Well...here we go again. This week has flown by. I cant believe how fast it has gone! It was a good week though.
Monday night after pday we just went out checking up on former investigators, potentials, and tracting...nothing super exciting happened.
Tuesday...We met with B which went about as usual. It is great that he comes and reads the Book of Mormon with us each week but it just doesnt really seem to go any further than that. We had District Meeting which went well. We have kind of started making things and then we bring them to District Meeting and share. This week Elder Preston cooked some of the Dunjas that N keeps bringing. They were actually really good. For district meeting this week we talked about Chapter 6 in Preach My Gospel which is Christlike Attributes. We all picked an attribute that we wanted to work on and then we set goals of how we were going to accomplish it this week. After District Meeting we went over to visit E because she has been sick. While we were there Elder Preston gave her a blessing. It was amazing. J was there for it as well as her 2 sons who are not members. The Spirit was so strong in the room and they were very grateful for it. Tuesday night we had English class. We started the program over and so we are teaching the same students and the same program but they are all on different levels. I was a little bit worried about it because the level we decided to do for the class I am teaching is a level down from what they have been learning but it ended up being really good and I think it was very helpful for them.
Wednesday...What a day...we first has a meeting with the Red Cross. Well...the Prestons had a meeting and needed us to translate. So we went with them and just basically found out exactly what it is that they do here and what we can do to help them. They told us that they had a meeting Wednesday nights where all of their young volunteers come and they talk about the events of the week and they invited us to come so that we could talk to some of the volunteers. We had some other things scheduled for the night but switched things around so that we could go. After we went to a members house. Elder Preston had asked one of the members who only speaks Croatian (no English) to talk on Sunday. And then he gave her a talk from conference to base it off of...but the talk was only in English. So we had to go over there to help her translate the talk so that she knew what it was that she needed to talk about. It actually went really well. This is a member that when I first got here I kind of had a bit of a hard time with...she was one that smoked, that came to church only because of what she could get out of it, and it was just really hard for me to see. But in the past 5 months since I have been here I have seen a HUGE change in her. She has stopped smoking and her husband has too. Their house is a lot cleaner and they take better care of it. They come to church each Sunday and they actually make comments in Sunday School that are good and apply to the lesson. And the talk that she gave on Sunday was perfect...it was short but it was good. If nothing else comes from the time I have been here we have seen a HUGE change in our members here. Members that werent coming or were only coming sometimes are becoming more active. Their testimonies are strengthened and they are all getting out and trying to do something with their lives. When I first got to Osijek not a single one of the active members had a job...now over half of them do and the other ones are actively out looking for it. I have even noticed a difference when we go and teach the members...they are more sincere with their answers and they are making the Gospel a bigger part of their lives...we still have work but it is definitely moving up!
After we went to the church for Family History. But no one came. Which was good because the internet at the church ended up not working. So we left. We went and grabbed something to eat and then we had a little bit of time before our meeting. We didnt know what to do because we didnt have a ton of time but we didnt want to waste it either. We had a few ideas of apartment buildings that we wanted to try but none of them seemed to work out and we just kept walking. We came to an apartment building that was completely out of the way from anything and we managed to get in. We went up to the top floor knocked on a door and the Mom answered. We talked to her for a minute at the door and she told us that they werent interested. We then told her about our English classes (we do this when people dont let us in in hopes that it will at least get them into the church) she opened the door and let us in. Her son is learning English in school and has been struggling with it. We talked to them a little bit about the English program and then her son started asking her questions about who we were and why we were here. She told him I have no idea ask them. So he did and we talked to them about the Book of Mormon and the Restoration. I was talking to the Mom a little bit and she said that when she was 17 she was baptized into the Catholic church. She said she doesnt know why she did it because she had never gone to church before that and she hasnt gone back. She has 3 children (2 boys and 1 girl) and she let them choose if they wanted to or not. One of her sons has and the other one hasnt. She then told us so if my boys want to come to your English classes in your church they can and if they decide they want to learn about your church that is fine with me because I want them to be able to choose their religion. We left them a Book of Mormon and told them to read it and I really think they will. I think we could get the Mom to learn about the church too. One of the boys came to English on Thursday and I think they both will this week. After meeting with them we went to the Red Cross thing and it didnt turn out to be what we thought it would be. They basically ran through the weeks activities and said who they needed when and then everyone left. We talked to a few people but it wasnt very effective. But...if we wouldnt have rearranged our schedule earlier in the day in order to go to this meeting we would have been in a completely different part of town and wouldnt have met this family.
Thursday...another great day. I had a zone conference phone call for all the district leaders that I had to be on for an hour in the morning. We did our studies and weekly planning and then we went out to the area that we were planning on going to Wednesday night. None of the people we were trying to check up on seemed to be home. But...we knocked on a door and asked for a man. The woman looked at us and said no one by that name lived there and she didnt even know anyone by that name but she would ask her husband. So she went and got her husband and he came and had no idea either. We talked to them at the door for a minute and then they invited us in. We sat down and talked to them for a little while. We had a good conversation and they asked us what made our church different from the Catholic church. We talked to them about the Book of Mormon. They asked us a few other questions and we also talked to them about prayer and how we believe that prayer is a conversation with our Heavenly Father. It went really well. They have 2 young boys and they told us we could come back. The Dad works and he told us that he hates his job but he has to work because he has to be able to provide for his family. He told us that they may not have a lot of money and they dont have the nicest things but they have eachother and so they are happy...thats an attitude that more Croatians need to pick up!
Friday...we had 2 appointments with less actives that live in the villages outside of Osijek. We went with the Prestons and the first counselor in the Branch Presidency came with us. We first went and visited the B's. It went well. We talked to them about hope and faith for the future and having Faith in Christ. Elder Preston had a few other things that he needed to talk to them about that he needed help with translating. M told me he wanted me to do the translating. So I translated and sometimes he would repeat exactly what I had said to them again. It kind of got a little frustrating and I was feeling like I wasnt making any sense. But after he told me that I did a good job translating and what I said was right he just repeated some of the things that I said to emphasize the point...so I felt better about myself. Apparently the B's have a referral for us to teach by them so we are going to go back either this week or next week for that...hopefully it goes well. After we went to visit V. She is a crack up. She is so naive and she says things how they are. We had a lesson with her and it was going really well and then apparently she decided she was done with it because she picked up her phone and made a phone call. I dont remember what she said that was so funny but I was keeping myself from laughing the whole time...we all were actually.
Friday night for Aktivnost we had a harvest party. We had hot dogs, and beans, and fruit and such. It turned out to be a lot of fun and we had a lot of young people come which was kind of refreshing.
Saturday morning we went and cleaned the church and then we did Young Women with A...it was nothing compared to the Young Women in Excellence that you had but it was good. We talked about individual worth and read scriptures that showed how God knows and loves each of us individually. For her Faith value project she decided that she wanted to write a song about Faith. Sister Frampton has written a lot of songs so she helped her get started with that also.
V hasnt been at church for a little while and we havent been able to get ahold of her this week. So Elder Preston decided that he wanted to just go show up at their house. They were a little caught of guard at first but it ended up being really good and they were grateful that we had come. V said something to us and I went to translate it and Elder Preston stopped me and translated exactly what she had said. I was amazed! They dont know very much Croatian but they do pretty well. Anyway...we had a lesson with N and V and it went well. We still cant get N to realize that he cant just read the Book of Mormon and be good. He needs to act on it and he needs to come to church. One day we will get him there.
Saturday night we had a lesson with F. We talked to him about the Word of Wisdom. He said it will be hard for him but that if he takes it a little at a time he thinks he can do it. We also talked more about the Book of Mormon. He has read it some but wont pray to find out if it is true. And he still struggles with his family because he said they could never accept him learning about another religion. But he told us that he can feel our goodness and he wants to keep learning and that he can see himself changing.
Sunday was great! First off it was daylight savings so we got an extra hour of sleep...happy day! Church was good. We had several less actives which was good. One of them walked in and said to Sister Preston...I miss church once, and then I miss it again and think oh I dont need it anyways. But the second I walk through the door I realize that I do need it I just need someone to push me. So now that we know that we will definitely be pushing her. We had planned to have our Primary sing in Sacrament Meeting...but our Primary didnt show up so that didnt happen...maybe next week! Z was at church this week before he starts his new job in Zagreb so all of the members were really excited to see him.
After we went and checked up on some potentials and former investigators over by the Prestons. We got one person to set up a return appointment with us! So that is exciting! The Prestons had invited us over for dinner so we went there and then we finished checking up on people that lived by them. And then Sunday night we had an appointment with a less active member...she has been sick (she always seems to be sick) but we had a good visit with her. I think she really does have a testimony and she really does know the Doctrine she just doesnt come to church. She said when she feels better she will come. But she constantly had one illness after another. We have good visits with her and I think it is good for her to see that we care and we know when she is not at church we are just hoping that we can get her to start coming soon.
We are hoping to have another good week this week! We have found a lot of potentials this week and we hope that as we go back things seem to go just as well. It always seems to be that our first visits go great and then we go back and they dont seem to go as well or dont want to talk to us. But I have faith that one of these days things will get better. We are planting seeds that will one day bloom. Last night as I was talking to the Zone Leaders to give them numbers the advice he gave us was You wont fail until you stop trying. And we dont want to fail so we wont stop trying. Some days it would be nice to see something happen from all of our effort but even if we arent having baptisms left and right I know that we are making a difference here in Osijek and that it is exactly where I need to be right now. We are seeing things happen and they will continue happening as we keep working and pushing forward. I love being a missionary. I love Osijek. I love the members, I love the people. I love the Gospel and am learning so much more about it every day!
I hope that you all have a great week! Love you lots!
Sestra Clark
Shoutouts...
Emails from Mom, Dad, Carrie, Ryan, Grandpa, Lex, Chris, Kelsey
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