Sunday, February 2

September 23, 2013

Sorry this will be short this week. I didn't leave very much time. :( Well, as for us in this area, Latvia has been super cold and rainy. Fall is definitely here. Fall in Latvia is rainy and windy. It stays about 50's at this time of the year, but has already dropped into the 40's and will eventually get that way more and more. The rain is the hardest part for me to deal with because I hate having wet feet and I most often have wet feet. I need to invest in some better shoes! But I don't mind the cold too much. I love wearing scarves and my coat and that makes it a lot of fun!
So last week, I wrote about our investigator J from England. He has been facing a ton of opposition from his wife. I hope that he can get baptized soon though. He has such an amazingly strong testimony of the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith and of  God's hand in his life and he clings to that testimony. It is so cool to see. I hope that he will soon be able to get baptized as he so strongly desires. We hope to be able to meet with the wife soon and help her see that the church isn't a bad thing and that what J is doing can only bless them. 
As for the rest of my week, here is what I wrote my mission president this week, "Our other investigator is A who really likes the Bible. We had an interesting lesson with him last monday. We learned that he prays, but he has never prayed to find the truth about anything. We also learned that he more has "knowledge" of the bible rather than faith or a testimony of the Bible. We are going to have a lesson this week in truly having faith in christ. He knows about Christ and all about his life, but we are beginning to realize that he doesn't have faith in Christ. Through this experience I am seeing how closely faith and action are connected. Without action, the faith shrivels and dies. He doesn't do anything to grow or nurture the faith he gains from reading the bible. He lets it dies. He has great knowledge, but that is where it ends. I can see how what we do really is how our faith grows. 
As for me and Sister B, we are doing well. We are really going to miss having K and M (two girls in our area who are leaving on missions this week and next, one is going to temple square and the other to the Czech republic) in our area. They are going to make great missionaries, but they were a huge help on more than one lesson. I can't wait for them to serve though because they are going to do great things. As for our transfer goals, we have done really well at focusing on them. We have really gotten to work on our member cards and it has been really helping me focus on truly getting to know the members in our area and in the branch in general. It is wonderful to know about the little facts about people. Like what people's hobbies are and if they have pets or not. That makes it a lot of fun and I really feel like I am getting to know these people. Also, we have a goal for 75 percent of our planned lessons being member present and that has been so helpful. I believe we are at 80 percent right now and it is great! The members have been really great on rallying around us and helping out with the investigators. I am really gaining a testimony of the difference between member present lessons and other lessons, but also the difference between prepared member lessons and just member lessons. These members have strong testimonies and also a lot of them are good teachers, and when you really let the member know what your goal is for the lesson and what you are teaching to get there, they really can and will help much better then if you just invite them to be in on a lesson. "
Well, sadly that is all I have time for. I am not sure what I have time for, so send me questions this week! I want to know what you all want to know. :)
Lots of love,
Sister Cloward

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