From Kendrick

So, I just wanted to mention how blessed we feel as a family to have Andre serve our Heavenly Father in this way. He loves his mission and its exciting to watch him grow. He loves Cameroon and the people there.
Yesterday, for Christmas, Andre was allowed to contact us. Usually missionaries can call home only on Christmas and Mother's Day. Thanks to today's technology, we were able to not just talk to Andre, but see him as well, thanks to Skype! I took advantage of the moment and we took a family picture. Hope you all had a Merry Christmas and thanks for sharing an interest in my son and his adventures in Africa.

NOt much time but... December 19, 2011

I wanted to send a couple pictures. So this is Elder Tingey and I with our new machetes. We went au champs this week (worked on someone's farm) and so we decided that in order to be prepared to do it again, we needed machetes. I took a couple of pictures like this. Just remember that the "field is white already to harvest."

Pictures, andd..... December 5, 2011

Here is a picture of our zone at thanksgiving with all our food, and here is a nigerian song that is super popular here. Elder Tingey was able to get a copy of the CD and I ripped it to my flash drive. Don't worry - I'm not listening to it. I really wanted to know what kind of music is popular here, and well, here it is.

One more experience while everything is loading. I bumped into a musician the other day, and he and I talked a little bit. He was a guitar player, didn't know how to read music, but man could he play. The style of music here fills two genres: religous and pop, and this guy mixed the two. He played this song for us where one of the lyrics was "Shake your body for Jesus." To be honest, it felt really sacriligious, but he could really play guitar.

That's something that's interesting here in cameroon. Everyone believes in God, everyone is chrisitian, and everyone loves to talk about it. That's one of the more difficult parts of serving here - you get people who just want to talk, not committ to a specific church.

Anyways, I hope you enjoy.

Per usual, not much time... December 5, 2011

So I'll type as much as possible here.

First of all, thank you for your emails. It really means a lot to me hearing from all of you. I hope you all enjoy reading these ones.

This week, per usual, not much has happened. We had thanksgiving, and that was fun. I'll send pictures of our zone at thanksgiving. Basically, we just ate a bunch of rottisserie chicken and mashed potatoes, as well as drinking Djino and Topamplamoose. It was fantastic.

Francoise is going to be baptized, most probably. I have high hopes for December 24th. She has totally committed and is now reading her scriptures and stuff every day. I love going to see her. I just really hope she wants to keep going.

I have a couple new investigators I'm excited about. Francois (unrelated to francoise) works at Camtel (cameroonian telephone company) and he is awesome. I love going to see him. He's a really sharp guy, and after giving him the book of Mormon, read through the first 5 chapters of 2 Nephi, from the start. He has committed to living the word of Wisdom, which is tough for him to do, but I really hope he is going to pull through and make it to baptism. I get the feeling he will.

Charles is the husband of a recent convert. Charles has had a troubled past, and has had some troubles with his wife, but now is coming to church, and has started settling differences and helping his wife out with stuff. He is really receptive of the gospel, and has also committed to the Word of Wisdom. I really hope he makes it to baptism too. I get the feeling he will - he already has extra support from his wife.

Sorry this email is skimpy. I don't have much time... Again...

- Elder LaFleur

More fun times from central africa - November 28, 2011

Bonsoir, devoted readers and fans!

So recently, we have been rebuilding. Our two most progressing investigators got baptized (the doctor and his wife), and so now we are in rebuild mode. I have high hopes for a few of our investigators, but our biggest challenge is having investigators get to church. Investigators coming to church is super important because it signals an investigator is progressing towards baptism. We don't want to baptize someone who isn't going to be active at church.

I think the reason church attendance is such a difficult key indicator to have a high number of here is because of the cultural opinion of what church should be. On average, people don't go to church to worship God, although that's what the pastor will be saying you're doing. Church here is more of a social gathering and performance than it is a sacred time to worship the Lord. Elder Tingey went to another church once (he promised an investigator that he would go to his congregation if the investigator came to ours), and told me all about it.

Basically, it started out with a rock band up front playing rock music. They were all getting into it and stuff, the band was totally rocking out, and there would be a pastor up front yelling stuff through a microphone. The pastor finally said "Alright, now confess your sins!" and everyone jumped up and started screaming all their sins. There was a guy there who yelled something like "I'm committing adultery with my neighbor!" while another guy was like "I stole from the supermarché!" and this and that. The band is still all rocking out and stuff, and then gigantic baskets get passed around. The pastor yells "Pay money and God will forgive your sins!" This money, of course, goes straight to the pastor, but never mind that. People are dropping like 50 000 cFa into these baskets (that's like $100; a lot for Cameroon), sometimes more into these baskets.

Finally after like a half hour of this the pastor calms everything down and asks for more donations in white envelopes. He said something like "Now this donation is between you and God." The woman next to Elder Tingey was dropping another 50 000 cFa into this thing. After that, the pastor gave a brand new mercedes to a random guy. The guy in the congregation who got the mercedes talked about how he has been praying for a new car.

Finally, the talking started, and the pastor taught something. Basically he taught that "Not all revelation from God is acceptable." Basically if God gives you an answer to a prayer you don't like, you pray and tell him to change it. He claimed that prayer is what changes the will of God (not a belief in our faith; you should always pray humbly).

And so, church for other people here is like going to a rock show. So a lot of people have trouble going to our church, where we don't have a band or dancing and dolling out the free cars. 

In other news, I finished the 12 week program for training. I am now a full fledged in the field missionary! I had to be trained for 2 transfers, and now I'm trained!

We are getting some new missionaries in the next few months. One is coming January (he should be entering the MTC in the next couple weeks), as well as a bunch more in may when Elder Tingey's generation leaves (that's a replacement force of 10 more missionaries; not a whole lot of missionaries get called to Cameroon). 

Elder Tingey and I had a cake off recently. Basically I took the recipe my mom gave me and Elder Tingey took his recipe and we gave it to a bunch of people and asked which was better without telling them who's cake is who's. It ended up being a tie, unless you count Elder Tingey's vote, in which I would have won. But whatever. I just enjoyed eating all that cake.

I also taught a District meeting using a nice long allegory about jazz ensembles. I don't have my notes with me, but next week I'll bring back what I taught.

Anyways, that's it for this week. Bonsoirée, and Excelsior!

- Elder LaFleur

All Your Base Are Belong To Us...

This week is moving along nicely. I had an interesting experience with a couple of pastors though.

So this week I got told that I am going to hell, and dragging everyone else around me down too. It was actually kind of funny. I thought for sure I would get all upset when it happened, but it ended up being a nice contrast.

There is an investigator named Francoise (not real name) who knows that our church is true. But there is a pastor Etienne and a pastor Steven who belong to her old church who keep showing up and telling her that she needs to come back to their church. She isn't though. She knows that our church is true.

Anyways, we show up one day to talk to Francoise about stuff, and pastor Steven laughed and said something along the lines of "If you give me a million cFa, I will join your church." Elder Tingey totally chatiè'd him (chastised in broken franglais) by quoting the scripture "seek ye first the kingdom of God." Pastor Steven got all emberassed and was about to walk away when pastor Etienne showed up and started getting in our faces. Then pastor Steven tag teamed with him and yelled loud and clear that we are of the devil, we are preaching the devil's doctrine and that we need to go back home and fix our gospel. 

I didn't say anything. To be honest, it was kind of pathetic. I mean, there are differences between our two churches, but we don't march up into people's faces and tell them they are of the devil. The only thing I could think about was the reference Romans 1:16 "I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ." And so, we just stood there for 30 minutes and let them tell us that we are evil. I figured it wasn't worth arguing, despite the fact that they were saying plenty of things that are not true. So Elder Tingey and I just stood there.

The situation reminded Elder Tingey of something a Congolese Elder told him (his name was Elder Nsimba, and he was the man). Elder Nsimba said that "People only throw rocks at a mango tree if there is good fruit." So the only reason people were bashing us is because we have good fruit! Just like it says in the scriptures, "Ye shall know them by their fruits."

They packed up and left, and then we talked to Francoise for a minute, and then set up another rendezvous with her. We then went back later and Etienne was there. He kind of looked dumbfounded. We walked in and sat down, and right before we started, Etienne ran off. We spoke with Francoise and had a really awesome rendezvous. The Spirit was super strong, and she is getting closer to baptism. Once again, "Ye shall know them by their fruits."

Please note that I did not mention any denomination that these two belong to. This was on purpose. We as missionaries do not seek to bash another man's form of worship. We don't even enforce ours on other people. We invite others to come unto Christ by receiving His restored Gospel. We do not with to diminish any other man's form of worship, and believe that every man should worship as far as his own conscious will allow. 

So that's it for this week. Je vous aime!

- Elder LaFleur

more news in Cameroon.... November 7th 2011

Bonsoir, tout la monde!

Life is still pushing along here in Bastos I. We had a baptism - Brent and his wife have both been baptized. They are a fantastic family! It was such a blast teaching them. Brent said that he didn't want to wear the jumpsuit, so he bought his own clothes. His wife got a nice dress too. They're almost temple ready! She just needs longer sleeves.

Brent bought his own clothes because he said that the jumpsuits make people look like prisoners. He said something like "I'm about to be a free man! I don't want to be in a prison outfit when I'm about to be relinquished from my sins!" And so, he looked super sharp at his baptism.

That was so incredible to see. I am so grateful that the Lord placed them in my path. I am so grateful that the Lord let me teach this family the gospel. That was really a wonderful experience. I probably looked like a total dufus at the baptism because I was all smiles the whole time. 

Teaching that family shows that the Lord is preparing every one of us to hear the gospel. The Biloungas have totally been prepared to hear this gospel and to accept this message. They accepted everything we taught so readily. The Spirit was always super strong in every rendezvous we had. It was really a blast teachign them. 

I wanted to thank you all for sending me recipes the last time. Thank you all for sending me recipes.

I have received a lot of questions about me getting packages and mail. Turns out I can send mail and receive packages. Here is what you must do:

1. Find something to mail me. Food is okay, but you have to make sure it is in a tough container. Cardboard and plastic are easily opened by mice - a strong plastic or metal tin container are the best things to send food in. 

2. My address is the following:

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints

Elder Andre Charles-Philip LaFleur

B.P. 3171

Douala, Cameroon

Send it to that address. If it's a normal letter, you can get away with an international stamp (about $1). If it's a package, you can USPS it (super costly, but more reliable) or Post Office (less costly, unreliable).

3. The missionarry couple in Douala will pick it up for me when it gets to cameroon - about 2 or 3 months. Cameroonian government looks inside every package they receive, and then you have to pay them depending on what is inside it. Don't send packages near Christmas - then it costs lots of money for them to pick it up. If you send something valuable, it costs even more (once again, Cameroon got number 1 on "most corrupted country" list a couple years ago). Save yourselves and us some money - don't send anything valuable. To be honest, all I really want is American candy. Skittles, Warheads, Twizzlers pull'n'peelz.... And my mom's homemade blackberry jam. The money that the couple in Douala pays I will have to pay them back in full.

Speaking of homemade, can I get your recipe for bread mom? I want to bake my own - despite the fact the baguettes here are so good.

And so, that is what's happening here in Bastos I. I hope you are all enjoying your time in the states. I am loving it here in Cameroon. I will send some more pictures of scenery next week.

- Elder LaFleur