Beautiful view
Monday...we spent the first part of the night out tracting. Then we went to the P's to have family home evening. It was great. We talked about conference and about prophets then we played prophet Jenga. We built the structure talking about how Christ is the foundation and then there are other leaders that make it a full structure. Then each time someone took out a block they had to name one of the twelve apostles or first presidency. It worked great until they started getting off track of that and naming older prophets such as Moses...and then they started listing missionaries...not really sure where those came from. But it was great and we had a good, fun night together.
FHE activity
Tuesday morning we met with S. We read 3 Nephi 17 with her which is where Christ comes and calls the children to come to him. We talked about how Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ love us and that one day each of us will be called unto them. We talked about how we can show our love for them and show them that we are grateful for them. We also met with H on Tuesday night. It was a good lesson with her. We talked about prophets and following the prophet because conference was coming up.
Then we watched the General Womens Meeting with all of the women members. We watched it in Croatian...well I did. My companion watched it in English with Sister Matosich in the other room...so I was on splits with one of the members. When I told her thats what I was doing she told me to go watch it in English...apparently she didnt want to be my companion for a few hours. Anyway...the meeting was great and I loved seeing the young primary girls there and seeing how the speakers made it applicable to them as well as the Relief Society sisters.
Wednesday morning we started out with piano with B. That is still going well and we are still slowly trying to get her interested in the church as well. I really feel that it will click with her sometime. We then called H to set up an appointment and she asked if we could meet right then. We had some time so we did. She has a lot going on right now and is having a really hard time dealing with it. She is also having a hard time letting go of some things from the past. We are trying to help her see that the Gospel brings peace and happiness and that if she accepts it and accepts Christ and his Atonement that she can recieve strength through her hard times. The problem is she accepts everything we teach but she is having a hard time actually applying it to herself and to her life.
After H we went and met with V. I feel like she has more faith than the first time that we met with her but I still feel like every time we meet with her it is as if we are starting over. She knows what she needs to do in her life to help build faith and to get her back on the right path, she is just stubborn and wont do it. She headed back to Varaždin yesterday so we wont be meeting with her anymore and I hope that we made a difference that will help her to start making the changes that she needs to.
We had English Wednesday night and then we went and met with B. We actually had a really good lesson with her. We went in and let her talk for a few minutes at the first and then set expectations for the rest of the lesson. We told her that we had some important things that we were going to talk to her about and that we wanted her to listen and to pay attention to her feelings and when we asked questions to really think about it and answer them. We did a repeat of the first lesson because she was confused on a few things. She stayed on topic throughout the entire lesson. It was really powerful and she is really searching for an answer to see if it is true.
Thursday we had a lesson with H and we took S with us which ended up being great. S told her exactly what she needs to do to be ready for baptism and to move on from her past. We have told her multiple times but I think it was really good coming from someone other than the missionaries. We talked about faith with her and told her what she needs to do in order to get a witness that the things we are teaching her are true. She said she believes it but she hasnt actually prayed about it. So we helped her to see what she needs to do and now we just hope that she will have the faith and the desire to actually do it.
We had weekly planning on Thursday and then we had a lesson with A which was great as usual. We talked to him about how happy he was at baptism and how happy he was when he recieved the Priesthood and that how each step he takes forward in the Gospel will add to that happiness. We talked about temples and family history work as well as missionary work. It was a great lesson and he said he is still trying to find ways to teach his friends and family about the church...one day he is going to start bringing people in just by the example and the light that shines from him.
We then went to S and M's. We havent met with them in a long time and they wouldnt set up appointments with us so we took Sister Matosich and just showed up at their house. They let us in and we were able to have a really good lesson with them. We talked about grace and how The Saviors Grace is waiting to help us but it will only come after we have done everything we can. They are really struggling right now and instead of turning to the Gospel and trying to strengthen their faith they are letting it weaken. We also had a lesson with A. We talked to her about conference and not only watching and listening to conference but then taking what we learn and continuing to study it and apply it.
Some of her MTC group at Zone Conference
Friday we had zone conference which was great as usual. The focus of zone conference this time was personal conversion and finding. We talked about how the first person that we need to convert is ourself. We have to know, we have to feel and we have to be able to express that to our investigators and the people we come in contact with. We talked about finding...how we can find people who are ready to learn about the Gospel. We got to take the bus home from zone conference so we had a nice 3 1/2 hour ride home. But the time passed quicker than it usually does so that was good...I love Sister Bunker. We have a lot of fun together but we also work really hard and are seeing results from our efforts. Even though she struggles with the language and I carry a lot of the weight that way this transfer has been one of my favorite transfers so far...and we are only 3 weeks into it.
Saturday morning we went out tracting/contacting. We were on our way home from the area we were in and a potential investigator came to my mind and I realized we were close to them and we decided to go try and see if they were interested. We went and knocked on their door...they werent interested. But we decided that since we were there we would tract the building. We found 5 sincerely interested potential investigators. 5 in less than an hour...that is amazing. We got addresses and phone numbers and they all were really excited for us to come back!
We did piano with B again on Saturday and after we did piano with L...she was a little stink and obviously didnt really want to be there...but by the end she was ok with it. We had English and we only had one student so we decided to ask him what he had questions about. We were expecting him to ask us questions about grammar or things that we had priviously taught but no...he wanted to learn some good phrases. So we were like ok...we can do that. So he gave us a phrase in Croatian and then we would translate it. By the end of the lesson we came to the conclusion that he wants to go to America and be a taxi driver because the questions he was asking were super bizarre and the only way you need to know it is if you are going to drive a taxi...we found it quite humorous but he was dead serious about it.
Saturday night we watched the first session of conference. Well...when we got it started we realized we had a problem. The session wasnt being live translated to Croatian and none of the members that speak English were there. So they turned to me and said Sister Clark you get to translate. I about had a hard attack. Anyway...I got started and got about half way through the first talk which was Elder Holland. Translating was really difficult because he was speaking so fast that I could only catch part of what was being said to translate it. After about half way through Z got there so she came to switch me out. She started for about 5 minutes and then turned to me and said this is impossible and stopped. We even had the O's come and she used to be a translator for the church and she said there is no way I can translate it without a script. So we arent really sure what the problem was but we ended up watching the first session in English because it wasnt in Croatian.
Sunday morning we went to the church and luckily they had the Saturday afternoon session in Croatian so we were able to watch that in Croatian. I was on splits with one of the members again so that my companion could watch it in English. After conference we went to the P's and we did Personal Progress with V which ended up turning into a P family lesson but it was great. Then we did another whiteboard finding activity. Our question of the week was What do you like to do on Sundays? It was perfect because people would say what they do and then we could lead into we go to church on Sundays...and bring up the Gospel. We had a lot of fun and we got some potentials and one appointment for the week. It is proving to be an effective finding tool and I think we are going to start doing it every week on Sundays. After our finding activity we walked back to the church and watched the Sunday morning session of conference. We havent watched the Sunday afternoon session yet but will be watching it tomorrow night.
Conference was great. It is hard for me to pick one talk that I like the most because they were all so great. Because of our Sunday school class that we taught last Sunday about how the living prophets and apostles teach of the Atonement I went in with the intention to apply every talk to the Atonement. In some way, every talk did. I also paid close attention to the end of each talk when they testified...and they all testified of Christ and His Atonement. It wasnt surprising because Christ is the center of our church. It is through His Atonement that we find strength. I know that the Atonement is real and that it can apply to every aspect of our lives. I see evidence of the Atonement every day in my work and as I learn more about it, the more I find strength through it. The Gospel is true. Thomas S. Monson is called of God to lead our church. This is Christs church that has been restored to the earth.
I love you all and hope that you have a great week!
Volim vas!
Sestra Clark
Shoutouts!
Emails...Dad, Mom, Carrie, Grandpa, Lex, Tys
And I got the package this week so thank you for that!
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