(Elder Putnam)
Gooodddd Morning Vietnamammmm!!!!
Gosh it has been quite some time since I wrote an email
home.
I got a Rimi card. That saves me like .16 Euros per Rimi
trip. It'll build up over time. Some how I end up spending like 25% more on
groceries every week than other Baltic missionaries do. Its wild. So I'm
half-broke, but I'm getting my protein in. So we are all set.
Let’s backtrack like 4 weeks. Ok so we got Raitis on date
about a month ago. He's a 19 year old Latvian dude who has just been waiting
for the gospel. He is now gonna be baptized on Saturday which will be super
cool. That Sunday was also the first day he showed up to church with a button
up shirt. Like he is so cool. He wants to serve a mission too (Or at least he
is thinking about it). Unfortunately, his family is not super interested in him
joining the church. It's kinda sad. But he just loves the Book of Mormon and he
keeps talking about the peace that he always feels at the church and when he
reads the Book of Mormon.
3 weeks ago was Lasmas birthday, so we threw her a party. It
was also a Thursday which meant English Night, a lesson with Raitis, and Vlad.
Vlad gets his own shou-out. He will call random missionaries out of the blue
just to talk to them in English. He is so kind and polite, but he is a little
bit of a hassle sometimes. On top of that we had Exchanges. So Elder Argyle
joined our lesson (which was a Book of Mormon read) and got to know him better.
Very good things. I did drink my last Fairlife protein shake gosh that tasted
good. I'm now using the bottle for my fast-offering collection. About 3 weeks
ago we were supposed to start teaching Sebastians Tomass about the Priesthood.
He will soon be ordained a deacon and that will be so dope. The amount of
Aaronic Priesthood holders in the branch just spiked. Like it’s so dope. And
with Raitis we will have another priest pretty soon. Some dude on the street
called us Satanists. That was funny, but then like 30 seconds and 100 meters
later we placed a Book of Mormon. Get got, Lucifer.
2 weeks ago we thought we had a new friend. We went street
contacting and like nobody was interested. I had been preparing short little
thoughts that I could share throughout tram rides and stuff like that. (tram
contacting sucks by the way, in Liepaja at least). But I saw a youth wearing a
cross necklace and I was like, bro, do you have time to talk about Jesus? and
he was like, yeah bro of course. So we gave him a watered down 60% of the
Restoration lesson, and we set up a time to meet. Then he was like, bruh I'm
sorry, can't make it tonight. Then we rescheduled, and he biffed on us again.
But its cool though, cause we have his contact info, and as soon as guitar
night happens, we're gonna try to get him there.
This past week (since I forgot what happened the week
before): Ok so we've been trying to set up a meeting with Atvars. He's an
inactive member. Last P-day he stumbles into the guitar studio (while we are
spending a copious amount of time shopping for a guitar for Masa Johnson). So
he walks in, like probably 30 seconds before were about to leave. and I
introduce myself as the dude who's been texting him in English (the entire conversation
was in Latvian too). It was whack but then we started contact with him again.
That was good. On Thursday we had English Night again. A couple months ago the
Masas found a group of kids to come to game night. Every once in a while one of
them, Ernests, comes to an activity. Such is the case here. So Raitis and
Ernests are the last people to be at English night and Raitis mentions that he
is gonna be baptized. And Ernests gets super surprised and starts asking
questions about that. So we show him the baptismal font, explain it all, and
then he sees the Big Book of Mormon (a giant wooden frame that looks like a
Book of Mormon that we use to talk to people about the Book of Mormon.) And so
we give him the schpeel on the Book of Mormon (he speaks fluent English but we
spoke in Latvian cause were like that) and then how it relates to Joseph Smith
and the First Vision. And were like, would you be interested in learning more
about it? And he's like sure. So we do a lesson, with our almost baptized
friend, Raitis, and the Masas. And he wants to be baptized and serve a mission.
It’s crazy. Absolutely love the dude.
We also had District Conference (the equivalent of Stake
Conference) in Riga this week. Raitis came in person and Ernests attended over
zoom. They are both just eating up the gospel. We want to make sure the seed
isn't falling on stony ground though, yall feel? Mathew 13:5 vibes. We baptize
converts that are gonna stick with it. They both loved District Conference.
I also loved district conference cause I understood like 97%
of it. Like its so wild. The church is so trueeeee. Like I like to think about
things logically. If the true church is not on the earth (and I am not serving
the true church), there is no way that I could pick up this language. I'm smart
but I’m not that smart. Like I speak Latvian. It’s an obscure and difficult
language. The gift of tongues is real and the church is true. God still
performs miracles. Moroni 7.
Alright yall are dope. Love yall. I hope this was
entertaining enough for yall to read it all. See yall next time
Elders Patnams
No comments:
Post a Comment