February 21, 2011

Hello! It was a pretty long week! It poured rain for four days straight and when most of our rendez-vous cancelled on us, we were stuck out in it with no one to contact because no one wanted to be out in the rain, and all the people that were outside didn't want to stop to talk to us. It was quite a challenge! Elder Park and I are working super hard, but not seeing a whole lot. This Friday we had zone conference and the President interviewed all the missionaries. I was so thankful for that interview. We basically just talked about our work here in Cannes and he really helped me out. He's an amazing man! He knows we're working hard, especially in finding new investigators, and is happy with our work. He told me that starting a new area like we did is kind of like starting a car - you've always gotta start in first gear! It's the slowest, but it takes the most power. He promised us lots of blessings during my interview that would come if we continued working as hard as we can. So of course, we're going to! (He also told Elder Park and I that we're the best looking companioship in the mission haha - so random. So I guess if all else fails, we've got that! Haha just kidding) Yesterday and this morning we stopped and looked back at the last few weeks and looked at what we had done well and what we can improve on. We know we're working our butts off and doing our best, but it's true that our best can always improve! So we've set some new goals and actions to achieve them that we hope will help the work start moving along a little faster.

In other news, a sweet guy that I taught my last week in Nice named Jean Marie got baptized this week! I was there when he committed to be baptized. And guess what? Marcelline's son Livio wil be baptized before the end of the transfer if all goes according to plan. This week is Stake Conference in Nice so I'll be able to see the ward there again which is pretty awesome. I love the ward here in Cannes though. The bishop is the man and I love the members. This week there was an older couple from Holland who attended at our ward. They spoke no French, but they spoke pretty good English, and they asked me to translate for them during Sacrament meeting. That was my first time translating for someone, it was pretty intense!

We're working with a less active member right now and trying to get him to church. We saw him this week but we didn't go in his house because he preferred to go to the park and talk. Later, we found out that in his (not very big) apartment lives at least 8 people (adults), 6 dogs, 9 cats, 8 hamsters, and pigeons that come and go. Ah! I think we'll stick with the park. We're also working with another less active named Ricardo (he's about 28) who is super sweet. He's from Cape Verde and hasn't been to church for over a year and a half now. He used to be the young men's teacher and was really active. He was baptized about 5 years ago. When I was on exchange here in Cannes a couple months ago I contacted him, but the missionaries here never got a hold of him after I had taken his number. But last week I found him again in the road! I think I'm a Ricardo magnet. Apparently he got a new phone and he gave us his new number. We have seen him a couple times, and he came to church this Sunday!! He's a super sweet guy and I'm so glad we found him again because all the members love him and he got so much support when he came to church this Sunday. I'm excited for him to keep progressing and become fully active again! Inactivity is a pretty big problem here, and all around the world for that matter. between 80 and 100 people come to the ward in Cannes every Sunday and there are at least 300 members here. Attendance was about the same in Nice, but there are close to 500 members there. It's really sad! There's obviously a lot of work to do with less actives.

Well I'll leave you for this week and I hope to have more good news next week! I know that Jesus is the Christ and the Redeemer of the whole world. My testimony of that grows every day that I am here. And I know that this is His church on the earth! I also know that God still speaks to us today through his prophets, and being out here on a mission, I realize just how important prophets are! I can't express how thankful I am that I have the opportunity to testify of the Christ, Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon, - all the things that I know to be true - every day! I pray that people are touched by the Spirit of the Lord while I testify of these things to them so that they may come unto Christ and receive the Restored Gospel. I love you all, and thank you for all of your support! Have a great week.

Love,

Elder Tudor

February 14, 2011

Some pics of the members of Nice

As you can see, they love me enough to kiss me!

Me and Elder Park

Allo! Wow, it was quite a week. Probably the longest and hardest week of my mission so far. We had so many lessons set up and ready to go for every day of the week, but out of the whole week we were only able to see a few of them. Either they didn't show up or canceled on us a few minutes before. So, we ended up doing a lot of walking like last week. There's really only one big good street to do contacting in Cannes - Boulevard Carnot. We basically destroyed that street this week, and it destroyed us too haha. But we were able to contact some good people.

We're still teaching Kenneth and Rowenna, and their friends Jenny and Armand (the Philippinos). They're sweet! We're going to see them tomorrow with a member who is from the Philippines. They're really our only steady investigators that we have right now. They said they would be baptized when they received an answer about the Book of Mormon. We're giong to try and set a date this week.

It's been pretty tough doing everything we can to have rendez-vous and then having almost all of them fall through. We set up appointments, call and confirm the appointments, then they're not there! It's been a trial of our faith and patience, but we're doing everything we can to get the work started up here. I know that eventually we will see people and we will have more good investigators, it all just depends on the Lord's will and timing! I don't have a lot of time this week cuz I'm gonna send some pics. Bonne semaine à tous! Je vous aime!

Love,
Elder Tudor

February 7, 2011

Bonjour à tous! It was quite a week! Probably the hardest week I've had so far in my mission, but I feel like we worked super hard and I'm happy with what we were able to do. When I got here, they had to split Cannes into two areas (it was one before), and most of the investigators were in the other Elders' area, and we were left with 3, 2 of which are on vacation right now, and the other one is leaving this week. So, needless to say, we spent a lot of time finding new investigators. There are a LOT of old people here, but luckily there are plenty of people from every age as well (the old people are either atheist, strong Catholics, or both - yes, apparently it's possible). We walked probably a good 10 kilometers a day because Cannes is small enough that there's not much of a public transportation system, but it's just big enough to kill you on foot if you're walking all day. After a week of doing that, we're exhausted! But we're happy with the work we've done. We were able to set up tons of rendez-vous and find 6 new investigators. We found a beautiful little Philippono family too! We found a lot of Philippinos, for that matter. They're all in Cannes! It's crazy. I'm really excited for this week and to continue to find new investigators and teach.

One of our investigators that we already had when I had arrived is a Chinese girl named Ling. Right now she is on vacation and in 10 days she is going to return for 10 days, and then she is giong back to China. We talked with her on the phone yesterday, and she told us she wants to be baptized! The thing is, she has only been taught a few times and we'll only have 10 days to teach her everything that's left and do the baptism. That would be insane! We're praying for her and that we'll be able to do it before she leaves. We weren't sure if we wanted to at first because the Church isn't really in China (or so we thought), but we talked with our zone leader who is from Taiwan and teaches chinese students all the time in Aix, and he said she'd have no problem continuing in the church in china. So we're going to try for it! We might have to teach her through Skype while she is on vacation. We'll see what happens.

I love Cannes so far! It's been a rough week, just trying to build a base to work with, but we worked super hard and I'm excited to keep going. Elder Park is awesome and we get along great. We played basketball this Saturday with the youth, and I'd just pass it down low to him every time and he'd clean up (he's about 6'5"). The French couldn't stop it haha. Basketball isn't their strongest sport! We're playing soccer next week, so I guess I'll know what they felt like :). But anyways, I think the theme for this week was patience. Elder Park and I learned a lot of it this week! Contacting can be fun and it's important, but after awhile it can drive you crazy. As missionaries we want to teach! But we had to find investigators, so we contacted for hours each day. Sometimes we went for hours when no one was interested, and I felt like just giving it up. But, since there wasn't really anything else we had to do, we kept going and believing that someone in our path would have been prepared by the Lord. One day we went the whole morning, and the few hours after lunch with NO ONE being interested, and none of the passbacks (to give us a place to go, we would pass by teh houses of former investigators) were home. We were starting to get frustrated, but fortunately, we had read together parts of the talk by President Uchtdorf entitled "Continue in Patience" that morning. One of the points that he makes is that patience isn't merely waiting, but it is actively waiting, despite your circumstances. It would've been easy to take a little break after those dreadful few hours, but instead we decided to keep moving forward with faith and patience, hoping for the blessings to come. We still didn't have success for almost an hour, but then there was a good half hour where we found 5 or so people who were genuinely interested (including the Philippino family)! I love these words of President Uchtdorf, "My dear brethren, the work of patience boils down to this: keep the commandments; trust in God, our Heavenly Father; serve Him with meekness and Christlike love; exercise faith and hope in the Savior; and never give up." Many of us are doing all those things, but still don't see the blessings. Elder Park and I were being obedient, having faith and hope, serving the Lord, never giving up, and trusting in His promised blessings, but we still weren't seeing the blessings right when we wanted them. We eventually were blessed, but it took time! We never know when we're going to be blessed by the Lord or delivered from our trials, but we can know that we WILL be as long as were are doing all those thing that President Uchtdorf has instructed us. I know that the Lord keeps his promises, and that even when we don't see His blessings immediately in our lives, we can know that the Lord is aware of our situation and that He "...will not always reward you immediately according to your desires. Rather, God will respond with what in His eternal plan is best for you, when it will yield the greatest advantage." - Elder Richard G. Scott. I know that this is true, and that as we are patient (and not just bitterly waiting), the Lord will eventually bless us! Je vous aime tous et je vous souhaite une bonne semaine!

Love,
Elder Tudor

January 31, 2011

Allo! Wow, lots of news this week! First of all, at this moment I am in... CANNES! I got here about half an hour ago. We got transfer calls on Friday and the President informed me that I would become senior companion and serve with Elder Park at Cannes. Wooh! It only took a 20 minute train ride to get here this morning haha. I didn't move very far! But I'm so excited. Before, there was one companionship in Cannes, but now there are two. Elder Park and I are going to work in Cannes and the smaller surrounding areas, and the other companionship will have a car and work in St. Raphael, Antibes, Grasse, etc. Before it was one giant area. I was pretty nervous when the president called, because that usually means you have a new responsibility if he calls you himself. I was a little nervous at first, and still am, but I'm excited for the opportunity to be senior companion! It should be an interesting transfer, because we're basically opening a new area. Before, they had a car, but now the other companionship has it, and there aren't really any buses here. So it looks like we'll be walking a lot! So, about Elder Park. He's a transfer younger than me and is from Tremonton, Utah, and is super tall! He's such an awesome guy though and a great missionary. I'm so excited to serve with him! I've done exchanges with him in the past (because Cannes is in the Nice district) so we already know eachother. The other Elders in our apartment will be Elder Brown (one transfer older than me, Elder Park's former companion) and Elder Garland (From England, in his second transfer). It's going to be a young apartment! I'm really excited for this next transfer and I'm ready to work hard.

It was weird leaving Nice, since it was my first ville. This morning, Elder Dorton and I woke up at 5 and ran all the way from our apartment to the ocean and jsut walked around on the Promenade des Anglais. It's so beautiful! I guess it was our goodbye to nice. And oh yeah, Elder Dorton is going to Nimes! And Elder Call and Elder Graham are staying at Nice and receiving new companions. This will be the first time in my mission that I'm not with Elder Dorton. Weird! And sad. He's super tight and I'll miss him! It was sad saying goodbye to teh ward yesterday at church. I love them! Marcelline was super sad that I was leaving too. But I guess that's the life of a missionary. Elder Dorton and I spent a half hour after church taking pictures with all the members and our investigators. I'll miss them! But I'm so stoked for this next part of my mission.

So here's some other BIG news. Starting July 1, 2011, I will no longer be a missionary in the France Toulouse Mission, but I will be in the France Lyon Mission! What?? So what's happening is that they're combining the Geneva, Switzerland mission and the Toulouse mission into one massive mission. So the mission home will be moved to Lyon, and instead of getting a "new" mission president, our mission president will be President Murdock who is currently the mission president in Geneva. He'll have a year left as president when the Lyon mission starts, so he'll die a few weeks before I do. That's sweet because I'll have had two mission presidents who already had two years of experience. I'll give you more information as I find out more about the Lyon mission. Pretty crazy!

This week we found a SWEET new investigator named Jean-Marie. He's a Christian guy from Cameroon. We taught him one time this week and it was in a big shopping center (he's moving so we couldn't go to his house). This guy is one of God's elect. During the lesson, I started talking about how Jesus showed us the example by being baptized, and then he asked me, "So, what do I need to do to get baptized?" He reminded me of Edvin. He explained to us how he has been searching a long time to find truth, and that he hopes and belives that he has now found it. After we told the first vision, he committed to be baptized the 19th of Februrary! Too bad I won't be able to continue teaching him, but I'm so excited to hear about him, because I've never had a first lesson as powerful as that one, even though we were in the middle of a mall! That experience increased my faith so much that there are people prepared by the Lord, and that the Lord will place them in our path as long as we are being obedient and working hard.

Cannes is pretty different from Nice. In Nice, you can go anywhere and contact a million people, but Cannes isn't super big and there's not a whole lot of people just walking around. It will be interesting to work here and figure out how to work in a smaller ville. I'm sure it will be challenging, but I feel like I'm going to grow a lot here. Especially since it's my first time as senior companion. But I know that this is the Lord's work and that this is where I'm supposed to be, and that the Lord qualifies those that he chooses. I know that as I rely on him, and not my own strength, that I can do all things! I'm so thankful for the opportunity I have to be with Elder Park in Cannes and to serve the Lord. I love you all! Bonne semaine a tous!

Love,

Elder Tudor