Week 22 & 23

 Hello Everyone:

Short Version: 

     My trio companionship in Vilnius split up when Elder Evans came down from Latvia to be companions with Elder Yeyna. We met a Muslim man on a our bus ride to get our vaccinations who was so excited to hear about the gospel. He's going to live in the rural wilderness of Poland so hopefully he reads the Book of Mormon we gave him. 

Long Version:

      We finally found a list of members in our ward so we can start setting up lessons and service opportunities with them. The privacy laws here make it awkward for missionaries to keep track of people legally but we found the member list that we're mostly sure is legal for us to have possession of. If not, oops. It's been really usually to have people's phone numbers and not having to try and find them through Facebook. 

     A funny thing we found out this week is that members here don't really enjoy having "lessons" with the missionaries. When we first got here, we would call or text people and ask them if we could have a short lesson with them and/or their family. Some would agree but most weren't interested in having yet another zoom call to attend. This last week we changed our approach and started asking them if they would be willing to read the Book of Mormon with us in Lithuanian. Almost everyone we asked to read with said yes. Our lessons usually just consist of reading the Book of Mormon anyway so really all that changed was how we phrased it when we asked to meet. 

     I've never used public transportation other than a few times before being in Lithuania. The closest thing was riding the bus to and from school but I dont think that counts. We're still figuring out the bus stops and which busses to get on. We have an app that is supposed to tell us but it hasn't been trustworthy (or maybe we're using it wrong). We hopped on a bus to take the sacrament to someone and we started getting farther and farther from our destination. Once we realized that we were headed in the wrong direction, we were about a kilometer down the road (1 kilometer = 0.62 miles precisely). We got off at the next bus stop and had to run back up the road to try and catch the correct bus. We didn't run fast enough and it left before we got there. Let me tell you, it is not fun to run in the sun. It is much less fun to run in the sun with a backpack and church clothes. We had to call the lady and tell her we couldn't make it. She was very upset and later in the day we got a text that said she went ahead and blessed the sacrament for herself. 

     My Lithuanian is getting better bit by bit. I text a lot of people on messanger since we're in a weird awkward stage of quarentine/not quarentine. Since I text a bunch I'm getting pretty good at reading and writing, but my speaking and listening is not as good. There's a few people that I texted and asked to practice the language with. When I start talking to them and trying to figure what they are saying, a few have said something to the effect of "you texted pretty well, I thought you were gonna be better at speaking." 

     Here's a delightful poem I found in a talk called "Nobody Said That It Would Be Easy."

     The Oyster: 

There once was an oyster

Whose story I’ll tell,

Who found that some sand

Had worked under his shell.

Just one little grain

But it gave him a pain,

For oysters have feelings

That are very plain.

Now did he berate

This working of fate,

That left him in such a

Deplorable state?

Did he curse the government,

Call for an election,

And say that the sea

Should have some protection?

No! He said to himself

As he sat on the shelf,

“Since I cannot remove it,

I think I’ll improve it.”

Well, years passed by,

As years always do,

Till he came to his destiny,

Oyster stew!

But the small grain of sand

That bothered him so

Was a beautiful pearl

All richly aglow.

Now this tale has a moral,

For isn’t it grand,

What an oyster can do

With a small grain of sand?

And what couldn’t we do

If we’d only begin

With all of the things

That get under our skin?

Ether 12:24-27

"And thou hast made us that we could write but little, because of the awkwardness of our hands

....and I fear lest the Gentiles shall mock at our words

...And when I had said this, the Lord spake unto me, saying...my grace is sufficient for the weak 

....my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me....for if they humble themselves before me...then will I make weak things become strong unto them."

Viso Gero,

Vyresnysis Smitas