This week has been really cool because we've been doing everything that's been in our power, and we've been seeing a lot of... different blessings. I guess sometimes we just need to remember what "success" is while we're on the mission. It's not the number of people we find to teach, it's not the number of people who are "progressing" and it's not even the number of people that we baptize. Yeah, those things would be nice, however, they're not what define a successful missionary. I remember studying, not this week but some time else, in chapter one of "Preach My Gospel" about what a successful missionary is. It's funny, that when you read it, not a single point under that section talks anything about what other people do; every single point is about you, about what you do, about how you feel the Holy Ghost and about how you follow the promptings of the Holy Ghost.
So, with that in mind, we had a really successful week. We taught very few lessons, however, we were out working every day, very hard. I felt that we were doing well in following the Holy Ghost, and we did something really impressive: we set up around sixteen lessons, and almost all of them would have been new investigators. Sadly, all of them except for two ended up not coming. That's a bit of a bummer, but Elder Gabrielsen is taking it really well. In fact, he's really excited every day to go out and find. It's really cool to see the enthusiasm that he has and how he wants to go straight at it every single day. I really like the way that he contacts: he sees someone he wants to talk to, he walks right at them and then he stands in the way. It's a little intrusive, but our message is intrusive: we've here to call people to repentance. Isn't that intrusive? Isn't that bold? I really love this kid. He's doing really well.
One of the meetings that did go through was with a guy named Petr Lefky. Elder Bown found him last transfer and they had been having a bad day, but Elder Bown was determined to get one person before they turned in to go home. It was a Saturday night, and there weren't a whole lot of people out, but they ended up talking to Petr and they got his number, but according to Elder Bown, he didn't seem too promising. Nonetheless, he invited him to church and said that he'd call him Sunday morning to remind him. Come Sunday morning, Elder Bown calls and he doesn't pick up, so they just went to the building and basically said that's that. However, a little before church starts, a guy walks in and shakes Elder Bown's hand, and Elder Bown didn't remember him for a second, but soon realized that it was Petr. Petr stayed for all three hours, loved it and actually asked for a Book of Mormon. Since then, Elder Bown's been trying to get meetings set up with him, but he's been down on himself saying that it's not worth it with him because he's an alcoholic. Elder Bown fought through that and said that it is worth it. Recently, he texted us after he didn't come to a meeting saying that he was sorry, but that he couldn't come because he was in the hospital. We told him that we could come and visit him, so he sent us the place that he was staying at in the hospital and we went and visited him yesterday. He's in the hospital for rehab. He's been there before, and the time when Elder Bown contacted him, he had been out for less than a week. We found out that he was in there because he had drunk seventeen shots of vodka and just about killed himself. The meeting was really great with him. He's just such a golden humble guy. He told us that he loves the Book of Mormon and that he's already read up through Omni. We shared things from the Book of Mormon with him about how he can conquer the problems that he has right now, but he needs to pray to get over them. Then he said, he doesn't know how to pray. So we taught him that and he actually gave a prayer at the end of the lesson. It was an amazing prayer and he did it completely correctly. Way amazing guy. At the end of the lesson, Elder Bown left a Book of Mormon with him, because his copy was at his apartment, and he couldn't leave the hospital. He also left there a restoration pamphlet and said that we'd talk about it next time. Then Petr asked about the book that we had read from at church , because he really liked it because it was really clear and straight forward. It was a Gospel Principles. Luckily I had mine with me because we had been at church earlier, so I left my copy with him. I also marked the chapter on the Word of Wisdom. The man just looked so incredibly happy to have us there. The entire time we were there, I had the feeling that he didn't have anyone coming to visit him, so I asked if he had a family or if he was alone. He kind of squirmed like it was a hard question, so I rephrased it and he gave me a weak, "Yeah I have family." I felt that something with that was wrong, so I just said, "Well, it's okay. We'll be your family." He looked really relieved when I said that. When we left, Elder Bown told me that he had a wife and a ten year old daughter, but they walked out on him, and that was probably the reason that he started drinking again (he had been sober at one point for three and a half years). Well, I guess I had said the right things, even though I didn't know why.
We're having miracles and success, but it's not always the way that we want. Sometimes we just need to step back and have the humility to know that we can't do anything, that our success shouldn't be based on results, but based on what we put into it - that's all God is taking notes on.
I love you all alot, and I hope that everything is going amazing with you all!
Much Love,
Starší Monk