September 5th, 2011

Hey everyone!

Sounds like you all had a great week, which as usual is great to hear! Unfortunately, my time is a little short this week cause I'm in Yerevan. We have Zone Leader Counsel tomorrow and we are just staying the night with the AP's cause it starts earlier in the morning. But I did my best to get some personal emails out and hopefully this one will fill you in on how things are going here. It was another great week here in Armenia!
Yesterday at church was especially great! I can honestly say it was one of most spiritual sacrament meetings of my life. To start it off, Tadevos blessed the sacrament and Tigran passed it to the congregation! It was so great to see them using their priesthood already! I could tell they were kind of nervous but they did such a great job. They both looked great in their white shirts and ties too! And then Lusine, Tadevos, and Tigran all received callings. I was so happy that they were given assignments cause I know that it will only strengthen them. And then, the best part was the testimony meeting part of sacrament meeting. Tadevos got up and bore his testimony and did so amazing! He talked about how when we were teaching him he always wondered what it felt like to know that these things were true. Then he said, "After today, I no longer have that question anymore." It was so powerful. He received that confirming witness from the Holy Ghost and it was so cool to see! And then right after him Tigran got up and bore his testimony. It always amazes me how much he knows and how strong he is spiritually. He is only 14 but he is so mature. I think there are big things ahead of him in the future. I really hope so. He is such an amazing kid. And then after him Silva got up and bore her testimony as well. It was so amazing to see them get up and bear their testimonies. That was one of the best moments of my mission. Just seeing these people get up and bear such strong testimonies barely a month after their baptisms. It was just as satisfying, if not more, as when they got baptized. That is what missionary work is all about. I really hope I can stay in Charentsavan for a while so I can continue to see these great people continue to progress and grow!
As for our other investigators, they are all doing really well! Unfortunately we weren't able to visit that family at all this week. The daughter had her baby Monday so they have been super busy. Something really funny happened when we went to visit them Monday though. We had no idea she was that close to giving birth, but we got to their place and they had guests over so we were going to say we could come back another time but they insisted that we come in and eat with them. So we came in and they had us sit at this table to eat with them. It was Julietta, Suren, their son (the husband of the Narine who had just given birth) and then Narine's parents were there as well. So we went to eat and Elder Steglich asked if we could say a prayer on the food and they were like sure no problem. After he said the prayer Narine's dad, who by the way is super super drunk, is just like what was that. haha. Armenians say "Our Father" prayer from the Bible and that is about it. They always make a big deal about it that we don't say it. But anyways he started asking why we don't say that prayer and we started to explain how Heavenly Father is literally our father and how we talk to Him from our heart. Then he turns to Julietta and Suren and says forgive me, and right then I was like oh great this guy is about to lay into us haha. And he just started talking about how cause he is older he has that much more faith than us and some other stuff as well but I couldn't really understand cause he was so drunk. As he was going off on us he was kind of swaying side to side and I was just thinking in my head, this guy is about to pass out haha. I felt kind of bad but I was kind of hoping he would so he would stop talking haha. But he finally stopped and it was just super awkward haha. It was just really quiet and no one really knew what to say. So we were just like, well we've got to go and got up and left haha. The guy was started to do shots so we thought it was good to get out before he got any crazier haha. It was really cool though cause Suren and Julietta were defending us to him. We walked away having a lot of respect for them and we really can't wait to start meeting with them again this week. Hopefully things go better this next week. I'll be sure to let you all know! haha.
Other than that, everything else has been pretty normal. I love being a missionary. I love it all. The experiences like I had in sacrament meeting yesterday, and even the super awkward ones where drunk guys are yelling at us haha. I can honestly say that I can't imagine being happier than I am right now. I love sharing this gospel with others and seeing it change their lives. I'm so thankful for this opportunity that I have to be a missionary and to serve these great people!
I hope you all have a great week! I'm sorry again about the email being so short! I'll do much much better next week haha. I love you all very much and can't wait to hear how your weeks go! Let me know how you all are doing! I love you all!


Love,


Elder Fairclough