Nobody's Fo'ui

Here is a little Tongan history for you related to the subject line and the area in which I currently serve- Fo'ui is a village in our area. The word means "fault" and there is a good story behind it. There once was a princess that liked to go swimming at the beaches of fo'ui, and when she came back from the beach a particular day, she climbed into her house -which was in a tree- and as the men of her family were about the leave, she asked them to make sure someone stayed at the bottom of the tree to guard her and keep her safe from crazy men. She was very beautiful. The men left and no one guarded the tree. While she slept, a man climbed up the tree and had his way with her. I know sorry, not missionary appropriate. BUT, when the father came back, she told him what happened and said-"Ko ho fo'ui." or "Your fault." Anyway, so now the village is named after that! Hah! Anway, the point I want to draw from the story is that sometimes bad things happen and we look for someone to blame, but especially in missionary work, it is important to look forward and move on. A lot of unfortunate things happened this week that were nobody's fo'ui, but through them, we were able to see miracles.

1. Sister Vete keeps getting migraines and we had to stay home for 2 days and we tried contacting tons of people to come vilohoa with us so i could go out and work, but they were all busy. Nobody's fo'ui. 

2. We were excited to have a baptism this week, but it fell through because the investigator totally believes, but got to the interview and said she doesn't want to get baptized because of the harassment she will get from other kids her age. We will keep working on her :) 

3. We went to a vilohoa with sisters who didn't seem to like us very much. Maybe a misunderstanding. Nobody's fo'ui. BUT after 24hrs with us, we became really good friends and their desire to work hard came alive again :)

4. Not many teachings went tthrough this week, but many members contacted us with names of friends and family that we will be teaching this week!

I could go on and on. But, the point is, don't be like the princess.  First of all, leave guards at the bottom of your dang treehouse, and second, don't dwell on blaming anyone for bad things that happen. See all the good to come. :) Love you All <3 

p.s. Transfers are this week so i'll let you know what happens, and fo'ui also has a place called umu tangata which means pit to cook men in. yeah gross. these people are totally lamanites from the book of mormon. oh and random pick of our old ward mission leader who just moved to AUST. :(.

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Sister Emily Bever

Tonga Nuku'alofa Mission

random pick of our old ward mission leader who just moved to AUST. :(.

hange ko ha peau

Today. for the first time in my whole mission, i got to sit at the beach and read on p-day. you would think since i have been in Tonga for almost 8 months, i would have done that by now... hah. BUT, my subject line for today was inspired today by that little outing. There were really large, beautiful waves breaking on the coral reefs and I just drew so many parallels to my mission while thinking about the waves.... uu peau in Tongan. For one, my comps health has been like a peau this week and when the poor girl actually felt well enough this morning to get out and exercise with me for the first time in a while, we got 9 minutes into running and she falls and sprains her ankel! Hah. its okay, just a very minor sprain. But, then we got back home and she felt better until she got a migrane. Being with someone else 24/7 on a mission is hard sometimes, but i have been REALLY grateful for it this week because it gives me so many opportunities to serve someone else. Btw, one of my main goals for this week is to be more self-less, so i think the Lord has definitely answered my prayers for opportunities to work on that. Other peau analogies... our investigators. One day we have ZERO lessons with investigators, and the next day we are overbooked! Just like the waves i watched today, the excitement builds out of no where, all at once, and if you aren't always looking ahead, you miss the chance to see something beautiful that might not come around again for a while. Luckily, in this work, we have the help of the spirit to guide us to the right places at the right time. 2 examples of that this week- we met a girl on the side of the road while trying to contact a less-active family, and she may be the only person in our area who has never spoken to missionaries and actually really wants to. We set up a day to visit her, she was actually there, and she accepted the invitation to be baptized!! Today as we walked in the sand, my comp sat down close to where we parked, but I wanted to walk farther down to a more peaceful spot. She said-- "nah. i'm just gonna sit here for a second." why? i didn't know. BUT then she looked over, perked up and said, "HEY!" We then met an old friend of hers we had been meaning to contact to teach. The friend was at that spot on the beach for 3 minutes to take a picture and then she left. If we had kept walking like I wanted, we would have missed her. We were able to talk to her, get her current phone number, and meet her boyfriend who is a member! She wants to be taught by the missionaries. She even asked some elders to teach her before, but they didn't follow up. We will probably teach her this week. 

I could go on and on about more reasons why this week was a wave-- up and down all over the place, but I'm almost out of time. I just want all of you to know that this work is guided by divine power, and if you allow it to, that same power can guide your life in everything you do. That power is not chance, it is not some abstract or scientific energy, it is the power of God- the literal father of our spirits. He loves you more than you can imagine. If you turn to him, and have the faith to change your life to align it with his will, you will find the greatest happiness. I KNOW IT, but don't trust me, get on your knees and try it out. Pray. with your whole heart. 

Until next week,

Ofa lahi atu,

Sister Bever

ooh and yes, cheesy, totally staged picture attached, but hey, at least I got a wave in it.  And Mother's Day phone call.