I Did It!

Hello family and friends,

Greetings from myldsmail! It sure is weird using this because the setup is different. I guess I can handle it for 6 more months.

This week was ok. Something not so fun happened. Phumela said that her parents sat her down and talked to her about baptism and asked why she needs to be baptized in this church if she's already been baptized. They don't want her to be baptized anymore but said she can still come to church and seminary. Phumela said she went in her room and cried. We taught her about the restoration of the priesthood and she understands now why she needs to be baptized in this church and said she'll talk to her dad again.

I got over my stomach sickness but now I think I'm getting the flu. Yesterday we had to ride the bikes through the rain and it had already rained a whole lot so we were riding through a river while it was pouring hard and it was getting late at night. We got to our last appointment and we were soaked! I now have the sniffles, but I'll be ok.

We are still teaching a lot of people and keeping busy. The weeks are going by too fast for me! I am sure enjoying mission now and I think its because I am striving to be more obedient. We also got to go to the temple on Friday and it was so nice. It has sparked so many more questions, going through the endowment again. The questions just force me to jump in to the scriptures and search for them, so I do it.

I hope that Camille can find a good vehicle now that her van is gone. Did she move into her new house yet? Are the house prices still really low? How bad is the economy there? Its hard not knowing what's going on with the world around me and only hearing bits and pieces from the people here.

I got your package, so thanks one million! I shared some of the candy with people we are teaching. Here is a picture of me in our flat with our dog. It's not really ours but it comes up to our flat every night and just hangs out for a bit. This is the shirt that Grandma and Grandpa gave me so if you could send them the picture too that'd be great! I sure love you all! Thanks for doing so much for me!

Take care and CTR!

Love,Elder J. Langston

Eita Hola!

This is a family in Gold Reef. The mom and daughter were baptized just before Jordan got there.
This lady, Sharon, was a good friend to the missionaries in Gold Reef. She helped organize the meals. Notice the cute one on Jordan's left side.

Dear Family and Friends,

This week was a pretty good week. A lot happened and some more embarrassing things happened to me because I am sick.

The rest of the week went well. I had to give a talk yesterday and though I was very nervous, I guess I did a good job. I spoke about repentance and how we need to be prepared. I started out telling everyone that I had not prepared anything and that I had other things I had to do. I apologized and asked for everyones forgiveness and started to walk away from the microphone. Peoples faces were so shocked! I came back and related it to us here on this life and how many of us find excuses to not doing what's right and preparing for God. I was the last speaker and I had to fill about 20 minutes. I have never done that before but I just kept rambling on and telling stories and it filled the time just right. The teaching is going well. My studies are going well too. I keep learning great things as I read the scriptures. I was reading in Daniel the other day and found something funny. I dont remember what verse its in but in chapter one it talks about how Daniel found favor with the eunuchs. It made me smile. Good work Dan! Phumela is doing well! She got permission from her parents to get baptized and we are trying to set up a time to see her parents and visit with them.

My time is running out. I sure don't like this emailing because then I can't write a lot, especially without my adderall, I'm all over the place and can't focus. How's things going with UVU? I'm excited to see my new room when I get home. Maybe I'll just stay at home for a while! I dont need to move out, right? I sure love you all! Thanks for the many emails I got from everyone! I loved them and the pictures! I'll write more next week. Take care and CTR!

Love,
Elder Langston

My Joy Is Full

Hello Family/Mom,

I just wanted to say thanks for the email. Thanks for all you have done for me and continue to do for me. I've only been getting one email a week now days, which is fine, I'm not complaining, and I think its because I come home soon so everyone is just saving the awesome stories for when I come home so we can all just chill and chat! I'm excited for that! (rhymes) I sure love you Mom!

The work here is going great! We have another "platinum investigator" in this area! I thought Moya would be my only one but I have found yet another! This girl is so awesome!!! She's 15 years old , going on to 16 and her name is Pumela. She just came to church one day out of curiosity in the end of November and has been coming ever since (when she's in town). She also enrolled in Seminary which is 4 days a week and goes every day! We usually have to wait for people her age to attend church for at least 6 months, consecutively, before they can be baptized. We got special permission to baptize her for the 22nd of March and let me tell ya, she's ready for it!! We taught her the Gospel of Jesus Christ on Friday and I talked about repentance. She asked how to repent and stuff so I told her. I also mentioned that if we have wronged anyone that we should ask them for their forgiveness so we don't have that problem in the back of our head. Oh yeah, she also knew the five steps(i.e. faith, repentance, baptism, Holy Ghost, and ETTE) before we even told her because she read it in the Plan of Salvation pamphlet. It just mentions it briefly but she recited the steps back to us by memory! Any way, we were at a members house last night just visiting with them and we got a text on the phone from Pumela. She said that she is writing letters to all the people whom she has wronged and she feels a great burden being lifted off her back! She said, "I'm crying as I write this because of the joy that I'm feeling." She mentioned that she had never felt this before he started coming to church. She is just the cooolest girl! She also said that when she makes time to read from the BOM, she somehow still has time to finish everything else that she needs to do like homework and cleaning and she feels much better as she does those other things! I love this work!!

On the flip side of things, we met up with a recent convert who hasn't come to church for a while and when we talked to him he said that he's torn between his old church, J-Dubs, and the LDS church. He can't decide which one is true, but he plainly told us that he has felt the Spirit as he reads the BOM and when he goes to church, but he wants proof. The whole time he was talking, not only was I frustrated because he doesn't understand, but I was thinking about Korihor and Alma. Alma told Korihor that he "has had signs enough" and Korihor said he wanted proof. As we all know, Korihor got his proof and later asked for the "sign" to be removed. Alma denied his request and Korihor eventually got trampled and died while begging as a mute. The one question that he had that has been confusing him is that the BOM talk of baptism before Christ was even born but the Old Testament says nothing of baptism. He was crosssed with that little question and because of that, has fallen away from the church. I so badly wanted to read 2 Nephi 31:14 with him, but we approached his situation a little more different and loving. I'm always just wanting to show people how dumb they are and what they are in for, but Elder Burnnett is teaching me better.

Burnnett and I are getting along great! We have a lot in common. He was a drummer for a band before he came out and listened to cool music like I did. He's a quiet kid though and everyone thinks he's young on mission because of his silence. He's got a strong testimony and a good teacher. I've been learning a lot from him.

Some more good news, I found out that a lady that I found at the pharmacy in Thaba Nchu got baptized and her kids are on date. I just met her when I was buying some chap stick and she wanted me to pray for her. I told her I would and I saw her again at the grocery store the next week. She followed up on my assignment, which I totally forgot, and so I just tried to make it up to her by setting an appointment to go visit her. She agreed and we starting seeing her but she wasn't getting it. I guess she finally got it and got baptized. The Gospel really is true. I seriously love meeting new people and sharing these wonderful truths with them to lighten their minds and help them find the right way to God. Some of our recent converts have been inviting friends to their house as we go there and a few of them came to church yesterday. They are so cool! The only problem is is that they are all females and the branch needs males to help them grow. We will find some soon because we are brainstorming to come up with new tactics for finding people. We are meeting with the Branch Presidency this Thursday to discuss our ideas with them and I'll give you a report next Monday.

I'm sorry I dont have any pictures here. The computers we use now dont have a USB drive, except one computer. I'll take a few pictures this week and I'll fight for that computer next week to send off some nice pics. Hopefully, the school will get back to you soon so you can pick some nice classes for me. We live above some ladies garage and she has a huge yard. I'll send you pics of the place next week.

Well, I'm going to end so I can write to Jeanette before I get off. I love you all very much! Have a very lovely Valentines Day. I can't really think of anything I want in the package. Some jerky or something? I dont know. Recent pictures of everyone would be cool, but if not just have Jacob draw pics of everyone. It would've been cool if we could get some of my friends to write a letter and just give it to you so you can send it off since they are no good at sending things. Also, if you could talk to Venus and get Leif's email address for me, that'd be great! I've been thinking about how he's doing now. Thanks one million for all you do! Take care and CTR!

Love,
Elder "Jordy-Boy" Langston

ps. they sell some cool curtains for cheap here in this country, since that is all people have on their windows, and I was wondering if you want me to purchase some for the giant window in front so you can get rid of the other, ghetto ones ;) If you do want some, let me know the size of the window and the color scheme you want and I can get you some with cool designs or even animals stitched in the curtain. Also, I want to get shirts for everyone before I come home so if you could give me the sizes of everyone, that'd be nice so I can start collecting them slowly before I go home! Sala Gahle! Ka o rata! (Stay well! I love you!)

I Love Township!

Dear Family and Friends,

"Oh my holy yum yums!" I sure love township! This week has been so awesome, well after Tuesday it was awesome! I'm with Elder Burnett from Yakima Washington and has been out 6 weeks longer than I have. We are in Tsakane and we ride bikes every other day so I keep in shape. Oh yeah, another way I keep in shape is a free membership to a gym here that we go to every other day to work out. The lady that owns it isn't even a member but she loves missionaries and lets us go every day if we wanted to. I love it here!

We are teaching a lot of people! We have 6 on baptism date and there are a few more that will be there soon. There is a kid that comes out with us named Wandile and he loves missionary work. A bunch of the people we are teaching are referrals from him and he comes with us to teach them. We went to a family that lives next to him last night and they were so tuned in as we were teaching the Restoration. It was powerful for me too because I haven't been able to sit down and teach the whole first lesson in over 3 months so it was a good spiritual experience for me. I even started to get a little teary eyed.

Sunday was the coolest! We meet in a high school and we have to clean the rooms we use on Saturday and set up chairs and everything so Sunday it'll all be done. I love the members here! We get fed every night!! One of the sisters got up yesterday to bear her testimony and she expressed her love for the missionaries. She spoke a bit about the previous one and how everyone loved him. Then she started talking about me. She met me on Wednesday and on Sunday, no one gave me the special invitation to go up to introduce and bear testimony like they usually do, so Sister J. told everyone about my "big voice" and how she wanted everyone else to be blessed by the voice and she pretty much called me out and told me to get up there so everyone can see me. When she was done talking, I made my way over three black kids sitting in the aisle and I bore my testimony. Of course I had to throw in a couple of jokes to get the smile on their face and then testify of truths just so I could see them smiling faces nodding their heads of approval. It went well and I even got a couple hugs and a big kiss from a girl before church was over. It was nice! The girls were 5 years old and the cutest things ever!

Also this week I got to feel like a missionary on a movie because we were walking one day and two cars splashed me and I got soaked-er. It was awesome! Well, I love you all and wish you the best back home. Tell Grandpa Langston I'm praying for him and I love him! I hope little Troy is doing well! Take care and CTR!

Love,
Jordy Boy Langston