Week #16

Sunshine!!!

The rain has stopped! My Utah dry is coming back! The only problem now is humidity and it's super hot in the afternoon (and it's not even summer yet :( ). Ali sve uredu! But it's all right! It feels super nice in the mornings when we exercise and in the evenings when we tract :) The rain stopped and the sunshine sure came on! Drum roll...we had 10 lessons last week!!! And 3 of them came from tracting, 1 following up with a potential, and 1 person just walking in. Sestra L hasn't had a week like this before in her mission. It was a great week! So about the person just walking in. After English class, we ate dinner and were about to head to tract, but then this woman walked in. She asked if there was a class going on. We told her English class ended, and she was like, "No, I mean I want to find the Church of Christ." We were like oh ok. She didn't want to participate but just listen to a class. So we gave her a pamphlet and explained it at the same time (aka gave the first lesson). Her concerns were finding a church that follows the Bible of what the true church of Christ. So we tried to ask for her phone number or something, but she didn't want to give it to us for some reason. She travels a lot, so she said she would come back on the day of our seminar. After we prayed, she just had this huge smile on her face and was like that was very beautiful. The Spirit just hit me sooo strong! I just spoke up in my very best Croatian and testified to her that was the Holy Ghost. He was testifying that this prayer was good. She looked thoughtful and I think agreed. We weren't able to give her a Book of Mormon before because she said she just wanted to listen not really participate. But after the prayer, I just grabbed the book and said it was a gift for her and if she wants to find truth here it is. Hopefully we'll hear of her before our seminar next week, but if not, that will just give her more time to finish the Book of Mormon ;)

Funny story of the week: short but still funny to me. On Friday, we had an aktivnost (branch activity) where we sang hymns, learned how to conduct, and then played a game with the hymns. Well, we wanted to have a nummy snack, so I suggested white chocolate on popcorn! We bought some white chocolate and tried. Well...my first try I burned the whole bar! I know that if you put chocolate in a pot then put that pot in a pot of hot water it doesn't burn, but we didn't have time. So I just put it in the microwave. We were discussing how it was good we bought two bars. Then we just tried half of one and it worked out good. But then the second half went into the microwave and I forgot about it and got busy with other things. So you guessed it. I burned it again! I wasted 1 1/2 delicious chocolate bars :( So we ended up having a small bowl of white chocolate and plain popcorn (no butter and barely salt because we didn't have any with us...)

This last week I experienced the saddest thing I've encountered on my mission yet. We went to go see a less-active. We went on Friday, but her sister-in-law said she was out of town and would be back on Saturday. We could come back on Sunday. So we went excited to teach another lesson to someone who needs help finding the iron rod again. So we walked up the path and she came out with a very angry face. She told us she was very unhappy we were there. We were flabbergasted. We had no idea what was going on. She continued and explained she didn't want anything to do with Church. She thought after she got baptized that things would be easier/problems would be gone. She had some family pressure to not be active in the Church, and so she stopped. She lost faith. I just wanted to start crying. Not because we wouldn't be able to teach or because she wanted to be off the records so that's one less person to count in Rijeka. But because a daughter of God lost hope in His plan. It made me think about the people of Rijeka who I was influencing right now, and if they were ready to live in the path of Christ? Because life's not easy. Christ will lift our burdens, but the burdens will still be there. I wonder if this woman thought that her problems would be solved and she would have a care-free life. Then when she realized that she still had the same problems, she gave up on what could have helped. It was really hard on me. But Sestra L brought out a good point, we can only help and strengthen them. They have to choose which path they go on. So I will choose my path. I will be firm in my Savior. He is my foundation. Helaman 5:12 is the scripture of the week for me. We need to have Christ in the center of our lives for when the storms come (for they will still come), we can be strong in Christ. For we can't do this on our own. We need Christ. He knows. He is the One (EFY 2011, great song). Stay strong!!! Christ is there! God is there! They want us to succeed! They want us to win! Follow the prophet! Pray every moment! Read the scriptures every day! Only by doing the simple things can we get through the tough times. Volim vas puno! Doviđenja! (Good-bye!)