October 3, 2011

Bonjour a tous,
Frenchmen translating for the the prophet, apostles, and other GA's = bizarre!!! Yep, I watched in French this time. It was good though! I understood everything and that's all that counts. It was just weird seeing these people I know speaking French in different voices! Haha. We got to watch GC at the B family's house which was awesome (on the internet). They didn't have it at the church because they don't have a satellite yet. Mb came as well, and of course he loved it, because he wants to be prophet someday. I liked listening to it in French actually because I payed a lot closer attention and I took pages and pages of notes. I'm so stoked for the Ensign! I didn't get to see the last session or Pres Monson's talk in the Sunday morning session which is too bad, but that's ok. I love conference! It was fun listening to the translator translate Elder Holland's talk in priesthood session. Super intense! I really felt the Spirit during conference and received lots of personal revelation. I hope you all did as well! I loved Elder Scott's talk on the scriptures. I set a goal to memorize a scripture a day til the end of my mission after hearing his talk.
I forgot to tell you last week that we had a really fun experience. We contacted an investigator who lives in La Force which is a tiny town about 8 km from Bergerac, so we took the bikes out there one morning to teach this lady. The road to get there is this tiny road barely big enough for two cars out in the French countryside - it was super epic! And the lady was there thankfully, because it took a good 25 minutes to bike there, and there was a huge hill at the end haha. We were sweating pretty bad when we got to her house. Also, she has this dog, and the first time I looked at it I thought it was a lab, but it's about half the size of a lab. It was so strange. So I asked her waht it was, and she said it was a Labrador/Jack Russell mix. It was so funny looking! It was a mini fat yellow lab basically haha.
I did an exchange in Perigeux this week with Elder Williams. Their area has been struggling a bit for awhile now, but we had a great exchange and turned a day with basically nothing much planned into a really effective and successful day. I hope they see how much is possible there now! Sometimes being in an area a long time gets you discouraged when things start going downhill a bit and it's hard to get your hopes back up, but exchanges always help change things up and helps to find new ideas. So, we have this new method called street meetings where we take this big white wooden board and put it on a tripod in the middle of a public place and contact the people who pass by. We usually put pictures on the board and a question or statement. Elder Williams' board is probably my favorite one haha. He cut out giant letters from this plastic/foam material and painted them and glued them on, so it said "DIEU VOUS AIME" (God loves you) and just put a picture of Jesus next to it. You can see DIEU VOUS AIME from like a thousand feet away haha it's great. So we walked to the place where we wanted to do the street meetings, but we had to carry it there obviously, and as we walked on the sidewalk, Elder Williams would hold it so everyone on the road driving by could see it, and every single person looked at it and either just stared or yelled something lilke "yeah, I love him too!" haha. We got to the place and set it up and were able to talk to a few people for awhile about our message. This one girl was passing by and did a double take of the board, then she pulled out her camera and told us to stand next to it and took a picture of us. Maybe someday I'll find that pic on the internet or something haha. I don't know why, but for some reason that board attracts girls, and girls kept driving by blowing kisses at us. Hmm... maybe we'll have to change it after all. Anyways, It was great to see how well it worked though. President put this method into place a couple months ago and we've all been pretty hesitant about it because it's kind of a Jehovah's Witness kind of thing to do, but we've obeyed president and we're seeing results from it. I know he's inspired and knows what's best for the mission! Speaking of president, he and Sister Murdock came to our apartment this week to consecrate it. It was great to have the President in Bergerac! Haha. They've been doing a tour of the mission consecrating all the apartments. They've got to be exhausted. Their visit did us a lot of good and it was great to feel the spirit that they brought.
We also got invited to have a drink by an old WWII vet in Perigeux that we contacted right outside his house. He was such a nice old man and had lost a kidney and all the toes on his right foot in the war. He had just lost his wife though and was very sad. We taught and testified that he would see his wife again, but he didn't listen. He wouldn't even think that it was possible. He had no hope. It was one of the saddest experiences I've ever had on my mission. My heart goes out to him, because there is just no hope when you don't believe that there is something better waiting for you. There's only despair! And that was his state. We tried our best to help him come to realize that his wife is waiting for him, but he wouldn't accept it. Why wouldn't you accept that? Or at least HOPE it? Hope is so essential to have faith. The man couldn't believe that God existed or that he would see his wife again, simply because he had no hope that it could be true.
Well, next monday we get transfer calls. Crazy! That FLEW by! I might be leaving Bergerac... I feel like I just got here. I don't care if I stay or leave, I'd be happy either way. Changes are always nice, but I love the branch and the investigators here! A should be baptized this Saturday as well, and she wants Bro Bouchet to baptize her, and she wants me to be in the water too in case something happens (she's paranoid that she's going go drown). There's a couple things that might keep her from being baptized this Saturday, so pray for her! I know she can be ready, but it's up to her. This work is amazing. It will never stop. Seeing General conference strengthened my testimony so much that this is God's church. We are in the world, but not of the world. While everyone around us conforms to the world, we don't need to, because we know a better way. How blessed we are to know this way, which is the restored Gospel. Like President Monson repeated, the difference between the world's morals and the Lord's is getting bigger and bigger, which is making it a bigger and bigger battle to bring people unto Christ who are so in the world - but, it's possible, and it is happening anyways. Satan's influence will always be all around us, but we can always separate ourselves, and we can always prevail against his temptations. I know that as we try as hard as we can to separate ourselves from the world, we will have the Spirit more abundantly with us and we will become instruments in God's hands. I know that the Gospel leads to happiness, so I'm going to live it! I love you all and I hope you have a great week!
Love,
Elder Tudor