Update: My bike finally arrived this morning. It was a glorious reunion and I pointed out to everyone how light and fast it was as I carried it (still in its bike box) into the house gleaming.
Last week, Sister Fonbuena was waaay sakit with a fever so we used her misfortune to our advantage and used the Miri 2nd sister's bike for a few days. Then Sister Pitts also got a fever, so I went on ghetto splits with my mission grandchild, Sister Pullicar. I took her around her area because it's my old area and you never forget where the people you love live. We visited this family who was active last year but now is inactive and I caught up with the mom and we pleaded with her to come back to church. Maybe when she's ready, in her own time.
Sister Fonbuena gave some directions to a water kampung at Pujut 4, so we went over the river and through the woods, uh jungle, to find a potential investigator. We asked some neighbors, who didn't know, but we ended up getting their contact information too. Then we saw a sweet lady walking down the boardwalk and asked if she knew a Maria. "I'm Maria."
"Oh, well that was really fortunate." She led us back to her house, and when we asked why she wanted to learn more from the missionaries, she said it's because she wanted to learn how she can better follow God. We can help with that. Then Sister Pullicar proceeded to teach this awesome Restoration lesson pretty much by herself. (We taught like 3 Restoration lessons in a row that day haha). She doesn't have greenie power because it's like she's not even a greenie. Her Malay is better than mine.
We jalan-jalaned to my area and met up with Elder Sheranian and Elder Hill, and tried to find some church members in kampung Sealine to help us find less actives and investigators because the four of us knew exactly no one. I found some boys maining some bola (playing soccer) and asked, "Aye, boy, ada ahli-ahli gereja kami dekat sini?"
"My mom." We found a chain of families, some active and some less active and got to know them a little better. Then that night I got us lost trying to find our 1st counselor's house by some warehouses. Gaggal. But it was still fun.
The next day, Sister Pitts and Sister Fonbuena still had fevers, and I spent the whole morning vomiting, which was annoying, but then Sister Pitts and I dragged ourselves out of the house and biked up to Lutong because we hated that missionary work wasn't being done in our area. The next morning, we were both hampir mati, so we stayed in and cleaned up our area book. I consolidated a lot of records and made the information easier to read, drew some maps to people's houses (because Sarawak isn't about having real addresses), and made the teaching records as easy as possible to follow so the next missionaries will actually be willing to find the people we love, haha. We have been going crazy being stuck in the house with paperwork, so it was nice that all my pleas to heaven for my bike to sampai were answered.
Sister Pitts and I put another family-man on date, a guy who's missing part of his cranium (I don't know how I always manage to find people missing parts of their skull on my mission). I vaguely remembered Sister Pitts mentioning he drank, so when I asked, he said he completely stopped last week because he didn't like the way it made him feel. I didn't realize the magnitude of this miracle until I got home and looked at his teaching record, and Sister Pitts was kagum (sorry I forgot the word in Iban) about it and said he was an alcoholic for years and it destroyed his family. Other missionaries had given up on him, and I wouldn't have focused on him, but God can change hearts in an instant. He ALMOST went to church yesterday. He dropped his son off on his moto and felt malu and drove away. Darn. Our other investigators are doing well and really enjoyed church. A tender little mercy for us not being able to meet with them as often as we liked.
Yesterday, Elder Fowler's and Elder Stewart's bike tires got stolen (pics attached). We shouldn't have laughed, but we did.
Like always, church was good. Sunday school for both branches is full, to the back of the classroom now. I had this moment of trying not to cry all over myself because the church has grown so much in one short year. Miri is the promised land. The culmination of all the missionaries' work here may have made this the coveted place to serve now (in your face K.K.).
Love you. See you soon. Jaga diri.
xo Sister Wynn
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