I would like to travel to Guadeloupe to see this beautiful country Jake keeps describing. Lance and I have seen some amazing sunsets in the Caribbean, Hawaii, and Costa Rica but perhaps Guadeloupe takes the cake.
I'm soo glad Jake is exercising...I truly believe that if the Missionaries exercise they will be able to focus and battle to a better degree any depression or anxiety that may come their way. Movement is God's gift to us through our bodies.
WELCOME TO BASSETERRE? SECOND BEST SUNSETS IN THE WORLD. In other news I
will be staying in basse terre gwada for another month and a half at the very least. but i hope that can stay here for a long time, several more transfers at least. to tell you, we live on the side of a volcano, we are about 200 metters above sea level top story of three with a all around balcony.life is good:) working out in the mornings for upper body on the balcony, or running next to the ocean the other three mornings of the week......boss.
In other news, Elder C and I have been doing work down here in Basse Terre. Tons of things are changing..... from reactivating families, to helping the group find a building here in basees terre now that we have approval from The Seventy.
This last week there was a huge strike on gass that lasted 8 days.now the church is 30 minutes away. so we had to save our gas just for going to church and walk our area. we have the biggest area in all of gwada and probably in alot of our mission. also, like i said earlier we livce on a volcano here. so everything is steep uphill. but it was good, just burned about a billion calloriiies and contacted about every living soul while heaving for air and emptying out the sweat bucket.... haha but life is good. i love these people. sometimes they are crazy, sometimes they drive you crazy, but i love them.
This place puts the Bible Belt to shame. a mixture of Seventh Day Adventists, J- wittnesses, Catholics, Evangelists screaming at the top ot their lungs, and rastas (both real rasttas after the order and guys who want to call them selves rastas with dreads and weed, weed is actually against their order, also rastas belive they live after nazarite law, if you mention malchezidek they will go on an hour or two rant(also to to service for them they have to do service for you) and about billion other religions I am probably forgetting. . these people breath the Bible and eat spirituality for breakfast.
Avoiding Bible bashing is probably the first lesson you learn out here, some people will not see sense, all you can do is bear solemn testimony of these things and be exactly obedient with hopes to have enough light to illuminate the darkness in their lives.
Anyone who isn't part of one of these religions comes from France and is beyond atheist or agnostic or whatever you want to call it. Those people one time told me when her and her husband get to an old enough age they are going to go to a little retreat in switzerland and commit suicide togeather... i found that very disturbing. But here you also have to remember that people have their own agency and you have to let them chose for themselves. For me, my favorite message is the joy the gospel brings. The blessings of the commandments. repentance. baptism. holy ghost. perseverance to the end.
Also, there is a type of green banana that is not plantain but you use it to make fries and it doesnt absorb the oil so they are healthy and delicious.
The chruch is true, it is lead by Jesus Christ through a living prophet. The Attonement is infinate and always there for us.
The blessings are waiting for our obedience,
je vous aime mes amis et ma famille,
Elder Lewis
