My Mission and Before

March 17, 2014

Hello Everyone!

It's been a wonderful, amazing, sunshine filled week. (For the most part.) Therefore my topic I didn't have to wear tights... I may have gotten some evil "what the heck" glances from the old ladies here but Sora Ule and I just didn't care! The sun was shinning there was a nice breeze it felt GREAT!

 

Well I feel like I just start over all the time with the week. It's weird and I feel like I tell a lot of the stories. So if you are still reading all of my emails, I am super impressed :) This week though was amazing so I hope you keep reading! Sora Ule and I were just so blessed. So amazingly blessed and we learned so much this week. SO MUCH!

 

Well Tuesday we had a busy day. Started off with some contacting and then we had a lesson with Vali. She's our 16 year old investigator and she's great. She doesn't really have a firm foundation on any religion or any real sense of what or who God is. The week before we talked about Faith mostly about just trying to read the Book of Mormon and then this week we moved onto the Restoration. Oh gosh. It was hard. It was a good lesson it was just a lot of new things for Vali. She did agree to pray about it. It was a good realization for Sora Uhl and I to know how to teach her though. She really didn't know anything about Christ or God or anything. I'm grateful that she is still trying to meet with us and progress and she does want to know more. Just have to take things more slowly. Sora Uhl taught a good portion of that lesson and I kept "accidentally" leaving to grab things while we were teaching Vali english (she doesn't know any english so we do 30/30's) so Vali and Sora Uhl would talk. :) Sora Uhl did an amazing job! We had our English class and in our English class we learned more about prophets and dispensations it was really really good. 

 

Wednesday we only had a plan to teach Andreea this day. I seriously love this girl with all my heart. She calls me her sister. I can't leave. It would just break my heart in half to leave her. We wanted to talk more about her baptism and the sacrament. Specifically of how she can renew it. I know I tell you how amazing she is but really she is amazing. She told me that this week that she was trying so hard to keep all of the commandments that she wasn't going to break a single one. She was really trying to pay attention to what she was doing and follow the spirit. But one day she didn't go to school (ditching hehe Andreea) and her mom came home and asked and she told a little lie. She said she realized how easy and how fast it was. What was amazing is that it was just a little thing she did but the guilt she felt and how she felt just hurt so extremely much that she couldn't wait until she could partake of the sacrament to be clean again. She's my most favorite person in the world. She never ceases to amaze me. 

 

We were about to go contacting when one of our formal investigators called us wanting to meet right then and her name is Alina. She is a sweet heart so we went over and met at the church and had a good discussion. She's a wonderful person and told us how the Book of Mormon changed her life it gave her more purpose and happiness. Her fiance is against her being baptized... ughh always problems with those things... but she does have a desire to learn more and she did want to be baptized. She randomly called us because she felt that since she stopped meeting with the missionaries she has just fell back into this depression and it's been a really hard time for her. I hope that with her meeting with us that she can just be filled with the hope and happiness the gospel does bring in to our lives. I always just want the people to teach to understand that I am not here just to teach them but I want them to have all the happiness that I have because I have the gospel. I don't just do it for nothing. I want them to have what I have because I love them! I sincerely love them. I can't wait to meet with Alina again though :) It'll be great!

 

Thursday. We had a lesson with our other investigator Alina. We had our branch presidents wife with us Mariana and I am so grateful she was there. She is basically the best teacher ever! She just bore such powerful testimony and I'm grateful because it was a hard lesson. She hasn't been remembering our past lessons and she still is coming to church. Agency people agency. Small steps. Sora Uhl and I after the lesson just felt absolutely horrible though. It was just so disheartening to see how she is just partly accepting the gospel. Sora and I talked about it after though the next morning... and we all feel like we have a better understanding of how to teach her. Little steps. She just can't handle all that we are trying to do and we both feel that we need to teach her little by little. Lots of prayers for her. I know she'll be a member. I know it. I know she will accept it. I know it.

 

Friday we did some district/member contacting. I've told you about the best member in the world right? Well she agreed to go contacting with us! Oh my gosh I was so excited. We met with her a little bit before so we could do some roll plays. Such a beautiful tender mercy it was watching Sora Uhl go through roll plays with Andreea and vice versa. They are both such great missionaries. It was fantastic she is going to be the greatest missionary ever. She was so nervous though... and I have to admit I was too. People are not the nicest when we go contacting and I did not want her to ruin her desires to go on a mission. Lots of prayers and comfort and we started our contacting off with a prayer and so there we went. We drew out the plan of salvation luckily Sora Uhl is an amazing artist and we had a lot of people stop to talk to us and Andreea just bore her testimony. It was still hard for her. We didn't get anybodies number... and there were some people that were just rude, normal. Andreea didn't stop though and she was grateful for the experience. I'm grateful for that experience.

Later we were supposed to have a lesson with one of the english students but we got bunged... saddness. Happens though.

 

Saturday. English. Our branch president was in our English class. I can't teach him anything he's a dang translator for that church! Haha. But he came in to be supportive and we played a bunch of speaking games. It was so much fun and our students seemed to have fun with it too. We tried to get them to be more competitive! Gosh dangit these people are just not competitive! WHY THE HECK NOT! Alin was probably the only one that was and Sora Uhl and I tried to make it more competitive... ughh dangit. America. You guys are great with competition! haha. I miss that! I felt super happy after though as Alin complimented Sora Uhl and I on how we teach and he told us that we were doing a great job. It made me happy and just grateful that the Lord has just given me the opportunity to learn how to teach and how to become better. 

 

"If I fail it's my fault. If I succeed I am grateful to the Lord who has prepared me to succeed. All things go to Him."

 

Really working on Humility this transfer. It's been one of my favorite things to study and I feel like my relationship with Heavenly Father has just increased as I have thanked Him for everything. All that I am and all that I have accomplished is because of Him. Let go of the pride. Let go of the pride. 

Later that night we had an activity and we had a bunch of Tibi's kids at our activity again. (the first counselor who is a theater teacher) Oh his kids are the kids he teaches they are all like 16-19ish is my guess. Anyways they came for like a Q and A. They were basically able to ask anything they wanted about us, what we do, what we believe, rumors or whatever. We first shared the restoration and then we opened up for questions. It was really good. They really actually thought of good questions and I hope that they will realize what we teach is true. We will see what happens though. 

 

After we sang Karaeoke? Spelled that wrong. It was so fun. Alin started rapping. That was priceless our branch president rapping in english. It was great :)

Just a side-note. It was a super weird week with men. Literally maybe it's because we didn't wear tights this week. But it was crazy. We met a for real crazy man. We called the elders and they helped us out there. He thinks we are some kind of devil worshipper he's also the guy that told us that there is no Christ. Seriously crazy. Then we just kept running into different people that tried to ask us on dates. We didn't contact a single one of them. I don't contact men. They kept talking to us. It was so weird! A man wants us to date his sons. hahaha I told him that we can talk to them with the elders if they want to know more about the gospel but that's it. haha he said that they will listen as long as we're there. Hmmm don't think so. It was just the weirdest week with them. Sora Uhl and I both just think the men here are crazy hahaha. It made for a pretty funny week though.

 

Sunday. I had to translate for the District Young Men and Young Women's president for our Young womens class. We only had one Young Woman Alina. She's a sweet heart. First I was just translating from Romanian into English but then I had to translate from English to Romanian. that was pretty hard. Andreea taught her lesson though on faith and it was amazing. Duh. They want her to present her lesson at leadership counsel in a couple months :) She's that cool people. It was branch conference and so our district president came down Doro. He's talk was fantastic it was super funny he talked about how we now have sister missionaries in every city and how the work is going forward the members just have to join in. It was funny though because he says how they need sisters because we do twice the amount of work that elders do. Oh my gosh I was laughing so hard and the elders gave Sora Uhl and I a fist bump. It was sweet though :) 

 

It was an amazing week though. We did a ton of contacting and we had a few lessons which was amazing! They weren't all exactly how we would have wanted them but the Lord let us know how we needed to teach and that is special. I love the gospel people can I just tell you that. It's amazing and perfect! I love being a missionary. :) It's AMAZING! I never want to go back to the person I was. I just have to keep progressing. I have to keep going forward. I will always be a missionary!

 

Love you all so much!
Sora Stewart

 

MATTHEW and CHANTAL! I didn't get to see a picture until today. Mom's pictures didn't work hahaha. I had Andreea add mom so that way I could see a picture hahaha. I was super anxious! CONGRATULTIONS! I am so excited to meet her! I love her already. I want to see more pictures. I'm so excited for the three of you though. I love you all so much and your always in my prayers. I can't wait to see you all in a couple months. I have a really cute outfit to give Kiana :)

LOVE YOU ALL!