Ready for a long email?

We havent had a full P-day since the first P-day of the transfer because of all of our appointments and so with the little bit of time we did have this past week we went and played volleyball with the Elders which was a blast, even though I am terrible at volleyball despite my hope that I would magically become good at volleyball because I am serving a Polynesian mission 😉 Tuesday we had district meeting and talked about how amazing the week before was! We had a miracle week for the whole mission and had so many baptisms and new investigators. I know the power of fasting and prayer because of this week and I love our weekly district meetings to talk about the work and see how we can do better. I always leave so excited to work!

We met a new investigator who was in the area book . Maggie was more energetic than anyone I have ever met and talked like we were all old best friends. She's impossible to explain and I wish so badly I could send a package of "Maggie" to you because she is one of the greatest people I have ever met. She was so excited to hear i liked snowboarding and went on for about 20 minutes about how Utah has the greatest snow on earth. 😉 The craziest part was this: She told us she watches general conference every 6 months and her favorite speaker is President Uchtdorf...we couldn't believe it haha. We are going to continue working with her and hope to set her with a baptismal date this week! 

We had a great lesson with Carlos and talked about Faith. He feels like he is "lesser" than everyone at church because of the mistakes he use to make and because he says he doesn't have enough Faith. He is continuing to stump us with questions and despite his doubts he is at church every week, reads the BOM and makes time for lessons every week. He is such an inspiration to me. 

This week a couple of my fellow missionaries in different parts of the world talked about how much they love the temple and were happy they got to visit this week. I haven't been to the temple in months and I miss it so much!! We really are so blessed to be able to live so close to 3 at home, I can't wait to attend as often as I can 😊 I understand why you tried to go every week now mom, sorry I ever said anything negative about it and thank you for your example.❤

Friday is when our miracle happened. 

Background: The ward counsel here in the Lahaina 1st ward has been a challenge at times. So me and Sister Fifita decided and started visiting just the ward counsel members in their homes. We visited the bishop, the 1st counselor, and 2nd Counselor, the Elders quoram President etc. etc. It took multiple visits, talking story for hours with some of them, and serving them, which was hard on me and Sister Fifita because we didn't get to work towards getting new investigators or baptism with anyone the whole week.  It was a miracle to see the all of the auxiliary leaders (except 2) fall in love with us and continue to invite us over. They didn't say anything negative in ward counsel and thanked us for visiting them. I have learned so much since being here in Lahaina but one thing that stands out to me is the power of a visit. Visiting teachers and home teachers are assigned so when that person goes to church or needs help they have already broken that ice. When we see the ward counsel in the halls at church it's no longer awkward for anyone and I am honestly shocked how 1 initial visit where we didn't stay that long and all we did was talk story changed that. I have a testimony of introducing yourself to others and visiting and home teaching, who knew right? 

😊 

So we have spend an especially large amount of time with the 1st counselor and his wife, the young women's President, the Kanihos. We had our initial visit Sunday night, went over for dinner Tuesday night, stopped by Thursday night, and Friday night we went to a softball game, because Brother Kaniho coaches and one of the guys he coaches with is an inactive member and none of his family is baptized. We got really close with this family and now we have it set up to go every Friday for a softball game to get to know the Hong family (coach) and a couple of the girls who's parents are inactive. It was been awesome to be working so hard and so much with the Kanihos. 

This week it has also rained sooo much and been cold. It's better than being hot, although I am no longer tan haha. We also gave a lesson in Young Women's (#membermauitrust) called "Why do the choices I make matter." It was a fun lesson to give and the girls were very talkative😊 

Last but not least, Sunday night is the night we report our numbers to the district leader and we were pretty bummed out because we had 0 new investigators that week and we usually have somewhere around 3. As we were getting ready to drive home (we live 30 min away from our area) I had the prompting to go visit an active auntie in our ward. I thought that was strange but we went and as we pulled up the Tongan wards relief society President was there, Ane Hafoka. She told us to park in the middle of the street (there was no parking, she was going to watch our car...parked in the middle of the street😂) and let us run inside and talk to Auntie about her less active son really quick. We did that and when we got there, unknown to the Ane and us, the whole part member family was there! We talked to the less active son and his nonmember wife and set up FHE with them for next week. We left with 3 new investigators (their kids were also unbaptized) and got to meet the family who we have been trying to get a hold of for months. 😄 It was a miracle all around and i am so excited to start teaching them. 

A mission is the best thing in the whole world and I am so grateful to be here. I can't believe today is my 10 month mark, it had flown by. We get transfer news this week already and I am praying I will stay here with Sister Fifita but as the song goes "I'll go where you want me to go dear Lord" 😊 

Have a good week❤ 

Ofa atu,

Sista Bowen

P.S. Sister Swenson is taking such good care of us and she made us 20+ frozen dinners so when we don't have dinner and they can't feed us we can still eat a good dinner, no more cereal for dinner😉😄

P.P.S I can look at emails all day on my phone on p-day so if you end up sending your emails later that's okay don't worry😊