Visit from Elder Bednar

 This weekend, Elder Bednar came!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  OH MY GOSH!!!  We saw him at Stake Conference on Saturday, he gave an incredible talk! (funny hearing him speak Russian ;) )  And yesterday he gave another incredible talk. THEN, we had the opportunity to meet with him as missionaries.  Only the missionaries in Moscow stake got to go, so I was WAY lucky.  He came, and I was expecting to get an intense lecture/talk about missionary work and stuff, maybe like Elder Holland style.  But he came up to the stand, and told us that we would be have a discussion.  He had asked us to read three talks of his before, and he just asked us what we learned.  He started just calling on missionaries and we would say what we learned, and then he would go off for a while about it.  He called on me, and asked me some follow up questions to my comments.  I talked to Bednar :D  And then he asked us to ask any ANY questions we wanted, and he would go off about them.  I, and we, REALLY learned a LOT about how to become a better teacher.  It was supposed to start at 2 (it started about 245) and it went until 6:30!!!!  And I was way sad when he left.  I shook his hand.  It was the most spiritually building experience I think I've had in my life, in that short of time. It was truly incredible.  I don't understand how his mind works; he's my favorite apostle now for sure :)

Please do not share any of this blog information publicly. Thank you!

1. Laws in the countries of our Area prohibit the online sharing of any “personal data,” directly or indirectly, pertaining to another person. Thus, we ask that you not share through social media tools any information – including photographs, names, addresses, contact information, or any other “personal data” – about individual members, nonmembers or missionaries. If you currently have a public social media site or Facebook page where Area related material is posted, please immediately remove all posted photographs of missionaries, members and nonmembers as well as any written information about them. If you wish to keep photographs on your site, please make that site private, and strictly control who has access to the site – by invitation only. Please ensure that those
invited onto the site can be trusted not to share or forward information made available on the site to ensure that we honor and uphold the law. Our missionaries are focusing on their missionary purpose, even on preparation days and we are asking them to be wise even regarding the number of photographs that they send home.

Church meetings.. .

 

Mom!  To answer one of your questions, we meet in a building underneath a restaurant. There are an average of about 35 members that come to church every week.  The meetings can be Hilarious sometimes!  They do things very differently than they do in America, but it's good.  

No effort is wasted

 

Dad, I know without a doubt that I'm supposed to be right where I am.  It's dang hard.  As one companion I've had put it, this mission is one slap in the face after another.  But I love it.  In PMG, it says that no effort is wasted, and I believe that.  

Building relationships with the members!

So this week was pretty dang good.  We had good stuff happen.  We're gonna get a baptism here, and not only that, we are going to change this area. (no date or anything, but our AWESOME investigator) We've been working hard, and we've been doing things differently than missionaries in the past, which is what the area needs.  We also taught a lesson yesterday in Church, and we talked about members and missionaries working together.  And we've been meeting with the members like CRAZY.  We are doing everything we can to build a relationship between the members and the missionaries I'll tell you what, since doin' that we've never had so much success in this area, and I feel that it's just getting started!  And it's not just our mission that it will work for. I testify that in order to get baptisms, in order to build whatever area we're in, in order to be an outstanding missionary (not just one that's good at contacting) we NEED to build a relationship with the members, so that they cry when we leave!  (But not by wasting time "hanging out" with them.)  Using them on EVERY lesson, serving them, siting by them at church, going to lunch with them, tracking down the inactive lost sheep, and becoming their friends.  We've just barely begun to do it, and I can't explain how much my view of the mission has changed.  I'll tell you success stories from it when they really start pouring in, cuz they're going to :)

I love you guys!  

A Tale of Two Missionaries

 FUN SIMILARITIES BETWEEN BROTHER AND SISTER

Their smile...

 

 How hard they work---worn out

 Cold weather countries

Happiness in Sharing the Gospel

Baptisms and a transfer

 

Sorry for the late email!  Had to cut email short today due to helping an investigator move.  

anyway!!!  New area!!!

 Podolsk is wayyy awesome in the fact I DONT HAVE TO RIDE THE METRO!!!!  :D  But there's a lot more walking, and now I have to go like an hour away by train to get to investigators or members houses sometimes.  It's kinda nuts.  ANd my new comp?  He's pretty cool :)

It's cold.  Like way cold.  And Moscow isn't even considered that cold compared to the rest of Russia.  We were walking with  an Investigator, who's got this mustache, and as we were walking his spit, or snot or something was collecting on his mustache in within 20 min he had an Ice-stache.  haha.  And about that investigator.....

We gave him a baptismal date!!!! Way awesome, and came out of nowhere!  We just called him out of the area book, and he said he knows the BoM is true, and he believes that Joseph Smith is a prophet, and our church is better than any others!

And we have another investigator who got a baptismal date the day before I arrived in Podolsk!  So we have two dates!  One for feb 15 and one for March 1.  Way awesome!

Ya right now, it's awesome!  I gotta a visa trip this week, gonna go to Riga for a full hour or so ;)

Well family!!  Have a great week!!

Love, Will