So this week I was on a lot of exchanges. Elder Barrett and I went down to Novgorod which is about 4 hours east of Pskov. I will first tell you about the road to that great city. There is at least an hour and a half stretch of just straight pot holes and bumps. We are probably going about 10 miles per hour over this deep pot holes. The bus was bouncing so much that you can't read anything, you can't sleep, and can't really think. It was a whole load of fun. haha. But we get there and Novgorod is this pretty big awesome city. I think it is about twice the size of Pskov there and they even have a McDonald's. But we get there and start our exchanges there. We had a service project in the Kremlin there. (Yes Novgorod has a Kremlin, and so does Pskov, and Moscow, and also Kiev. More or less all of the old cities in Russia have kremlins. It was pretty cool serving there. We first we moving tables and chairs because they were preparing for this big celebration on Saturday. We were there on Wednesday and Thursday. Apparently President Putin was coming to town that day, which is pretty exciting for a little (littler) city like Novgorod seeing how Russia is forever and a half enourmous. We then raked up inside the Kremlin. The Kremlin there is a lot nicer and prettier inside with old meeting halls and small fields around inside. We met with a few great families and investigators there in Novgorod on the exchange. There are two Elders there and two Sisters. Elder Branham from St. Louis just recently got called to be the Branch President there in Novgorod because they don't have enough members to find a branch president. That branch is even smaller than ours here in Pskov. Can you imagine that! He is 20 years old and is more or less a bishop.
So then we take a bus back to Pskov.... On the way back it was about 3 straight hours of intense bumps. The sits in front of me were literally shaken out of place and they didn't remain in place. Aside the terrible bus ride, we get back and continue doing our missionary thing here in Pskov. We went tracting in some small houses out in the outer part of the city of Pskov. I really felt like that that was the REAL Russia. It was in these small dusty streets amongst small cottage looking houses (called Dachas in Russian). I really love this place. I had a moment when I just loved Russia like that a few weeks ago when I had to pick up a few packages for the Pskov branch. I walk into this old building which I think once acted as a Soviet services building, but inside were these run down hallways where there were small businesses. For some reason, inside that old Soviet building, I fell in love with Russia. I love these people. haha I can't really explain why I had that feeling, but it comes once in a while at random times. These are my people!
This week, we had a lot going on with our investigators and we found 3 new investigators with another kind of in limbo right now as we were unable to set up a return appointment. One of the new investigators was a man named Alexander, who, upon our first visit, took control of the appointment and showed and talked about random stuff and about poetry. He is a very nice and smart man, but a little unfocused. But our second lesson with him started the same way, but I felt like I grabbed (with the Spirit) the lesson by the ears and shook it around. He really couldn't argue with or question my testimony. It was really interesting because he said you can find answers about the book by asking the question and turning to any random page and read any sentence. He asked, "What is The Book Of Mormon", and he turned right to, "Repent, Repent all ye ends of the Earth end be baptized in My name". The Book of Mormon really is the best tool to declare repentence, for us to change, and it helps us come closer to God "by abiding by its precepts more than any other book". But the Spirit was incredibly strong and he was touched in the lesson and we got him to pray at the end and it was one of the most sincere prayers ever. Once we brought in the Spirit, it had already been 40 minutes, we committed him to read and come to chuch and left. I really realized there at that lesson that that was truly teaching PEOPLE and not lessons. Its okay that we didn't teach the whole lesson but just a few points, but the Spirit was there and he was touched.
We have another investigator that we found last week named Andre who is just amazing. He had completely changed his life about 17 years ago and believes and just knows without a doubt that God lives. We had a very powerful lesson with him where he accepted a baptismal date and sincerely desired to become even better and become closer to Heavenly Father. One problem is that he smokes, and we are getting him to commit to take the new Addiction Recovery Program that the Church has. The Senior Couple in Pskov, the Gardiners are actually specialists with this program and have been working with it with others for years. We are going to get started on the program and prepare him for Baptism. He is a professional mushroom hunter. Mushroom hunting here is a PASSION. When it is fall time, it means "WOODS TIME" and search mushrooms like the Hobbits of Old.
Well this week was great. I really am grateful to be a missionary. I am so happy to be here and I love these my people here in Russia.
Love,
Staryeshina Tekoolviy
Ya tak blagadarin za to shto ya zdec' b Rossiyi. Eta moya lyobimaya strana i eta nye vazhno shto I delyok ot doma siechas. I lyublyu etu rabotu i Gospoda i etikh lyudyei
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