November 6, 2012

 We made several visits today before we headed for our scheduled appointments.  Our first appointment was with the Matshotyana family.  She is going to be baptized this Saturday by Vuyisile, her husband and a convert of less than 4 months. They are a really cute family and the spirit is always there when we visit them. 

 After our lesson, they served us cream soda and cookies.  Now Rick and I like the cream soda served in the states, but what they call cream soda here has no resemblance to that. This stuff is green and tastes like something that would be served to a POW during a torture session and only if there were no UN observers around, but being the good missionaries we are, we drank it smiling the whole time and thanked them for their hospitality. They offered us seconds, but we politely refused. The cookies were good, but we didn’t want to take a chance on them pouring us some more African cream soda.

After this, we went to give the lesson to couple who have had an up and down relationship. She is a member although not active and he is taking the lessons but not progressing very quickly. They aren’t married, but we are giving them the marriage and family relations lessons anyway.  We hope they will get married soon, but we have our doubts.  

 After our discussion together, Thabo asked if he could ask us a question.  He told us he had had a dream about finding his father.  He doesn’t know who his father is but in the dream was told he would find his father in a white church on a hill.  Where this branch used to meet, was on a hill but I don’t know if it was white. After traveling around, he ended up in Port Alfred and started coming to our branch and felt really good there.  He gave a little more explanation on his life experiences and then asked us if President would be his father.  Of course, Rick felt honored and said he would be glad to.  They take this kind of thing very seriously and we are really not sure what is all expected of us as his adopted parents, but we will do what we can.  When we left, he said “bye daddy”.  It was a very humbling evening.