Привет Миру,
It was a little bit of a strange week.
Sister Lindquist and I have been trying very hard to set up lessons and help her get to know the branch. Unfortunately, most of the days, it hasn't really worked out as we had appointment after appointment cancel. But we have had a lot of fun street teaching. We met a less active member from Nigeria on the street, who doesn't seem protiv to meeting us, so that's good. His name is Blessed, and he actually came up to us. And knew pretty much immediately that we were missionaries from the Church. It was the most surreal experience I've probably ever had considering that like for the most part no one has even really heard of the Church. Plus, the conversation all took place in Russian.
And we were able to find some pretty good potentials, not to mention an actual investigator who seems to be really well prepared. Her name is Nadejda, and we "found" her on the tramvai (kind of like a trax thing). She was just smiling at me, so I returned the smile and started talking to her. Turns out I asked her for directions a while back, and she remembers me. She has a lot of passion for helping other people, and I really admire how happy she is even though she sees all the evil that unfortunely happens in the world. She seems really cool, so I will definitely keep you updated on her.
Sister Lindquist and I have decided to set some goals to help the former Traktorny Branch reopen. Currently, our branch is actually made of two branches, the Center Branch and the Traktorny Branch. About 2 years ago, Traktorny was closed since most of the members went inactive, but we're going to help revive and restart the work out there. We've decided that our first resort will be to serve the people. Street teaching out there is hard (almost no one stops and talks to us), so we've decided to open hearts through service. We've also decided that every time we go street teaching out there, we'll bring our service clothes and just be ready for it.
We've been trying to meet with Less Active members out there, and so far, we've met with one. Her name is Natalya, and she hasn't been to church for 10 years, but she's still grateful for the blessings of the Word of Wisdom! She's forgotten her testimony of Joseph Smith, but she hasn't forgotten the blessings that the church has given both her and her children. We hope to see some progress with her, and we hope to be able to meet with even more less active members from that branch. I think we're not going to see a whole lot of progress at the beginning of our project, but the curve will come and multiply exponentially I'm sure.
Funny story: Natalya's husband from Azerbaijan came home at the time that we were teaching. He was slightly tispsy, but overall a pretty cool guy. He went into shake hands with Sister Lindquist and somehow, he ended up giving her a "noggin" as Crush from Finding Nemo calls it. I tried really hard not to die laughing.
Easter here was pretty cool. They eat this cake called Kooleech, and it was pretty tasty. I think I'm going to bring Russian Easter with me when I get back to the States.
This week's scripture comes from Mark 14. It's the story of Mary annointing Christ with expensive oil, and the apostles complaining that the money could have been used for something better. "And Jesus said; let her alone; why trouble ye her? She hath wrought a good work on me... She hath done what she could." Just remember that for Christ your best is good enough, so don't worry about what other's are saying around you or what others are doing. Just do your very best and Christ will be happy.
С Любовью
Sister Jarvis
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