McDonalds

I am sending this Email from Nadi, Fiji. I got a call last week on Wednesday that I will be transferring to Christmas Island, and will be working in the area called "Banana".  As part of the transfer to get to Christmas Island, you need to go through Fiji, and stay a night, and then the following night fly to Christmas. So I got in yesterday, and will be leaving close to midnight tonight. Pretty crazy huh. 

Other crazy things: I am the only one transferring to Christmas, which means I am alone in Fiji; I met one Kiribati person who served a mission in Boston, MA; another who is traveling to go to Boston University, and another who married an RM from Utah that had served in Kiribati and then met her when he came back to visit Kiribati. (Also that lady served a mission in Carlsbad, California.)

So the Lord has been watching out for me. I also got to eat McDonalds and take a hot shower and sleep on comfy bed. So all in all it has been a crazy week. So many blessings I have seen as well.

 So yeah that’s where I am at.

More to come for sure....

Tiabo, I tangiringkami

Elder Farner

PS I also was trying to email from an internet cafe that wasn’t open yet, I had been waiting forever, then a recent convert, a Fijian girl, came up to me and helped me find a different internet cafe that was open and way nicer… The Lord is way too kind.

te aii

My new companion is Elder W.  from Orem, Utah (born in Provo and raised in Orem). He is a really hard worker, like more than me.  We will be in a trio in 10 days with an Elder coming in from an outer island. Other than that we have been doing a ton of tracting with very little fruit of the labor, but at least we are getting the message out there.

We also cleaned the house today pretty thoroughly, so we should be having a good week in a nice clean house. 

Before

After

Look what ended up on a doorknob..a coconut crab; looked like a giant spider. Way creepy

te aii

No baptisms, and the closest possible time will probably be the end of June.... Slowly but surely though we can build up the work and the branch here in Tenmwaiku.

Tiabo ngkami

Elder Farner

Tiimou

We got a new branch presidency!  Awesome.  We also should have baptism this Saturday so that is cool.  Her name is Tiimou and she is 15.  She has a lot of support as she is a part-member family.  She currently lives at her brother’s house who is less-active, but her sister is an RM and her brother-in-law just got called to be the new branch president, and she has another sister on a mission right now so she has good support.  Plus she has friends outside of her family who are members as well that live close to her house.  So that should be good.

Another sunset at the bottom of the page, this picture was taken right next to our house.


Get to skype the family this week!

April 29, 2018

Hey Everyone,

This last week was a tough one!  But I am still alive and things are bound to get better.  On a positive note, we just go new copies of the Book of Mormon translated in Kiribati that now have a guide to the scriptures!  Way awesome, should help with the mission.

We have a person who’s should be ready for baptism May 12th, so we will see how things go.  Her name is Tiimou and she is a sister of members, one of which served a mission, and another who is currently serving one and is almost done.  The only problem I foresee is that her father lives on an outer island that is one of the furthest south of the main island, and so getting parental permission might be interesting...please pray for her.

Pictured below is Kanabure and his son, Tokantetaake. Kanabure is the man who got baptized with his wife on March 10th and he just turned 31 last week.  They are an awesome family.

Tekeraoi ngkami
Tiabo ke!

April 22, 2018

We have had an interesting week. Two elders that were in our house left to return home as their time here has finished.  They left Friday.

On Sunday we were biking past a man’s house and he was laying in a hammock and his kid ‘attacked’ Elder Hanks with a stick.  We passed and kept going and I thought we should talk to him but we kept going and I told Elder Hanks.  He then told me we should go back (listen to the first impression).  We went back and he hopped up and invited us into his house.  We didn’t even say anything really about going into his house, he invited us of his own accord.  Way cool. Nice experience.

Tiabo,
Elder Farner