got home we just contacted around until it was time to get to Emmanuel and Claudette's. Claudette had mentioned how she hadn't eaten any frites since she had her baby and so we wanted to surprise them tonight with some frites during our lesson;) so we went and got frites and then went and taught them. Tonight we taught the creation and the Fall of Adam and Eve and they were really confused. Honestly the lesson was not going too great. But then, after about 20 minutes of explaining, I literally just saw it in their eyes. IT CLICKED. EVERYTHING FELL INTO PLACE. I literally watched them go from asking tons of questions saying 'no that isn't right. Why would God let that happen?' To, 'oh my gosh. That is it. Right there that makes sense. God wants us to learn.' It honestly was amazing. The spirit just took over!!! It was amazing. They then asked for a blessing and so we blessed them and then came home for the night. It was a great night with them again;)

DIMANCHE

Today was a good sabbath. But like is there such thing as a bad sabbath?? Haha it was good and went pretty smoothly. It's funny cause like every Sunday, we have like a big gap from lunch to dinner of time to work, and every time it always feels like it is going to take forever, but like we go and do it and when it is finally time to get done with and get home I'm always like, seriously?! Shut up we just started! Haha or like it's just getting good! But like whatever. I just have to get used to it I guess. Today we caught our bus to church! So that made it that much better. We got to the church and I went to go and check our referrals on the referrals website and we had like a million of them! Haha no not a million but like I seriously had asked myself if the missionaries had ever even looked at the referrals. So I figured out where some of them were and decided that this afternoon we'd go and find some. A member brought his friend to church today and so I was super happy to see that #memberwork we had some good meetings and emmanuel and Claudette came to all three hours this week!!! They are too cool! We then finished up church and they offered us a ride home. When we got home we ate lunch and then had the rest of the day to go out and work and so we decided to go and find a referral that wasn't too far from our house and then go out to an area to port that we'd been to before and that we wanted to try again. So we went to this referrals house and he wasn't home, but we went and caught a bus out to this area. We went and knocked on doors and we found this one lady who let us in to talk and she was super nice! She is episcopalian and she was all its been a while since I've been to church cause my church lost its priest and so were waiting for them to send us a new one so funny. I was laughing. We talked and then she told us that we could pray and so I prayed and asked if we could come back and she was all BAH BIEN SUR! So were gonna go back and see her again next week. On the way back to catch the bus back to Namur we got a phone call on our France phone. When in Belgium, we have two cell phones. One to call people in France and one for Belgium. Anyway I answered and the voice goes, 'hi I'm interested in meeting you and learning more about your church!' And I was like 'ok well we are actually in Belgium. Are you in Belgium?' Even though I knew he wasn't cause the number was on the France phone and it was a French number and he goes, 'no I'm in France.' And so I was like where and he goes, 'Reims.' AND AS SOON AS HE SAID THAT I RECOGNIZED THE VOICE!!! It was Pierre!!! My good friend Pierre from Reims!!!! Haha he just called to say hi and said that he's super excited for me and my family to come back to see them and that him and his sister are already starting to plan out how we are going to stay there so I'm like super blessed to have all these friends:) I LOVE FRENCHIES!!! Anyway we got back to Namur and we came in and made a weekly sheet of our work for Frere Chung for tomorrow and that is how we ended our night. I also took some time to call Soeur Hudson one last time before she goes home and literally it was one of the saddest calls ever. Haha I told her that she had better stay in contact with me and she promised to write me every week! Haha she's such a cool kid, and I am going to be so sad when she's gone!

Et voilà! J'ai appris cette semaine que la vie est belle il faut, chaque journée, se préparer. La vie c'est une don d'un père que nous aime. Et ça c'est quelque chose que je vais commencer d'essayer à comprendre. Son amour pour moi. N'oubliez jamais que notre père céleste vous aime infiniment! Son amour est parfait et nous sommes important, nous avons une potentiel et nous pouvons réussir de comprendre tous ce qui est nécessaire dans la vie si nous nous humilions devant notre père. Il répondra à nos prières si c'est le vrai désir de notre cœur. Je sais que son plan est parfait. Je sais que par fois c'est difficile à accepter sa volonté, mais tout va finir par s'arranger. Mon invitation à vous tous pour cette semaine c'est simplement de prier pour recevoir l'aide de comprendre l'amour de notre père céleste. Son amour peut nous aider de mettre nos vies en ordre. Je sais qu'il vit. Et je vous rendre mon témoignage au nom de Jésus-Christ, amen. Passez un bonne semaine!!!:)  (And voila! I learned this week that life is beautiful   we need, each day, to prepare. Life is a gift from a father that we love. And it is something that I'll start trying to understand. Never forget that our heavenly father loves you very much! His love for us is perfect, we are important, we have a potential and we can succeed to understand all that is necessary in life if we humble ourselves before our father. He will answer our prayers if it is the true desire of our heart. I know that his plan is perfect. I know sometimes it is difficult to accept his will, but everything will eventually work out. My invitation to you all for this week is simply this: pray to get help to understand the love of our heavenly father. His love can help us put our lives in order. I know he lives. And I give my testimony on behalf of Jesus Christ, amen. Have a good week! :)

 

Elder Libby

 

        

 

WEEK 77

SALUT!!! J'ai entendu que le superbowl c'était bien passé? Honnêtement, les publicités sont les seuls choses qui me manquent...j'aimerais bien d'entendre laquelle c'était le plus rigolo!! Ce samedi nous allons savoir les mutations alors' S'IL VOUS PLAÎT ENVOYER TOUS LES LETTRES ET COLIS AU BUREAU DE LA MISSION!! Ce n'est pas le peine de perdre les lettres comme ça:) même si je sais que je vais rester ici à Namur, on ne va pas le risquer. Merci!! Je les attends avec impatience!!:)  (Hello!!! I heard that the superbowl was great? Honestly, the advertisements are the things I'm missing... I would like though to hear about the fun of it! This Saturday we will know about Transfers, then if you please, just for this week, send all the letters and packages to the Office of the MISSION! I don't want to think of losing the letters :) even though I know that I will stay here in Namur, we are not going to risk it. Thank you!! I look forward to them! :)

 

Elder Tanner Libby

France Paris Mission

131 Boulevard Carnot

78110 Le Vesinet

FRANCE

 

LUNDI SOIR

So today was this one members birthday who I've come to really love and so after we had finished emails me and elder Nelson ran home and got all the stuff for cookie dough and decided to make cookies for him! We were also going to change out of our PDAY clothes but as soon as we got onto the bus to get to the church for family home evening, elder Nelson asked if I had changed into my suit and I realized I hadn't. Lol #worstmissionaryever. I had COMPLETELY forgotten! And so we got to the church and we made cookies and had our meeting with the ward mission leader and then family home evening. Frere Mazy was so happy for the cookies! We had a good night together and it was a fun family home evening:)

MARDI

well today we had a fun day! It went by super fast too! I can tell you one thing, I love the members here in Namur. They are pretty special. Today we woke up and went running and let me tell you, I am NOT a runner. Did y'all know that?? Lol elder Nelson is wanting me to do this 6 months to sexy thing and I'm just not for it.....bleh. Who needs to be sexy anyway? During studies we got a text from the Norby couple and they were telling us that the next step in our legality process was to obtain a police record from France and he told us we needed to do that as soon as possible. So for contacting this morning we headed up to the chapel and decided to do that. We got to the chapel and did it and had only a couple of questions and so we only had to make a couple different calls to him to ask him what we were supposed to do. After we finished that we headed home and took our lunch break and then after had a rdv with Josiane, our recent convert. She is such a nice old lady, and every time we go over there she always offers us these really yummy lemon drinks that she buys at the store, 'que pour les missionnaires;)' so that's always fun. We got to her house with Frere Chung and she was in a really sad mood. She said that just 20 minutes before we had gotten there her neighbor had come upstairs and was yelling at her because her dog barks too loud and that he was going to call and have him put down. So she was super sad cause she didn't know what to do. We kind of just let her cry for a minute and then said a prayer and went into our rdv. We started with reading in the scriptures because up until recently she had told us that the Book of Mormon she had had too small of print and that she couldn't read it and so she hadn't been reading. But the other day a member had ordered a triple combination for her and even though the font isn't bigger the book is and so I think she had it in her head that the words were bigger;) she was fine reading that;) so we read the introduction to the Book of Mormon and the first chapter in Nephi and it went well. After we'd finished she was still a little down and so we stayed and talked and cheered her up for a while cause I just don't have the heart to leave a sad old lady all alone with her dog....lol so we stayed and talked and laughed and when she finally said thank you for coming today it really helped me, that's when we asked if we could leave her with a prayer haha! When we left Frere Chung asked if he could come and do some work with us and so we said sure and he came with us and we went less active searching and contacting and then he mentioned that we were in the same neighborhood as this one guy who is kind of less active that he home teaches, but had never been to his house. And so I was like I know where we are going! Him and Nelson were a little adamant but we went and saw him and I guess because it was my idea, I had to give the spiritual thought....so it was fine. I got my home teaching done!;) then we had a dinner appt with a member family and he was coming to get us at our place and so we left and made our way home and he came and got us! Xavier Istace served his mission in Florida and so he speaks English and reminds me a ton of my dad. He was funny and laughing and honestly the whole time I was with their family tonight I felt like I had stepped into the Libby house: Belge edition lol it was a super fun night and we had some good times and he was telling us how they are working with their neighbors doing some missionary work! #EVERYMEMBERAMISSIONARY They fed us tacos and we shared a little message and then he took us home.

MERCREDI

Today was a pretty full day. We were going around doing busy work a lot today and it went by pretty smoothly. When we got up this morning I was doing my morning workouts and we got a buzz on the door at like 7 in the morning? I went and answered the phone the dude was all ya I live on the 3rd floor and yesterday someone was here to give you a package and I have it so can I come give it to you? And I was all ya! SURPRISE PACKAGE! Haha so he brought it up and it was a supply package from the Presiding Bishopric in Germany?! Lol that's what the packaging said. But I opened it, cause it was addressed to me(?) and it was a bunch of missionary pamphlets and planners. This is super weird cause like we can get these things, no problem, but in order to get it, we have to send in a request to the mission office and the office ladies have to order them, and I NEVER did that! And then on the packaging slip it said: Sold To: Phillip Andin and it had the address of the mission couple in Brussels! But the couple in Brussels are the Norby's! Haha it made no sense...and we were like what the heck is going on. So I called the mission office and they were like just keep it! Haha so we're keeping the package from the mysterious Phillip Andin who lives at the Norby's house lol? How did he know I was in Belgium? And Namur none the less!! Anyway we got our studies done and then had to run to the grocery store to get some drinks for district meeting tomorrow. So we ran and did that and then made our way to #LUNCHWITHPATRICK. Ha our weekly rdv with him is definitely a highlight of my week. We had a good time with him and ate some great pasta and had some fun and then went out to do some work. We went and tried to find some less actives while we were contacting along the way as well. It went well today and we found out that 2 people had definitely moved cause the people knew them and that 1 person still lived there but it sounded like his wife was a little against the church. So we'll see what happens. We then needed to get to the church cause we had a rdv with Jean Claude! It went really well! He told us that he had been reading in the Book of Mormon and that he even tried to pray once but had forgotten the Lords Prayer;) so we re-explained that praying is something that comes from the heart and that when we pray sincerely God answers our prayers. Then we did an overview of the plan of salvation and showed him all the steps just so he could get a general idea for it, and told him we'd go into detail the next time and he said that he understood what we were explaining and that it all made sense. So that was a good rdv! Then we went home so I could change into my thermal garments cause I was FREEZING cause the wind chill was horrible lol and after we did that we went to find this Chinese restaurant that we were going to eat at with this member family tonight. The Paulus family are so cool! They are a young married couple with a 2 year old boy and honestly they seemed like the kind of people I would have hung out with in high school! Pierre served his mission in Utah and so he speaks English as well and so it was super fun to hang out with them tonight. We got talking about the new video the church made about garments and temple clothing on LDS.org and he showed me the video cause I had never seen it and it was cool that the church did that! They were telling us how they met and how it was to have to wait a year to get married...they said it was hard being engaged for that long! They were super nice. They then drove us home for the night and we had an hour to kill and so we went out to walk and talk to everyone and it was good! We found a member and stopped and talked to her for a while so that was nice;)

JEUDI

Well today was a blur lol! It honestly doesn't feel like we did a ton...but we DID have an amazing rdv with Emmanuel and Claudette! It was super good! And it marked 6 months til I go home!! And today we finally got to see the world wide broadcast for all the missionaries. It was super good! That took up most of our day, so that's one reason why we didn't get to do a ton. This morning we woke up and headed out the door to make our train into Charleroi for district meeting. We got into Charleroi and it was raining and I didn't have my umbrella and it wasn't raining a ton, but it was raining enough that if you were out for a little bit you would get wet...so after we took the bus to the stop we needed we had a good 5 ish minute walk until we got to the chapel and so by the time I got there, I was fairly wet! And to make matters worse, no one was even at the chapel to let us in and so me and elder Nelson had to get all nice and cozy under the little patio until some people came and let us in. We were sitting there waiting for a while. When everyone finally got there, we started the broadcast and it was really good! We were taught about teaching repentance to investigators and baptizing concerts and it was super good. We heard from a lot of general authorities and it was super great!! So we were in the middle of watching it and all of the sudden it stopped working. Like something was wrong with the Internet site and so we tried to fix it but couldn't and decided to give the computer a little break and that we'd eat while we let it rest. So we all went and ate and had some burritos and then after we'd finished up, we went and tried the video and it was working and so we finished up the broadcast. It went well:) something I learned was that we need to testify of Christ and help our investigators understand the true meaning of why we get baptized. It was way good! Then we made our way home for the day and we went contacting outside for a little bit and then came in for dinner and had a rdv with Emmanuel and Claudette. We invited the Mazy's to come with us and so they came and picked us up and we went and had an amazing lesson with them! We did an overview on the plan of salvation and it went super well and they understood it all and at the end of our lesson, we had the most amazing thing happen. Emmanuel and Claudette told us that they'd been thinking about it and that the choice had been made. They are going to get baptized!!!!!! They said that they had put together a plan and that that plan consisted of them coming to church and praying and coming to know when GOD wanted them to get baptized. They told us that they have been so thankful to hear of the gospel that they wanted to be able to do something to help out their friends in Rwanda to hear the gospel and that they were going to wait for when the Lord told them that it was time for them to be baptized. So I threw in the fact that this Sunday was fast Sunday and that they could fast to know as well and Emmanuel said that he wanted to! Claudette can't because she just gave birth;) so they asked us to come back tomorrow to explain how fasting works and stuff. It was such a good rdv! They are doing so well! Thanks for all the prayers and thoughts on their behalf!:) I came home and had the pressing thought to call up sister Walton, aka my best friend and so I did. She told me that it was an answer to prayer and we talked for a while. She's such a cool kid and I'm going to cry so hard when she goes home next week! How am I supposed to live without all my soeurs?!

VENDREDI

Today was a good day. Lol it was busy and full of a lot so like no problems right?? We got up this morning to do our studies and we got all those done. Currently I am reading the Isaiah chapters in 2 Nephi.....ahhh they are killer and I don't understand a ton but I'm following along in the student manual and there is a quote from Boyd K Packer that said: 'Most [readers] readily understand the narrative of the Book of Mormon. Then, just as you settle in to move comfortably along, you will meet a barrier. … Interspersed in the narrative, are chapters reciting the prophecies of the Old Testament prophet Isaiah. They loom as a barrier, like a roadblock or a checkpoint beyond which the casual reader, one with idle curiosity, generally will not go. You, too, may be tempted to stop there, but do not do it! Do not stop reading! Move forward through those difficult-to-understand chapters of Old Testament prophecy, even if you understand very little of it. Move on, if all you do is skim and merely glean an impression here and there. Move on, if all you do is look at the words.' And so that was like just for me and I'm just gonna have to keep on going. We then went out contacting and we contacted this one lady who was super nice, open and interested and she was like ok I'm from this little ville right next to Luxembourg.......GAH! So we are hoping that all works out as the missionaries from lux work with her....we then came in for lunch and then went out to our rdv with Luis. I honestly am just super lost on what to do to help out this guy....he won't come to church, and today told us that he doesn't like to pray/can't pray cause he gets this weird feeling pulling inside him that he doesn't like....but he did tell us today that he was reading in the Book of Mormon. So hopefully that helps him! We then went out to Emmanuel and Claudette's. We talked about what they thought about the rdv last night and also explained the principle of fasting and then we got out of there. It was good to see them and to see just how happy they are! THEY ARE COMING TO CHURCH THIS WEEK!! After we had finished with our time with them, we headed out to go do some porting in an area that I had never been to and we were knocking doors and one lady let us pray with her and told us to come back another time to explain more! So that was awesome! Then we came home and stopped and got some fries for dinner:) I also finally got my letter from my mom today!!!! It was so fun to get her pictures and letters and fun to have the New Era that she gave me;) haha I do love me some mail!!

SAMEDI

Well straight up there is not a lot to say about today. We contacted and had weekly planning and then went porting and that's it. Lol we woke up and had our studies and then called up a few people that we needed to and then went out to contact for the morning. While we were out we went into downtown and fell upon the city market. Here in France and Belgium the city markets are held every week and are a super big deal and they go for like 2 or 3 hours a day and so like all of downtown is shut off during this time. Plus they are just fun to be in. People are selling all kinds of stuff! Clothes, fruits and veggies, homemade items, and they are just kind of fun! So as we were walking through, you know there were like a billion people, and I was just looking at every stand and I found this coin holder! When I was back in Metz, elder lattin had one and I thought it was the coolest thing! It holds coins and it's just this little plastic thing that holds all your coins for you in like an organized way and since I saw elder lattin's I always wanted one. So when I found one, and it was 3 euros I bought it! Haha so I was super happy about that buy;) we went in for lunch and then after we finished that we did weekly planning and that just took forever....lol it was long and we got off topic a lot and it was super annoying, but we persevered and finally made it through! We then went and did some porting to end the night and it was in this super weird and old neighborhood and I felt like I had walked into a Wanderlust haha I was just in what seemed to feel like this little neighborhood inside of a neighborhood up in the mountains somewhere and the whole night I just felt out of place. It was a super interesting night for porting. When we got home I got reading the new era from my moms package the other day and read an article that hit me hard! It was called 'preparing to take the sacrament worthily' or something like that...it talked about a kid who said that when he was little he never knew really what it meant to go to church every Sunday. He said one week he heard someone say in a talk that we need to make Sunday's and sabbath days the CENTER of our lives, and not a PART of our lives. He said he can't remember who said it or what the rest of the talk said, but that that helped him. Later in his teenage life he said that he was struggling with some worthiness issues and didn't really know what to do. He said he didn't really want to talk to his parents or bishop, but that he knew he needed to change. So he started by applying the counsel he heard when he was younger and by making the sabbath the center of his life, mainly preparing all week for the sacrament, he was able to go to his parents and his bishop to get the help he needed. I thought it was an amazing principle! Preparing all week for the sacrament! I decided that I'm going to start doing it with purpose, and get on the right track....cause heaven knows we all need to get on it sooner or later:) 

DIMANCHE

Emmanuel and Claudette came to church today!!!!!!!!!!!!! Hahah it didn't come without a scare though...lol we woke up this morning and we were late getting out to the bus stop and missed our bus to get to church!! So we walked and when we got to the chapel, we welcomed everyone in and then started and there was still no Emmanuel and Claudette! So I called them and asked them if they were coming and they told us they'd be there in about 20 minutes cause they thought that it started at 10! Ahhhh and something that the Mazy's brought up is that what we could do for their baby is bless it since he's just small....I didn't know we could do that for non-members?? But Frere mazy used to be a bishop and so I trust him. Anyway, today there was a baby blessing for someone in the ward, and they missed it!:( but they got to the chapel just in time for all the testimonies and they said that they loved it! We then had all the other classes and sister mazy was just a saint!! She totally was with Claudette the whole day and just helping her with the baby and hanging out with her in relief society! It was so cool. Emmanuel and Claudette and doing SO GOOD!! I hope things will pick up pretty soon:) after church I wanted to sit and chat with them and all the members, but we got into a rdv with these 'less actives' that we scheduled earlier that week. Wilmy and Allisson are a member couple that are not married, but live together.....and it's sad cause they both have such good testimonies, but they just don't get this point I guess? They are super nice and we had a great rdv with them! We shared 'Is It Still Wonderful to You?' And it went well! #BESTCONFERENCETALKEVER #WHATSYOURS? I guess I'm a little biased given that Gérald Causée is my French homie and I can't wait to find him when I get home and we can just go around speaking French in front of everyone and just be so much cooler than all you haha but no really, I'm gonna go and find him when I get home. I gotta find someone to speak French to! After that we ate dinner with them and spent the better part of our afternoon with them and then they took us to catch our train and we missed it so they had to drive us home lol. We got home and changed and then we went out porting to finish up our night. It went well! Lots of knocking and lots of no's...but we win some and we lose some and we learn from each experience! We met an old guy, he told us he was 80, and he told us that he appreciated what we were doing and that he hopes people will accept us warmly and that he wants us to come back in 20 years, cause he'll still be there! And he told us to tell him, remember on February 7, 2016? And he'd remember us lol I'm half tempted to try it;) we came home and I made cookie dough to eat cause I wanted to;)

Et voilà! Comme j'ai dit toute à l'heure, merci VRAIMENT pour vos prières et vos jeûnes qui ont été fait pour moi et mes amis de l'église! Je sais que le Seigneur entend nos prières et que, ensemble, nous sommes plus fort et unis. Je sais que notre père céleste nous aime. Et je sais qu'avec l'aide de son fils, notre frère, nous pouvons retourner dans sa présence encore un jour. Je vous encourage, chaque un d'entre vous, de commencer à préparer pour la Saint-Cène ce dimanche. Vous serez content avec l'effort vous avez fait d'être digne de la prendre. Je suis très reconnaissant pour l'évangile rétablie ici sur terre. Nous sommes béni de l'avoir dans nos vies pour nous diriger. Je vous demande de continuer à prier pour moi et mes amis de l'église pendant les prochaines quelques semaines, car nous avons tous besoin d'eux. Merci encore et n'oubliez pas que je vous aime!! ️  (And voila! Like I said any at the time, really thanks for your prayers for me and my friends in the Church! I know that the Lord hears our prayers and that, together, we are stronger and United. I know that our heavenly father loves us. And I know that with the help of his son, our brother, we can return another day in his presence. I encourage you, each one of you, to start to prepare for the Sacrament you will take this Sunday. You will be pleased with the effort you have made and to be worthy to take it. I am very grateful for the Gospel restored here on Earth. We are blessed to have in our lives to direct us. I ask you to continue to pray for me and my friends of the Church during the next few weeks, because we need all of them. Thanks again and remember that I love you!)

Avec amour, votre FRENCHIE préféré;)  (With love, the FRENCHIE you like best ;)

Elder Libby