November 28, 2011 "Thanksgiving in Abundance"

Happy Thanksgiving à tous!

Well kinda...for my American family out there... haha. This week our ward went all out and I ate more turkey than I've ever desired...we had three different Thanksgiving dinners! I guess having a mostly American ward has its advantages...

This week I felt like I had one of those 'real missionary moments' of seeing people change and come unto Christ. I can't remember how much I've told you about the less-active, part-member family we've been working with. But basically they have been less active for 5+ years and so two of their three girls have not been baptized. The youngest just turned eleven... and is seriously the french version of Kaila. She and I are best friends. She teaches me all sorts of fun french words...anyways...when we first got here Soeur Murray saw their name on the ward list and felt like we needed to go pass by them. We stopped by several times, getting to know the family little by little...and finally worked our way up to a fixed rendezvous with them. Well last week was our rendezvous and it was very intresting...the dad told us he was not intrested at all in coming back, but if his family wanted to go he wouldn't stop them. The wife said she understood that, but she didn't want to have to deal with coming to church and then coming home to his anti attitude. Well then last week she came to church with their youngest daughter. This week we had another rendezvous...and it was amazing. He had completely changed...he expressed to us that he really wants to come back, but he wasn't sure that he could. We assured him that he can. By the end of the rendezvous that had promised to pray together as a family every day and he had asked for a priesthood blessing. Well this week he came to church...and the ward was amazing! Welcomed him and involved him immediately. It was so good. I feel so blessed to work with this family and to see the miracle and change that can happen in just one week!

We also had an amazing rendezvous with a refferal. This family was referred to us because the mom is the sister of a member of the ward. When we showed up at the house the mom and the four kids were very friendly and excited to see us. Apparently the mom had to been to church a few years back but because she lives a little out of the way, the missionaries never came by. We had an amazing rendezvous and told them the first vision story. Afterwards we asked what they thought, the 18 year old son told us that 'well its intersting...I think someone would have to know for themselves if its true'. He is exactly right! We gave him his own copy of the Book of Mormon and he just kept turning it over and over in his hands and flipping through the pages and telling us how excited he is to read it.

Soeur Murray and I have been talking alot this week about how it feels like in our mission we get so excited when just ANYone is interested in listening to us...then lots of times we end up baptizing people who are not completely ready, or are the only member of thier family and end up struggling. In the wards Ive served in, we then end up with these recent-convert, less-actives who don't have testimonies and are difficult to work with. I don't mean to diminish them at all...its just hard on the wards to support pages and pages of these less-actives. I think whitewashing has been a good experience for us because we've really had to listen to the spirit when trying to decide which amis are really progressing...and which just aren't ready to progress quite yet. Its hard on missionaries too- to pray for and prepare for and teach people who just aren't ready to progress and keep committments... because you learn to love these people you never want to give up on them. I guess the product of my whole ramble is that I have just felt so blessed this week to work with people who really have been prepared by the Lord and are ready to progress. You can feel the spirit with them and know they are taking your message seriously. These are the amis we're looking for...its just hard sometimes to have the faith to turn down a person is willing to have rendezvous with you...to go knock on doors or go contacting to find the one that will take you seriously. But its worth it.

Well that's my missionary wisdom for the week. I guess since I hit HALF WAY this week it has some legitamcy... but probably not because I still have so much more to learn and do here! Lots more people to trouve!

Love you and miss you!
Soeur Smith

November 21, 2011 "It's always, always, ALWAYS the last house on the street"

Bonjour!

 

So at the beginning of this transfer I made a deal with Brussels. I said it was allowed to get cold on November 23rd (transfer day) and to snow on December 21st (the first day of winter) and today the sun is shining...So so far the deal is still on! I just need to keep praying for my luck to last...I didnt think commanding the skies would actually work. I guess my opinion has a little more wieght as a missionary...haha

 

This week has been full of miracles! To explain I need to give a little background. When President Poznanski became our mission president he started changing a few things in the mission. One of them was dinner hour. With President Staheli we were allowed to have dinner hour from 8 to 9 and then do planning from 9 to 9:30. Oh no, Im about to get into some dirty details about missionary life. The "missionary rule book" says that dinner is supposed to be over by 6, but your mission president can change any rules according to culture, etc. Our mission is so spread out that it takes a while to get home for dinner hour and then back out again, so it was more logical to have dinner hour at eight, then just stay in for the night. Following? Ok so President Poznanski changed that rule because from 6-9 is when families are home, so he told us to 'make a concerted effort' to finish dinner by 6 when possible so we can be out with the people at night.

 

Ok background info over. So after zone conferance, Soeur Murray and I did some reflecting about our dinner hours. We were generally done pretty early, but just how our rendezvous were working out, we would have lunch around two, so then have dinner at five seemed ridiculous, so we were fixing lots of rendezvous for nighttime and just coming home around 830 and eating. President Kapishka shared stories from his mission, where he made an effort to be knocking doors every night from 6-8, because that is when families are home, then fix rendezvous at 8. SO Soeur Murray and I decided to just experiment and see how it works. So instead of planning as many rendezvous as we could at night; we planned being out every night!

 

Im not going to lie. As a missionary, your planner becomes your life. Its kind of an obsession. To look through the week and see NOTHING planned everynight...its a bit terrifying. But as President Staheli once said "There is nothing more exciting than an empty planner, because then the Lord can direct your time". So Monday started off. We come in from Pday...it was dark and cold...and we had to go right back out to do finding. When our carbon monoxide alarm starts going off. After having a minor freak out...we think we figured out it was just the battery dying. But to make sure...we had to go to the store to buy a new one. It was looking like our 'concecrated finding' was ruined from day one. So we decided we were going to try our 'grocery store' contacting. Store Number One: After playing dumb and asking three different families where the batteries are and asking them to teach me the word for battery in french and trying to bring up the gospel...we decided we had lingered long enough and were starting to look creepy and should go to the next store. Store Number Two: repeat scene of number one. Bus Stop: me feeling frustrated that our entire night had gone towards buying a battery...so I just sat next to lady at the stop and started chatting. Result: she's seen the missionaries lots and always wondered who we were and took a Book of Mormon.

Miracle Number One: the Lord directs us where we need to be...even if its by a carbonmonoxide detector (ps..it was the battery..we are still alive!)

 

The rest of the week was full of other miracle moments. People really are home at that time...and although its cold out (which seems to make people close thier doors faster...rather than invite us in...) we had some amazing experiences! Wednesday night we went back to a home which we had knocked on the door about a week ago, and daughter was home and told us her mom would be interested if we could come back. But when we came back the mom just slammed the door in our faces. SO we took the bus to another neighborhood. We went from door to door for about an hour. It was getting late, and as a joke I said to Soeur Murray 'well its always the last house on the street, lets finish this street then go home'. Towards the end of the street, the second to last and third to last houses had no lights on....so with all of our missionary clichés running through our heads we skipped to last house on the street. The lady answered. She was muslim. BUT she told us her nieghbor would be interested.(that we had skipped) We ran to second to last house on the street. No answer. As one last attempt. We went to the third to last house on the street. She answered. Her name is Tom ( non native english speaker...chose and english name...they always choose boy names!). Tom let us in. She listened to our explanation of the Book of Mormon. She wants to know more. We are teaching her again this week!

IT IS ALWAYS THE LAST STREET ON THE HOUSE (or at least the last one of the night). Lessons Learned: dont skip houses, and dont go contacting until 845 because then the 'last house' will come alot faster. JUST KIDDING.

Miracle Number Two: Tom

 

I wish I had time to share so many more stories. But Im sure at this point shaking your head thinking 'oh Soeur Smith'... so I'll just share with you one more story. We went to teach a family this week that we've had good contact with, but the mom and dad are never home at the same time so we haven't been able to teach the family. We had a rendezvous fixed...but when we got to their house they weren't home. Rejected we went to pass by another ami. She wasnt home. Rejected encore, we felt like we should back and visit family number one again. We walked all the way back...again they weren't home. We left them a note PROMISING they would be blessed if they made the effort to be at church. Two hours later...we got a call. Jean-Claude (the dad) told us he was really sorry they had missed us and the promised they would be at church!

 

And they came! They came, and the part member family we've been working with came! And it was an amazing day at church. I dont know how to describe the joy that comes from seeing people come to church. We were beaming. It was amazing. This week I've just been feeling so grateful for the inspired leaders in the church and the amazing rite we have to personal revelation to apply the guidance they give us. Even if I tend to interpret thier guidance into spazzy plans like skipping to the last house and asking people for random words in french. I just have the faith the Lord is using my spazziness to put me in the path of people who are prepared for the gospel.

 

Oh and its a new transfer. And Im staying in Brussels for Christmas! Meaning this is Christmas transfer: donc in my books its christmas season, so Merry Christmas!

I love you.

 

Soeur Smith

November 14, 2011 "Awkward contacts"

Bonjour Bonjour!

 

How is everyone? I hope its sunny there...because although yesterday was foggy and dreary, Brussels repented this morning and the sun is out again. Im not exactly sure how long this is going to last so Im pretty excited.

 

This week was awkward. Let me explain. It started off amazing with Zone Coneferance with Elder Kapishku (sp?)... he is the area President. He started off the conferance with asking us to write down a question or a worry that we had. He then promised that by the end of the day we would have the answer to our questions. Each one of us. Then he announced that he nothing planned that day and he was simply going to follow the spirit for the next 6 hours while teaching us. It was amazing. He then made us promise that if we got the answers to our questions we would then have to challenge our investigators to church the same way; challenge them to write down a question and promise them that they would get the answer. He wanted us to promise people that church is always, well can always be, a revelatory experience. I got my answers. So our theme this week has been challenging everyone we meet with to write down questions and be prepared for church.

 

Another activity he did, was during our lunch break we were to go into a room with our companions and really pray about what our area needed at this time. And then fix goals appropriately. Along with other goals, Soeur Murray and I have been coming up with some interesting contacting techniques. The first is what we like to call 'grocery story contacting'. Our Relief Society president actually came up with this one. She came up to us one Sunday, and almost as if pleading asked us to find solid families for our ward. She said maybe try in grocery stores around six pm because that is when parents, with solid jobs are getting off work and stopping at the store to pick up dinner. So we tried just walking into some grocery stores, asking some nice looking people where things are, and trying to tie that into the gospel. We'll just say it led to some awkward moments and we have yet to find our groove in this type of contacting haha.

 

Another one we came up with is to pray in the morning for what our 'theme' is for the day. Elder Kapishka really stressed that we are not the ones out there preparing people for the gospel, that is what the angels are doing. Our job is to actually find the people who have been already prepared. So we've been praying extra hard, and more specifically for the Lord to help us find the people who have been prepared and are ready to progress in the gospel. We have fixed themes for ourselves such as 'puffy coats' or 'red jackets' or even 'teenage boys'...and then if we see that during the day we have to contact those people no matter what. Well we've had some amazing experiences...we've have found some families that hopefully are ready to progress. BUT this has also led to awkward moments such as running off the tram for a lady in a puffy coat and awkwardly trying to invite teenage boys to church without feeling creepy. Its been good.

 

As well Soeur Murray and I have been trying to be better about just talking to people in general without hesitating. This led to one of my favorite contacts ever. And one of the most awkward. I was holding a Book of Mormon and Soeur Murray asked to see it. I handed it to her and she asked the guy sitting next to her in the metro if he was believing. He didn't say anything and just kept staring forward. So she tried again, asked if he had ever met missionaries. He just started shaking his head. She asked more questions (not even yes or no questions) and he just kept shaking his head. Finally she asked 'is my accent to strong for you to understand'...at this point he just decided to ignore that she even exsisted.Not even tell her that he's not interested or anything. It was sufficiantly awkward. But I was so proud of her!

 

I also had some awkward contact this week when we, for the first time this transfer, went to Saturday sports with other missionaries and investigators.I've been anti to this whole idea because a. it involves me playing football. B. it involves me playing football. But we gave in after enough peer pressure. Well just say me running straight into a very tall elder and almost breaking my nose qualifies as very awkward contact haha.

 

And this week we had a very uncomfortable feelings as we somehow ended up being fed THREE TIMES in one day. It was awful. AWFUL. The last rendez vous even had three courses. We just had rendez-vous with people and for some reason they felt like it was neccessary to feed us. All of them. By the last house we were dying. That gave us very uncomfortable feelings for about the next three days. Good.

 

But overall a very good week, I had a very missionary moment when we going from door to door, and it was late and cold and we got to the last house of the street and it a giant gate around the house and a security system. We walked past the house and started to head for the bus stop, when I turned and said to Soeur Murray 'its always the last house...' so we went back and rang the intercom. Shockingly they buzzed us in...so we leaped to the front door...ready to give our message...when turns out they speak dutch. We gave them a family proclamation in french and we will be passing them to the Netherlands mission. haha...

 

So what have I learned from this week? A mission is just one big awkward moment...embrace it! Carpe Diem.

Love you all!

 

Soeur Smith

 

PS OH YA Christmas. Ok so apparently Belgium has a wishy-washy mail system. So the best bet for me getting a package is to send to the mission home. They can then give it to me at our Mission Christmas conferance. I don't know exactly when this is...but probably early December, so you'll want to get sent soon so it can get to the mission home on time. Or you could risk it and try sending it to me here in Belgium. OR if you happen to be going to the states in the next little while, a family in our ward has offered to let missionaries' families send things to thier NATO mailbox...which means you don't have to pay international fees. The address for that is:

Dave Holloway

PSC 81 Box 119

APO AE 09724

 

Just put my name on the box somewhere I guess.

 

BUT here is the other trick. Transfers are next week. SO with the chance that I'm getting transfered...its probably just better not to send anything to that address till after Saturday. So best bet...if you want to send things this week. Mail it to the mission home :) THANKS!

November 7, 2011 "Little Rays of Sunshine"

Bonjour!!!

Well our Halloween costume ended up being... Belgium Waffle with a fork! Haha...you might thing its wierd.But here they give you these funny little forks to eat your waffles with...so naturally if your going to dress up as a waffle...you have to have the fork as well! Ill try and include pictures....

This week as been an adventure...as usual. Alot of our rendez-vous fell through which means we spent alot of time finding........yup that means more wheres waldo moments and some good ol street contacting. Im pretty sure Soeur Murray is getting a little sick of me being amazed that there are actual houses here in Brussels...she keeps telling me that I was in Paris for too long and that a yard is not a novelty. I can't imagine what I'm going to be like when I get sent to some tiny town where houses are not only exisistant...but seperated from each other! (Brusells kind of looks like San Francisco style houses...nice and schmooshed together). Anyways...

During our contacting this week I feel like we've talked to an unusual amount of aethisist. To be honest...I hate those contacts. It makes me so sad. I just can't even imagine a life where you think that this life is it...I guess that's why we are out here! Still..I'm starting to relate to those scriptures about not being able to bear the thought of one soul being lost...

Our church had an open house this week. It went over pretty well! The ward has been working on this for a couple months now. I guess a common complaint from non members is that they can just walk into any other church at anytime and see what it is all about. But our church has a gate and a fence and is only open for a couple hours on Sunday. So the ward came up with this idea to let people come and see what the church is all about. For it being the first time, it went really well! We didn't have as many non members as we hoped, but the members were great and alot of people came out! There was one lady who stayed the whole time...but she is also currently studying with the Jehovah's Witness so we will see how it works out...

We had a little miracle this week amoungst all of our cancelled rendez-vous. So one of our first weeks here Soeur Murray and I went and passed by a less active family's house. We didn't know anything about them, other than thier name on the ward list. When we passed by they told us they would love to have us over, but its not considered polite in Belgium to just stop by at peoples homes (sorry as missionaries I think we choose to kindly ignore that social normality...among most other social faux-pas haha) So we went home and tried to call them...but the number didn't work. Since then we've passed by and left a couple notes for birthdays and different things. Yesterday, we decided to stop by again. Just the mom was home and one of her daughters.We were able to get in and spent about an hour and a half talking with them. They even said they had been waiting for our call so we could come over.  It sounds like they have kind of just been forgotten by the ward and went inactive because of some misunderstandings of doctrine. We also found out that two of the three teenage girls are not baptized because they were too young when the family went inactive. The girl is adorable, and wants to come to Young Womens this week! We are pretty excited...we are hoping that all this family needs is a little love and guidance and they can start coming back to church.

So that family is our ray of sunshine...along with the real sun that has somehow miraculously stuck around! Fall is beautiful right now...lots of leaves changing colours and brisk air. But this morning is foggy and cold...so I'm scared that winter is just around the corner. We hear rumors that its supposed to get down to -20°c this winter...not too excited about that. Ah well...we just need to find lots of investigators so we can spend all day inside teaching.

Find, find, find. That seems to be the answer to all our problems. :)
 love and miss you all!
Soeur Smith

PS another ray of sunshine. We totally ended up walking in the flemmish countryside for an hour trying to find a member's home...Mom tell Sister Burgess to tell Evan that he is SO lucky. It is SO pretty...stopping to take pictures was necessary. He's going to love it!

October 31, 2011 "Miracles that Stick"

Happy Halloween!!

 

Although walking around today you could have fooled me...I have yet to see a jackolatern or a witch anywhere in brussels (although Im looking at some pretty crazy cobwebs on the ceiling of this library - it has yet to be determined whether those are for decoration or not...)

 

This week we've continued seeing some pretty amazing miracles. On Tuesday we were sitting at the bus stop and this lady sat down next to us and saw our books of Mormon and said 'I have also that book...I have to lots to say, can we talk?'...Right...soo cool! then her bus comes and we hand our card...and we have yet to hear from her. We met with Richard this week....it was interesting. He can't really get over the fact that the Book of Mormon is 'at the same level' as the Bible...so we'll see what happens with that one. We contintued to have some pass-by miracles...almost everytime we've gone to just spontaniously pass an old ami or a less active they have been home! (that never happened in Paris!) oh and they let us in... the real miracle!We are getting a little more used to Brussells...we still walk around with our heads in our map book...and get a little lost (silly Brussells...why does EVERY street need a french name and a dutch name...thats just complicated...) BUT I think we only had to back track up and down a street once this week...its a record for sure.

 

But Im not going to lie I've been getting a little frustrated with our miracles this week. Every time we have a really good contact or find a less active...and we go another week without having a true progressing ami, a quote from President Staheli keeps running through my head...he said 'a miracle isn't a miracle unless it sticks'. AKA Its great to have miracle contacts and lessons, but unless it turns into something...then really they aren't true miracles. So with that running through my head I would like introduce you to the Quenten family.

 

Brother Quenten is active in the ward and he has two daughters, who are 8 and 12, and a son who is 3. We were told by our DMP that their mom is struggling so it would be good to stop by sometime. So Sunday afternoon we went to visit them, and asked them for their conversion story. They were baptized in 2005, but Brother Quenten met the sister missionaries on the bus 3 years before that. He kept their card for two years, after going from church to church he found their card in the bottome of some drawer and gave the missionaries a call. Two elders came over and taught him, and he told them that they were crazy and the Book of Mormon could not be the same as the bible (sound familar?) ...but after they left he picked up one day and read it. A year later...he called the missionaries again and wanted to be baptized.

 

I can just picture all those missionaries along the way...just thinking their miracles weren't sticking...but now this family has been sealed in the temple and its dramatically changed their lives. I hate having the attitude of 'we're just planting seeds'...we were told in the MTC we are sent to baptize...not just plant seeds...So everytime we exhaust ourselves trying to teach someone, I can't help but think we're not doing everything, we need to do more than leave warm fuzzies all over Belgium and France. But sometimes that's all we can do...we work on the Lord's timeline not on 'transfers'. SO, to answer your question...no Richard is not leaping into the baptisimal font...but my new approach to things is 'on sais jamais'....

 

This week has been entertaining as well...we went porting for my first time (going door to door)...since it wasn't allowed in Paris this was my first experience. It turns out that its kind of like playing Where's Waldo. We ring the doorbell or the intercom, then we take two steps back and wait for someone to pop out of some window somewhere on the building. Then you awkwardly yell your message from the street. It gets pretty entertaining...you never know who's going to pop out of where haha. Also may result in a sore neck by the end of the night....

 

Two holidays this week...daylight savings and Halloween...yes daylight savings is a holiday because we got an extra hour of sleep...it was glorious. Halloween...my costume has yet to be determined...but there is a pretty good chance I'll be going to the FHE party as a gouffre or a Petite Prince character...got to live up being in Belgium while you can!

 

As always, I love you and miss you all! Your in my prayers!

 

Soeur Smith