March 19, 2017

All is going well out here on Fanning Island. I am really enjoying myself.  I am so used to the life here on outer islands and I am enjoying every moment of it.

We were able to baptize a young couple this last week, which was awesome to see and a way cool experience.  It was my first time doing a baptism in the ocean since last July! I think that we are going to be having some more baptisms in the next couple of weeks, which is way great!  We are starting to clear up a lot of time for finding new investigators so all is going well. We have gotten a little bit of help on the paperwork for the marriages that need to be performed, but we still need to get a few of them figured out, which has been really hard.  We still need a lot more help if we are going to get things done.

This week was a little hard because we had to leave our area for a day and a half to help out with transfers since one of the elders on the other side of the island had to leave.  We are working in a threesome until his new companion comes in a week and a half.   Hopefully this week we will be able to stay in our area and go on splits so that we will be able to get more done. 

Last week we went fishing but didn't catch tons of fish... I think that we are going to be going again today and that we should be able to catch some more.. it should be fun.

Time is flying by... I'm currently almost finished with 1 Samuel in the Old Testament and I love it. I don't know why I never read the Old Testament before.

Love you all.  Have a great week!

Elder Parrish

Photos!!!!

This week we were fortunate to receive some photos that Elder Parrish's last companion, Elder Murri, sent home with a returning missionary.  Enjoy!

The church property.  The house where the missionaries live is on the left.  Sacrament Meeting is held in the Maneaba (Center).

Fishing!

Doing service in the Kiribati pits with the native root called called "bwabai."

Going to pick up Elder Johansen

Goodbye Elder Murri!

March 12, 2017

Dear Friends and Family,

Fanning Island is greattttt! Elder Rowsell and I are enjoying our time out here working hard and having some fun. Last P-Day we went fishing and I caught the biggest fish that I have caught on my mission. Like a 30 pound fish--it was soooo sick! We are going out to get some bone fish today. <3 I love working out here and the work is going great.

We haven't had fewer than 16 investigators in each of the last three weeks at church.  Yesterday, we had 90 people overall at church, which was the most we have had in attendance at the Fanning Branch in months.  It was way cool to see so many people at church.  Pretty much all of our investigators have come to church and are progressing at this point... Sometimes things change week to week with our investigators, but all of them are searching for truths and I think they will all get to the finish line at some point.  We have four or five families who are pretty much READY.  And we have a list of 10 marriages that need to be performed before the investigators can be baptized, which is really overwhelming. But the hardest part is knowing that it's out of our control... We are relying on people from Kiritimati and government workers to get the paperwork through for the marriages. We are praying and hoping that things will get there at some point.

The one family I want to talk about is Tekannoe and his wife Neinang and their 3 angel daughters (ages 14, 12, and 10). They haven't been super religious in the past and Tekannoe has been a drunk for years.  But when we started lessons, they began to change until they have completely changed and are currently keeping the Word of Wisdom and are waiting to get married. They hold family prayer, read their scriptures everyday and have come to church the past three weeks. It's been a complete 180 degree change and it's so cool to see. Pray for these marriages so that these baptisms can start flowing.

I Love you all.  Have a great week!

Elder Parrish

Photos:

1.  Missionaries at the District Conference on Christmas Island that Elder Parrish              attended a few weeks ago

2.  The Fanning Island Branch at their Meeting with Elder Johansen of the Area 70            who recently visited

3.  Biking to Church

4.  Recent Baptisms

5.  Fishing

6.  Full boat

March 5, 2017

March 5, 2017

Dear Family:

Thanks for the emails.  Last week was a good week!  I would love to send you some photos of Fanning, but the internet here is way slow and I think that I would be wasting time trying to send any. I guess that you guys will get to see them soon enough since I’m down to four months left!  It's crazy how time flies.

Nothing too mind blowing happened this last week.  You asked about my area.  Fanning is a big island, but a lot of Fanning is unpopulated and so our area isn't too huge! Maiana and Tab where I previously served were definitely a lot bigger in area than Fanning, but we still bike an average of about two hours a day.

Last week, we did have two baptisms, which was nice (my first baptisms on Fanning) and we should be having some in the next few weeks, which will be great. The two baptisms we had were of two kids whose parents were both members so it was cool to see their father perform the baptisms. He was the first missionary in Kiribati and a former student at the Liahona High School.

We had 16 investigators at church, including a couple of awesome families, but it's difficult because most couples in Kiribati don’t get married and these couples won’t be able to be baptized until they are married.  Even when the couples are happy to get married, the process for getting that done here is not an easy one. And it is a bigger problem when the person who doesn't want to get baptized out of the couple refuses to get married to the person who wants to be baptized.  I guess that we will just keep working and see what we can do.  Missionaries who will be coming after us will be able to see some of the fruits of our work here on Fanning once these marriages are performed.  I guess that's what happens when you spend most of your time teaching adults and families.

My new companion Elder Rowsell is a great guy and we get along with no problems.  He's way laid back and we have been working hard and having a good time together. 

I don’t have much time today because we are going to go fishing.  We haven’t been able to go because there hasn’t been any gas on the island until some just came on a ship.  I'm pretty excited! 

It sounds like all is going well at home! I love you and I hope that you have a good week!

Elder Parrish

February 26, 2017

February 26, 2017

Hello everyone!!

These have been two of the sickest weeks of my mission! I can't wait to tell everyone about all of the exciting things that have happened/are happening.

Two weeks ago, Fanning Island was visited by a member of the Area 70, Elder Johansen. It was almost a disaster because we woke up in the morning and it was POURING rain. Kiribati people DO NOT deal with or work in rain so we were having a hard time getting them motivated and making it to the airport on the boat and we had no clue if the airplane was even going to come. To make a long story short, we were SHOCKED cuz when we got to the airport the airplane was there and we had made a member of the 70 wait on us for like 20 minutes. HAHA--just one of those things we had to laugh off cuz we didn't know if we were going to get killed. We didn't end up having much time with the members because the plane was supposed to take off at 12 and the weather still wasn't great, but the weather cleared up quite a bit and we got tons of members to come at the perfect time to meet and greet with a member of the 70.

There were so many little miracles. Elder Johansen is such a powerful man-- He is from Tonga and he is exactly what the people of Kiribati need. He spoke and he said that "the job of a 70 is to pave the way.... He was the first to come on Fanning. There will be other leaders to come on Fanning, mission Presidents, and maybe 70's, until the Savior Jesus Christ comes himself to Fanning." As I looked out I saw everyone crying.  It was so powerful!

Due to the weather, we didn't get to charter the plane to Washington Island as we had planned, but we returned to Kiritimati Island where we had an awesome weekend. On Saturday, we attended the Priesthood Leadership session and had an awesome activity at night with local dancing and singing and then on Sunday we had a conference with all of the saints on Kiritimati.  On Monday, we had an awesome meeting with Elder Johansen before we flew back here on Tuesday. It was so awesome to meet with members and other missionaries on Kiritimati island. I was able to hang out with some of my best friends from my intake and then I was able to have one of the coolest weeks of my mission.

We flew back to Fanning Island this past Tuesday. I came out here with my new companion, Elder Rowsell, who is from Idaho and has been out for about four months. He is a way cool guy and we should have no problems.

The work here on Fanning Island is CRAZY good. We had 19 investigators--yes 19 investigators--at church. We had like 5 families come to church. It was INSANE!  Everything came together and ALL of our investigators came to church. We have many hills to climb with the Word of Wisdom and the Law of Chastity (marriages especially), but people are coming unto Christ. It's nice to see these things happen and to know that you are fulfilling your purpose as a missionary. It's awesome to see how this area has changed even in the one month that I've been here. We will be having two baptisms this week and hopefully a family the following week.

        One quick story:

A couple of weeks ago, we were lessoning with a family. They are members of the Protestant Church and the minister had been getting mad because they had been meeting with missionaries. We were at their house teaching them about the restoration when the minister showed up at their door. We had the picture of the first vision with our bibles open to James 1:5. We had just said "amen," when the minister came up to us and told us that we couldn't visit this family anymore because they were members of her church. She said that she didn't visit our members. I told her that we share the gospel of Jesus Christ with people and try to help them increase their faith. She told us to never come back, but we didn't back down. To make a long story short, she left the house and we closed our lesson in prayer with this family. The father gave a powerful prayer asking for the truth. This family came to church yesterday and are preparing for baptism this month and happily accepted their date this week. Such a COOL experience. I had literally told Elder Murri earlier that day that I really wanted to have a conversation with a minister before I finished my time and it happened like two hours later. So funny how the Lord works!

    All is well and people are changing through the gospel! Have a great week!

Elder Parrish

Update!

February 12, 2017

Hey fam and friends,

It's been a while since I've done a little bit of an update. It's crazy to think that this week will be the end of my first full transfer serving on Tabuaeran or Fanning Island. It's been a super fun transfer serving with Elder Murri as my companion. I'm super sad to see him go. I will be getting a new companion named Elder Rowsell who is from Idaho and is from the same intake as Elder Murri.

This week is a pretty special week because there will be a member of the Area Seventy coming as well as President Larkin and a couple of other people. They will be flying a charter plane here on Friday and spend about three hours here before we go and visit “Teraina” or Washington Island. After several hours there we will all fly back to “Kiritimati” or Christmas Island and have an awesome weekend with a district conference before I will return to Fanning the following Tuesday with my new companion. This will be the first time that the Mission President--let alone an Area 70--will be coming to Fanning Island so it will be pretty special.

This past transfer has been awesome even though Elder Murri and I haven't had any baptisms yet. I love serving on outer islands. There is nothing better than taking bucket showers in the open air and sleeping on mats inside of mosquito nets. This past week we literally slept in hammocks under the stars and got destroyed by mosquitos. We have gone fishing in the beautiful lagoon and we have gone fishing with hand nets. We have done service and learned how to work in the Kiribati pits with the native root called "bwabai" and we have learned how to work on the "seaweed" which is an export native to Kiribati. I feel right at home.

We have seen so many people change and we have some amazing investigators. The branch has many problems, but I wouldn't change our investigators for a thing. We had ten investigators at church yesterday and the work is really starting to go well. Here are a couple of my favorite investigators.

Tenikoraa: She is so smart and she literally just knows that the church is true. She has prayed to know the truth and her prayers have been answered.  The problem that is keeping her back from baptism is the fact that she is a Deacon in the Protestant Church. It's been so interesting to watch her fight between what her heart knows is true and what her mind wants. She is shy to come to church and the Minister keeps asking her what is wrong. I hope that she can get over her fear and ultimately come to church, but she is still an awesome person. We would love some prayers her way.

Terewaa: Terewaa is a 75-year old man who is so sickkk. He is one of the oldest and most respected men on the island. In the Kiribati culture, old men are the most important of all people and it's been awesome to work with him. He is progressing so well and even came to church yesterday and had to bike under the blazing sun to get to church. The members were so excited when he came to church and they all went to shake his hand. The only thing keeping him back from baptism is the fact that he isn't married and his wife refuses to get married to him unless it's in the Catholic church. We are praying that something will give and that he will be able to get married by the government.

I love all of our investigators so much and I know that next the next transfer will be a great one as we start to see some of the fruits of our labors. I love this people and this language and this culture.

Funny story: Tabuaeran is known for not having very much cargo so when the cargo ship came this past week, the island basically shut down. Elder Murri and I went and dropped a bunch of money on chips and chocolate, hahah, but that's not the story.  We asked the workers on the ship if we could eat with them and they let us on the ship to eat and chat with the captain and the workers. We had an awesome dinner on the ship in the bay eating mashed potatoes and pork with a side of corn–the best food that I've had in almost two years. My stomach was destroyed that night when I kept waking up going to the bathroom. (Maybe I should have eased into the white people food.)  It was way interesting talking to the workers on the ship all of whom had very different backgrounds and difficult and kind of hard lives. Elder Murri and I commented that we felt so different from these people. We truly felt like "the chosen generation and a royal priesthood."  We feel in the world but soooo out of it at the same time.

It's so great to be a member of the church and to have direction in my life and a sense of where I'm going. Lots of exciting things happening right now. Livin' the dream! Talk to you guys from Kiritimati in a week!

Elder Parrish 


Photos:

1.  The Cargo Ship
2.  Meal on the Cargo Ship
3.  Chips and Chocolate

Quick Update!

January 22, 2017

Quick updateeeeee cuz I'm about to go fishing (hehe);

All is going well out here on Fanning Island. We came back and things were a little slow, but after a few weeks things are definitely starting to pick up. Yesterday we had eight investigators at church--people who I never ever thought would come to church showed faith and came. It's so nice when you see inspired commitments help people come closer to Christ.

Yesterday we held our first gospel principles class in the branch (YAY) and our branch did its first ever rescue (whaaaa!!). The branch isn't perfect, but they definitely try their best and I know that they want the church to grow here on Fanning.

We have some awesome investigators. One is this lady named Tenikoraa who we just started lessons with. She is legitimately a Deacon in the Protestant church.  Although she wants lessons,  she expressed how hard it would be for her to ever leave her church and her calling. We shared the scripture in Acts 4:29 about how we need to do God's will and not men’s will.  It hit her right in the heart. I know that she has many challenges, but we have been having great lessons and I'm really excited to see where it goes.

To be honest, this week I have just been thinking about the gospel and how it changes lives...  It seriously blows my mind. We can lesson with someone for 30 minutes and it can change them so much. We lessoned on the Word of Wisdom with one of our investigators who was NOT progressing and it changed him to the point where he came to branch service on Saturday and then to church yesterday. That "double-edged sword" (Hebrews 12:6) called the word of God has the power to change lives quicker than the sword (Alma 31:5). It's seriously the best part of being a missionary. It's so fun to see the process of conversion from start to finish.

I hope that all is going well at home! I love you guys!

Elder Parrish