#6 Buda: Teaching the Gospel is the BEST!
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| Yes, This is Elder Morgan! |
This week, we had some really good experiences. On Tuesday we taught one of our investigators named Hamid, he is from Afghanistan, he lives and works here as a doctor. Hamid is in his 30's. He was born in Afghanistan but moved to Iran as a young child and returned to Afghanistan in his 20's to fight in the war against the Taliban. He fought as a mercenary for the U.S.. He made quite a bit of money doing that and moved to Europe. He is now a doctor and he lives in a nice property in Buda. This was my first time meeting with him. After getting to know him for a little bit, he started talking about his experiences fighting for the USA in Afghanistan and honestly said, "I don't know if I feel confident that there is a god that loves us, you wouldn't either if you have seen and done what I have. I want to know he is there, but I don't know how to make him show himself to me if he is there." We shared with him Alma 60:13:
"For the Lord suffereth the righteous to be slain that his justice and judgment may come upon the wicked; therefore ye need not suppose that the righteous are lost because they are slain; but behold, they do enter into the rest of the Lord their God."
We also read and discussed Alma 18:1-24, where Ammon teaches King Lamoni, who didn't know very much about God, and so it teaches about God very simply. It was amazing to see that change of his countenance, transforming from one of worry and frustration to joy and excitement. It was really good to see a weight being lifted from him. It was one of the best lessons in my mission that I was really able to see the power of the Book of Mormon at work. We taught him how to pray, and helped him recognize the spiritual feelings he has felt before, we also gave him a Book of Mormon in Persian, and he was very excited to read and pray about it and to read through the scriptures in the 21 day challenge. I don't know if it will be the case, but I hope that as we continue to meet with him that we can have similar experiences together with the Book of Mormon.
On Wednesday we went to meet with a referral we got from the sisters. He was an African man named Mr. Dean, who is an inactive member who was baptized in Holland in the 80's but he is originally from Gambia. He runs a non-profit helping poor people immigrate to Budapest to get better jobs and education, and one way he funds this is by running a soccer team. He was a character! He did not have a grounding in the the doctrines, or even the details, of the restoration... so clearly he has been completely inactive for a very long time. We spent sometime serving him. It was interesting, but he invited us over again. We'll see how that goes.
Elder Fales and I taught English class and talked about travel and favorite places they'd travel and role played talking to travel agents; and Elder Fales talked about Vegas and his grandpa being a cowboy, which the class thought was pretty cool. At the end of class one of the students came up and said, "I'm not really interested in God but I want to learn about your religion because there is something very different about your church and I want to read the Book of Mormon and learn about the differences between our your church and other Christian churches." So, we have another person to teach.
On Friday I went on exchanges with Elder McCann and we visited with a new member couple who are expecting a baby and who are planning to go to the temple when they hit their year mark. They are super sharp! It was a really really good discussion. Then on Saturday we went to the church and picked up the Young Men's president and drove out to a small town to meet with an inactive member. We had a heart to heart with a young man there. One of the reasons he doesn't come to church is because he doesn't feel good enough to go to church. I think we helped him understand that church is not for perfect people.
It has been really cold in Budapest this winter. I didn't really experience a real Buda winter last winter... now I know what all the hype about cold winters was about! When it's cold, Hungarians turn into ogres... so streeting and tracting gets much more unpleasant.
We also had a powerful experience with the Priesthood this Sunday. We went with one of the Office senior couples after church to visit a member named Tania who has been really sick for the last few weeks. Tania is from Ukraine, I think I've talked about her before. She's been really sick for 3 weeks. We talked with her and she told us about some experiences that she has been having helping her older brother accept the gospel, and what things she does when she goes back home to Ukraine to visit here family. We gave her a blessing and then she thanked us and remarked about how she hoped she would be well enough to go to church next week and take the sacrament. It popped into my head "You hold the authority to administer the sacrament for her." We then got a hold of the Bishop and with his permission blessed and passed her the sacrament. She was crying, I felt the spirit. For her it was probably one of the few times that she has been able to understand the words of the sacrament prayer since living in Hungary for the better apart of 20 years since she doesn't speak Hungarian. We did the prayers in English, which she does speak, and it was very powerful. She said "Thank you, so much, You have now done everything I could have asked."
We are having a mission tour in a couple weeks and a member of the area presidency, Elder Sabin, is coming to the mission. That will be cool. Something we are preparing for now.
I feel very privileged to be able to use my hands and my mouth to do the work of the Lord. I can be his hands and his mouth as I preach his gospel, and administer his ordinances. I know that Christ lives, and that his prophet is Russell Marion Nelson. I know that Christ's priesthood and church are at work on the earth. I know these things are true.
Elder Morgan.
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