Week 23 in Yaoundé: The wild drug chase

Bonjour amis et familles!

This week felt super quick. We didn't have too many things going on this week but we still had cool finding opportunities and lessons and the like.

I do want to explain the subject line before I get into the spiritual stuff: so Elder Sadiki got super sick Sunday night, so Elder Caldwell and I had to run get him something to knock out his fever. There's a pharmacy right next door to our apartment so we didn't think it would be a hassle. But it was closed. The other one 5 minutes away was closed. The one next to the supermarket was closed. The one that Google Maps said was open didn't seem to exist when we went down there. We eventually had to go all the way down to Bastos (basically downtown, a good 20-minute taxi ride) to find an open pharmacy. Eventually we succeeded and got what Elder Sadiki needed. But it turned out to be quite the adventure!

MISSIONARY MOMENTS OF THE WEEK 

Elder Caldwell and I have been contacting a little in neighborhoods I haven't been to yet in my 5 months of being in this area. This has led to some pretty cool experiences. At one point, we were faced with what we thought was a dead end, and we were about to just go back to the main road. But this man came out of his house and asked us where we were going. He directed us to where the path actually continued, and we decided to keep following it. I'm super glad we did because we were lead to this lady with whom we had a wonderful conversation with. We gave her a Restoration brochure and she told us she would read and pray about it and let us know what she thought. We weren't able to get her contact, but we'll probably just visit her again this week to follow up.

We had met someone last week named Marie-Elise through contacting and had gotten her number. We set up a time to meet with her. As it turned out, the lady  I thought we were going to go see was not who I thought was Marie-Elise, but someone else who had been listening when we contacted them. We were able to teach not only the real Marie-Elise but a couple of other ladies in this household. It was a fun experience in seeing how we ad missionaries and representatives of Christ are guided to people that need the message.

SCRIPTURE/SPIRITUAL THOUGHT OF THE WEEK 

Alma 34:16:

"And thus mercy can satisfy the demands of justice, and encircles them in the arms of safety, while he that exercises no faith unto repentance is exposed to the whole law of the demands of justice; therefore only unto him that has faith unto repentance is brought about the great and eternal plan of redemption."

Some people believe that because Christ has atoned for our sins, no matter what we do in this life, we will automatically receive mercy at the judgment bar. This is actually not the case. As Amulek explains here, if we do not have faith in Christ, a faith that leads to repentance, God will not be merciful unto us. God won't want to give us the gift of forgiveness if we show, through our unbelief and our unwillingness to repent, that we don't want that gift. It is only through repenting and continually striving to become like God that we will be worthy of His mercy and forgiveness. When we do so, we allow the Atonement to take effect in our lives, and we can be healed of all sin and tribulation. Mercy satisfies the demands of justice only if we choose to make it happen. 

Je vous aime tous et j'espère que vous aurez une bonne semaine avec tout ce que vous allez faire!

Elder May

P.S. check out these breakfast burritos from this week. And how crazy beautiful Yaoundé is.






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