Well, this week was pretty good, we FINALLY had someone at church. Everyone for the past few weeks has been shanking us at the last second, and will come up with any excuse under the sun to not be able to go. Although the top excuse of all would be "I prayed and asked if I should get baptized then my fish died, so thats a sign that I shouldnt do it" "well its probably not, so we'd invite you to pray again" "well I dont want any of my other fish to die". Lame. Really it just comes down to desire. Theres this one family that apparently was taught alot before and was pretty close to baptism, we had a lesson with them last night and committed them for church and they said they would let us know on Saturday if they would be able to. We talked a little about it and basically explained it like this: God really wants you to go to church. Satan does not, and he will try to throw anything and everything he can in that time slot to make you not go to church. If you say today that you will reserve that time for church, he might try to get you to go do laundry or go shopping or go somewhere with a friend, but you will already have something more important in that time slot, and will be able to go to church, and will be able to do those other things another time. If you say you will wait for Saturday, that gives plenty of time for him to come up with something to throw in the path, and if you are not comitted to come to church, then that other activity will fall right into place and Satan will win. So will you commit right now to come to church with us on Sunday?
From what I could tell, I think it worked. We'll let you know for next week if they came or not. So anyways, our guy that came was Rolando, hes been doing pretty well, we taught him the word of wisdom last night and found he smokes, and drinks alot of coffee. Oh boy. I know with some faith and hard work, he can still be ready for baptism on the 9th. We had a really sweet lesson with a part member family the other night, she is less active and is going to some other church here with the rest of her family. They are totally awesome, they have 4 kids from 8-12 years of age and are a ton of fun. We had a really fun visit with them the other night, we had a short lesson with them, we taught them about nephi building the boat, and with faith and Gods help we can always keep the commandments. Then we just kind of hung out with them, I did a little juggling act for the kids, they showed us a bunch of pictures from their family vacation over the summer, and we got the kids to like us alot. First step to getting them away from this bogus church to which they go. :)
This last week we also had a zone conference in which we really focused on our planning and kind of overhauled the way we do it. Without going into unnecessary depth that would be uninteresting to anyone whos not a missionary, they are going for the "less is more" approach. So instead of in your weekly planning having a whiteboard, an extra notebook and your planner and area book, to just keep everything in the area book and have all your plans in one place. But, I sort of feel like its taking a step backwards. Because, they have us plan out every day we are going to teach certain principles and extend certain invitations, which I've seen, doesnt always work out on the appointed day. So it really just seems like a waste of eraser to me, because what we would do before is say take each person, say we want to teach these certain concepts and invitations, and then see them when we could see them and plan day by day. So I thought what we are doing now is the "higher law" that left behind what we just started doing again. But, well see how it works out.
Other exciting news: we have a christmas tree in our apartment! I made it. How, you ask? When Elder Sorensen got into the mission, his bike came in a box. I decided we would do something exciting with said box, so its been kicking around our apartment for a month or so. Then, the revelation came! I drew and cut out a shape of a christmas tree on both sides, and then did the think where you cut a slit halfway on each one so they slide together, and boom! christmas tree! (see attached picture if that didnt make sense) We might invest in some green spray paint to make it really authentic.
So, thats about it. I think I mentioned I would talk about the crazy romanian guy. His name is Tiberius Dragos. We just call him Drago. Hes drunk most of the time, but always wants to talk to us. He's brought up something about the Sabbath being saturday, and also asking why we dont like other churches. He says the book of Mormon isnt true because it says Christ came to the americas, and he has a book that says that Christ didnt. We've still yet to see this book and apparently its in Romanian anyway. So we try to communicate and ask why Jesus couldnt have come here and he says with a thick accent and poor grammar that the united states wasnt discovered yet. Well, yes, Drago, but there was still people here, were they children of God as well? "NO!!" "really Drago?" "Ok, well yes, but Jesus no come here!". So the other day we printed out a conference talk in Romanian and gave it to him, he said he liked it. Slowly but surely, we'll get him there. Apparently some missionaries in the past gave him a BOM in Romanian, and we've asked him to find it but he still hasnt looked. When he does hell have some good reading to do.
Hope everyone has a great day, and write back!
Love,
Cam
Pictures too!!
1. Me, elder Heredia and Elder winters. Elder Heredia went home on saturday, Im gonna miss him a bunch!
2. Elder Francis, Me, Elder Anderson. Elder Francis just went home as well.
3. Elder Huffines and me. I had no idea what was going on next to me until I looked at the camera later.
4. Our living room! complete with foosball table, nappy couch, our bikes, and the christmas tree I made!
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