The power is taken away, it's the great apostasy

Often we teach investigators that the apostasy is when God takes away his priesthood power from the earth. Everyone in my apartment but me was in the great apostasy, money wise. idk where all their money went but poof, no more money. That’s what happens in this mission. However, there was also no power too, best birthday present ever we came back after the cyber on Monday and they had cut the power to just our apartment. All our neighbors had power but not us. We gave our bills to the office to pay so we called them turns out the person who pays the bills got sick and didn’t pay, so no power for us. But hey, no problem right, it’s the Benin Cotonou mission. We slept up on the roof of our apartment complex because there was a little air up there because inside the apartment it was literally cooking us alive. It was like that from Monday to Thursday. We used candles, all our food spoiled in the fridge, the other companionship had fish in the freezer and it got so rotten. The apartment still stinks a little like rotten fish. However, we were not left in darkness a figurative angel Moroni came and we got the power back! The restoration is oh so good. Now I’m not saying this to complain I’m fine. I prefer to have water cut then power but really these experiences are so unique and I continue to live through things that I thought would be super hard but they are only for a few days and then back to normal. It was a good week.

Thank you to all who wrote me a note on that birthday banner. It seemed like everyone I know wrote me something so thank you so much. I got that package on Friday my sixth month anniversary on the mission, which really shocks me 6 months done is so cool. It has gone by fast, not super fast, but fast enough. I still have a lot left but I treated my self to a little bottle of apple juice to celebrate, it was great. Thank you all so much again for the kind words you wrote me.

In the middle of a birthday, six month mark, and power outages I’ve been out in the red sandy hills teaching. And boy is it hard, to teach here is difficult and I’m not complaining but I’ve done all this work to learn French and I come to Hevie and no one speaks French, or if they do they don’t speak it well enough and can’t read. I’m now learning how to teach super simply without scriptures without big words just simple phrases, lots of examples and things like that. We have quite a few kid investigators too because we teach a lot of families and it’s great you just tell them something and that becomes the truth for them if they can understand it. But some good things are coming out of this I’m learning how to speak Fon little by little, not super well but I’m learning new phrases and words every day. I can start a conversation ask how someone is doing and say that I speak Fon, even if it’s not true. Raveneau and I have convinced quite a few people we can speak Fon with our limited vocabulary, but its growing which is really cool. Just seeing these people’s faces light up when a Yovo can speak their language it’s just so fun. Every sector has its difficulties and upsides but I’m doing my best.

Me and Elder Ellison

Me and my huge birthday banner

Raveneau and Peterson - father and son