July 25, 2011

Hey everyone!
Can't believe another week has already gone by! Sounds like everyone is doing well, which is always great to hear. This past week has been really good. Really busy but really good. It was great getting new missionaries in Charentsavan this week. They got here Thursday and we have spent most of this second part of the week helping them get acquanted with the area and with some of the members. The two elders that got sent here are Elder Frye, he is from Elder Steglich's MTC group, and Elder Smith, from my MTC group! It was really cool seeing Elder Smith again. He had been serving up in the North Zone at the top of Armenia so I had only seen him once since we got here. But I think they are both going to do really well here in Charentsavan. But other than that everything has been rolling along.
As for our investigators, they're all doing really great! I'll start out by filling you all in on the family we are teaching. Lusine, Tadevos, and TIgran kind of had a rough week. Their land lord sold their apartment out from under them and they had until Sunday to be out of their place. It was really stressful for them and every time we went to visit them this week they just looked absolutely miserable. They are such a faithful and strong family but you could just tell how hard it was on them. Elder Steglich and I just kept promising them that if they pray together and read from the Book of Mormon as a family and have faith that everything would work out. It was tough seeing them struggle like that though. But finally they called us Saturday night and told us they found a place. We met with them shortly after they had got the place and it was so great to see how happy they were. I had forgotten what their smiles looked like! haha. We asked them during the meeting if they had read and prayed together the night before and they had! It just really showed me the importance of enduring. I know that we all face trials like that in our lives of different forms, but it just Ether 12:6 just kept coming to mind. Its so important that we endure our trials with a perspective of what does the Lord want me to learn from this or how can I improve from this. And then after that trial of your faith, will those promised blessings come. But all three of them are doing well and moving along. We are hoping for them to get baptized in August.

Also, we were able to pick up Knarik's sister as an investigator this last week. Her name is Ruzana and she is going to be in Charentsavan for a couple months taking care of her Grandma. Knarik actually called us this past week and told us that her sister was here and for us to go visit her. We asked her how her Book of Mormon reading was coming and she said she finished it like 2 weeks ago and that she is reading the Doctrine and Covenants now! haha. She also told us that she goes into Gyumri 4 times a week so she'll be able to meet with missionaries after all! We called the Gyumri elders and gave them the referral and they were so happy haha. We just handed them a dream investigator haha. But we just had our first meeting with her sister Ruzana yesterday and she seems just as solid. So we're both looking forward to working with her while we can as well.
And as for Silva, she is doing really great! Elder Steglich and I are hoping that she'll get baptized in the next week or two. I'll have to keep you all posted on that. We have a few other investigators that we are working hard to get them to be more serious investigators. So we are staying pretty busy with work which I am way happy about. Like you said in your email dad, some areas are more prepared than others. There are a lot of areas in Armenia that are struggling right now and I just consider myself really blessed to be here in this area. It has been such a great area to learn and gain experience from so early in my mission. I am very very blessed to be here!
Everything else is going really well also. The language is coming along, slowly but surely. I actually saw a lot of progress this last week. I decided to study patience a little bit this past week because I realized I was starting to be a little impatient with myself and the language. I realized that I had the mindset that if I just kept working harder and harder that it would just click one day. And as I was studying patience I came to the realization that this is an experience I'm meant to learn and grow from. I started to take the point of view that I talked about earlier in this email. I started looking for ways and things I can learn from this experience and portion of my mission. It's still so so important to keep working hard and pushing myself but I realized that I can't control when the language will come. It will come on the Lord's time and in his way. So I've really been focusing on relying on the Spirit and on the Lord. I'm still working really hard but there is such a better feeling about it. I don't feel like I'm running into a brick wall over and over again anymore hahaha. And I know that as I keep working hard and am obedient that it will come, not all at one, but line upon line and precept upon precept, as it says in Nephi.
I'm so thankful for this gospel. For the peace and comfort that it has brought and still brings in my life. And it is so amazing to help others feel that same peace and happiness as they move closer to Christ through this gospel. This truly is an amazing work and I am so grateful to be a part of it. I love everything about this church and our message. I know this church is true! Its been so amazing to see the strength that my testimony receives on a daily basis. I hope you all can be strengthening your testimony and sit back and look at the happiness that this church has brought into your lives. Its humbling to look at the blessings that our Heavenly Father has poured upon us and our family. I love you all and hope that you all find happiness this next week in all that you do! I am so thankful for our family and the great blessing that you all are in my life! Have a great week and I'll talk to you next week!


Love,
Elder Fairclough