Hi everyone!!
I hope you all had a great week! Not a ton to report from here this week, actually. We had a few good programs. Our best one was on Friday for sure though. It was with that family that I wrote about last week (the one who we tracted and it took a while to finally meet with but it went so well...András, Éva and Tibor). We taught them the Plan of Salvation. That program was another testimony builder to me of how the Spirit is the real teacher. We taught it to them and my Hungarian was...understandable...but not the best haha but somehow they were still able to understand and feel the Spirit. We asked them if they continued to learn these things and gained their own testimonies if it was true, if they would be baptized. They all said YES! I will keep you all updated on how that goes. We will meet with them again later this week. We were so excited and happy!
Earlier on Friday, we went to Buda for Zone Training. We had a great training on the importance of church and why it is important for everyone to go to church to gain their own testimonies. It was a great training because we were able to implement it that night with András, Éva and Tibor :). We actually offered that if they could only make it to the first hour, that was great. But Éva said she wanted to stay for the whole three hours! :) We offered to meet them and walk with them to church. She about jumped out of her seat and came over and hugged us and kissed us each on the cheek! :)
Yesterday we were able to travel to Pest for Stake Conference. It was a great Conference. There were soooo many people there. All of us missionaries had to sit in a separate room. They actually released the Stake Presidency and called a new one. It was really special because we got to hear all of their testimonies. We also got to hear from a member of the Seventy (...I don't remember his name) and then someone else (who I am also not totally sure who he was... :P). But the cool thing was...they were both BRITISH. It was so fun to hear British accents. It was also cool to hear the talks in English and then hear the translation afterwards. I was trying to see in my head how I would translate what they said (I am very glad that I didn't actually have to do it! ;)). Something that one of them said that really stuck out to me was "Real intent is the difference between eating bread/drinking water and partaking of the Sacrament." That one really made me think!
This week as a mission we were studying Charity and Love. That is one of my favorite attributes to study. I was able to re-read the talk that Elder Holland gave at this past conference, "Are We Not All Beggars?" which was my favorite from what I had heard. I love that he talks about how we need to help others. At the very end he says, "Although I may not be my brother's keeper, I am my brother's brother, and 'because I have been given much, I too must give.'" Life is hard. Everyone has trials and difficulties. As we read in Alma 7:11-12, Christ performed the Atonement, the greatest act of charity, so that he could perfectly understand every pain, trial and affliction that every single one of us will go through. Though we may not all understand each other's trials, Christ does. And we can be the tools in His hands to help those around us. We may not even know what others are going through. But as long as we are kind and loving to all and searching for opportunities to serve, we will also be serving Christ.
Sorry it is kind of a short email today. I don't really have a lot to report on. This is the last week of the transfer though so next week I will be writing on Tuesday with the transfer news!
I hope you all have a wonderful week. Thank you to everyone for your prayers and support. It really means so much.
Sok szeretettel,
Simons Nővér xx
Monday, November 17, 2014
Monday, November 10, 2014
Sziasztok!
I hope you all had a great week! We had an awesome week in Érd. Things are finally starting to feel like they are picking up. There is still a ways to go of course but it is exciting to see stuff slowly starting to happen. We had some pretty great things happen this week.
On Monday, Ilona came to Family Night again! We were SO surprised to see her!!! She brought her boyfriend again too. That was so fun to have them there. I think they really enjoyed it. She was so cute. I snuck a cookie before we started (not so sneekily) and she pointed at me and told me to repent! I laughed SO hard!!! Then she went on and told Elder Whiting the 5 steps to the gospel of Jesus Christ. She said she had been studying. She is so cute I love her so stinking much.
On Tuesday, we had a really great day. We went out streeting and stopped to talked to this old couple. I started talking to the old guy and Sister Erlandsson was talking to his wife. We chatted for a bit and I was able to give him a Book of Mormon and share one of my favorite scriptures with him. We got their phone number and hopefully can set up a time to go over and meet with them. They were so sweet. After that, we headed over to a program. That program wasn't the best but that's okay. As we were walking back, we had some time before our next program. We decided we would stop by and see this lady we met a few weeks ago and then ended up tracting into her. We had gone over a few times but the time was never good for her and she always told us to come back later. We were walking by and saw her walking out with her bike and thought "ugh seriously again!" but as we walked by we waved at her and she asked us where we were going. She asked us if we had time and if we wanted to come in and chat! We thought "...wait. seriously?!" So we went in and chatted with her and her husband. They were both so sweet! Her husband was such a nice happy old guy. Sadly, he has Alzheimer's and I think that the wife, Marika, is really lonely because they have the same conversations over and over again. It was nice to finally be able to chat with her. We talked about our families and had a good time. We are going to try and go back again some time because she said that we were welcome to come over whenever! :) Later that night, we had another program. This was with a couple who Sister E and Sister Jensen (Sister Training Leader) met while we were on splits last week. We went over and gave them each a Book of Mormon which they were excited to get. We then taught them the restoration lesson. The Spirit was so strong in the room. They seemed to accept it all well. They are such a nice, kind couple. They have strong faith already and such a great feeling in their home. We are going back tonight to see them again so that is exciting! :) Then Tuesday night, we got packages from our families that the Elders brought back from Buda. That was amazing. I literally cried :) Aaaaaaand no judgements but I am totally listening to Christmas music already!
On Friday, Sister E and I got to go to Buda for interviews with President Smith. That was fun. I always love going into Buda (I love Buda and I LOVE riding trains :)) and I love President Smith so it was great to be able to chat with him for a little bit.
The rest of the week was pretty good too. Last night was really great. We had a program with András, Éva and Tibor (new investigators). We met András while tracting a few weeks ago and got his phone number. We have tried to meet with them a few times and it never worked out. We went over on Saturday for the 3 rescheduled time and he asked if we could come back on Sunday. As we were walking back on Sunday, I am not going to lie I was not totally sure we would meet with them. But when we got there, he let us in! We met his girlfriend and her son and got to know them a little bit. We taught them about the restoration. The spirit was so strong. It was such a testimony builder to me that the spirit does all the teaching, we just provide the information. I felt like my Hungarian wasn't the best and I was probably a little spazzy, but somehow the Spirit was strong and they were able to feel it. We gave them each a Book of Mormon (well, András and Éva...we had only brought two that night). We bore our testimonies about it. I told them how i Know this Book is true. Éva responded that she knew it was true too! It was amazing. Sister E and I came home pretty pumped last night! I will keep you all updated on them!! So exciting! :)
So this week for the Christ-like attribute we studied hope. At the beginning, I was trying really hard to think of the differences between faith and hope because a lot of the things I read and studied, their explanations were very similar. What I learned was that faith and hope, though different, work completely together. In Preach My Gospel it says that hope is "optimism, enthusiasm and patient perseverance." Faith, is the reason we do something. It is what moves us forward. Hope, is what keeps us optimistic and positive. It is what helps us to keep perspective.
I hope you all have a great week. Thank you for all of your love and support and prayers! Talk to you all next week! :)
Sok szeretettel,
Simons Nővér xx
I hope you all had a great week! We had an awesome week in Érd. Things are finally starting to feel like they are picking up. There is still a ways to go of course but it is exciting to see stuff slowly starting to happen. We had some pretty great things happen this week.
On Monday, Ilona came to Family Night again! We were SO surprised to see her!!! She brought her boyfriend again too. That was so fun to have them there. I think they really enjoyed it. She was so cute. I snuck a cookie before we started (not so sneekily) and she pointed at me and told me to repent! I laughed SO hard!!! Then she went on and told Elder Whiting the 5 steps to the gospel of Jesus Christ. She said she had been studying. She is so cute I love her so stinking much.
On Tuesday, we had a really great day. We went out streeting and stopped to talked to this old couple. I started talking to the old guy and Sister Erlandsson was talking to his wife. We chatted for a bit and I was able to give him a Book of Mormon and share one of my favorite scriptures with him. We got their phone number and hopefully can set up a time to go over and meet with them. They were so sweet. After that, we headed over to a program. That program wasn't the best but that's okay. As we were walking back, we had some time before our next program. We decided we would stop by and see this lady we met a few weeks ago and then ended up tracting into her. We had gone over a few times but the time was never good for her and she always told us to come back later. We were walking by and saw her walking out with her bike and thought "ugh seriously again!" but as we walked by we waved at her and she asked us where we were going. She asked us if we had time and if we wanted to come in and chat! We thought "...wait. seriously?!" So we went in and chatted with her and her husband. They were both so sweet! Her husband was such a nice happy old guy. Sadly, he has Alzheimer's and I think that the wife, Marika, is really lonely because they have the same conversations over and over again. It was nice to finally be able to chat with her. We talked about our families and had a good time. We are going to try and go back again some time because she said that we were welcome to come over whenever! :) Later that night, we had another program. This was with a couple who Sister E and Sister Jensen (Sister Training Leader) met while we were on splits last week. We went over and gave them each a Book of Mormon which they were excited to get. We then taught them the restoration lesson. The Spirit was so strong in the room. They seemed to accept it all well. They are such a nice, kind couple. They have strong faith already and such a great feeling in their home. We are going back tonight to see them again so that is exciting! :) Then Tuesday night, we got packages from our families that the Elders brought back from Buda. That was amazing. I literally cried :) Aaaaaaand no judgements but I am totally listening to Christmas music already!
On Friday, Sister E and I got to go to Buda for interviews with President Smith. That was fun. I always love going into Buda (I love Buda and I LOVE riding trains :)) and I love President Smith so it was great to be able to chat with him for a little bit.
The rest of the week was pretty good too. Last night was really great. We had a program with András, Éva and Tibor (new investigators). We met András while tracting a few weeks ago and got his phone number. We have tried to meet with them a few times and it never worked out. We went over on Saturday for the 3 rescheduled time and he asked if we could come back on Sunday. As we were walking back on Sunday, I am not going to lie I was not totally sure we would meet with them. But when we got there, he let us in! We met his girlfriend and her son and got to know them a little bit. We taught them about the restoration. The spirit was so strong. It was such a testimony builder to me that the spirit does all the teaching, we just provide the information. I felt like my Hungarian wasn't the best and I was probably a little spazzy, but somehow the Spirit was strong and they were able to feel it. We gave them each a Book of Mormon (well, András and Éva...we had only brought two that night). We bore our testimonies about it. I told them how i Know this Book is true. Éva responded that she knew it was true too! It was amazing. Sister E and I came home pretty pumped last night! I will keep you all updated on them!! So exciting! :)
So this week for the Christ-like attribute we studied hope. At the beginning, I was trying really hard to think of the differences between faith and hope because a lot of the things I read and studied, their explanations were very similar. What I learned was that faith and hope, though different, work completely together. In Preach My Gospel it says that hope is "optimism, enthusiasm and patient perseverance." Faith, is the reason we do something. It is what moves us forward. Hope, is what keeps us optimistic and positive. It is what helps us to keep perspective.
I hope you all have a great week. Thank you for all of your love and support and prayers! Talk to you all next week! :)
Sok szeretettel,
Simons Nővér xx
Tuesday, November 4, 2014
Faith (hit)
Sziasztok!!
I hope you all had a great week and a great Halloween! :) Things are good here in Érd. Last week we had the Sister Training Leaders come for a day and that was fun. The Sister Training Leaders right now are Sister Jensen and Sister Daniels. They are such good missionaries. I hope I can be half as good as they are when I get to that point in my mission! :) (They go home in January!) I had the chance to go tracting for a few hours on Tuesday night with Sister Daniels. It was great. We were able to talk to a few people and give away a Book of Mormon. I then got to go streeting on Wednesday for a bit with Sister Jensen. It was really cool to be able to spend a little time learning from each of them.
On Saturday there was another Holiday - Day of the Dead. On that day, everyone goes to the cemeteries to visit the graves of their loved ones. I think it is so cool that they have a day that is dedicated to the memories of their loved ones who have already passed on.
On Sunday night, we had the opportunity to go to Budapest again for another baptism! A little girl in our branch got baptized. It was so great! There were so many people there. They had great talks and a BEAUTIFUL musical number. (Made me really grateful that they hadn't asked us missionaries to do another Musical Number. It wouldn't have been half as good as this one was ;)).
This week, as a mission we studied the Christ-Like Attribute Faith. I wish I had remembered my study journal to tell you all what I learned. But...I forgot it at home haha so I'll just tell you a few things that I remember about it. One thing that really stuck out to me was (not worded exactly like this) faith is kindled by hearing the testimony of those who have faith. I thought that was so interesting! I reread that a couple of times. As I read it, I thought about how the things that we are teaching people are sometimes completely new and foreign to them. But as we teach it to them, they can start to develop their own faith. When we bear our testimonies, that is when the Holy Ghost can really bear witness to them, allowing them to establish and strengthen their own faith. I could go on and on about what I learned but that was one of the things that stuck out to me the most! I also love that faith is a principle of action. It takes effort on our part to strengthen our own faith. We can just have faith once and then leave it to let it grow itself. It's like we read in Alma 32 about the seed. You have to strengthen it and nourish it for it to grow. It is also a principle of action on the sense that, if it is Heavenly Father's will, we can do anything according to our faith. If you haven't read about faith in True to the Faith, I would recommend it! It is really cool! :) I have also been attempting to read Jesus the Christ (wow does that man use big words!!). It is really interesting in there too to read examples of faith in Christ's life too.
I hope you all have a great week. I am getting way too into the Christmas spirit too early haha they don't really celebrate Halloween here and the Christmas stuff is out already. So I am feeling really Christmassy haha but I always start too early on the Christmas music so I guess that's nothing too new ;)
Thanks to all of you who email me! It really means so much to hear from family and friends. I love hearing how you are all doing! :)
Sok szeretettel,
Simons Nővér xx
I hope you all had a great week and a great Halloween! :) Things are good here in Érd. Last week we had the Sister Training Leaders come for a day and that was fun. The Sister Training Leaders right now are Sister Jensen and Sister Daniels. They are such good missionaries. I hope I can be half as good as they are when I get to that point in my mission! :) (They go home in January!) I had the chance to go tracting for a few hours on Tuesday night with Sister Daniels. It was great. We were able to talk to a few people and give away a Book of Mormon. I then got to go streeting on Wednesday for a bit with Sister Jensen. It was really cool to be able to spend a little time learning from each of them.
On Saturday there was another Holiday - Day of the Dead. On that day, everyone goes to the cemeteries to visit the graves of their loved ones. I think it is so cool that they have a day that is dedicated to the memories of their loved ones who have already passed on.
On Sunday night, we had the opportunity to go to Budapest again for another baptism! A little girl in our branch got baptized. It was so great! There were so many people there. They had great talks and a BEAUTIFUL musical number. (Made me really grateful that they hadn't asked us missionaries to do another Musical Number. It wouldn't have been half as good as this one was ;)).
This week, as a mission we studied the Christ-Like Attribute Faith. I wish I had remembered my study journal to tell you all what I learned. But...I forgot it at home haha so I'll just tell you a few things that I remember about it. One thing that really stuck out to me was (not worded exactly like this) faith is kindled by hearing the testimony of those who have faith. I thought that was so interesting! I reread that a couple of times. As I read it, I thought about how the things that we are teaching people are sometimes completely new and foreign to them. But as we teach it to them, they can start to develop their own faith. When we bear our testimonies, that is when the Holy Ghost can really bear witness to them, allowing them to establish and strengthen their own faith. I could go on and on about what I learned but that was one of the things that stuck out to me the most! I also love that faith is a principle of action. It takes effort on our part to strengthen our own faith. We can just have faith once and then leave it to let it grow itself. It's like we read in Alma 32 about the seed. You have to strengthen it and nourish it for it to grow. It is also a principle of action on the sense that, if it is Heavenly Father's will, we can do anything according to our faith. If you haven't read about faith in True to the Faith, I would recommend it! It is really cool! :) I have also been attempting to read Jesus the Christ (wow does that man use big words!!). It is really interesting in there too to read examples of faith in Christ's life too.
I hope you all have a great week. I am getting way too into the Christmas spirit too early haha they don't really celebrate Halloween here and the Christmas stuff is out already. So I am feeling really Christmassy haha but I always start too early on the Christmas music so I guess that's nothing too new ;)
Thanks to all of you who email me! It really means so much to hear from family and friends. I love hearing how you are all doing! :)
Sok szeretettel,
Simons Nővér xx
Tuesday, October 28, 2014
"Csokit vagy csalunk!"
Sziasztok!
I hope you all had a great week! This week was definitely interesting here in Érd. It was a busy week. We had about 22 finding hours with not much to show for it, unfortunately. But, nonetheless we worked really hard and we are hoping that we will be able to meet with a few more people this coming week! :)
On Wednesday, we decided to spend some time going and looking up some inactive members. We had quite the adventure. After a few hours and no success, we decided to try one more house before English class. We made it up there and realized the gate didn't have a doorbell. So, after I snooped around the gate a little looking for a doorbell, a man came out! We walked over and said we were looking for Lászlo. He was Lászlo! It was so cool! We had no way of getting ahold of him and he just happened to come out at the right time (although he probably saw me awkwardly looking around his gate ;)). We talked to him for a little bit and gave him a Liahona. He has been inactive for over 10 years now. I don't know if he will want to come back any time soon but it felt great that we were able to find him and talk to him a little bit!
On Thursday, it was a holiday. Which was hard because no one was out and no one really wanted to talk to us. It was so weird to see the streets basically empty! It was also pretty cold and rainy so everyone we did try and talk to, did not really want to talk to us.
On Friday we had a really interesting day! We had planned to go over to Eszter's house (an inactive member) to help her clean her house a bit (she's pretty sick and has a hard tiem moving). We went to the branch house and changed into some jeans before we ran over to her apartment. (That was the first time in 5 months that I had worn jeans and I forgot how great they are :) and they fit still! ;)) Anyways we ran over there and she had prepared us a nice lunch. So we ate and taught her the Restoration again. Then, we asked her where she wanted us to start with cleaning! She then told us she wanted us to do the windows so it was too cold today to clean. We felt kind of dumb because we basically just went and did a program in jeans haha! Oh well we ran straight back to the branch house and changed back into our proselyting clothes. After that, we did a little streeting before we headed over to the bus stop. We ended up waiting for 30 minutes for the bus!! (We looked at the wrong day and didn't consider that it was the "holiday" hours even though it wasn't a holiday anymore. So we made it out there and we tracted for a few hours. It was FREEZING!!!! We met a few cool people though! But no let ins. One funny thing that happened was we rang this one csengő and this old guy came out...in a SPEEDO. That is a normal thing to happen in summer. But dude! Its freezing outside!! haha it took a lot not to laugh when i saw him lol After we tracted for a few hours, we had dinner at a member's house. It was so nice!! They are such a cute family. There son is the one who got baptized last week. It was so nice to be in a family home. The dad is the Ward Mission Leader so we meet with him every week. But it was nice to be able to sit down and talk with them all and just get to know them.
On Sunday, Eszter came to church!! She hadn't been to church in 12 years! It was so exciting to have her there. We also had a surprise visitor at church. There is this lady here in Érd that we have seen a few times on the street that...has conversations with herself. A lot. Anyways, we were standing in the entry way before church greeting people as they came in and all of a sudden, she walked in! Sister E and I just looked at each other confused! But, we welcomed her in and she came and sat in on Sacrament meeting! It was interesting at first but by the time the meeting was over and she left, her countenance had changed and she was so sweet and nice. I'm not totally sure what/if anything will come of that. But I think it was really good for her and it was a good environment for her to be in.
This week we are starting a mission wide study of Christ-like attributes. I am so excited. We started on faith today and I already feel like I learned a ton about faith. I will let you all know next week what else I learn! :)
I hope you all have a great week! I am stealing the vocab from the AP's this week to share with you all! :)
"trick or treat"- "csokit vagy csalunk"
vámpír- vampire
csontváz- skeleton
Sok szeretettel,
Simons Nővér xx
I hope you all had a great week! This week was definitely interesting here in Érd. It was a busy week. We had about 22 finding hours with not much to show for it, unfortunately. But, nonetheless we worked really hard and we are hoping that we will be able to meet with a few more people this coming week! :)
On Wednesday, we decided to spend some time going and looking up some inactive members. We had quite the adventure. After a few hours and no success, we decided to try one more house before English class. We made it up there and realized the gate didn't have a doorbell. So, after I snooped around the gate a little looking for a doorbell, a man came out! We walked over and said we were looking for Lászlo. He was Lászlo! It was so cool! We had no way of getting ahold of him and he just happened to come out at the right time (although he probably saw me awkwardly looking around his gate ;)). We talked to him for a little bit and gave him a Liahona. He has been inactive for over 10 years now. I don't know if he will want to come back any time soon but it felt great that we were able to find him and talk to him a little bit!
On Thursday, it was a holiday. Which was hard because no one was out and no one really wanted to talk to us. It was so weird to see the streets basically empty! It was also pretty cold and rainy so everyone we did try and talk to, did not really want to talk to us.
On Friday we had a really interesting day! We had planned to go over to Eszter's house (an inactive member) to help her clean her house a bit (she's pretty sick and has a hard tiem moving). We went to the branch house and changed into some jeans before we ran over to her apartment. (That was the first time in 5 months that I had worn jeans and I forgot how great they are :) and they fit still! ;)) Anyways we ran over there and she had prepared us a nice lunch. So we ate and taught her the Restoration again. Then, we asked her where she wanted us to start with cleaning! She then told us she wanted us to do the windows so it was too cold today to clean. We felt kind of dumb because we basically just went and did a program in jeans haha! Oh well we ran straight back to the branch house and changed back into our proselyting clothes. After that, we did a little streeting before we headed over to the bus stop. We ended up waiting for 30 minutes for the bus!! (We looked at the wrong day and didn't consider that it was the "holiday" hours even though it wasn't a holiday anymore. So we made it out there and we tracted for a few hours. It was FREEZING!!!! We met a few cool people though! But no let ins. One funny thing that happened was we rang this one csengő and this old guy came out...in a SPEEDO. That is a normal thing to happen in summer. But dude! Its freezing outside!! haha it took a lot not to laugh when i saw him lol After we tracted for a few hours, we had dinner at a member's house. It was so nice!! They are such a cute family. There son is the one who got baptized last week. It was so nice to be in a family home. The dad is the Ward Mission Leader so we meet with him every week. But it was nice to be able to sit down and talk with them all and just get to know them.
On Sunday, Eszter came to church!! She hadn't been to church in 12 years! It was so exciting to have her there. We also had a surprise visitor at church. There is this lady here in Érd that we have seen a few times on the street that...has conversations with herself. A lot. Anyways, we were standing in the entry way before church greeting people as they came in and all of a sudden, she walked in! Sister E and I just looked at each other confused! But, we welcomed her in and she came and sat in on Sacrament meeting! It was interesting at first but by the time the meeting was over and she left, her countenance had changed and she was so sweet and nice. I'm not totally sure what/if anything will come of that. But I think it was really good for her and it was a good environment for her to be in.
This week we are starting a mission wide study of Christ-like attributes. I am so excited. We started on faith today and I already feel like I learned a ton about faith. I will let you all know next week what else I learn! :)
I hope you all have a great week! I am stealing the vocab from the AP's this week to share with you all! :)
"trick or treat"- "csokit vagy csalunk"
vámpír- vampire
csontváz- skeleton
Sok szeretettel,
Simons Nővér xx
Tuesday, October 21, 2014
October 20, 2014
Sziasztok mindenki!
I hope you all had a wonderful week! Things are good here. The weather is pretty weird. It is pretty cold in the morning but by the afternoon it is really warm again.
I don't have a ton to report this week to be perfectly honest. We did have a program with Ilona this morning that was great! We talked to her about the Gospel of Jesus Christ (the five "steps"...faith, repentance, baptism, the gift of the Holy Ghost and enduring to the end). She told us how much she loves meeting with us. We felt the spirit so strong in that program. Oh I just love her so much she is so stinking cute!
I have always known that it is important to go to church. But this week I felt like I relearned how important it is. In this branch, it is technically 2 hour long church. But occasionally, there is a third hour of Sunday school. We were struggling with some of our weekly numbers and I am sad to say I hoped that there wouldn't be the third hour yesterday (because it usually started late and got out really late) so we could go out and work more. However, there was the third hour! (of course ;)). In the class though, although I didn't understand every word, I was able to follow along with the whole lesson and I really learned a lot. And, we got out at the scheduled time we planned. And then we went to see a less active member and were able to meet with her and were able to work for a few hours and get the hours that we need. Basically, I could see the blessings that we received from going to all of our meetings! And it was a really great lesson!
We had a baptism this week! This 8 year old boy named Nímrod got baptized! It was so special. His dad baptized him and when he came out of the water he just gasped and smiled and was so excited. It was SO cute!! Us missionaries did a special musical number. We sang "I Feel My Saviors Love"...accapella. It wasnt the best but I think it brought the Spirit :) It was fun we combined English and Hungarian and I think Nímrod loved it so thats all that counts! :)
Hungarian is coming along! I have also gained a testimony of legit studies every morning :) The mornings where I do a rendes language study, I am able to understand and speak a lot more that day. The days where I don't put in as much effort as I should, I struggle a little more. I love this language though! I do get a little bummed when I try and speak Spanish and only Hungarian comes out. But I know that this is the language that the Lord needs me to speak right now! When I get home with a little effort I think I can get my Spanish back too! :) Hungarian is hard, but its so much fun. It is so exciting when you are able to understand more and more and speak more and more. All thanks to the Lord though. I know that without his help there is no way I would be speaking this much of the language after just 7 months!
Which reminds me, yesterday I hit 7 months! Oh my gosh I cannot believe how fast time goes!! I know I say that pretty much every week but its so true.
Things are great! I love being a missionary. I love being able to share this message with the people here. I love seeing how it blesses their lives. I love being able to watch them develop their own testimonies. It's all true! :)
I hope you all have a wonderful week! Thank you for all of your prayers and support. It is sincerely appreciated.
Sok szeretettel,
Simons Nővér xx
I hope you all had a wonderful week! Things are good here. The weather is pretty weird. It is pretty cold in the morning but by the afternoon it is really warm again.
I don't have a ton to report this week to be perfectly honest. We did have a program with Ilona this morning that was great! We talked to her about the Gospel of Jesus Christ (the five "steps"...faith, repentance, baptism, the gift of the Holy Ghost and enduring to the end). She told us how much she loves meeting with us. We felt the spirit so strong in that program. Oh I just love her so much she is so stinking cute!
I have always known that it is important to go to church. But this week I felt like I relearned how important it is. In this branch, it is technically 2 hour long church. But occasionally, there is a third hour of Sunday school. We were struggling with some of our weekly numbers and I am sad to say I hoped that there wouldn't be the third hour yesterday (because it usually started late and got out really late) so we could go out and work more. However, there was the third hour! (of course ;)). In the class though, although I didn't understand every word, I was able to follow along with the whole lesson and I really learned a lot. And, we got out at the scheduled time we planned. And then we went to see a less active member and were able to meet with her and were able to work for a few hours and get the hours that we need. Basically, I could see the blessings that we received from going to all of our meetings! And it was a really great lesson!
We had a baptism this week! This 8 year old boy named Nímrod got baptized! It was so special. His dad baptized him and when he came out of the water he just gasped and smiled and was so excited. It was SO cute!! Us missionaries did a special musical number. We sang "I Feel My Saviors Love"...accapella. It wasnt the best but I think it brought the Spirit :) It was fun we combined English and Hungarian and I think Nímrod loved it so thats all that counts! :)
Hungarian is coming along! I have also gained a testimony of legit studies every morning :) The mornings where I do a rendes language study, I am able to understand and speak a lot more that day. The days where I don't put in as much effort as I should, I struggle a little more. I love this language though! I do get a little bummed when I try and speak Spanish and only Hungarian comes out. But I know that this is the language that the Lord needs me to speak right now! When I get home with a little effort I think I can get my Spanish back too! :) Hungarian is hard, but its so much fun. It is so exciting when you are able to understand more and more and speak more and more. All thanks to the Lord though. I know that without his help there is no way I would be speaking this much of the language after just 7 months!
Which reminds me, yesterday I hit 7 months! Oh my gosh I cannot believe how fast time goes!! I know I say that pretty much every week but its so true.
Things are great! I love being a missionary. I love being able to share this message with the people here. I love seeing how it blesses their lives. I love being able to watch them develop their own testimonies. It's all true! :)
I hope you all have a wonderful week! Thank you for all of your prayers and support. It is sincerely appreciated.
Sok szeretettel,
Simons Nővér xx
Tuesday, October 14, 2014
October 13, 2014
Hi Everyone!!
Hope you all had a great week! We had a good week here in Érd. First, we had a program with Ilona that went so well. We brought Aniko with us and they hit it off right away! We taught her about the Plan of Salvation. She is so sweet. She loved hearing about how this gospel really helped Aniko. Aniko was baptized about two years ago and has such a strong testimony. Elder Gonzales (Ilona's grandson who was in the MTC with me) called us the next day and said that he had talked to her on the phone. He told us that she LOVES meeting with us. He said that she told him all about the "Mormon Convention" that she went to with the girls! (By Mormon Convention, she meant General Conference ;)). I am so excited. I hope that she continues to progress. She is very interested in everything that we teach and does read from the Book of Mormon! We'll see! I'll keep you all updated with how it goes! :)
This week we went over to dinner at the Palmer family's house. They are an American family that just moved into the Branch! The mom is Hungarian and the dad is American. It was so nice of them to have us all over. It was really interesting because I could remember all the times when my family would have the missionaries over. And this time, I was one of the missionaries! I could see myself sitting where the 15 year old daughter was sitting. We could feel such a good spirit in their home. They will be such a great strength to this branch.
I learned a really good lesson this week. Sister Erlandsson and I really wanted to get Standard of Excellence this week. Although a worthy goal, I think that I focused a little to much on just getting standard. We came pretty close but yesterday I was a little discouraged because we weren't going get it. We went out tracting for a few hours yesterday and had a few interesting conversations at doors but most people were just not interested. We got to the last door and I was still feeling a little discouraged. A néni came out and we started trying to talk to her but her dogs were barking too loudly...so she told us to come in! I was so surprised. But we went in and started asking her some of the survey questions. She seemed really sad but was really nice talking to us. We asked her if she could ask God one question, what it would be. She thought for a minute and as she started talking, she started to cry. She said she had had a baby that died and started telling us about it. It was an interesting experience for me as I listened to her, I could feel the love that the Savior had for her. I had just me this néni and yet I just felt so much love and compassion for her. I just wanted to hug her and tell her how much her Heavenly Father loves her and teach her everything right then. At that moment, I remembered the real reason I am here. Of course I would love to get Standard again :) but, I am here to help bring others unto Christ and to help them come to know their Heavenly Father and their Savior. We gave her a Book of Mormon and told her we had a message that could bring her peace and happiness. She was so excited to receive a Book of Mormon and we set up to go back the coming week!
Hungarian words for the week :)
kém - spy
láthatatlan - invisible
szemöldök - eyebrow
Also, I discovered a song on my iPod (thanks to Mckell #shoutout :)) that I had never heard before. It's called, "Come See the Light" by Freddie Ashby. Everyone should go listen to it!! I have had it on repeat for like a week now haha it is so good!
Hope you all have a great week! :)
Sok szeretettel,
Simons Nővér xx
Hope you all had a great week! We had a good week here in Érd. First, we had a program with Ilona that went so well. We brought Aniko with us and they hit it off right away! We taught her about the Plan of Salvation. She is so sweet. She loved hearing about how this gospel really helped Aniko. Aniko was baptized about two years ago and has such a strong testimony. Elder Gonzales (Ilona's grandson who was in the MTC with me) called us the next day and said that he had talked to her on the phone. He told us that she LOVES meeting with us. He said that she told him all about the "Mormon Convention" that she went to with the girls! (By Mormon Convention, she meant General Conference ;)). I am so excited. I hope that she continues to progress. She is very interested in everything that we teach and does read from the Book of Mormon! We'll see! I'll keep you all updated with how it goes! :)
This week we went over to dinner at the Palmer family's house. They are an American family that just moved into the Branch! The mom is Hungarian and the dad is American. It was so nice of them to have us all over. It was really interesting because I could remember all the times when my family would have the missionaries over. And this time, I was one of the missionaries! I could see myself sitting where the 15 year old daughter was sitting. We could feel such a good spirit in their home. They will be such a great strength to this branch.
I learned a really good lesson this week. Sister Erlandsson and I really wanted to get Standard of Excellence this week. Although a worthy goal, I think that I focused a little to much on just getting standard. We came pretty close but yesterday I was a little discouraged because we weren't going get it. We went out tracting for a few hours yesterday and had a few interesting conversations at doors but most people were just not interested. We got to the last door and I was still feeling a little discouraged. A néni came out and we started trying to talk to her but her dogs were barking too loudly...so she told us to come in! I was so surprised. But we went in and started asking her some of the survey questions. She seemed really sad but was really nice talking to us. We asked her if she could ask God one question, what it would be. She thought for a minute and as she started talking, she started to cry. She said she had had a baby that died and started telling us about it. It was an interesting experience for me as I listened to her, I could feel the love that the Savior had for her. I had just me this néni and yet I just felt so much love and compassion for her. I just wanted to hug her and tell her how much her Heavenly Father loves her and teach her everything right then. At that moment, I remembered the real reason I am here. Of course I would love to get Standard again :) but, I am here to help bring others unto Christ and to help them come to know their Heavenly Father and their Savior. We gave her a Book of Mormon and told her we had a message that could bring her peace and happiness. She was so excited to receive a Book of Mormon and we set up to go back the coming week!
Hungarian words for the week :)
kém - spy
láthatatlan - invisible
szemöldök - eyebrow
Also, I discovered a song on my iPod (thanks to Mckell #shoutout :)) that I had never heard before. It's called, "Come See the Light" by Freddie Ashby. Everyone should go listen to it!! I have had it on repeat for like a week now haha it is so good!
Hope you all have a great week! :)
Sok szeretettel,
Simons Nővér xx
Monday, October 6, 2014
Általános Konferencia :)
Sziasztok mindenki!!
I hope you all had a great week!
We had a good week here in Érd. We had Zone Conference on Wednesday which was so fun. We got to go to Buda for a few hours and receive some trainings and guidance on how we can improve as missionaries. We learned how to strive to be "Master Teachers." They focused a lot on loving the people here. Because we aren't here just to get numbers and baptize for the sake of baptizing. We are here to help others come unto Christ. We are here to help and love these people!
We also had General Conference this week! Woohoo! It was so good. We got to watch all of it except for Sunday Afternoon session and the Women's Meeting and Saturday Morning we watched in Hungarian so I didn't honestly understand a lot of what was going on. But I still had some really great experiences during the Hungarian sessions. As we were waiting for the Women's conference, I was sitting out in the hall. All of a sudden I hear someone come in and I look up...and it was ILONA!!! AH I was so excited to see her come in!!!! I got up to go greet her and then a man came in. She said it was her boyfriend and asked if it was okay if she had brought him. We said "of course!!!" So ILONA CAME! And she brought her boyfriend! OH my gosh it was so great. They stayed for the whole Women's conference and I think she really liked it. We are meeting with her this week with one of the branch members so we can see what she really thought of it.
Right after, we watched the Saturday Morning session live in Hungarian. I was a little bummed I didn't get to watch it in English but I learned a lesson pretty quickly. The Hungarian connection started having some difficulties. After a few minutes, they ended up putting it up in English. Elder Whiting started translating for a little bit (and did a great job!) but we could tell how difficult it was and how quickly he had to do it. I just felt so guilty. I couldn't even focus on what was being said, to be honest. I just felt so bad that I couldn't help Elder Whiting translate. I felt so bad that the people of the branch couldn't understand anything that was being said. I just felt so awful. I remember saying a prayer and just asking Heavenly Father to let the Hungarian one work instead. Sure enough, I few minutes later the English connection started cutting out. They went back and tried the Hungarian connection again and it worked! And not only that, it had no problems for the rest of the conference. The second that it came back on in Hungarian, I felt the Spirit again. I was so grateful that the people in the branch could hear and understand the words that the people were saying. My testimony of prayer grew so much that night! :)
We did have the opportunity to watch the next two sessions in English the next day which was a blessing. I loved Elder Holland's talk about loving and serving those around you. I felt like he had written that talk for me. It was interesting because as I was listening, I wrote down a question in my journal of how i can better help people? At the time, I specifically wanted to know how I could help people when I get home from my mission. But the answer I received a few minutes later answered that question and how I can better help people now. Just a few minutes after I had written down the question Elder Holland said something like, "God knows how you can help. He will guide you." Things would be so much better in this world if we were all just a little kinder and loving to the people around us. We should all be striving to help each other and to lift each others burdens. Another thing I loved about conference was how two talks (at least that I saw) were given in the person's native language. How cool was that?!?!?!?!?! It was interesting because the first one was in Chinese so that had been translated into English and then into Hungarian. I just thought that was so cool. It shows how world wide our church is! I hope they do that more in the future!!
Anyways those are my few insights from this past week! I hope you all had a great conference weekend. To those of you who are not members of the church, I would encourage you to go and listen to some of these talks that were given this weekend! They are so wonderful. The people who give them are really called of God. I know that Thomas S. Monson is a true prophet of God today and that through him, Christ guides and directs this church.
I thought it would be fun to start sending home a few fun words that I learn each week!
varázspálca - magic wand
kaloz - pirate
kihallgatni - to eavesdrop
Általános Konferencia - General Conference
Love you all! Hope you all have a great week! :)
Sok szeretettel,
Simons Nővér xx
I hope you all had a great week!
We had a good week here in Érd. We had Zone Conference on Wednesday which was so fun. We got to go to Buda for a few hours and receive some trainings and guidance on how we can improve as missionaries. We learned how to strive to be "Master Teachers." They focused a lot on loving the people here. Because we aren't here just to get numbers and baptize for the sake of baptizing. We are here to help others come unto Christ. We are here to help and love these people!
We also had General Conference this week! Woohoo! It was so good. We got to watch all of it except for Sunday Afternoon session and the Women's Meeting and Saturday Morning we watched in Hungarian so I didn't honestly understand a lot of what was going on. But I still had some really great experiences during the Hungarian sessions. As we were waiting for the Women's conference, I was sitting out in the hall. All of a sudden I hear someone come in and I look up...and it was ILONA!!! AH I was so excited to see her come in!!!! I got up to go greet her and then a man came in. She said it was her boyfriend and asked if it was okay if she had brought him. We said "of course!!!" So ILONA CAME! And she brought her boyfriend! OH my gosh it was so great. They stayed for the whole Women's conference and I think she really liked it. We are meeting with her this week with one of the branch members so we can see what she really thought of it.
Right after, we watched the Saturday Morning session live in Hungarian. I was a little bummed I didn't get to watch it in English but I learned a lesson pretty quickly. The Hungarian connection started having some difficulties. After a few minutes, they ended up putting it up in English. Elder Whiting started translating for a little bit (and did a great job!) but we could tell how difficult it was and how quickly he had to do it. I just felt so guilty. I couldn't even focus on what was being said, to be honest. I just felt so bad that I couldn't help Elder Whiting translate. I felt so bad that the people of the branch couldn't understand anything that was being said. I just felt so awful. I remember saying a prayer and just asking Heavenly Father to let the Hungarian one work instead. Sure enough, I few minutes later the English connection started cutting out. They went back and tried the Hungarian connection again and it worked! And not only that, it had no problems for the rest of the conference. The second that it came back on in Hungarian, I felt the Spirit again. I was so grateful that the people in the branch could hear and understand the words that the people were saying. My testimony of prayer grew so much that night! :)
We did have the opportunity to watch the next two sessions in English the next day which was a blessing. I loved Elder Holland's talk about loving and serving those around you. I felt like he had written that talk for me. It was interesting because as I was listening, I wrote down a question in my journal of how i can better help people? At the time, I specifically wanted to know how I could help people when I get home from my mission. But the answer I received a few minutes later answered that question and how I can better help people now. Just a few minutes after I had written down the question Elder Holland said something like, "God knows how you can help. He will guide you." Things would be so much better in this world if we were all just a little kinder and loving to the people around us. We should all be striving to help each other and to lift each others burdens. Another thing I loved about conference was how two talks (at least that I saw) were given in the person's native language. How cool was that?!?!?!?!?! It was interesting because the first one was in Chinese so that had been translated into English and then into Hungarian. I just thought that was so cool. It shows how world wide our church is! I hope they do that more in the future!!
Anyways those are my few insights from this past week! I hope you all had a great conference weekend. To those of you who are not members of the church, I would encourage you to go and listen to some of these talks that were given this weekend! They are so wonderful. The people who give them are really called of God. I know that Thomas S. Monson is a true prophet of God today and that through him, Christ guides and directs this church.
I thought it would be fun to start sending home a few fun words that I learn each week!
varázspálca - magic wand
kaloz - pirate
kihallgatni - to eavesdrop
Általános Konferencia - General Conference
Love you all! Hope you all have a great week! :)
Sok szeretettel,
Simons Nővér xx
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