July 9, 2012

Burrito night at Simon's house!

Auguste! and his awesome car and hair

My favorite grandma ever - Babo

Salut,

It was an interesting week!  It wasn't as hot as it has been, which was good.  I also didn't light the apartment on fire this week, which is always a plus :).  Things are going great here and I'm loving serving with Elders Prows and Cushing.  The work is moving forward here.  Unfortunately, Augusto kinda took a wrong turn this week and things aren't looking to good for his baptism in a couple weeks.  Tamara is still doing well.  We're gonna have a big Slovakian movie night this Tuesday!  Except it will be at 230 in the afternoon, but whatever.  We're inviting all of them to come and we're going to watch the Joseph Smith movie at the chapel with them.  It should be fun and hopefully it will help them all understand the restoration better.  Sometimes they have a hard time understanding just because of the language barrier, and they have millions of questions about the restoration, so hopefully that should help. 

I went to Toulouse on thursday with Elders Snickers and Noyce to do a baptismal interview for one of their amis.  Unfortunately, he wasn't baptized this weekend, but we set a new date for him for the 21st and hopefully he'll be ready then.  He's a super sweet guy.  That's the first time I've ever had to turn down a baptismal candidate, but I just felt a little uneasy about it and said it would be better to wait.  The candidate agreed.

Le Festival de Jazz started this week and there are concerts at the bar right outside our apartment every night and it's super loud.  Luckily I have earplugs.  Planning sessions are tough though because we can hardly hear each other...

We have an awesome Chinese less active member named Simon who hasn't been active for almost a couple of years but has come 4 out of the last 6 weeks or so to church.  He's super awesome and I'm so happy for him.  The members all love him!  Tonight for my birthday, we're going to the giant chinese buffet in Montauban with him, Jeanpierre and Auguste (a recent convert from Martinique who is super awesome).  I'm pretty excited!  Other than that, it's just kind of a normal day.  I kinda forgot it was my birthday until I got your card on saturday, Mom. 

I'm trying to read the entire Book of Mormon in french during this month.  The Book of Mormon is incredible.  I just finished Jacob today, which is one of my favorite books, and I just love the  Spirit that the Book of Mormon brings.  There are so many books, philosophies, theories, etc. in this world, and so many people pour over them for years and  years, and often times just end up confused and creating their own philosophies.  Fortunately, God has an easier and much better plan, He gave us the Book of Mormon.  I know that the Book of Mormon really is the most correct of all the books on earth, and that a man will draw closer to God by abiding by its precepts than by any other book, like Joseph Smith said.  And we have NO excuse not to read it every day!  Anna, one of our slovakian recent converts, is an amazing story.  There's no Book of Mormon in slovakian, so they all have to read it in czech.  For some it's not bad, but for Anna and Frankie it was really difficult and they understood nothign when they read during my first few weeks here.  But now Anna says she can read better in Czech than in Slovakian and she reads in the Book of Mormon every day.  It was such a sweet testimony and example to me of the power of the Book of Mormon and how faith and obedience can really make miracles happen in the life of anyone.  I'm pretty sad I  took the BoM for granted most of my life.  I've made studying it a lifetime pursuit though because I've seen how it changes our lives so quickly and so profoundly when we really get in that book.  The church is true!  Let's learn and live every day the Gospel that it's Head teaches us, I know it is the only way that is worth it in the end.  Bonne semaine!! Love you!

Love,

Elder Tudor