Life.

Hello. This week has been another week. I know I say this a lot but it really feels like the weeks just fly by and nothing happens in them. This week Skerdi ( pronounced like when you call some one a scardy cat) got the priesthood and came to church in his shirt and tie. My long sleeve shirts are running a little low... Left one in America, gave one away in Shkoder, and now one away in Lushnje. :) But he is doing really good. He also gave the closing prayer in sacrament meeting. He is progressing really well and will really become a real strength when he gets some doctrine and time under his belt. It's nice getting to see people progress in the gospel and when he tells me he's going to the temple in a year my head will probably explode. ha. As you know I haven't had very much success on my mission so getting to see someone that was baptized the right way and is progressing nicely is a real pleasure for me. 

     The other big thing that happened this week had to do with our recent convert family. The Nezha (ne and then say duh with a j juh ne-juh) I dont' know how much i've told you about them but they are a family of four 2 parents and a 18 year old daughter and 14 year old son. The three were baptized together about 5 months ago but the son was not. When I got here he had just started sitting in lessons but would walk in and out and would play on his phone and then he started staying for the whole lesson but would play on his phone and slowly he's been opening up and he has been to church a couple times which is great because the family has some financial problems and wasn't coming for a couple weeks but they started coming again. Anyways so with that background info we can begin our story. So we usually go out there on mondays, wednesdays, and fridays but since we were in berat and had mission conference this week we went over on thursday and then since we usually go out we just figured they would be expecting us to come friday. So we go out there(about a 15 minute drive into a village) and get there and walk up to the house and Osman (the teenage son) comes out and tells us that his parents aren't here they weren't expecting us to come because we had come the day before so we went inside and sat down with him and just talked to him and then he asked for some help with his math hw (asked my comp of course you know I feel about math) so my comp sat there and helped him and we just talked and got to help him. This is the first time that we have ever been 1 on 1 with him. Then after a bit his parents come home and we had a short lesson before we had to go and a little into the lesson he asked us a question about why we don't remember anything about pre earth life and the lesson kind of shifted and we started teaching him and it ended with us committing him to read the book of mormon and pray to know if it was true. BOOM. It was a huge step and we were really excited. Little cherry on top is that he came to church yesterday(he hadn't been for a couple weeks) and stayed both hours. We are going out to tonight and going to see if hes read or not and hopefully he can keep progressing. We are hoping that he can be baptized next month if he keeps going like he is. I can't tell you how excited I would be If we could get this kid baptized. First of all we would be uniting a family that could go be sealed in the temple and second this is the first time i've really gotten to see the spirit work on someone. A change of heart we could say. It's been amazing to see how the spirit has worked on him and how he has slowly opened up. If we can get him baptized I will pack my bags and die a happy missionary. All the hours of contacting and no lessons and disappointment would be worth it. The joy that would come from being able to get this family to the temple would be undescribable for me. Tonight is going to be a big night for us. Lushnje may not be my favorite city and i'm a city boy at heart but here more than any other area I have seen the hand of the Lord for WHY I have been placed here as a Zone leader and a missionary right now and it's really cool to see. God works in mysterious ways and it's not always in the way you want him to. 

    Other fun things from last week. We went on a super exchange with the missionaries in Berat (one being Elder Bangeter) because his comp just had an operation and they haven't been able to get out much so we went down so they could get some work done in their area. I worked with Elder Holding and my comp worked with elder Bangeter. We went out for a little in the morning and did some office stuff then ate lunch and after that went inside so he could rest. So I was inside for a couple hours and got some good quality reading time. I love the book of mormon and I know it's true but 5 hours is a long time haha I had to switch it up and journal a little and read this work out book they had at their house. I realized I am not a person that can just sit for hours and do nothing. I love reading but I get restless. If i'm alone I need to be doing something. We all started reading the Book of Mormon in 1 month on the 7th and I am currently in 3rd Nefi 17! Jesus just came so it's getting really exciting!! :) 

     We also got to watch the special missionary broadcast in Tirana. We got to here from Elder Bednar, Elder Oaks, and some others. It was really good and they just focused on the basics of preach my gospel. It was the first one they have done in over 10 years so it's cool I got to be out when they did it. It was a good eye opener for our companionship that we need to go back to basics and just do what preach my gospel says. 

    This week we have  a mission conference with President Kearon who is the Europe Area President and then the next day we have MLC with him... Which means that we get to sit in a room with him while he judges us and our zone!! Keep me in your prayers!!!! haha no it'll be really good and it's a wonderful opportunity to get to hear from so many members of the seventy. 

I love you all!!! Have a fantastic week. Achieve greatness and GO FORTH! 

     Elder Szabo

Baptism and Tracting. Tracting and Baptism. Tractism

Family!

       This week was.... a week. ha. My subject line describes how our week went. We had the wonderful opportunity to see Skerdi get baptized and I got to confirm him the next day. I also had a nice Albanian triple from one of my old comps so I was able to give that to him as a gift. The service was very nice. Not too many people but almost all of our youth showed up and went out to lunch after so that was a bonus. Dad you asked for detail but there isn't too much I can say. We all showed up a couple of prayers were said some people said some words and then Skerdi got put under water.... haha. One of our youth gave a talk on baptism and then I gave one on the Holy Ghost. It was nice our rm/1st councilor/everything told us we were going to do it a little different. Usually everyone goes in together and then they get in the font and then they get out and everyone leaves but this time we had us go in first, then they got in the font, then everyone else comes in and the ordinance happens then everyone leaves and then they get out. It really places a focus on the baptism and not people slipping or getting in and out and saying it's cold. It really should be a sacred thing just like the sacrament is and i'm grateful for his knowledge and the way we did it. It makes it a lot better and the spirit is felt a lot more. Skerdi is super awesome and sooooo prepared. Afterwards we both just felt like it didn't even happened because we really haven't done anything. He is going to become a strong member of the church here and i'm really glad we did it right and didn't baptize him kotë. I talked about this last week but we've seen as zone leaders that there are a lot of baptisms when people are not ready to be members for the rest of their lives and a ton fall away and they become less actives later missionaries have to track down so i'm really glad that we've got this direction and that Skerdi was done in the right way. 

     We did a back to back exchange this week because the APs wanted to get one in. On tuesday we went and crashed Elbasan district meeting because they missed our training because they got in a minor accident so we went and gave our training and then did a super exchange so it wasn't a waste of time to go. I went with the trainee Elder Farnworth and My comp went with Elder Lesi who is a native Albanian. It was really good and I always love being back in Elbasan. So we did that then the next morning we had a DL training with President and the APs so we drove to Durrës and had that and then I started my second  exchange with Elder Befus!!! We went to Tirana and I worked in there area. I have now exchanged with both American forkers. We were totally in the same physics class! We had a really good talk about good ol AF. It's weird being with someone that knows about what you're talking about when you talk about your high school and people who are married. It was really good. I love Tirana. Shkodër is my birth place but my heart is in Tirana. I love big cities. It was a really good exchange. In the morning our phone died so we woke up thirty minutes late and then had to rush to get ready and drive to Durrës to exchange back because they were doing the training for the Tirana zone so it was a short exchange but it was really good. Good but traveling a lot and being out of your area for two days is tiring. 

     Besides that we contacted this week... A lot. I can't tell you how excited I am that Skerdi got baptized. It's my first one in a year and my third in my entire mission but it doesn't take the fact away that he was our only investigator and we now have 0 work. We ended the week with a 10 hour tracting total. We had the baptism on Saturday had some lunch then from 3 to 8 we had nothing else planned so we tracted and then proceeded to do the exact same thing on Sunday night. Don't get me long I love tracting as much as the next guy but 5 hours is A LONG TIME. Especially when you see no success. The last couple weeks we have seen absolutely no success but this week we saw a little. We got a lesson and they told us we could come back then two other people told us they didn't have time but come back tomorrow so the next day we swung by all three and we were..... 0 for 3. 2 didn't answer 1 answered and she told us he was sleeping. So we proceeded with our knocking and close to the end of the night we got into a house. It didn't go anywhere they were an older couple and were super excited to have us in there house but they didn't pick up anything we said but it was a nice little break. We hope that this week we can continue to see more success and find some families. We all know how much finding success I've had on my mission but hopefully we can turn that around. Number wise it wasn't a great week but we did get to see a lot of people that we don't usually see and some good stuff happened. 

 

      Not to sound like a terrible missionary but i'm a little burned out on the finding side of things. I've been doing it for a year straight and Skerdi is the only thing i've seen from. I will run until the end and do what the Lord asks of me but doesn't make it any easier. If nothing else I have learned and grown a tremendous amount on m mission and have a millions of things to improve on but it's amazing to see how far i've come.  The book of mormon reading continues. I am currently in Alma 10 and am two days ahead of schedule so that's exciting. Interesting commitment from President but it will be really good and it'll be the third time in my entire life that i've read the book cover to cover. This week we have a special missionary broadcast so we get to go to Tirana and hear that. It's going to be really good i'm really excited. 

       I love all of you and hope you have a great week. Elder Szabo

My body is like a microchip!

(Yet again if you want an explanation for that subject line ask Sam)

      Family!!! This weed was a good one... A little slow but overall good. On Wednesday we had our MLC. It was our second one together and it's crazy we've been together for that long. It was good nothing too special about it except that President committed us to read the book of mormon 1 month! So lots and lots of reading over the next month. The next day was our training which we were both very excited for. We have been thinking about it for a long time and a lot of ideas and discussions went into it over the last month. 

       

      Good thing I never had a fear of public speaking because I have to get up in front of 25 missionaries and President and the APs came this time. It went extremely well. It was just one of those things where you walk away and you know it went the way you wanted it to and the material was good.  It was titled "Real Rabbits" and we talked about getting real growth and real conversion in this mission not just baptizing people that fall away or are less active. It's a really big problem in the mission and since I've been here we've had a lot of baptisms but haven't really seen growth in the church. There is a lot of people that don't have a testimony. We talked about helping people keep commitments and be ready for membership in the church not just baptism. Baptism opens the door staying in the church gets you to the Celestial kingdom. It went really well and during the break we had in the middle  President came up to us and told us the impressions he had received about how missionary work is about preaching repentance not just baptizing people. When your mission president is getting revelation during your training you must be doing something right! We got pretty excited about that. 

       

       So that went well and then after President had to do Skerdi's baptismal interview (I got to translate for him) and half way through we realized that he had misunderstood one of the questions when we asked him and he didn't have any big problems like we thought so president didn't really need to do the interview but after he told me there's a reason for everything and it was really cool that president could meet Skerdi... and HE PASSED HIS INTERVIEW. Which means Skerdi Vecani will get baptized this Saturday! He is so prepared and we are pumped that he is getting baptized. A member will be baptizing him and I will be giving him the Holy Ghost. Baptism by fire baby!!! It's been about a year since my last baptism so this is a pretty big deal for me. It's been a pretty long since my last baptisms and they are both less active so.... As time goes on I think my mission is more to convert me then to find a ton of people to get baptized and confirmed. It's hard, it's long, and it's tiring sometimes but I learn through it all. I should probably stop praying for things that will help me to become a more Christlike person... Because they come! 

      Which brings me to this lovely Saturday and Sunday we just had... Long story short I got sick and pulled something in my chest so was in pain for two days and we tracted for 5 hours on Saturday night and 4 hours on Sunday night without a single lesson. Not 1. To say it was a long way to end the week is an understatement. With all that said it was great as usual and I feel like I was pretty upbeat and happy through it all. (my comp might tell you something else but in my defense it's not my fault I would randomly grunt in pain or sounded like a foghorn for two days!) It sucked and was long but everything is a learning experience. Don't worry I'm not perfect and complained through it and wasn't rainbows and unicorns the whole time but overall if there is anything I've learned on this mission it's the example of Nefi in that you can learn from anything and nothing is worth complaining about. This life is alllllll about overcoming adversary and opposition. That is literally the plan of God. Our progression is his life. The only way to know the good is to experience the bad. So next time something hard comes along don't think why me!!!??! but think how can I learn from this! and then use it to become more like Christ... and watch your entire outlook on life change. It's amazing what just turning your head can do. Are you looking at the mountain side or at the amazing view on the other side its all up to you!!! So choose this day and GO FORTH. Achieve greatness and be grateful for everything. *disclaimer... this only works if you are keeping the commandments and know you are in line with Gods will. I love you all. Have a fantastic week and smile! Life is beautiful. Elder Szabo 

Real Rabbits

Hello! Let me tell you. 40 minutes is not enough! After the crazy day we had it just seemed like we talked for 5 minutes but it was really good to see all of you. You feel a little disconnected sometimes especially when you've been out for this long. Good to get back in touch and see all of you. Not much to report since we last talked but I realized how little I actually tell you about what's going on in my area. I will try to be better about that. 

 

     First of all. SKERDI! He is amazing and prepared and we are really excited for him. His baptismal date is on the 16 and he has his interview this week so we are really excited. Every lesson we have with him he just accepts it all and asks us amazing questions. We taught tithing today and at the end he said it was a tiny sacrifice to make and then asked us when he could pay and we said usually at the first Sunday and he asked if he could do it tomorrow... The other great thing he said today was so I was talking to my mom and we were discussing which church was the true church and I said some things she said some things and i'm pretty sure I convinced her this is it and she said she wanted to come and check it out..... I almost hugged him. He is awesome. It's interesting my comp and I were talking about how on our missions we have either taught people that are super prepared and awesome or don't make it past a first lesson... Which is good because we are truly finding the elect. Both of my converts in Shkoder are less active so we are really trying to do it right this time. If he gets baptized this will be my 3rd baptism on my mission in a year and a half. Interesting to see why we are sent to the places we are and the lessons we are supposed to learn. 

     Speaking of being sent to places for a reason I think I have found a couple reasons why i'm here right now. The first is Skerdi and the second big one is Joni Mati. He is an RM who got back about 3 months ago and was made the first councilor of the branch... He is carrying the branch on his back right now. He is a great example of what a RM should be when they come back but the reason I say I think I was put here right now was because we are really getting along and have got a really good connection with him and I feel like he's going to leave in a couple months because of school and he really doesn't' want to be in Lushnje but while he's here he is doing a lot for this place. I feel like we are here right now so we could get a relationship with him so we could use him in our lessons and really try to do something for this place because he is our only strength right now. 

      Lushnje is a really weak branch right now. Our priesthood quorum is a really interesting group of people and not a lot of them are a real strength or have the potential to be. It's hard to explain but we have a lot of less actives right now as well and we've realized that we really need to find people that are going to be a strength for this branch. Lushnje is an interesting city because there is nothing to keep people here after they graduate high school. There are no big universities or colleges so you either get a job or leave to another city to go to school. I'm really trying to love it but it's not my favorite area ever. It's just really small and hard to be effective sometimes but I'm focusing on the positives and we are really trying to make a difference here. Besides Skerdi our area is really dead and we are struggling to find new people right now but are working hard and trying to find families. Our recent convert family who are amazing have been struggling to come to church recently because of financial problems so that's been a real bummer but we are still working with them. They are super solid just aren't willing to make that leap of faith right now to give up work on Sunday when it's the only day they can find work. 

     We have MLC and zone training this week and we are really excited about it. We have a lot of trainees in our zone. 5 to be exact and 4 of them are whitewash training. We are going to talk about finding real rabbits (a story Elder Crandall had heard google it.) and helping the church see real growth here. It's going to be really good! Plus going to Tirana is always a plus for me. 

       This mission has truly changed my life and the direction my life is going to take. I am learning so many lessons and things I couldn't have even imagined. I've become converted to the gospel and Christ and have strong roots to stay in this church forever. I will never be grateful enough for this experience. It may be hard and long and tiring but when you get past all that and look at who I've become it's been worth it. I really feel a big part of my mission was to make sure i'm strong in my gospel rather than baptizing 50 people. I know this church is true and that Christ lives and is our Savior. I testify of him daily. Please read the scriptures and pray. Go to the temple and church meetings. People find out why you sacrifice so much and how you can sacrifice even more. It's worth it but you need to find out why! Get on you knees and ask again to renew your testimony if it's been a while since you did. Ask God if this is his church and if its' even worth wasting all this time. After you find your answer or get it renewed start magnifying your calling as a member of this church and disciple of Jesus Christ. He wants all of you and no sacrifice will never be enough. Start this new year off right and make a goal to run faster work harder and sacrifice more. Set realistic goals and go out and achieve them. Don't set goals you know you won't achieve. Set meaningful realistic goals that will push you and become an optimal human being! Achieve GREATNESS! GO FORTH! and don't settle for mediocrity in anything you do! I love you all. Have an amazing week and smile for goodness sake. Love Elder Szabo 

Crazy Christmas Adventure....

Just thought I'd send you what happened on our Christams.

The crazy story I didn't have time to tell you...Get some popcorn this is a really good story! It'll be better when I can tell you in person.  So a couple days before Christmas we were talking about going to this mountain  that is close to Berat and the idea got bounced around but we never really decided so we woke up Christmas morning ate breakfast(which I made... :)) and after we were like what are we going to do today.... Lets go to Mount Tomori.... Do you want to??.... Lets do it! So with no idea how we were going to get there we set off. We got a fergon (van) to Berat and it dropped us off about 2/3 of the way there and we started walking to Berat and realized it was a lot further than we thought so we started trying to flag some down on the side of the road and they were all full but finally one stopped and it was full. I had to sit on my comps lap for a little. So we are get going and I was like hey ask the guy next to you about how to get to the mountain... i moved to the other seats when people got out and my comp kept talking to him and he told us he could show us how to get there so we got to Berat and met up with one of his friends. They were in their early 20's so we walked around with them to the place you get taxis and they talked to some people and they said you couldn't get one in Berat we had to go to a village outside so they walked us down to the place where you can get a bus to the Village. Pelican. (not pronounced like you think it is and has a squiqqly on the c) So we went and got some money and then came back and had a drink with them while we waited for the bus to leave for about 10 minutes. So we go to get on the bus and it turns out the bus driver knows a guy in the village that can take us up so he was going to be ready when we get there. So we took this bus on a very excited curvy road to the village. We step off the bus and the guy is waiting for us there. So we get into his makine and start off. We go up the mountain. It's a very unpaved mountain road so it went really slow. So we get up to the muslim place and take some pictures and then left because we were short on time. ( keep in mind we have to be back in LUshnje to skype at 6 and it was about 3 when we got up there.) So we chilled up there for a little bit. Really beautiful.  So we start down the road and get back into the Village. Pelican. and they tell us that the fergon should be there at 5 30  so we are stuck in this little village waiting to go back to berat and we aren't going to be back in time to skype. So we find a little internet place and email our familes saying we won't be able to skype until 8. Then we ran and got food really quick. Really quick meaning we walked in and out of that place in 15 minutes. Run Back down and wait and wait.... and it's not showing up on time and it's getting closer to 6 so we are just stuck with no way to get out and then this machanic guy that the guy that drove us up the mountain talked to and told him to make sure we made it alright comes over and tells us follow me. We were really confused but followed him and he tells us to get in his makine so we're like alright. We get in and he tells us the fergon is late and he has to go to Berat for some makine parts so he can take us. He had spent time in England and had a mouth on him but he was super cool. Being the good missionary that I am we started talking about God and faith and he told us he's atheist and that there is no way we're working for free and I was pushing him pretty hard and talking about stuff and we were joking around and then at one point he pulls over and says fine if you think God can save you get out and get to Berat yourself....awkward silence.... Then I say why would we do that when God sent us you. He kept driving. We were really worried for a little though. He drops us off in Berat right as the bus out to Fergons is leaving so we get out and jump on it. Excited we are going to get back to Lushnje in time then we get out at the place where the fergons are and they are all stopped for the night.... Yet another time stuck in a city with no way back.... We ask around, try to hitch a ride back into Berat and think we are going to have to sleep there that night but then we were able to catch the bus back into the city. Get off and ask the first guy if there are taxis for lushnje and he says I work a taxi says how much and we looked at each other nodded then got in. He drove super slow!!! We left Berat at about 7 and got into Lushnje right at 8 ran tot he internet lokal and got on skype and that's when I started talking to you.... We BARELY made it back. It was quite a story and an adventure and we met some really awesome people. What I just wrote doesn't really describe it well it enough but ask me about it when I get back because it was awesome and a lot of meeting cool people and people having connections and things going smoothly and being stuck places and getting back with just enough time to skype. So I dont' know what you did for Christmas but that was mine....