Monday, April 13, 2015

It's just another day in Paradise here in Szeged.
Well, this week was pretty busy for us, we met with a lot of people.
I can't tell you how great our investigators are here. They are just amazing people who are so serious about learning out the message that we have to share. You can really feel it and tell that this is no game to them, but that this is really interesting to them.
We have three people who have a baptismal date. All of them are in May, and all of them are progressing really well.
I talked about a man that we did the no-smoking program with, a couple weeks ago. We still visit him on a weekly basis. He has not touched a cigarette in two weeks, nor has had the desire to smoke. God is real and he helps people overcome addictions and obstacles which they don't think they can overcome. That's what I've learned by teaching this man. This man is also a regular attendee in Church, he comes every week and has just started bringing his two daughters as well. After this last Sunday, we called him that night and asked him about his experience at church and he said that he really liked it and that everyone was really nice to him and he felt like we were very close, like a community. Na, this is exactly what I was saying about how IMPORTANT members are in missionary work. If they make people feel like our investigator felt last Sunday, they are going to want to come back and feel the way they felt again. It's that simple, just be nice (you can do a lot more than just that, but this is a good start).
Another one of our bap. dates we met with a few times this week and well.. okay funny story. We met with her in the beginning of the week, and when we walked into her apartment, the sun was out, birds were chirping, no clouds but then when we were finishing up, we walk out and it's pouring rain! Again, my companion and I didn't have our coats so our investigator gave us an umbrella to use, we ended up still getting soaked but we get home and throw our umbrella on our porch so that it can dry over night. Well we share porches with our neighbor (it's just a long walk way) and funny thing about this neighbor that we have never really met, just have seen him and every time we've seen him, he's been really nice to us. But the first week that I got here, we had swept our kitchen and put the broom on our porch, well the next morning someone had moved it, but we eventually found it. I can't remember our other experience with our moving our crap, but we basically came to the realization that nothing is safe to be left out on our porch, unless we want it moved to a different location. We forgot about that though, because nothing had happened for a while, so we put our umbrella on our porch and the next morning it was in the trash... what the heck?? Haha, okay, who are you to throw our umbrella away. We actually just laughed about it as we went to buy our investigator a new umbrella the next day. We told her the story about how her old umbrella is somewhere in the dump but that we bought a new one for her and she just laughed. We all had a good laugh about it. Our teachings with her are going really well, she came to church Sunday, which is actually a big step for her, she likes church but she does not like being around of crowds of people so it makes her really uncomfortable when people are near her, but she came on Sunday and really enjoyed Sacrament meeting.
Like I said, our investigators are taking steps in the right direction and some of them are small, but the majority of them are personally big for them and we are so proud of them!!
Sunday we took another big step with one of our investigators. We meet with a young boy, well...not so young, but anyways he has been meeting with the missionaries since January and this kid just took in everything the missionaries gave him. This week he finished the Book of Mormon (in three months--I've never finished it that quickly...like I said this kid is great!) and he said that after he read it, he prayed about it and he felt that it was true. He was actually so passionate about it that we gave him A Book of Mormon to give out to someone and he was so excited to give it out. Talk about future missionary, which he will be. His parents aren't too keen on the idea of him getting baptized in the church, that's the only downside, but on Sunday we were invited out to the village he lives in (by his parents) to have a "traditional" Hungarian lunch. We actually ended up going out on the bank of the Tisza river and making fish soup in a big pot, over a campfire. Talk about fun! Oh, and TG (I'll give our investigator that name). TG's dad is a crazyyy fisher, he goes on fishing trips to Italy and catches 200 lb catfish. You walk into this families house and he has the biggest fish heads he has ever caught mounted on his wall. Talk about cool! So we made fish soup out of one of his catfish over a campfire on Sunday. It felt like I was back camping again. It was so fun, and we had a nice chat with his family. His parents are so nice and his mom had prepared palacsintas for us, as a dessert. Sister Layton and I both ate five each... oh my gosh, I thought I was going to explode. Hungarian food is waaayy too good!! Anyways, that's not important. The fact that we got to talk to TG's parents was the real reason why we went out there and that the meeting was successful. We didn't just talk with them, but we set up with them again in a few weeks so we can go out to their house and his mom can teach us how to make lángos. How much better can it get, making friends with your investigators parents, gaining their trust and eating yummy food at the same time. I'll take it! (: Sunday was a good day!
Unfortunately, I think I pulled my hamstrig this week. My companion and I have been getting up early in the morning with the zone leaders to go on runs and well... sadly, I have definitely slacked off on exercising during my mission, so I thought it'd be good to start up again, well I think I went a little too hard and it ended up in a hammy injury. It's so great though, because every morning we run along the Tisza river and it's so beautiful. I will have to take my camera and take pictures of the Tisza in the morning. It's quite the site.
Well, that's all I got this week. It wasn't too crazy of a week, but it was a good one, at that!
I love you all and thanks so much for all the love and support you have given me since I've been out here. I owe you all. Six more months. (:
Whitaker Nővér

Michaela Janae Whitaker




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