Week 27

Me and Sister Hardy, the best office lady in town.

Okay so finishing up last week. Thursday was tea party day. I had way too much tea. Skaidre, a member we visited after Santa Dike, fed us tea as well. She had the HUGEST cat on the planet. The thing must have weighed at least twenty pounds. She is really excited to be more active in the church since she won't be working as much.

On Friday Sister Ferrin got sick so I went on a crazy cooking spree: blueberry muffins, soup, chocolate banana bread, etc. Before she slept off her cold we had the trolls, Ieva and Olga jake us. Poor Sister Ferrin was just lying on the couch until President S. made her move. "People might look in and think 'What is going on there?'" He made her some tea from the leaves of a linden tree. I worked a lot on our little lost sheep project.

Saturday we taught English as well as Elvira Skube, an inactive. She talked. A lot. She has seen some really awful things in her life, it was sad. She doesn't come to our church anymore because someone once told her that she couldn't read her poems at an activity. I thought of the Gardners a lot as I was cleaning the church this Saturday. I thought to myself, "What would Brother Gardner have me clean?" And then I would go and clean it!

On Sunday I was able to go to Young Women and participate in a great lesson about repentance. We talked about forgiving yourself and that if you haven't it probably means that you need more faith in Christ's atonement. We had a lesson with Santa S. (an investigator) and her younger sister. Afterwards I dragged the hooligans in and asked them who was interested in learning about the gospel (They were at church all three hours today). One of them, Davis, is interested in learning more! We had them all watch The Restoration film with us.

Monday we ate at Cafe 21. I got potato pancakes, yum! They have corn at the market now! I haven't bought any though because it costs $1.20 US an ear. Zoinks! I made a chocolate pie...the crust didn't turn out too well. We went to go find inactives. My favorite moment was the neighbor kids of this older lady. "Who are you?" "Missionaries." "Pensioners?" "No. Missionaries." "What is that?" We then had an enjoyable conversation and they told us how their neighbor yells at them to be quiet and now they know that we are not old people who live off governmental subsidies.

Tuesday we worked on making a church tour in District Meeting. President Boswell is so inspired! We have done the tour a few times and with excellent results. You can really feel the spirit and it is just so much fun to use the beautiful building and all of the paintings. I made some creamy cauliflower soup because autumn keeps on showing up about every other day. We taught Davis (16 year old hooligan who we play floorball with) the Restoration. He is a smart kid. And he asks questions when he doesn't understand. I love it.

We had a crazy adventure in the morning on Wednesday. We went to visit a woman who was contacted in 2005. Her name is Martina. Turns out Martina is actually one of the elders' investigators as well as the lady that Madara babysat for. We had a great lesson with her. She is such an amazing mother with high standards for raising her children. She fed us some yummy tea, mate aquante. I guess they drink it all the time in Brazil. She is really interested in learning about the gospel and wants to come to church, she is just insanely busy (3 kids, two jobs, school, a husband at sea, an internship). We actually met the elders on the street coming out of her lesson so we told them what happened and then they shared about a miracle they just had. They found out that this member who was blind can hear now and that her and her grandmother want to come back to church. They also put together the pieces that this man who is deaf could now be taught (before his daughter translated and changed what the missionaries said). "All this time we thought he was a jerk for never answering when we knocked on his door. But he is deaf! He could never hear it!" I'm still wondering how you get in contact with deaf persons then if they live alone. Anywho we went on an adventure with Santa D. (member) to Nadezda (another member who is Russian). We talked with her about hope (after a very long fussy time in companionship study deciding what to teach). Turns out that her name means hope in Russia! God works in mysterious ways! There is a new hooligan, Chris (who as of today has a baptismal date) who complimented me on my floorball skills. This is a huge compliment from a 13-year-old boy. I felt pretty proud of myself. Acceptance by the hoolies! Yes! We met with sweet Liga and taught her about service and callings. She is off to the woods again so she won't be at church.

Obedience to God truly makes us happy. I've been learning that a lot lately. We met with Ieva and Olga. We took them on a church tour and they told us that their boyfriends wouldn't let them come to church (lie) and that they quit smoking 6 weeks ago (we were still meeting with them 6 weeks ago. Another lie. Sigh.) When they left they lit up on church property. Sad day to see that they haven't yet had that change of heart. Annika taught us Latvian today and there was a really special spirit when we took Oskars on the church tour. Teaching Davis the plan of salvation was so fun! He is such a smart kid, he started asking questions and we would just smile and say, "Wait a minute. We're almost there." It really is neat to see how sincere his interest is and to see him working it all out in his head. He has two brothers, Chris (8) and Martins (16), that have came to church with him the past two Sundays. They are always playing in the church parking lot (or in the church). We had our first Branch party that Rita was in charge of. It went well though we didn't have a large branch turn out (but a large hooligan turn out!). We played charades and I just about died when cute 80-something year old Ausma pretended to be a bear and was stomping around in her flowered skirt with her hands above her head.

Friday we did weekly planning and met with Marika, a member since 2002 or so. She opened up a lot and we learned a lot about the war and the occupation. It is sad how so many people got sent away and how many people died, how many families were split up. She told us how her mom thought her brother had died. He had actually gone into hiding so he wouldn't get sent to Siberia and then years and years later they met again. Latvian people have a hard time hearing the gospel in Russian because that is the language they were forced to speak and the language that banned God from their lives. It explains a lot of why so many Latvians are so grateful and so impressed that we as missionaries have learned Latvian so well and so quickly. There was a beautiful lightning storm tonight! Rita and Sister Ferrin were scared and were jumping left and right. I just laughed as we walked home.

Saturday we had a huge English class! Irina, Viktoria's friend (who is Santa's friend) took a Book of Mormon! We taught Davis about the gospel of Jesus Christ and then committed him to baptism! Sweet Ludmilla was the only one who came and helped us clean besides Rita. I took a whack at making rataouille. Not as good as in France, but I still appreciate all the summer vegetables we have here.

Well, karma hit me on Sunday. I always made fun of my mother for sticking out her tongue and making faces when she plays the organ in church. I got to play the piano in church. For someone who hasn't had a lesson since second grade this was quite nerve wracking. Many faces were made and wrong notes played. I survived though and all the missionaries were very supportive. Sister Scebinina gave a great Sunday School lesson from Acts about how everyone is important in the church. I had the opportunity to translate Relief Society for Maria. She lives in Ireland, is from Portugal, and is married to a man from Latvia. It was neat that the focus of church today was the temple and she is planning to go perform baptisms for the dead for the first time next month. Santa D. did a good job teaching about the temple especially since she hasn't been. The ladies who had been didn't delve in too much about the temple, so that was good. We had a crazy mega lesson Sunday night with the elders. Martins, Davis, Chris, Chris, Rita, Rita's friend and the elders. We taught from Mosiah 18 and now we have Martins, Davis, the older Chris with baptismal dates and the younger Chris and Rita's friend thinking about being baptized! How neat is that!

The church is true and God will have it His way.

Love,
Sister Lindstrom












The girls of Latvia. Lindstrom, Wilson, Sutterfield, Ferrin, Madara