PETER'S BAPTISM - April 24, 2011

Good Morning!!!!!

Big things happened!! Whooooaaa!!! But before we get to that.....We had Peter's baptism on Wednesday! It was great! I got to baptize him! He is doing great, after I brought him up out of the water we gave each other a big hug! He said thanks... I've been with him through all the good and rough times and to finally get to see him get baptized was great! The Spirit was strong... He bore his testimony, said how he knew this is where he needed or where God needed him to be. Then he talked about his family and how his goal is to get to the temple, and especially get his family to the temple and be sealed there. Now it will take some time, because he has been doing it by himself, but he has great faith and he has a lovely wife that I strongly feel would make a great member of the church one day. So I'm very excited for him and his future as it looks bright!!!

Now for some big news! I went to President Porter's house on Tuesday and he pulled me aside and said those words that make your stomach drop because you know that something big is going down, "Elder Belnap, are you ready for your new assignment?" I said "Yep, what do you want me to do?" He said, "I'm moving you to go to Manukau, to be with Elder Stucki." So I'll give you the background and why all of this is so important.. There are 3 zones that are called the big 3. The mission pretty much rests on these 3 zones to come through each and every month. Then there are 2 zones that are the flagstaff of the mission. Manukau is one of them. So Manukau had some stellar months, baptizing roughly 30+ a month, doing great. Then, the past couple months took a hit baptizing only 12&19 (very low). So President Porter put Elder Stucki in to clean it up and take it to the next level. Which is exactly what he does. He was my zone leader in Henderson when we hit the zone best, then took Tamaki (another one of the big 3) from an under performing zone to performing at a level people never thought (what we did in Gisborne he did in Tamaki). Well he came in and right away cleaned it up and this month. They broke the zone best, and tied the all-time zone best in the mission of 33 baptisms.... And it was just ridiculous what happened and next month is going to be a month that people thought could never happen. So President Porter sat me down and said you will be junior to Elder Stucki, who he said is the best he's ever seen. And he told me that he just wants me to LEARN LIKE CRAZY from him. And then to carry the zone to the next level. So that's my assignment this transfer. Work my butt off and learn like crazy. To be honest, it's going to be hard. But it will be worth it. There is a MAJOR PRESSURE SITUATION. Thus far in my mission. I've never been put in a situation where things are going great and President Porter is just expecting them to get better. I've only been asked to turn zones around and get them pumping, which I have: Gisborne, Hamilton, and Mount Roskill is finally getting on board. Now I'm coming into a pressure situation where even more is going to be required. So I know that President wants me to become great because he wouldn't have stuck me with the best if he didn't. And I'm killing of Stucki this transfer. He is going home. I love him. He's intense. He's very similar to Chase Hart. But even more intense lol! He's good at what he does and everyone knows it. People think he's cocky, but it's just who he is and once you get to know him you realize that's not true, just his personality. It'll be good. He runs things like a business. Like a fortune 500 company, but I've come to learn that it just takes organization and trust from your missionaries and along with that, serious revelation. I've never had a zone planning where we spent literally hours praying, pondering on what God needed us to do to get our zone to the next level. In all, I am blessed to be serving with Elder Stucki. Yes we get along, yes he has a much different personality, BUT we still get along great! And he will help me become a GREAT missionary and leader, what more could I ask for? And in my personal life, he has already helped me, and in business as well.... Elder Stucki is from Las Vegas, and a state champ wrestler. And has a strong testimony of the church!

So a bit about Mount Roskill. In my last area, my ward hadn't baptized in like 3 month, unacceptable. But I baptized the whole time I was there, and left 2 solid people set. And next month my area should be able to baptize weekly for may! Here in Manukau, I love my area. Elder Stucki and I are the ONLY WHITE PEOPLE LOL... Everyone is islander, LOVE IT! We have 5 people set in our area! And our goal is 10! I feel we can get it! Yesterday at church this guy spoke and said how his wife isn't a member and how he wants her to be. We asked if we could come see his family. Last night we saw the Fosio family (Samoan) and had a super powerful Restoration lesson with them. We found 4 new investigators. And the family felt the Spirit super strong, and I feel that they are great prospects for next month! It was just powerful. And last night we helped this family that recently got baptized and it was a powerful lesson we gave the boys blessings. And both of them were incredibly strong. It just feels good to follow the spirit. I was praying for Heavenly Father to bless me with a good pumping area and I got it. Roskill was hard for me, cuz stat wise it was difficult, but now we are teaching 30+ lessons a week and having great success. NOT because of us, but because of the Lord! So I am very happy to be here!

I LOVE YOU ALL HEAPS!!!
HAVE A GREAT WEEK!!!!!!
OFA ATU (Tongan, Love You)

Elder Belnap

General Conference and 3 sets!! - April 10, 2011

Malo lelei (Malo-lay-lay... Tongan for "Hi") Wow, Conference was powerful!!! Loved it!! Those talks were exactly what I needed! Ha especially all the marriage talks lol!!! Boy there was quite a few!.. Anderson's was great! You should've been in Conference over here when he talked about Sid Goings! Don't know if you know, but they broadcast Conference to all the stake center's in New Zealand... So we don't get to lazy around in our pajamas and watch it lol! But when they said his name, it was like everyone's heads went straight up lol!! He is a legend, member or non-member respects him! Our investigators where riled up about it too! And Dad, I got pretty excited about Roger Bannistar, I still remember you telling me about him. I learned a lot about the temple. Especially when it comes to marriage. First, if you are having problems with your marriage to go to the temple. There were 2 examples given of struggling marriages, but when they went to the temple it solved it as they remembered their temple covenants. Second, if you want your marriage to stay stable and STRONG, go to the temple! Third, if you feel tired, worn out, or need a boost or to feel better, go to the temple. There are many blessings that come from it and it made sense to me as the Spirit bore strong witness to me the importance of the temple and the Eternal blessings that come! The talk about "TO BE" was inspiring! Really good! It's important to praise on the things that help you get the result! And I've already started applying that within myself and the zone as I feel that will help change the nature of our zone. And more importantly my nature. I've learned that it's really important to change my nature so when I go home, I'm not the same person that left. Of course I'll have a much stronger Spiritual side, and more knowledge of the gospel, but it's the other things that are important to have a nature change, and this is also what President Porter has talked to me about! Anyway, I could go on all day, but I hope that each of you had your own epistle from one of the pophets or apostle as stated by Elder Holland. And then I hope you apply it into your "TO BE" as beautifully put by Elder Gibbons!!! Our week was good! We set Peter for the 23rd after a very intense lesson!! I can't even begin to tell you about it, he's just intense!!! And he looks at things very different! But whatever it takes to get him baptized!!! We need your prayers, because he is almost our last person that can be baptized this month!!! We also set Krissy and Yasmine! Or should I say they set themselves!!! The only problem is they are set for the 21st of May!!! Which is 6 weeks away!! And way to far away for Satan to keep them from getting baptized! But they both enjoyed Conference and have been progressing!!! Louis we are still working on, but he's not quite progressing!!! We had good week! We also had three other people at church!! So that is great for us!! LOVE YOU ALL HAVE A GREAT WEEK!!!!! Elder Belnap PS FULLY INVESTED..... IN NZAM!!! also it's my 17 month mark, going by fast, crazy!

Great Week!! - April 3, 2011

Kia Ora! We had a great week! We finally taught many lessons and found some good potentials for our area! Now if we can keep it going and be consistent then we got something good going on here!! We had 4 investigators at church which is the most I've had here. And we taught 18 lessons which ties my record here! So things are going really good! And tonight if all goes well hopefully we can set Peter for either the 16th or the 23rd! We had some really good lessons with Krissy, Louis, and Yasmine! They are just golden. Krissy told us that since she met us that she has been trying to give up coffee and smoking, and we haven't even taught the Word of Wisdom and yesterday I gave her 2 Nephi 31 to read; and Krissy and Yasmine read it and they had some questions about getting baptized. And Krissy's like, "I don't think I can get baptized." I asked why. She said, "Well, I'm afraid of water." lol! I shouldn't be laughing but I'm glad that it's that than something else... so we are hoping for her and her daughter to get baptized together and we are shooting for the 16 or 23rd! They are great!!! We've got some other people in mind that could get baptized this month, it's just going to take some serious miracles! We had interviews with President! It was sadly my last interview with President Porter as he will be finishing in June... We had a really good chat. I just love the guy. I went in with a question in mind about business, if that is what I should do, and maybe what area and different things like that. And anyway, I didn't even say anything, he just started saying,"I've always thought you would be great in the business world. That you just have the mentality to get things done." And he shared some other things with me. And he asked what I wanted to do. I told him real estate. And he was pleased. But he said, "More importantly, you will make a great leader in the church." As much as we were talking about business, he said that at the end of the day it's not the money, or how big you make your business, the Lord is going to need your leadership skills in His kingdom. And that really hit me, because I'm all business lol! And leadership stuff is hard lol! But we had a good chat. Then we talked about some Spiritual things.... my next question was finishing out strong. And he told me exactly what I needed to hear so that I can finish. Because it's hard work. Being a leader and different things. It's like you are always tired, and you always have to be smiling, even when you have a bad day, Elder Callistar said that's just part of being a leader, you might have to go to the bathroom and cry for 30 seconds but then you have to come out and act as though everything is fine and uplift your missionaries. I feel that I've been doing better with that, but I need to continue to go hard even when fatigue sets in! I went on a tradeoff with this Malaysian elder! Elder Leong in the Chinese program, and boy did we have a great day. We talked to 75 people which is the most I've talked to in one day. And not to mention that probably like 40 of them were some serious opposition! But we had a mean miracle..... So a few weeks back I was on a tradeoff with him. And we talked to this girl named Bianca. She seemed semi-interested. She said if we could find her house that she'd listen, all she did is give us a street. Well fast forward 3 weeks... we were on our way back to a lesson and I was just sitting pondering on the bike what to do while Elder Leong was busy looking at his plans for the day. I glanced up and I see this street, Letterkenny. I think, "Wait Letterkenny, that's where Bianca lives." As I look down the street, I see it's a dead end street so I was like, "Well, it might be worth knocking out the whole thing it's only 40+ houses." I turned to Elder Leong and asked if he remembered her, and he did. And I asked what he thought. He was all good for it. So I said, "I'm only going to knock houses that I feel impressed to knock because we don't have much time." I was walking and I see this Chinese guy, so I go talk to him thinking, "Oh, this must be why I was guided back her, to help Elder Leong find some Chinese people." But he wasn't interested, and we asked if he knew a Bianca? He said no, but there are some girls that age of 20 around and pointed out the houses for us. As I was walking I looked at this one house and felt good about it, knocked it, and guess who answered the door? Bianca. She was blown away that we found her house. Ha, so was I. But I felt like a real instrument in the Lord's hands. God put us on the street, had us stop right underneath the street sign, had me glance up to see the sign, then we only talked to 2 people on that whole street and the one pointed us right to her! That is when you know that you are being an instrument and that this work is TRUE!!! We will be going by to visit and follow up with her this week. But we have to pass her onto the sister missionaries because she is out of my area. But she is good! HOPE YOU ENJOYED CONFERENCE!!!! LOVE YOU ALL!!! Elder Belnap

Found a Family - March 27, 2011

Kia Ora! We had a crazy hectic week!! We had our zone council and leadership training this week! Which took 2 days! But it was all really good! President is getting ready to go home and it was a very emotional meeting. He showed a clip of Remember the Titans and man, my heart was racing, blood pumping, I was breaking a sweat lol! I was just ready to go play some ball, lol! And then he opened it up to the leaders to come bear testimony and the most outspoken missionary gets up and it was powerful. He had us all stand up and make a promise in our heart to finish strong! And it was great, like a Remember the Titans! So that really got all the missionaries pumped up! As for our zone and breaking the zone best, well, Satan got hold of many people this week. We were supposed to baptize 21 souls for the month, but we finished with 15. I don't know what happened. I spent more time in the other missionaires area trying to save their people. I learned many experiences. I learned that if we work hard and do our best that God will definitely provide. And he did, we had 26 sets in the zone. But if we don't do our part in taking care of them then we will lose them. We lost 11 souls! Which is nuts! In any of my zone, I have never lost this many. In fact, I would say I have a reputation for hardly ever losing a set. But we took a toll this week! I also learned that we have to always be fighting against Satan! And we have to do ALL we can to help them get baptized! We can't just give it 90% and expect them to enter into the waters! So I've been on my knees a lot beause I feel very responsible. So know I have to in a lovely way help the missionaries understand the same thing. BUT on a positive note, always got to have the positive, something I've been trying to work on, I've been a bit negative lately lol! Every companionship in the Zone BAPTIZED!!! Which has never been done before in this zone! So we are definitely improving! And I am very happy about that. The next challenge, getting the zone best, And having the whole zone baptize again next month!!! So here we go!!!!! We found a CHOICE family!!! A member gave us this referral and we went and taught the Krissy (mom), Louis (dad), and Yasmine (daughter, 14). Krissy is super prepared. She had all the right questions and we answered them. We got her to kneel and pray on the first lesson and ask God if what we taught is true. And the Spirit was strong. Then on Saturday we had another lesson... and this time Yasmine sat in! It was great, taught the Plan and they loved it! She had a great experience. She stresses a lot, but she said a prayer this week, and she felt the Spirit calm her. Then on another occasion, she thought she saw her grandad come to her and tell her what she is doing is right, who just happened to be a member. And yesterday, she and Yasmine came to church!!! They are doing so good!!! What a blessing aye!!!!!! We also set Peter for baptism! This Maori guy! He came into the lesson asking God if he should get baptized!!!! And we taught 1 Nephi 8. Asked where he is on the straight and narrow. And said that he's almost eating the fruit. We asked what he needed to do to taste it, "get baptzied"... Yep! So we set him. And he might get baptized this week, if he's not in Christchurch... if not it will be soon!! So pray for Peter!!!! And last night I saw a girl that is in the Swanson ward! Her name is Shayna Tapasoa and she got called to the St. George visitor center mission! and she gets there in August! So I'm super excited for them! Going to have to go visit her!!! Things are good! Still trying to find New investigators! But God is still providing in a big way!!!!! LOVE YOU!!!! Elder Belnap

TESI'S BAPTISM!!!!!!

Kia Ora!

We had a fantastic week! Tesi got baptized!!!! And it was a GREAT baptism!! She asked if I could baptize her and I was privileged!! And I got to wear my ificonga (if-i-conga)!! It's like a guy's skirt lol! But it was fun to baptize her! So our first baptism in the area!!! She is a true miracle! She overcame heaps of different challenges, especially smoking, but she relied on the Lord and He provided for her! And yesterday, she got confirmed a member of the Church! She is just so good, really stanch... she's going to do great!!!!

Our zone is doing really good! We are finally on pace to do something great!!! So right now we are projected to break a Zone Best!! It's 17, but we are projected to hit 20!! And another thing, we've got all 9 companionships baptizing!! So that is great!!!! Another thing that hasn't been done before here in Roskill!!! So we are being very blessed, every single companionship! And this last week we lead the mission in Preach By the Way! Each companionship hit over 100 and a zone average of 145 people talked to for each companionship! So we are really stretching ourselves!! And we are doing our best to take things to the next level... In fact, I don't know if any zone has ever averaged that high of number before! So we are doing all we can to accomplish big things here in Roskill!

We also reset Nia this last week to get baptized in April! So we are really praying for that miracle! But really overall, we need to have some big miracles because we need more investigators!! And we need to find more people that want to progress and be baptized!

LOVE YA!!
HAVE A GREAT WEEK!!!!

Elder Belnap

MIRACLE WITH TESI!!!! - Sunday, March 13, 2011

Kia Ora!

Transfer week!!!! So I'm staying in Mt. Roskill!! But Elder Christiansen got transferred to Tauranga!! Lucky guy!! I was jealous of him, but he's now the Senior Zone Leader down there with my other boy, Elder Keyes! They are going to do great down there! My new companion is from Tooele and his name is Elder Bresee. He's the most loving, humble, guy. And he's just pure and righteous. I'm really excited to be with him. He's just great! We are really trying to get our zone to the next level! We've got all the potential to have a BIG MONTH! We are on pace to break the zone best! We are looking at roughly 20 baptisms for the month, with all 9 companionships baptizing! So I'm really excited about that, if that happens we are in great shape and President Porter will be happy! lol!

We had a pretty good week! Had many miracles with Tesi! She's all good to get baptized this weekend. She has a strong testimony. She has had many trials but has been able to overcome all of them. She had a problem with smoking, but she hasn't smoked in two days!!!! And she said that it has been a lot easier for her to quit smoking! And that was a big testimony for her! Next problem, we asked if anything else would keep her from being baptized? She said, "Well if my mom found out..." I was like, "WHAT!!!" She said if her mom found out that she would freak and probably not allow her to be baptized (even though Tesi is 26). It's like Niuen tradition or something. So I've been freaking out and praying my guts out the past couple of days! And yesterday as we were walking to church with her, she said, "Elders, good news. I talked to my mom and when she was dropping me off, I said, 'Mom, that's the church I'm going to,' and she said, 'Oh, I used to go to that church." And she was absolutely fine with her going to church and getting baptized!!!! Prayers are answered! So this Saturday at 6:30 she'll be baptized!!!!!! CAN'T WAIT!!!!!!!

Also, we had Nia at church yesterday hoping to re-set her for next month!! So we've been having some good miracles! Still need more investigators! But we are still being blessed! Heard about the earthqauke in Japan, but we are all good here in NZ!

LOVE YA!
HAVE A GREAT WEEK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
PRAY FOR US!!!!!

Elder Belnap

ZONE CONFERENCE!!!

Kia Ora!

We had a good week! Had Zone Conference this week! And then we had Zone Council right after that with Elder Callistar of the Seventy, then we were invited to go to the stake presidents' and bishops' meeting with two of the Seventy. It was really good! I learned heaps!! For example, Elder Callistar talked to the Zone Leaders about using the doctrine of principles with your missionaries. So I learned that that's exactly what my parents did with me growing up... Example:
"Can I be out after 12?"
"Well son, does anything good happen after 12?"
"No."
"So then you know the answer."
Anyway, I've been applying the principle thing with the missionaries and it works!!! So I know why my parents did some of the things they did, lol!

Tesi came to church yesterday! She LOVED IT!!!! She said that she was waking up throughout the night because she was so excited. She was just loving it! So she is looking good to be baptized on the 19th!! Stoked about that.... Alvina didn't come, super disappointing. And Nia, well she can't be baptized this month, hoping for next month! This area you just really have to work hard so we need some serious prayers that we can still find people that can be baptized!!!!

It's starting to get cold! New Zealand is weird. One day it is hot and over night the season can change. We've only had two maybe three good months of summer which is so short! So I'm hoping that it won't be too cold of winter...

Transfers is this week!!! I'm hoping that Elder Christiansen stays!!! We get along so good! So here's to hoping!

It was somewhat of a slow week! But hoping that God will bless us more this week!!!!

LOVE YA


Elder Belnap