Monday, October 26, 2015

Happy Halloween!

It was a very busy week last week, we had a lot of stuff going on. On Wednesday we had Zone Training which went really well, and then we went on splits with the Buda Elders, I was with Elder Lee (old companion from Kaposvár), so that was a lot of fun. We were able to find a cool new investigator tracting too, an older man, before I even finished saying my name he told us to come in. "I don't know who you are or what you want but I'm sure I'll find out." When we told him we were missionaries he said he was athiest, but was open to the idea that that could change. The hardest thing was trying to stay focused, he had so many questions. I kept having to use the we'll talk about that later card. But we'll head back tomorrow to continue.

Some other fun tracting things. A dog that was at least 200 pounds. He could have eaten Splash. I think it was half wolf and half elephant. We also got let in by a nice lady soon after that - blessings for not being scared away. We also had a young guy open the door in a robe (not bathrobe, think old Christian monk). We interrupted a feast to the Celtic gods. But we got his number and he said we can come back.

We also got to do some service chopping wood for one of the other Elder's investigators. That was a nice little workout.

We had a ward halloween party on Saturday. Halloween is not Hungarian, but they are picking it up, especially in the church because all the missioanries love it. And we had it a week early because Buda is having one next week. That was fun, we had a good show up and some investigators showed up. We also got to take part in the pumpkin carving contest.

That's about it, life is great. I've been thinking a lot about how God helps us in this work. It's interesting, because as he directs us it's not neccesarily just to spread the gospel. It's about building us. God is perfectly capaple of spreading the gospel (see Mosiah 27 for details), but he is helping us to become the best we can. And while we're at it we get the blessing of being able to help others. That's really what the whole church is about.

Thanks for the letters! And once again have a wonderful week!
Love
Parkinson Elder

Monday, October 19, 2015

Tracting and Stuff

So I feel like my subjest line is really lame because both my siblings have awesome identical Nephi quote's in theirs. Anyone else notice that? It'll have to do.

This was busy but good. I guess those two are usually related. On Wednesday we got to run over to the other side of the river for Mission Leadership Conference, it was my first time at one of those so that was pretty cool. We also went on splits with the AP's right after that, so I had an oppourtunity to be back in Buda for a day. A lot of fun and I learned a lot as well. We now need to plan out Zone Training for next week, this will be the first time I've taught one of those. We have a really sweet Zone though, I have 3 old companions here (Elders Craig, Martineau, and Lee), which is half of my old companions that are still out here.

This week went really well, we ended up with more programs then we expected, mostly from some good success tracting. One interesting one last night, two Jehovah's Witnesses (they were still very open though) who had been drinking (not too much, but a little) and their athiest communist roommate. We ended up giving the 2 a Book of Mormon and they said we can come back, the third is not interested and moving soon anyway.

We also got a suprise new baptism date.He has been meeting with the missionaries for a while and we actually both knew him from Buda, but he called us up and we met, basically we asked him why he hasn't been baptized, he didn't feel ready, we talked about it and he said the spirit struck him and that he wants to get baptized as soon as possible. So we set a date for November 7th, but he didn't come to church so we'll see. That was a really cool program though. Whenever an investigator tells you the spirit just told them to get baptized it's a good day.

We also went and tried to meet all of our neighbors (advice for President Szabadkai), so we went and knocked on all their doors and introduced ourselves and made some no bake cookies. It was really wierd for both of us knocking on doors and trying to be normal people. I'm definetly going to be an awkward RM when I get back. It went pretty good, most of the people didn't really say a lot, but one couple might have us over for dinner at some point.

Have a great week! Enjoy daylight savings!
Parkinson Elder

Monday, October 12, 2015

Big City Life

So I'm back in Budapest, my area is the south half of Pest, but we get the main part of the city as well, so our area has about a million people. Which is about 15 times bigger then Eger. I like it a lot, I enjoy big city life, all of the people on the streets, having more then just concrete Russian buildings to tract. Although I'll be honest, I've come to love those concrete Russian 10 stories. It's super cool having a ward here too, I had my fisrt mission correlation meeting in 3 months, and we had a lot of people in church, with the sacrament being passed by all young men. And we have a ton of little kids in this ward to, it was so loud in sacrament meeting, I love it.
We also got to see the last session of general conference, they played it at church for the 2nd and third hours. All the talks were really good, I feel bad for the guy that had to translate ponderizing. That was a really good talk, and I also liked Elder Bednars. It's wierd thinking how many apostles have died during my life time. It's also wierd thinking that President Monson has been around since before Mom and Dad's lifetimes. So many great people.
So I'm serving here with Elder Anderson, this is his last transfer before he heads back home. We have pretty similar lives, he was born in the big city (Vegas), moved to Nebraska when 1, and then moved to Idaho about the same time we did. Except for he lives in Burley. Isn't that Grimsey's home town? Anyway, he's a great missionary and we should have a great transfer.
Also, there are four of us here in Kispest, us and Elder Beaumont who is training Elder Stephens, the one Tom mentioned in his letter a few weeks ago with a twin in Norway. So it's a small world.

We don't have a lot of investigators here, so we are hoping to get that up. I like finding here though. The only down side is that we have to spend a bit of time travelling to get to the main city where we do a lot of our work. Back to public transport. Unlike Eger where we could walk anywhere in 30 minutes or less. Also, it's definetly starting to get colder. Luckily suit coat season starts in 3 days.
Love
Elder Parkinson

Tuesday, October 6, 2015

Back to the Big City!

First of all, Happy Birthday to Dad! I'll be back for your next one.

Transfer calls came in today. I will be heading back to Budapest, this time in the KisPest area, so on the opposite side of the river from last time. I will be serving with Elder Anderson, who was in my district last time I was in Buda. It should be a great transfer, I'm looking forward to it a lot. It will be hard to leave Eger though. I have really loved this city. I feel like every city I serve in becomes my new favourite.

Anyway, conference was awesome, we got all of the technology to work smoothly and had some investigators show up as well. It was nice being able to understand it well in Hungarian, I remember a year ago when I was watching it in Tatabánya and struggling to understand what was going on. I look forward to the LIahona still, Everytime I listen to conference it is so much information that I have trouble remembering it all afterwards. A lot seemed to talk about our personal progression and an eternal perspective in that. Or at least that's what I got.

We also had interviews with President Szabadkai before transfers. Those went super well, it's always great to talk with him. I'm greatful for the wonderful leaders that we have, including all those that spoke in General Conference.

That's about all I can think of, Conference and transfers is all I can really think of right now. Being a missionary has really given me short time memory problems, at least as far as some things goes. And my terrible facial recognition has still not improved. In my defence we talk with a lot of people.

Have a great week wherever you are!
Love
Parkinson Elder