Week 34: February 17, 2014

Hey everyone!

Well, I´m still kickin'. This week has been quiiiite the week.

First of all, thank you so much for the package! Seriously, I was so happy. You really took it seriously when I said that I was almost out of the crushed red pepper flakes! Bags and bags. I couldn't be happier. 

We didn't end up going to Tallinn last week like we had planned. Instead, the Tallinn missionaries all came up to Narva and had an impromptu meeting. Nobody actually knew why we were meeting but our zone leader, Elder McCaffery, said that he felt really strongly that we should. And so we did, and it was amazing and weirdly something that everyone needed but didn't realize that they needed it. 

They brought up the very last chapter in John, where Peter has the awkward encounter with the Savior. Christ asks him three times in a row if Peter loves him, and Peter (slightly more exhasperated each time) tells him yes. After each time, the Savior says, "Then feed my sheep."

Jeffrey R. Holland has a talk called The First Great Commandment from October 2012 General Conference and he talks about this exchange between Peter and the Savior. After Peter says yes for the third time, then I love what Elder Holland says.
In his words: "To which Jesus responded (and here again I acknowledge my nonscripturalelaboration), perhaps saying something like: “Then Peter, why are you here? Why are we back onthis same shore, by these same nets, having this same conversation? Wasn’t it obvious then andisn’t it obvious now that if I want fish, I can get fish? What I need, Peter, are disciples—and I needthem forever. I need someone to feed my sheep and save my lambs. I need someone to preachmy gospel and defend my faith. I need someone who loves me, truly, truly loves me, and loveswhat our Father in Heaven has commissioned me to do. Ours is not a feeble message. It is not afleeting task. It is not hapless; it is not hopeless; it is not to be consigned to the ash heap ofhistory. It is the work of Almighty God, and it is to change the world. So, Peter, for the second andpresumably the last time, I am asking you to leave all this and to go teach and testify, labor andserve loyally until the day in which they will do to you exactly what they did to me.”

Whew, right? 

We all had this moment where we realized that we're some of the luckiest people in the world. We get to serve somewhere that most people count as hopeless, and we get to teach people who have the mindset that life is to just be lived and that's it. We get to be the ones to care after these down-trodden sheep and we get to be the ones to scoop them up and bring them back to the Savior.

We were all pumped, so all of our zone went out for a quick twenty minute blitz. We ran to catch people on the streets and we taught with pounding hearts (admittedly, that was slightly from the running and lacking litheliness, but mostly from the burning desire to let these people know that more joy than they can comprehend is contained in the book in our hands). It was great. We were more persistent than usual and we all had really miraculous encounters to tell when we returned to the church. As for Sister Patino and I (we went on an exchange of sorts), we didn't find any new investigators or anything but we both were able to teach with more of the Spirit on the street than I've ever taught. So that was cool.

We've been on fire ever since. What I mean by that is that we've taught by the Spirit and given every single interaction that we have with other people our best shot. For example, a lot of people here like to say, "I've read the Bible and I know everything." I realized that it is totally acceptable to say, "No you don't. Did you know that God has a living prophet on the earth today? Did you know that you don't have to settle on being the person that you are right now--that you can decide to change if you aren't happy? We have exactly what you need to get started." 

It's been cool and a lot more people have actually stuck around to talk to us because of it. 

We have also been experiencing more opposition than ever. I honestly have felt Satan's pressure on me every day in a way that I've never known I could, but I guess that's how I know that we're doing something right. 

We had a sort of miracle last night when we had a long block of time to be teaching outside. We had left and locked our apartment, and I watched Sister Dalley step into the elevator to go downstairs but I didn't get in with her. I just felt like we were forgetting something. So I told her to come back out and we went back into our apartment. When I saw a little notebook sitting by the door, I grabbed it on a whim and figured that it would have to be the thing that we were forgetting. So we took the notebook, which happened to be a less-active member's, and decided to drop it off. His name is Pavel and we have tried countless times since I got to Narva to meet regularly with him, and for the past two transfers he hasn't answered his phone or been home when we stopped by. So we stopped by his apartment and he said that we couldn't come in because he was sick, but I told him to let us in real quick just so we could give him his notebook. He let us in and he actually was sick (usually people lie to us about that, so we were pleasantly surprised, haha) and told us that we can come by on Saturday at 4.
Wooohooooo! Pavel is one of the coolest guys ever so I am really hoping that we can start meeting more regularly with him.

Another cool thing that happened last week was when Sister Dalley and I were walking around and teaching people. We passed this guy who looked a nice grandpa and we said hello in Russian, and he responded, "Hello" in English. We stopped in our tracks, turned around, and ended up talking to him for about twenty minutes. His name is Roman and he's from Italy but he's working here in Narva for two years. He doesn't speak a lick of Russian but his English was really great. He's an engineer, so he's smart. Anyway, he was super nice and we ended up walking him to our church and agreeing that we would meet again. He's not the most interested in the gospel (he mostly goes to church because it's nostalgic for him) but boy was it refreshing to have a conversation where I could say exactly what I meant. That doesn't happen too often for me with Russian. 

Anyways, things are going really well. I'm slightly heart-broken about the fact that I missed the Ashton dog races and all, but I'm glad that you all had fun. Figures that Cal would be a crazy driver on the snowmachine. 

I love you all! Especially Riv, Yvey, and Ashton. Give those lil' buttons a kiss and a hug for me.

Love,

Sister Gooch