August 20, 2012
"The pig is your comrade, Elder Peterson!" "No! I
want to eat it! Bacon!"
Hey there everyone! :)
It's been a crazy week (seems like I say that a lot, don't I) and
its' had it's fills of ups and downs. The biggest down, unfortunately, was
about the investigator we hoped would be baptized. We had prepared her for the
baptismal interview and the day before the invterview we were having a lesson
and pumping her up about baptism. She gave a very strong testimony about the
Atonement of Jesus Christ and the vitality of baptism for the remission of sins
and was all ready for the interview. The next day however, she didn't answer
the phone as we called to confirm the meeting, although we were sure everything
would work out since we'd talked about the time and place for the interview the
day before and sometimes she doesn't answer her phone because she's at her
daughters house. As we waited at the appointed place and time, she came and
told us that she couldn't meet right then because she had been invited to
dinner. We said that that was ok, but asked when we could meet to have the
interview (preferrably that day). She then told us to never call her again and
that she no longer wanted to meet or pray with us ever again and to go away. We
were both pretty baffled as she said that, and right after she said it she
left, giving us only a second to say goodbye. She didn't show up at Church this
Sunday, so it looks like it's not her time to be baptised yet.
Some good news though! For this next cycle I'll be staying in Marks
with Elder Strebe! Yay! I was pretty happy to hear that I don't need to pack
and that I don't need to worry about getting to know a new area quite yet. It's
been such a huge blessing to have Elder Strebe as my companion. As with anything
in life, there's hard times, but it's always a lot easier to take on everything
when you have a good friend with ya. We've got some great plans on working with
the members and preparing and helping Marks to grow. Another bit of good news
was that this week we had a culture night by going to a members house and
learning how to make delivious soup and filled bread goods (pirozhki). There she
chose to tell me that my fate would be that I would become a Journalist and
marry a gypsy woman (the gypsy woman part becomes of my carefulness with money,
apparently). Another bit of good news is that we've started to have members
give talks in Church, with the first one happening this past Sunday. It went
super well! It was cool to see how one member used scriptures and different
teaching materials in his talks just like we always do, so already the members
(or at least he) knows how to give a good talk. It's all gonna go uphill from
here methinks :)
I'm not sure if I mentioned it or not, but for this next zone
conference we have a member of the 70 whose's coming up (he's actually also the
scond counselor in the Europe East area presidency! Spiffy, right?) and I was
thinking about how cool that'll be. Every single zone conference there always
seems to be something really cool or new that helps us to do missionary work.
In looking at the past zone conference notes I took I realized there's a lot of
things that I've been taught that I can still really do a lot better in the
work. It always seems like I want a new arrow in missionary work when all I
really need to do is have better aim and use the quiver I've already got. In
any event, it's been cool to review over notes and apply old principles into
new situations. Kinda like reading scriptures, applying old situations and using
them in daily work.
By the way, I've been reading Daniel in the Old Testament lately,
and it's a seriously cool book. I never realized that King Neb. actually became
a righteous guy. Isn't that crazy? Pretty cool.
Alright, times up this week. I love you tons. Thanks for your
prayers and your letters! :)
With love
--
Elder Peterson
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