# 15

Dear family, 

This past week, Sister Clove and I saw many miracles happen with our investigators. Probably our most incredible week so far!

 

On Monday, Sisters Clove, Broadbent, Henriquez, McDonald and I visited Garney and Gayhart. Garney is an old pagan temple built to worship an Armenian pagan god that is kind of like Zeus. Gayhart is one of the oldest Christian churches in Armenia, built from the inside of a cave on the side of the mountain.  (Some of these pics were included in last post.)   It is super old and they still do animal sacrifices and baptisms there.

On Monday we were thinking a lot about Arus. She has taken all of the discussions from multiple sets of missionaries, but she keeps telling us that she doesn't feel ready even though we know she has a testimony. We invited her to continue reading, praying and coming to church, but we had to drop her because she was not progressing. I felt bad for Hayk because he and his mom were present for the lesson which was at a park. Some boys he knew saw us with him and started teasing him. It's hard being Mormon in Armenia. It's hard being Mormon anywhere. But I was impressed because he just ignored them and contributed to the lesson.

On Tuesday, we met with Lala. We are working with her to continue reading and remind her everyday when we call her. During the lesson, we read from the Book of Mormon with her and finished 1 Nephi. We also talked about the "tripod" (reading the scriptures, coming to church, and praying daily) and how she needs to be doing all three of these things to progress towards baptism. We were able to set a baptismal date with her for July 20th. She is really excited!

We had our district meeting and talked a lot about our purpose as missionaries. Elder Zachary had me teach the Gospel of Christ and how it is applicable to us as missionaries, and how we can use it to benefit our investigators.

(District)

Later, we went to Lilit's baptism (Elder Woolley and Elder Kopsa's investigator). Her husband was able to baptize her, but he had to do it multiple times and her little son kept crying and screaming the whole time. It is interesting to see how Satan tries to stop others from getting baptized. Arus came to the baptism, so we talked with her a little bit there.

We met with Marine on Wednesday. During personal study, I pondered a lot about what Marine needed to hear. I felt like reviewing the Restoration and having her read Joseph Smith's account in Joseph Smith History would really benefit her. As we started our lesson, we asked her to open with prayer and were happy to hear that she asked Heavenly Father to "help with her dream to be baptized." As we began the lesson, we had her read from the beginning of Joseph Smith History in hopes that she could relate to Joseph Smith and his desire to learn about which religion was true during that time of confusion. While reading, she stopped and said "I can relate to Joseph Smith!" We then continued reading and as we got to the part where the prophet tells of his vision, she asked if instead of taking turns reading, she could read this part by herself. We let her do so and halfway through, she got goosebumps and told us that she felt it was true. We pointed out that it was the Holy Ghost testifying to her. We stopped right after the first vision and then she asked if we could come back the next day to continue.

We had our last zone meeting with President and Sister Carter. We prayed for all of our investigators by name as a zone. President Carter's last advice to us was to "carry on" with love and continue in the work. Sister Clove, Elders Woolley and Koopsa and I sang Praise to the Man as the special musical number. I was glad I could participate in the Carters' last meeting somehow. I just love them!

On Thursday, we met with Marine again and continued our discussion on the Restoration. She told us about a dream that she had when she was fourteen years old. (One thing about Armenians is that many of them have very spiritual dreams. In my opinion, I think dreams are how Heavenly Father communicates to them since they were unable to have the truth in their country for such a long time.) In her dream, she saw her grandmother laying in a bed. There was an angel that appeared and walked over to her grandmother and placed his hand on her head. He looked to Marine and told her that her grandmother would die. Marine told him that she did not believe it because her grandma had always been really healthy and was not near death. The angel pointed behind him and the room opened up and showed a fiery pit. He told her that many people who are evil or don't accept God and die will go there. He told Marine that God knew her desires and that she did not want to go there, so throughout her life she would study to find the truth and come close, but that she would have regrets along the way. But that one day, God would send her two messengers with the truth and she would learn and be saved from the fiery pit. Soon after she had her dream, her grandmother passed away and she started studying with the Jehovah's Witnesses. She fell away from them and is now taking the discussions from us. She has come to church once, but can't get work off every Sunday. We are looking to find her a job which allows her to come to church on Sundays. She prays and has been reading from the Book of Mormon. She is really excited and we are planning on setting a baptismal date for her soon.

After our meeting with Marine, we met with Ashken, Elder Arshakyan's sister. Let me tell you about Elder Arshakyan. Before he was a member of the church, he was at a market looking at books. He saw that a street vendor had a Book of Mormon and that it is "Another Testament of Christ." He bought the book, read it in a week, found the church, walked in and asked to be baptized. Yeah, awesome right? He is a missionary here in Armenia and has been working on his family. Since he has been on a mission, his mom has gotten baptized. He is now working on Ashken, his sister. She is married and has two young sons. We already taught her the Plan of Salvation lesson and how she can be with her family forever. Elder Arshakyan recently had surgery on his leg and has been staying at home with her until he recovers and goes back on his mission. We visited them and taught her the Restoration lesson. It was great to have Elder Arshakyan there to help teach her sister. I think it is a real blessing for him to have that experience and to see her progress. We invited her to begin reading from the Book of Mormon. She invited us back the next day for another lesson.

We also met with Lala again and read with her from the Book of Mormon. We are helping her to set goals to read from it everyday so that she can keep progressing towards baptism. We are also helping her to see how she can use the Book of Mormon to answer questions she may have. We are going to teach her the commandments in our next couple of lessons.

On Friday, we met with Ashken and Elder Arshakyan again. Ashken had read the first few chapters of 1 Nephi. We taught the Gospel of Christ lesson. During the lesson, both she and Elder Arshakyan could feel the Spirit and Elder Arshakyan began crying as he bore his testimony at the end. I think it was a great experience for Ashken to see her brother's love for the gospel and desire for her to be baptized. We invited her to be baptized and set a day for July 27th. She accepted, but is unsure about what her husband will think (since he is very much against religion). We are fasting on Tuesday together with Elder Arshakyan so that Ashken's husband will soften his heart to the gospel.

Afterwards, we met with Gohar, an eleven year old girl. She is the granddaughter of our street contact, Lala. Gohar loves learning about Christ. She read all of the pamphlets we have given her and the Articles of Faith. She came to church last week as well. She told us that while she was sitting in church she was thinking that she wanted to be just like us missionaries. So cute! We taught her the Plan of Salvation and how we can be happy in life. She is such a sweet girl with a sincere desire to learn. She has also been helping me learn the colors haha. (I know, I can teach lessons, but I don't know my colors...) Next lesson, we are going to talk about the Restoration and invite her to begin reading the Book of Mormon.

On Saturday, we met with Marine again. We watched the Restoration video with her and talked to her about commandments. She had many questions about different commandments. We answered many of her questions and talked about how keeping the commandments helps us progress in this life and we receive blessings from Heavenly Father if we are obedient. We are going to begin covering the commandments in our next couple of meetings. Next meeting with her we plan on setting a steady baptism date for her.

We also met with Lala again. We continued reading with her and helped her recognize how the Book of Mormon can help answer her questions. Next lesson we will teach the commandments. 

On Sunday, Nane (a member) brought her daughter-in-law, Anahit, to church. She has come a few times before and is interested in the church. We are going to begin meeting with her this week. Lala also attended church. Ashken, Gohar and Marine were unable to make it. We will follow up with them about that. We watched the Mission Presidents' Seminar in Armenian and we also distributed our flyers for the ward activity on family history this week.

(some ward members)

On Sunday night, we met with Jess, Lance (brothers), Joe, Rebecca (married), and Colleen, recently baptized members of the church. We shared a spiritual thought on enduring to the end with them. 

We also met with Rima to help her continue practicing teaching from Preach My Gospel. She is super sweet and fed us rose petal juice. I didn't know that even existed! It looks better than it tastes if you're wondering.  haha.

So how is everything back home? TREVOR!! HAPPY EARLY BIRTHDAY! Have a great 17th birthday, kid! Our little firecracker!  I hope you all have a great fourth of July as well. I miss and love you all!

Love you,

Sister Morreall

Funny/crazy things:

They call and hang up fast so you call them back and they don't have to use their minutes.

It's bad luck to shake hands under the doorway.

They have fruit lavash which is like fruit rollups but way healthier and delicious.

When someone dies they leave the body in the house for three days with a bowl of the person's blood underneath their head. The family can't leave the house for forty days and the men don't shave or cut their hair. Before the person is buried, they spin the coffin three times.