Elder Rapier: Dinner with the Russians

Alright y'all! We have had another great week here, to be honest as I am sitting here I can't really remember most of what happened. Everything is getting blended together.

To start there was (as always) a ton of drama in the zone. We had some companions really not getting along and so there were some emergency transfers; we kind of had to be their moms in making sure that everything got shuffled around. So that is always fun! We were also in a trio for a few days with Elder Simper. He is now back in his area with a new companion. That summarizes like 5 different switching of companions and the shutting down of an area. SUPER FUN.

On a good note we got to go on exchanges with the assistants to the president. They are both close friends of mine and I really enjoyed the exchange. I went into Spokane Valley into the Pines ward and we went out contacting at 3 and came inside around 8. It was so nice to be able to do that again. It feels like it has been many moons since I have been able to do that due to my current situation. So it was very nice.

In the ward things went great. We were able to teach a lot of people this week.

Last Friday we had a little time after an appointment and so we went out knocking to try to contact some potential investigators. We knocked on this Russian guy's, George, door that we had street contacted the week before. He came outside and talked to us in the freezing cold (did I mention that it snowed a foot this week?). After a minute his wife opened the door and told us to come in, but in a form of sign language because their English is not good. We busted out Google Translate and started trying to communicate. The wife asked what we eat and then mysteriously disappeared to the kitchen and then they started Skyping their daughter. So we have a lot of noise coming from the kitchen, a Russian daughter on Skype and an old Russian man hard of hearing that has no idea how to use a phone and translate with Google. So an hour and a half later (we usually try to keep lessons to 45 minutes max) we walked out with a belly full of Russian food and still absolutely no idea on their gospel knowledge and understanding. They fed us some sort of chicken rice goulash, crusty bread, and tomatoes with cheese that they themselves made by fermenting grocery store milk... My bowels started World War 3...

On a more productive note, Daniel is doing so well! We moved his baptismal date out again to March 17. We taught 4 people from Africa and were able to set up a bunch of appointments with new investigators. Everyone else is doing super well. We are mostly struggling to get people to church. There is a church building 5 minutes from where most people live, but our ward is assigned to a building that is a 20-minute drive... so a lot of people are just outright lazy... Oh well. Other than that, I received my first letter saying "finish strong" and I am in denial that that phrase has been uttered, I still feel like a greenie.

Anyway I love y'all and I want y'all to know that I love the Lord with everything that I am. I will send pics in a different email :)

E.Rapier :)

Elder Herbst says "Hi"