My hair is growing longer!!!! its cause i am serving a mission that the lord is blessing me with longer hair #realtalk
well i had an amazing week as so many great things have been going on! well i am still in Varaždin, which i am so happy about and i will stay here till Dec 16 then we have another transfer so we shall see!
So first off on Thursday i talked to the most amazing woman in my life! well they are Croatians from Zadar but moved to Provo, Utah a long time ago because her husband played basketball for BYU with Krešimir ćosić who was a great basketball legend and also the person who translated the Book of Mormon into Croatian. When Kresimir arrived at BYU he was not a member of the church. Anyhow, this lady lived there for a long time. But now they are back here to serve as the first counselor in the district over here! We dont even have a stake in Croatia or all the areas in the mission! krešimir ćosić baptized them (he was the first member of the church over here!) anyways she came up to talk to us and wow i felt like i was talking to one of the young women presidency! She is the type of person u want to take notes when she is speaking cause she is so strong in the church! she told of her conversion story and how she didnt go to church or anything and yet she was taught the plan of salvation and everything the Mormons told her about this journey of life- this puzzle- well it all fit together perfectly. It made total sense and there was not one piece left out. No more qeustions for speculation or mysteries that she was always told not to question. She talked about how this the hardest mission in the world right now because the people here think that if they leave the catholic church they are giving up their nationality because it is their history with the ethnic cleansing and war that took place I think in the 1990’s here.! But she said,"Don’t give up! THE FACT THAT YOU WERE CALLED TO THIS MISSION SAYS A TON ABOUT THE PERSON YOU WERE BEFORE YOU CAME ON YOUR MISSION! this mission is hard, as we see the circle of people coming to church then leaving church then coming to church and leaving church but i have found out that when u can do nothing else, when u can’t run or jump anymore stay on the path and crawl.
Many of the people forgot all the blessing that have come from being members of this church, but we HAVE TO REMEMBER! EVEN IN THE BAD TIMES WE HAVE TO REMEMBER ALL THE HAPPINESS WE HAVE RECEIVED AND THE KNOWLEDGE WE HAVE GAINED THAT OTHERS DO NOT HAVE. WE HAVE THE WHOLE TRUTH AND NEVER FORGET IT!" these words pierced my soul and i will never forget our conversation my comp and i had with her. Then we did a finding activity in our town square where we made chocolate chip cookies and gave them out to people who would fill out a list of questions they might have ever thought about- questions of the soul along with a flyer about a stop smoking class we are going to have! We did it right in front of the web cam onb the town square so on Tuesday we are doing it again around like 530 am your time so yep I am just saying!
So an amazing miracle happened. We had 25 PEOPLE AT CHURCH!!! 5 WERE FROM ZAGREB BUT OTHER THAN THAT WE HAD 13 MEMBERS 1 LESS ACTIVE AND 2 INVESTIGATORS!!! VESNA WHO IS LESS ACTIVE HAS BEEN TO CHURCH 2 WEEK IN A ROW AND NOW HER DAUGHTER IS BECOMING INTERESTED! this is the one that said could not have missionaries in her house because they were guys but things have changes because we as sisters are now serving! then Andriana - one of the kids that was going to get baptized came to church for the first time in a month ... with her mom!!!!! petar was sick! she loved it and said they were coming back next week! it was so weird to hear kids talking in church! i was fighting back tears when i heard other voices singing besides mine and the piano! and we had a lesson with this girl who is 28 and has 2 kids and she said we could come back next week! so that is an event to look forward to!
well i have to go but hope all is well!
love sestra peterson
PS Here are some answers to questions people have asked:
1. Do you have a baptismal font in your church building?
We have like a blow up pool or in the city of Zadar they baptize in the river! We have a big baptism the 21st in Zagreb. all who is getting baptized will go there from all of Croatia. Zagreb is the only place in Croatia with a font. (It is bout 1-1 1/2 hours away by bus for us.)That is why they are doing the baptisms there. However, in the summer they always do it in the river.
2. Do you have lots of dinners?
Also,we have dinner every sunday with tim and vanja and a lesson with vanja and hope tomislov hears cause he is all into science and everything so religion is hard for him but we are straight up with him adn he is so nice! so that is at 7 to 9 cause at 6 there is no one in the street to talk to cause they are all sleeping! dad could live here ah! last night we has a really good Croatian dish that tasted like stuffed peppers
3. Do you know your neighbors? Do you live in a house or an apartment? Does it have 1-2 bedrooms? Is it tiny?
Yes yes yes! Our neighbor works at a casino so that's fun haha. Our land lord is awesome! We have a two room apt and its nice we want to give the landlord a book of Mormon but we never see them. our apt is not tiny. i think it is big! i can't believe how fast the mission is going. i need more time here as there is so much work to get done and not enough time
Also, we have no senior couple so i have made a lot of cookies for activities. And i am getting really good at ping pong cause its a popular sport over here so Blair and Preston better watch out! did u know our mission is the largest by land mass with like the smallest amount of missionaries ha im so lucky to be one of them! we only see prez rowe (our mission president) once a month at zone conference!
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