Hola, ma famille,
This week has lasted for forevvvvvvvvverrrrrrrr. I don't even know what has happened. Lets see...
-I play volleyball with the Elders instead of with the Sisters now. Haha. It's just a bit more fun because they try. Ha
-Tomorrow we're getting 45 new missionaries into our district, and only 6 of them are Sisters and only one of them is going to Lyon that I know of. I'm a "host" tomorrow, which means I take the new missionaries from their families, get them their books, take 'em to their rooms, then take them to their classroom. THEN tomorrow night and Thursday night I'm talking to the new missionaries (with the district leaders) about the rules, what we do..etc. Ya know. Anyway. Yeah, so busy next few days.
-Ummmmm...oh!! Thanks for the sparkling cider, mom and dad!!! GREAT story about that. So I got it right after dinner, and the Elders do a package dance for us if we're lucky, and this time they made up a new dance, which is based off of the "haka". They call it "the paka". It's pretty epic. and I don't use that term loosely. Anyway, so it was awesome and then after class I opened it and found the bottle, tried a lot of different ways of opening it and not succeeding, so Elder Brent had the idea for me to put it in the door where the door closes, like the metal part is a perfect spot to open the bottle. So I put it in the crack, and right when I pushed it so the top would come off, the Elder was like, but be careful, and then I got completely sprayed in the face by the martinelli. And I got it all over Sis Harris because she was standing next to me, and I got it all over Elder Call's desk (which I helped him clean). It was sooooo funny. I couldn't see but I was laughing so hard and so was everyone else. Good times.
-so that same day (Saturday? Friday?? Je ne sais pas!) we taught Eric and asked him to be baptized and he accepted!!! We taught him about the first 3 principles of the gospel, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and His atonement (reviewed since we already talked to him about it), repentance (which we made a notecard for him with the five R's and a scripture to back each one up), and then baptism! We had the best object lesson where we took ziplock bags into the cafeteria and collected a lot of gross, slimy foods. We asked the custodians for some plastic gloves, then collected a few trash bags. So we when we had him sit down on the floor with us and put the glove on, we asked him how you can sin. Then we put the food on his hand for everything that he said, then asked if he'd want to shake the Savior's hand with that hand. He said no, because it was dirty and we said exactly! That's why through repentance we can be cleansed. Then I had him read 3 Nephi 31? The whole chapter is about baptism, and I had him read a scripture that says something like if the Savior had to be baptized, how much more then do we, and then I had him read a scripture a few verses down from that that says for us to follow his example, then I asked him how we could follow his example and he said to repent of our sins and be baptized and i was like, so will you follow the example of Jesus Christ and be baptized? (En francais: Suivrez-vous l'example de Jesus-Christ en vos faisant baptiser? Not sure if it's completely correct, but it's the basic layout of the sentence). And he said yes! Then we ended it and when we were going through what to improve and what we did well with Frere LaPretre (btw if you didn't remember Frere LaPretre is our teacher and our "investigator", Eric. He's playing himself 6 years ago), and we went over like 30 mintues, and Frere LaPretre said, "It was my pleasure to sit and be taught by you two for 30 extra minutes. That was really really good!" It made us feel realllly reallly good!! And then I sprayed myself in the face with a martinelli! Partyyyy! But yeah, great night.
-Sunday we watched Legacy after the fireside, and Sis Hurrell and I were like, oh yeah! When Joseph Smith showed up because he's pretty good looking in the movie, and then we started laughing so hard because we were checking out Joseph Smith. She said, "Geez, just shows how desperate we are. Instead of comparing actors, we compare Joseph Smith's!!" Kind of pathetic..
-We got a new Elder yesterday from some random island by the Fijian Islands, and he's really black and doesn't speak much of any english, and E. Smith and E Hilburn (zone leaders and they're in our district) coudn't find him anywhere! So they told us to look out for him and so I'm leaving the cafeteria and see this really dark black guy who I'd never seen and I ask him if he's new and he's like, uh...non..lskjflsdferdfkd. He started speaking spanish to me, trying to be funny I guess. I aws like, oh..nevermind. It was awkward. Oh yeah, they found him like a few hours later. He was randomly in a classroom with 2 other companionships on the bottom floor of our building. They were like, HEY!! We've been looking for you!! And there was a Sister in there who looked at them weird and was like, he's fine.. haha. Awkward moment for them also, apparently.
-Yesterday night we taught Eric again and he was telling us he didn't want to be baptized because his family didn't want him to and they thought the Mormon religion was a cult (sect en francais). So we had to read him scriptures and give personal experiences, so I talked about how my parents (holla!) were both converts (it would be wayy too difficult for me to explain dad's situation en francais) and it was hard for them, but it blessed their future family so much. I asked him if he wanted a family in the future and he was like, yeah! and I told him that through being baptized you would be blessing your future family as well as yourself and bless his family now, even though they weren't being baptized, and that I'm an example of that. I told him that through him being baptized, he could recieve the gift of the Holy Ghost and always feel the way he does when we are with him. Then we asked to meet with his family so if you guys have any great scriptures or personal stories that I have forgotten, shoot me up! You know where to find me. I'm not goin anywhere..for 3 weeks, at least.
Sunday I think me and 2 Elders and my comp and I will be singing a hymn during church. I'm not sure what song we're singing, yet. We're practicing for the first time today.
So I'm sorry I haven't written anyone back, preparation days have been getting soooo busy it's kind of crazy!! if i take a nap I don't have time for anything else. Blah.
Anywho, I love being here. I mean, the food is okay, the classrooms are alright (it kind of feels a bit like home now, since we're there 90% of the time), but it is incredible how amazing you can feel here. It's honestly through the Holy Ghost. This week I was reading a lot from the Bible Dictionary, and it is actually very interesting!! Without the Atonement, there would be no point to the Restoration. There would be no point to anything. I know that's kind of common knowledge, but it was just a thing that was much more emphasized on this week. Incredible how that works. The Church is sooo true it's INSANE. Like honestly. There are so many times that I wish I would've shared the gospel to a friend or a random person that I met in the airport or something. It's so important to share the Gospel with others because we were given the gift of being born into the Gospel and they didn't. They don't have that knowledge. some people are just waiting for the truth. How incredible the Gospel is, and how important it is for us to share it with others. It's like the talents or whatever, the person who hides his doesn't get anymore or something? I don't remember the whole thing, just the jist, but what I do remember is that if we're given soemthing, we should share it with everyone that we can! Some people don't want it, but some really do. You can just tell! The gift of the Holy Ghost is real, and when we testify we are giving the nonmember the power of the Holy Ghost, which gives them a testimony of Jesus Christ. Read it in Bible Dictionary, "the Holy Ghost". It's awesome. I didn't realize that there are two different things. I knew, but not really. AHH!!! SO COOOOL!!!!!!!!!!!!
I love each and every last one of you, and I hope that yall are doing so great!!!
Write me! I leave in 3 weeks from yesterday! June 18th I'm shippin out to Lyon! Well..we'll get there on Dad's birthday, June 19th. (dad, I think someone's pulling a lot of jokes on you..first my mission call to France, now I get there on your birthday? Haha. Start lovin' some frenchies or I'll be married to one soon! ;-) )
Love always,
devano (Sister Gardner)
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