Week 15 – Galaţi, Romania
I love hearing about home. It seems strange to me that life is moving on out there. Frankly, I don’t mind. I am very happy where I am and with what I am doing, but it is fun to know what I am missing too.
It is a lot of fun to work here in Galati. I am learning more and more what stores, and posters to not look at…period, and the wonderful vocabulary some people use with us! I am proud to say that I don’t know any cuss words in Romanian, nor do I want to learn any.
We have so many things to be grateful for. I love being here. I love this city, and I learn new things everyday. We have learned that the sun never really comes out here, because of the Danube. Thus, I have been thinking about buying some Vitamin D pills. People will wonder why I am so happy! ;). I have have learned some serious lessons in happy ways this week. I have been really frustrated about not getting to teach any lessons, but we keep working and the Lord provides a way. We have been blessed this week with not one, but three lessons! Three lessons, one new investigator, and 13 hours of contacting. That sounds like a small number, but that is minus 3 hours of lesson time, and everything else involved with being a missionary. That is a lot of time! We also had, on multiple accounts, very inspired conversations with people, and have much success in sharing the message of the Restoration.
I thought about why all of a sudden we have had success. I think I know my answer. The Lord needs missionaries who will work hard in the face of adversity, not just in time of success. In fact he needs missionaries who will work harder in times of failure, and keep working in times of success. I think that the Lord was preparing me for what my mission may bring. Not that I won’t have success, but now I know how to work. I know how to work and push myself when things aren’t seemingly up. It is a really cool thing to feel. it is a great knowledge to have.
Our investigator is a good lead, and we will be helping him along his path towards the Gospel. Things will be great. I hope. Other than that we just need to keep finding people who will listen to our message, and hope that the Lord is preparing people for us. I know that He is though. I hope that through my actions He can see my faith. After all that is how we show our love, our desires, and our understanding of the gospel. It is super cool to be out here right now.
Okay something crazy…so there is a revolution in Ukraine right now, and we are literally a ten minute drive away from Ukraine! It is pretty crazy. oh well, that is the only news I have heard about, like at all.
Things are really good here. I am learning more and more how to be happy without things to begin it. If that makes sense. I can choose to be happy and enjoy the lovely things about Romania without those things being brought up to me. This in turn makes me really like waking up and seeing what the world will bring me that day. We keep ourselves busy and we work our hearts out. My language skills are improving and I think that the more lessons we have the more I will learn. I feel more comfortable in a lesson setting then just on the street. However, I am starting to really grow, and I can tell people all about our free English classes we have all by myself. It makes me want to sing that jingle “I’m a big kid now!”. ;).
My companion and I are really learning what it means to be exactly obedient and how it can really bless our lives. We started going to bed as early as we can, and getting up on time, or a little before time, so we can start our day right, and be more focused. That’s when we started having really good success. Thankfully, we have English classes, which is a great way to get people to the church building and to have a lot of potential investigators. I hope that you all are doing just wonderful. I care about you all very much. The Lord has promised that you will be taken care of, and I trust Him. 😉
Love, Elder Oldham