Čau! Sveiki!
I hope everyone is doing well! I am! The work is hard and this week
was hard, but it is so very rewarding as well! Sorry, there won't be
any pictures this week. I forgot my card reader so I won't be able to
upload any pictures. :( I'll send a ton next week!
This week was hard because we got canceled on a lot. We had some
great plans to commit some investigators to baptism and we really felt
that we would be able to do it, but every person we had planned to
commit canceled on us and now we can't get a hold of them. We're working
hard, and hopefully we will be able to get a hold of them.
Also, we received bad news right before we left the apartment to
come email. I told you a little bit about an investigator who was our
only progressing investigator. He had MS and we were trying to get
permission to get him baptized. He loved the gospel and loved his book
of mormon. Well, he had a surgery last week and was healing really well.
The surgery was either his apendix or gall bladder we're not sure.
Well, this morning we got a call from his cousin, Dzintars, who is
a member, (who's family he lives with) and he said that he passed away
this morning. I cried pretty hard and still now feel so sad. We really
felt like in the next coming weeks we were going to get permission for
him to be baptized. His cousin is pretty shook up and I feel awful that
this happened, but at the same time. We can now go forward with Dzintars
and do the work for him in the temple! I'm so excited for this at
least. In a year, Dzintars can go to the temple and do all the work for
his cousin! It will be wonderful! I never did get to meet Eriks but I've
heard so much good about him. He knew this church was true and knew
that the Book of Mormon is true. He will be a missionary in heaven for
sure, and I also think he will do what he can to prepare his aunt to
hear the gospel and accept it. We will hopefully meet with her in a few
months and talk about what happened and share our testimony about where
Eriks is right now.
We also have been meeting with this awesome lady that I love! She
is from our English class. Oh... i haven't told you about English. We do
service every week by teaching an English class. It is great. Most of
the people in the class have been coming for a while and really can
speak pretty well, but it is still good that they come. Anyways, Inese
came to the English class. She had never come before and wanted to do
private English lessons. We are okay with doing that but we tell them
that we will be sharing a spiritual thought at the end. Well, so far she
loves hearing about the church. This is what I wrote to the mission
president about her this week, "With Inese, I love her a ton and our
lessons have turned from English to more church now. We found out she is
russian orthodox and prays a lot. She has a strong belief in prayers
and that her prayers can be answered. She doesn't pray to Christ though.
She prays to a picture of Mary and to Saint Nicholas. We hope that she
will pray in a lesson with us soon. We've been having two meetings a
week with her and they are going really well. She loves to help me with
my latvian and I'm not allowed to speak in English at all. If I say
anything in English she says, "Latvian please" and I have to say it in
Latvian the best I can before she will respond. Our last lesson with her
we talked about the church the whole time. We taught some of the first
lesson. It was really good. Sister p and I pretty much talked in
Latvian the whole time and she would ask all of her questions in English
and then also she asked what latvian words were in english, like prayer
and to pray. I have high hopes for her and we are also hoping to bring
her to a baptismal service soon. I think it will be a really good
opportunity for her to see. She talked about a Catholic baby baptism
that she saw and how interesting she thought it was. I hope that she will
also like our baptismal service and feel the spirit there and have a
desire to be baptized." Also, she is super sweet and trusts us so much
already. She told us that she wants a child so bad. She is about 35 and
hasn't been able to have kids. She says that everytime she goes to
church she prays for a miracle that she will be able to have a baby. She
got emotional about that. It was so sweet that she shared that with us.
We testified that prayers are answered and that through Christ we can
feel peace about all we go through. Sister P and I are going to
talk about the Plan of Salvation with her next time and explain that a
little bit and what we believe about the plan of salvation. She is
awesome and I love Inese!
We also have a new investigator named Ainars. He is about 50 and
is really great so far. Sister P contacted him on the street and
those first few days we were here with Sister W. They gave him a
book of mormon and got his number and this week we were finally able to
get a lesson set up with him. We taught half of the first lessons and he
really liked it. He thought it was great, but was a little confused on
why we would need prophets if we have the Holy Ghost to give us
guidance. It was a really good question and we gave him some possible
answers, but also gave him a chapter to read in the Book of Mormon that
should help to answer those questions. We set up another meeting with
him and hopefully we will be able to keep it going with him. He seems
really interested, but meeting with him will also be harder because he
doesn't live in Riga, he lives in the laukos (the country) and so we can
only meet with him when he is in Riga, and I don't know how often that
is.
So, yesterday was zone conference and it was wonderful! There were
so many amazing things said, and I can't tell them all to you, but I
will do my best to share a little bit. I only have a little bit of time
left but I want to talk a little bit about the baptism number goal for
this year. 153. It comes from the story of Peter and the apostles when
they go fishing again after Christ dies, and he comes and tells them to
cast their net on the right side and they do and have to many fishes.
153 is how many fish they caught and so, that is where they number was
originally read from and everyone has prayed and felt it was right. I
also received my own confirmation about it yesterday. President Boswell
was talking to us about where he thinks that number came from. He asked
us all to think about first where we thought it came from and I thought
maybe from God, and that this is the number he knows are here in Latvia,
but President Boswell didn't agree. He said that we as a mission picked
that number in heaven. We knew we would be serving here and together we
got together and picked that number and said we know at the time we are
there there will be 153 new people ready to hear this message. I felt
so good. I believe that that did happen and that I knew I would come to
the Baltic mission and that I picked that number for people that we
could find that would be ready to hear the gospel. I know it is our
number for this year and that if we exercise great faith and go about
doing all that I can do, that I can play my part in getting this number.
It won't be easy, and honestly, it will probably be the hardest year in
the mission, but that is because satan also knows we can do it and he
will do anything to stop us from acheiving that goal!
Also, related to that topic. As I've gone to church and met
different members in the past few weeks, I can't help but feel like I
know these people. I feel that they are so familiar and that I should
know them so well, even though I don't even know some of their names. I
know that I knew these people before this life. They were some of my
best friends there. They knew I would come and serve among them, and we
were so close to each other. It makes me excited to get close to them
here and I know that they will be my friends forever and ever after
this. I love these people and I love this place. Riga is beautiful and
there is a great work here to do! I'm so grateful that the Lord trusts
me to be a part of it.
I love you all and I hope that you know that I know this church is
true. I know it with all my heart. I have seen so much joy by being a
part of this church. I also know that Book of Mormon is the word of God
and if we read it we will receive so much guideness, love, and happiness
in our lives. Please read it every day and if you have never read it
before, read it, because it is from god for us and a way that we will be
happy in this life forever! Also, I know that we have a Heavenly Father
who loves us and wants us to pray to him. Please pray to him and you
will feel an outpouring of his love. I love you all as well. Thank you
for your support and prayers!
Much love and gratitude,
Māsa Klauvarda aka Sarah
No comments:
Post a Comment