Hallelujah!

The weeks are flying by. I keep feeling like I just barely wrote. We had a good week, we got invited over by members 3 times already this week and are off to some more tonight, so that has been a ton of fun. The perks of serving in a ward, working with members is always tons of fun. Give your local missionaries a chocolate easter bunny.

We got a really cool new investigator this week that we teach over skype. He got referred to the church by some member on an internet forum, and the secretaries sent him a Book of Mormon and some other stuff. He lives in a little town a good distance from any missionaries, so we skyped him. He was super legit, I love it when people really have a desire to learn, it makes our job so much easier. He would ask all the right questions and even asked us for a homework assignment he could do before the next time we talk. Super cool. It reminds me of last time I was here in Buda the Elder's were skype teaching a guy in Noway that Tom knew.

Easter should be awesome tomorrow. I started reading through the New Testament accounts of the Easter story this morning augmented by some Talmage commentary to prepare. It was super good.

I have been reading a bit in Jeremiah as well lately, and despite the reputation the Old Testament has for being dry it is actually super good. All about the scattering and gathering of Israel. I like reading through it as a missionary, because it talks about the work we are doing know, and reading about Jeremiah's life makes missionary work here seem really easy.

Happy Easter!

Parkinson Elder

Happy Holidays!

It's finally springtime here in Hungary. The weather is beautiful, despite the fact that there was apparently a blizzard in the hills on Tuesday (Elder Priest was on splits so I wasn't there, but he's also from Arizona so I'm not sure if I believe him). I do believe that he is a runner though, we have started going on some early morning runs, and he is fast.

We finally got our area mapped out and all of the members put up on it this week, and so we were able to put that into work a bit. We spent a bit of time looking up some members and tracting and streeting in their areas.

We spent a lot more time finding, we have a couple of potential investigators that we weren't able to meet with this week but hopefully will next week, and our one investigator canceled our teaching appointment. I have been working a lot to apply what we learned in the conferences, specifically to have a solid finding approach. There was one man that we stopped on the street on Wednesday with whom we were able to set up a time to go to his house on Friday, but when we went his doorbell ringer didn't work and nobody else would let us in the building, one said she there wasn't anyone of that name there that lived there. So we don't know if it was a bad address or just bad luck. He had been to church before so hopefully he will show up and we will be able to talk to him there.

Also, Elder Priest is playing the piano for an easter musical number tomorrow, so I got roped into singing a duet. Life lesson, take piano lessons.

We also had a national holiday on March 15th, so everyone was celebrating. The nice thing about missions is we get twice as many holidays to celebrate. For the rest of our lives.

I can't think of much else to write. Have a great week!

Love

Elder Parkinson

Line upon Line

First off, congrats to Hannah!

This week was awesome, we started it out with splits on Tuesday with the Miskolc Zone Leaders who are super awesome, we had a great day and found a couple of people we can hopefully go back to. There was one cool younger guy who let us in and we talked about the Book of Mormon, it went well, but I didn't think it was going great. We then asked if we could say a prayer before we left, and he asked if he could say it. He then said an incredible prayer, saying God, you sent these two boys to my door with a book and a lot of faith, and you know I have been open to this kind of thing lately, I'm interested to see where this goes. So we will hopefully go back to him on Monday and see what happens.

 We then had our mission tour with Elder Leimer of the 70, that took almost all of our time Wednesday through Friday, it was super good. All of the Zone Conferences went well, the first two were very similar, but the third one ended up being very different, it was really cool to see Elder Leimer adapt what he taught based off of the needs of the missionaries and the spirit. It was a bit draining, I was really tired by the end, but it was awesome.

That took up almost all of our time and made me forget about basically everything else, so that's all. Have a wonderful week!

Love

Parkinson Elder

Another Busy Week in Budapest!

The work here is still going fairly slow, but we had a couple of people that we were able to find who will hopefully start investigating. We were on splits on Tuesday and after a full day of finding Elder Martindale and I streeted a guy at night near a metro station. He had headphones in, and so at first he didn't hear and kept going, but then realized we were trying to talk to him, turned around, and we were able to talk. We weren't able to say a lot on the street but are set up to meet with him on Tuesday, so that's exciting. Also, headphone technology is really annoying as a missionary. And what is worse is when we think they are just listening to music and start talking to them and then realizing they are actually on a phone call. Technology these days is crazy. But I guess we need it to do our family history work. Anyway, the same day the other Elders also ran into a girl that Elder Priest had given a Book of Mormon to last transfer on the street, she has been reading it and taking notes, and now wants to meet. 

We will be having a mission tour next week by a member of the 70 so that should be awesome. We will be having 3 different Zone conferences and an MLC, so it will be busy.

We were able to go meet with a Serbian member family that I knew from when I was here last year, that was a lot of fun. When we were sharing the spiritual thought we had them read aloud a scripture in Serbian, and then we talked about it in Hunglish. They all speak 5 languages, it's crazy.

I honestly can't think of much else to write, but Elder Priest looks like he's writing a big long letter so if your still following him he might have more interesting stuff to say.

Also, it's strange that now when I introduce myself and talk about my family I can no longer say that half of my siblings on on missions as well. Maybe if they lower the age again David can get out before I come home. Or I could extend for 3 years...

Love

Parkinson Elder

Tovább menjünk tovább - "Go GO GO"

It was a fun week this week, we spent a lot of time tracting and streeting, we got dropped by the only investigator of ours that I have met with so far, the others have been hard to set up with. So we went finding. It was great, after being stuck inside a little last week it was great to spend all our time outside working, the weather was great too, and Buda is beautiful, our tracting area is up in the hills of Buda, with a full view of the city, castle, river, and Parliment down below. There are also a ton of embassies in the area, so we have to be carefull not to knock on those ones. We accidentaly tracted into the Islamic Republic of Pakistan on Tuesday, fulfilling our call to preach the gospel to all nations. In our defence we didn't see the sign and just thought it was just a really nice house. 

We also found a pair of beautiful Newfoundlands at one house that I was able to make friends with while we waited for the owner to show up. There were a couple of people we were able to share copies of the Book of Mormon with, so we'll see what happens with that. On of them was a lady we started talking to by asking if we could help her fill in a hole in her driveway she was filling in. She said no, but we started talking. She told us that whenever she needs help in her life it always comes from books that she finds and give her advice. We couldn't ask for a better introduction. So we gave her a book that will hopefully give her advice as well.

Also, at church last week I ran into Jeffery Lewis from Minnesota. That was super cool. There were a bunch of Americans that showed up for church and we were trying to figure out the translation for them when I looked over and thought, oh my I know that man. A bit of a suprise. He was suprised too. It was super cool though, and then he and one of his buisness partners took us out to dinner on Wednesday and we got to talk a little. It's good to know there are still great people in the world.

We are planning on going for a hike up in the hills today, so that should be a blast.

Also, I'm not sure if Tom is going home this week or next week, but whenever it is have a nice reunion. Somebody bring 2 chipotle burritoes with avacado to the airport. He deserves them.

Have a great week!

Parkinson Elder

Jeffrey Lewis and Parkinson Elder

Sharing a meal in Budapest

Feasting

This week started off a bit slow, Elder Priest got sick, so he had to take some rest time. Then one of the secretaries got pretty sick as well (tip, only buy sushi at legit sushi places) so I spent one or two days basically on splits full time with the other secretary while they stayed at home or went to the doctors. On that note, I realize I always forget to give companion info so before anyone reminds me I forgot I will. His name is Elder Priest, he is from Mesa, Arizona, has been here in Hungary a little over a year. He is a cross country runner, so he used to run 20 miles every morning back home. He is super nice and outgoing. At first it was a little weird because most of my companions for the past year have been quieter like me, so it was strange to have someone talking all the time. We get a long super well though.

We had 2 more missionaries go home this week, so we got another delicious dinner with the Szabadkai's.

We were able to meet with a couple of people and have some lessons, but with the sickness and other stuff going on we didn't get to do a ton of missionary work this week. On Wednesday I was going through hard core I haven't been tracting in 3 days withdrawels, so maybe it will be a good thing to get straight back to BYU when I go back, because I probably will go crazy if nothing is going on. I was able to get a lot of studying in though, which is a plus. I read through Our Heritage (getting close to my goal of finishing the missionary library), it was really good, nice to see all of church history lined up next to each other. What especially stuck out to me was the incredible work of the early church members as they established the church. eventually in Utah. And then the statement by President Kimball that we must lengthen out stride. We must not let our contributions and efforts be any less then that of those early saints.

Also, a continuous theme I have been running into and studying over the past few months is the House of Israel. I had a really good talk with Elder Priest the other day about Jews, and it changed my outlook a lot. In the past when I have met someone that is Jewish I haven't really known what to say, but now I might say something like, "Hey my brother from Judah! I'm Elder Parkinson from Ephraim, the Lord's promises towards our people are beginning to be fulfilled. We have a message and a book written for your people announcing that as long promised God is once more gathering the scattered House of Israel and restoring them as his covenant people." The hope of the gathering after many years of being scattered is one of the central messages in the scriptures, and especially in those pertaining to the last days. This is now being fulfilled.

I also found this pearl in Psalms 106:19-20 : They made a calf in Horeb, and worshiped the molten image. Thus they changed their glory into the similitude of an ox that eateth grass.

Don't be an ox. Don't eat grass. We have way better options.

We also had a run in with a con man. Long story. Another one to ask me about when I get home.

Have a great week!

Love

Parkinson Elder

Long time no write

So the fun thing about having 2 P-days within 4 days of each other is that not a lot of new stuff happens to write about.

Kispest ended on a good note, we got to have a really good last teaching with V. after a couple of crazy days beforehand, so that was a relief. It was weird not having to travel far again for transfers. After taking trains across the country for most of my mission I haven't traveled anywhere far for a long time. Anyway, we got to have the new missionary training which was fun, and dinner with the Szabadkai's and a departing missionary. Sister Szabadkai is a really great cook.

We had MLC on Friday which was fun. We had some guy from the area come down and talk to us about the churches 12 step program for quitting addictions, and how to use that. It's a good idea for implementation, because of lot of people here have addictions of some kind. I guess that's true for most of the world.

Also, this computer has spell check in English on. Really helpful. Spelling is hard.

I can't really think of anything else to write, really not a lot has happened since Tuesday. I'll write more next Saturday.

Have a great week!

Parkinson Elder