MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM PITESTI!!!!!!!

Hey all! So I know that we'll be talking in just a few hours, but I've got this time to say something, I might as well right? Everyone else in the district talked to their families last night, so I'm the last one. Sounds like your Christmas morning was really nice! Mine was pretty good, the other elders spent the night at our apartment, and President Hill gave us permission to sleep in till 8:00! So we got up, made a Christmas breakfast of pancakes and German pancakes, opened presents, and then went to church.


Church was only an hour, and then the rest of the day was spent relaxing. Most of it was spent at the church where everyone was skyping with their families. We have a wireless connection there and Ani, one of the members here has a laptop she let us use. Actually, that's what I will be doing today. President Hill also gave us permission to watch a movie for Christmas, and so we're watching ours today at the end of our p-day and then after that I'll get on skype to talk to you guys!!! So I'll be on probably at like 6:00-6:30 tonight (my time). 


By the way, thank you tons for the peppermint bark, and the scarf that Ally made me is sooo awesome!!! I love it! It's incredibly thick, soft and warm. Perfect for a cold, humid Romanian winter. Well, I don't want to say too much, we gotta have stuff to talk about tonight! But, we also had a zone Christmas party on Friday that was really fun. I was able to see Sora Bedebone, Elder Simmons, Elder Johnson, and some other missionaries from my MTC group and people that I've served around. The Marcovs were there, they are the senior couple that were in Bacau when I served there. They've now been moved to Ploiesti which is really close to Pitesti and Bucuresti. 

Not much to say in the way of investigators. Everyone's busy until after the holidays pretty much. This is the last full week of the transfer! On Saturday we will find out who stays and who goes. Elder Martin and Elder Ekins will probably be leaving, since they've both been here for 4 transfers. That's 6 months! I would send you pictures with this email, but the library where we usually go for internet is closed today and the internet cafe we are at right now doesn't have very good computers. I'm not sure how good the virus protection is on them, if they even have any and I don't want to risk getting any viruses in any of my stuff. I'll send you lots of pictures next week for sure!! 

I love you all and can't wait to see you all tonight!

Love, Elder Myers

Vine Moș Crăciun!

That means "here comes Santa Claus!" My favorite holiday of the year is less than a week away! This Christmas is going to be a pretty exciting one for the Pitești branch. We're moving buildings this week and will be holding our Christmas service there this Sunday! That means that this week us missionaries will probably be helping with the move. Yay for service opportunities!!!!!!! Outside of teaching English it is sooooooo rare that we have opportunities to do any kind of volunteer service. People here just won't accept your help. You can't even help an old babă carry her groceries to the bus stop. It's kind of sad, I think it's one of the side-effects that communism and stems from a general lack of trust in people. In Romania most of the time of someone offers you their help it's because they want you to pay them afterwards. 

Anyways, wow what an intense week! I was shocked to here about Richard. I'm gald that you all think that 25 stitches and a broken eyebrow isn't too bad! I guess now that I think of it 3 guys against one, they definitely could have done a lot more damage if they had wanted too. I'm glad that he's recovering well. I'm sure Richard put up a good fight, he's not someone to give in. 


I've started reading the Bible from start to finish and I'm almost through the five books of Moses and reading about the way God dealt with the children of Israel seemed brutal and heartless at times but I've been coming to understand this truth -- God is love. Anything that God does is a manifestation of His love, even if that means consuming some of His own covenanted people with fire from heaven. What we have to remember is the scripture in Hebrews (I think, I can't remember exactly where it is) where Paul teaches us how God chastises those that He loves so that they can be humble, because without humility we can't come closer to God. 


And also the scripture in 1 Nephi, when Nephi is commanded by the Holy Ghost to kill Laban, but he hesitates, not wanting to take another man's life, and God reveals to him through the Holy Ghost that it is better for one man to perish, than for an entire nation to dwindle in unbelief. God truly is loving and merciful. Only those who don't open their eyes to an eternal perspective perceive God as an unfair and cruel being. 

In other news, there's not much to report of this week. We were able to visit with Dorin, and he's feeling much better. Georgetta, a lady from English class who stays for all the spiritual thoughts and took a Book of Mormon home and started reading it came to church yesterday! It seemed like she really liked it. When we see her on Tuesday we will try to set up a time when we can have a discussion with her. 


On Wednesday night, we switched companions for an exchange, me with Elder Staheli, and Elder Ekins with Elder Martin, and then on Thursday I ended up getting a fever which climbed up to 103 by the end of the day. I had Marius come over since he lives close to Elder Staheli's apartment and that's where we were staying and had him and Elder Staheli give me a blessing. Then until this morning I was pretty much bed ridden most of the time. By Friday my fever went down to around 100-101 and a couple times my temperature actually went down to normal, but would then climb back up the next day. By Sunday I was feeling well enough to go to church, but then spent the rest of the day inside. And now today I'm feeling much better. I wasn't the only one who was sick either. Everyone except for Elder Staheli got sick. None of them got as bad as I was though thankfully. Marius was concerned about me being sick, and called on the phone several times over the weekend to check on me. He's an extremely loving man with one of the biggest hearts I've ever seen. 

So that's pretty much it. Thanks for the words of wisdom given from the missionaries you ran into. That's something that I try to keep in mind as much as I can. And here's the deal with the Skyping. The church building has wireless internet, we just don't know the password. Right now we're working on getting that. So the plan is I will be on Skype Monday evening, probably anywhere between 6:00-8:00pm which is 8:00-10:00am for you guys I'm pretty sure. If anything changes then I'll just call you and let you know on like Christmas Eve or Day. I can't wait!!! On Friday we have our Zone Christmas party in București and I'm super stoked for that too!! Sadly it hasn't snowed yet, but there's still time! Hope you all have a beautiful week, have fun with Nana and Papa Graham, and Heather too. Send my love to everyone around you. I love you!

Love, Elder Myers

two weeks

TILL CHRISTMAS!!!!!!!!! So I guess my beloved family is too pooped from the Christmas party at Grandpa Gary and Grandma Linea's to email me this week. :P I'm just kidding, no worries! Hey just so you all know, President Hill emailed us all about Christmas phone calls, and he said that we can call/Skype pretty much any day right around Christmas since Christmas day is on a Sunday and in Romania, practically EVERYTHING shuts down on Sunday. And holidays. So, I was thinking it would probably be easier if we did it on Monday. Let me know next week and we'll get the details figured out. I'm excited to see you all! Just so you know, there's also a possibility that I will only be able to call on the phone. Pitesti doesn't have very many internet service providers, and I don't know how late they'll be open. We might be able to use a member's computer though. Well, grandma Linea sent me an email with a bunch of photos from the Christmas party, it looked like a lot of fun! Next year I'll be back there with everyone! That's a pretty fun thought. 

Well, what all happened this week? A lot, it seems like. We found out that the church will be moving buildings before Christmas. The new building is much bigger and in a better location, right on a main street that has a lot of traffic going by, it should be publicity for us. We're pretty much halfway through the transfer right now, and things are starting to pick up more for me and Elder Ekins. On Saturday we had an appointment scheduled with a less active family and we got their a good 30-40 minutes early. The weather wasn't too great, it was cold, cloudy and hardly anyone was outside, but we decided to take a circuit around the neighborhood to see if we could find anyone to talk to.


When we first got to the members block I noticed a guy sitting on a bench in front of the front door, and got the slightest feeling that it might be a good idea to talk to him but he was talking with a friend and I didn't want to bother him. So, we make our way around the neighborhood, gave out some pass along cards, but nothing too exciting. When we came back around to the member's block the guy was still sitting there and this time he was alone so we decided to go up and talk to him. We sat down on the benches by him and just struck up a conversation. His name is Cristian (kree - stee - on, Romanian equivilant of Christian), he's 30 years old, a really nice, polite and respectful person, and works at a kindergarden for kids with disabilities. Turns out that about 3 years ago missionaries had knocked on his door and givien him a brochure!! We talked with him for about 15 minutes and just got to know him a little better. After a few minutes three other guys, buddies of his came up and joined in the conversation. One them told us that he has a Book of Mormon, and they were all really nice, joking around with us, and at the least mildly interested in finding out more about what we believe in. 


But Cristian told us that he was really interested in learning more, and wanted a Book of Mormon. We gave him a brochure about the Restoration told him that if he had time the next day we coud give him a copy of the Book of Mormon and talk about it some more. He more than willingly agreed and the next day we had a lesson with him about the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith. It was a really good lesson. He told us that he had never understood why there were so many different churches and religions and he always wanted to find an answer. He agreed that there should really only be one, if there's only one God. He said he was really excited to start reading the Book of Mormon and try praying about it. He said he had never really tried praying just with his own words, he's always recited the Orthodox prayers, but he said he would start trying. Not only that, he PROMISED that he would read the Book of Mormon and pray about it. In Romanian culture, making a promise is a really big deal. If someone makes a promise then they really mean it. To them promising is in a lot of cases a bad thing because it is such a huge dishonor and pretty much one of the most rude and hurtful things you can do if you break your promise. The only downside is that he's going to be gone with his wife in Spain for two weeks, but he said that he would call us right when he gets back.

We also had a lesson with one of our English students, Iustin (Justin) about the restoration. We gave him a Book of Mormon and he said that he's very interested in learning more about it. He's married and has a son in 8th grade, and he and his son came to Family Night on Saturday. It seemed like they enjoyed it! Iustin is a kind of quiet, but really nice and very respectful. He was brought up in the Baptist, but doesn't really consider himself "Baptist" and is interested in learning about other religions. We are really hoping that we will be able to start sharing the gospel more with him, and with his family! 

On a more said note, we found out that, Dorin, the recent convert we've been meeting with, was in the hospital yesterday. We had a lesson scheduled with him for last evening, but his phone was off, and when we went to his apartment, no one answered. Finally later that night we were able to get a hold of his wife and she said that at 4:00 in the morning something went wrong with his heart. He takes high blood pressure medicine, and he had forgotten to take his pill and went into cardiac arrest or something like that. His wife had to call an ambulence and he was rushed to the emergency room. He seems to be doing ok now. We tried visiting him this morning but his wife said he was at some clinic for the morning. We'll probably go later this evening. 

That's pretty much it, we haven't been able to meet with Cristina, she busies all our phone calls and we can't set up a time to go visit her. I don't know, she probably saw some anti-church stuff or someone told her crazy things about us. That happens a lot. Tomorrow we're going to stop by E----'s work place and see if we can smooth things over. Other than that, things just keep movin on! 


Before I go I just want to say thank you for all those who have been sending me emails and letters, and I'm sorry that I haven't been writing back very much...It's hard to find time to write letters, but I'll get them out, no worries! Have a great week everyone!
Love, Elder Myers

La Mulți Ani România!

La Multi Ani celebration, Pitesti, Romania

That means happy birthday Romania! This week on the 1st of December was Romania's "national day," the equivilant of the 4th of July for US. It was awesome!! In București they put on a huge parade, but we weren't sure if anything was going to happen in Pitesti. Well, at around 4:30 Elder Ekins and I were passing out flyers for English classes when we saw a band setting up in front of the City Hall. We stopped for a couple minutes to check it out, and this man in a suit approached us inviting us inside the City Hall. They were holding some sort of art exposition and a free buffet so naturally, we said yes! We walked aournd a few minutes, the art was all mostly political anti-war type stuff, not bad, and then the Mayor gets up and gives a speech and toasts every one in the hall! After the toast we approached him, told him about the Book of Mormon and the Restoration, and he invited us to come teach his family!!!! ................Ok that part isn't true, but we really did meet the mayor! He asked us where we were from, how we learned Romanian, etc. It was pretty cool!

Romanian Folk Music, Pitesti, Romania

So then after that there was a big parade of a marching band and the Pitești military and law enforcement. After that the mayor gave a speech and there was a fireworks show and a Musică Populară (Romanian folk music) band started playing. Now, Romanian folk music is a very very unique genre. If you go on You Tube and type in musica populara you should be able to find some pretty easily, and you will recognize it right off the bat. Romanians absolutely love the stuff. They go crazy over it! A huge dance circle started up in front of the stage, and even the mayor was dancing with everybody!! So that was pretty cool. 

Other news, well E----- has pretty much dropped....kind of a ridiculous story. So the lady that introduced her to us,  V-----, is a landlady, and missionaries used to live in one of her apartments. She started investigating the church, and eventually wanted to be baptized. Well, the missionaries ended up moving out of her apartment because it wasn't that great and they needed a better one, but once they moved out V---- decided she wasn't going to get  baptized. Ever since then she's tried bribing the missionaries to get them to rent one of her apartments again.


Now, the other elders, Elder Martin and Elder Staheli have been planning to move out of their apartment and V---- has been wanting them to take hers, but they didn't want it. Sunday morning we got a call from V----telling us that she didn't think it was right that Elder Martin and Elder Staheli won't take her apartment and so we won't be able to meet with E---- anymore. I asked her if she had talked to E---- about this, she said she had and that she agreed completely. I have my doubts as to how much E--- actually knows about the situation so we're going to try giving her a call and seeing what she says. Probably one of the most ridiculous things I've ever seen happen with an investigator. We both had a feeling that something like this would happen when V---- first referred E---- to us, but we just decided to try it out anyways. And still, it's not totally over, but I don't really see much good coming out of it. Honestly, the whole thing just makes me laugh that V---- is that desperate to rent out her apartment that she would find us an investigator. That's definitely a first! 

Earlier this week we had exchanges with the zone leaders on Tuesday and Wednesday. Elder Ekins went to Buc with Elder Pettit, and Elder Johnsen stayed with me in Pitesti. We ended up having a really cool lesson with this lady in her 30's named M---- who was referred to us by the office. She was contacted by sister missionaries Buc during the summer and decided that now she wants to find out more about the church. She's had a pretty rough life and is in an even more rough situation now. She's a heavy smoker, drinker, has gotten involved in drugs, and is taking medication for bipolor disorder, and she wants more than anything to clean up her life. She was so incredibly open and just thirsting for the truth. She asked what she would have to do to get baptized, and we told her that she would have to quit her addictive habits, with which we could help her. She told us she wants our help, and she wants to come to church. She was also interested in what kind of activities our church does, service projects, etc. She's a really nice, sincere lady, I just hope that she will be able to overcome all of her problems. Anything's possible through Christ's atonement, but we're approaching this one with caution. This branch is so small that it can't really support someone who is not mentally stable. 

Those are some of the main highlights, there are more things I would love to tell you about but I don't have a ton of time....We haven't been able to get in contact with Sora R---- or her husband yet, and they didn't come to church so were still working on that, hoping that it wasn't just a fleeting idea on their part.

Shane in his apartment, Pitesti, Romania

I'm glad to here that Dad's feeling better, back at the racquetball! I miss playing that. And Heather's going to come down and visit! Jealous!! Say hi to her for me! Oh yeah, so you asked about the whole song writing stuff, well both these two times the first few lyrics have come to me in Romanian and then for the rest I have to make myself conceptualize it in Romanian as much as I can, otherwise the lyrics and the way the writing sounds has a distinct "english speaker" sound to it. It's incredible how much culture is infused with language and music. It's been really fun trying to capture the Romanian culture in these songs. Then for the music, in Bacau there was a guitar at the church I could dink around on here and there, but here we only have an electric piano so pretty much while I write the lyrics I have to imagine the melody and music in my head and then when I have time try to plunk it out on the piano. It's pretty hard trying to get the exact feeling and tones that I have in my head out and it doesn't always sound exactly how I wanted it to, but it's turning pretty good I think. I imagine it's pretty similar for you mom when you're painting and you have in your mind a certain way you want the painting to look and you can never get it exactly that way on the canvas. It's been fun though, and a good outlet for me. 

Ani, Elder Myers, Elder Ekins
at La Multi Ani celebration in Pitesti, Romania

 

Well that's it for now! I love you all and hope you have a beautiful week!! I've attached some more photos. The first one is me next to the little fake Christmas tree I bought for like 30 ron (that's about 10 dollars) and the others are from the parade. The girl in the photo is Ani, she's a member of a year, and such an awesome person! She helps us a ton with missionary work. I love you all!!

Love, Elder Myers

Salut!

Elder Ekins, Elder Myers, Branch Mission Leader,Marius
Pitesti, Romania

Hey everyone!! Man, sounds like you all had a pretty exciting Thanksgiving! Carissa gets called to Brazil, and Dad gets his appendix taken out! Way to take it like a champ, dad. Surgery one day, turkey dinner the next. That's how we do it in the Myers family! Thanks for the new excerpt from your book mom, it's coming along really well! Oh yeah, I have to apologize for sending Heather the lyrics to my song before I sent them to you...... oops! I translated it for her and I had intended to send them to you the same week but I forgot to copy down the lyrics in English before I mailed the letter to Heather. And the card...I still have to send that too. I'm actually going to see if I can fit the video in an email so you can get it sooner. And yes, I will remember to start having more pictures taken of me. I never think to get pictures of me on my camera to send back to you. I guess it makes sense that you would want to see ME on MY mission.


Oh yeah and guess what, this week I started writing another song in Romanian! Like the first one, the idea for it just kind of popped in my head one day. I was thinking about the most recent convert here in Pitesti who was baptised the weekend before I got transfered here and the incredible changes he went through and miracles he experienced. When Elder Ekins and Elder James taught him he was a former investigator who was an extreme alcoholic.  Within two weeks of meeting with the missionaries he had stopped drinking and smoking, got baptized, recieved the Aaronic priesthood, and just gave his first talk yesterday in church! It was phenominal, he spoke as if he had been a member of the church and living the gospel for years! He comes to church every Sunday and we meet with him once a week to teach him the recent convert lessons and his understanding of the gospel is just so inceredible. He is without a doubt a future leader of the church here in Pitesti. It was his conversion story that inspired the song I'm writing right now.


So this has been a pretty good week, we had a second lesson with E---  on Friday. It wasn't as spiritually powerful as the first one we had, we actually didn't get much teaching in because she talked so much but it was good to here more from her. It gave us an opportunity to learn more about her beliefs, and she shared some incredible spiritual experiences she's had in her life. I've found that it's just as important to get to know the person as it is to teach them because if you don't know what kind of a person you are and what kind of beliefs you have, you won't really be able to know how the gospel will help them and how to teach according to their needs. From this last discussion we had with her I feel like we were able to get a good feeling for what direction we need to focus the next lesson. 

Also yesterday at church an inactive sister came to sacrament meeting and brought her non member hustband! Sora R---- had come to church the past couple weeks but since then she hadn't been in years I think. I was able to talk to her and her husband and she said that she's been going through some really hard times and whenever that happens she always feels a need to get closer to God, so she decided to start coming back to church.  The husband told me that he'd been to church here before and it left a really good impression on him so now he feels like it will be a big help to him and his wife. What a miracle!! It is so incredible to say the way the Lord works in people's lives. It's always been hard for me to see people who have convenented with their Heavenly Father by being baptized into His Church and then fall away, but I've been seeing more and more examples of how powereful the healing effect of Christ's atonement can have on people. It gives me hope for those people who have let go of the ''iron rod'' and started their way towards the ''great and spacious building'' that is the pride of the world. God knows His children perfectly and knows how to help them best.

Sunrise from  Shane's apartment,
Pitesti, Romania

One last thing that happened this weekend. A senior couple from Ploiesti (a city near Bucuresti), actually the Marcov's who were in Bacau when I served their came up for the weekend to meet with the branch president, attend sacrament meeting and see how the branch is doing in terms of function and organization. Of course, I had to do all the translating for them as he met with President Georgescu (the branch president of Pitesti) and asked him questions about the branch organization, its strengths and weaknesses, and things to improve on. It was really interesting to learn more about how the Church is organized. I don't know if I ever said this but I never expected to learn how the run a branch/ward while on my mission!! I feel like a big part of my mission experience has been church leadership training.

That's about it for now. Just so you know I got your first package on transfer day! Thank you so much for the seasonings, Christmas music, etc.,and tell Nana that the chocolate she sent was absolutely delicious! I love you all and look forward to hearing from you next week!

Love, Elder Myers

Happy Thanksgiving!

Snow in Pitesti, Romania

Well, this transfer is pretty much over! Transfer day is this Wednesday, and I'm heading into number nine! In less than a month I hit my year mark of being in the country. It's really weird going into winter now. I keep having all the memories of my last weeks in the MTC and my first weeks in Romania, and it's kind of hard not to get a little homesick for both Cluj-Napoca and Durham. 


The mission just changed the way we find out about transfers, now the Zone Leaders will call us the Saturday before transfer week and tell us where we're all going, that way we have time to say good bye to members and investigators. I think that's how they do it in Adam's mission as well. So the day before yesterday I got a call from Elder Johnson and found out that our district is staying the same. No one is getting transferred out! I'm both excited and a little wary. This past transfer has been really challenging for me dealing with everything in the district and trying to understand my companion and fellow district members so that we can all be on the same track. I'm glad that I'm everyone is staying because I feel like I've made a lot of progress, getting to know everyone better, and I feel like we as a district have made improvement. Going on exchanges with Elder Martin and Elder Staheli really helped a lot. It gave me a chance to get some one on one time with them and talk to them about how they feel about things, and a lot of light has been shed for me on the whole situation.

This week didn't have too much going on....We're teacing English to a member who needs to learn it for a job he's applying for in January. He has a pretty hard living situation. He's a taxi driver and lives a good 40 minute maxi taxi ride outside of Pitesti and barely makes enough to provide for his family. His work hours are not the greatest, and he hardly has any time to be with his family or to come to church. He's a good man with a big heart and a lot of faith. 


The biggest highlight we had this week was the only lesson we had with an investigator. Her name is E--- and she's a friend of one of the other Elders' investigators, V---. We had the lesson at V---'s house, and it went sooooo well! The Spirit was really strong. Before we started, E--- offered to say the opening prayer, saying she had a prayer she had written before that she wanted to recite. We tried explaining to her that it would be better if she prayed using her own words, not something pre-prepared but she insisted and I didn't feel like pushing it would be a good thing. So she started reciting her prayer/poem, and after a while she took a long pause, and when she started back up again the prayer had a different feel to it. The Spirit was there instantly and I was pretty sure that she was now praying from her heart. When she finished she told something just happened that had never happened to her before. She had recited that very same poem many many times before and had never forgotten a word; but for some reason this time halfway through she completely forgot the words. She said it was as if she had been reading it off a piece of paper, and then the paper just cut off and there were no more words so she had decided to continue using her own words.


She started crying as she told this to us and we proceeded to teach her about the Holy Ghost and how it can place thoughts and feelings into our hearts and minds. For the rest of the lesson the Spirit was there so strong, and she was really receptive. She committed to reading the Book of Mormon and praying to know if it is true, and after we read in 1 Neph about Lehi's vision and explained to her what it meant,  we asked her if she found the Book of Mormon to be true would she be baptized. She said no, but that actually made me feel relieved. She said that she's always felt like she's been on God's path, that he's been there holding her hand and so she doesn't feel like she needs to join any church. We then explained that the Book of Mormon was written for us specifically in these days, and that even if she sees no reason to be baptized now, reading from the Book of Mormon and praying to know of it's truthfulness will only enrich the spirituality she already has in her life. She agreed to reading it, and to continue meeting with us. I feel confident that if she reads and prays with an open and sincere heart, then she will come to understand the importance of the Restoration and will see a need to be baptized by one holding God's authority. That was a huge spiritual boost for me and I'm excited to meet with her again! 

I have a feeling this next transfer will go by pretty fast, what with Christmas and New Years just around the corner. I also now know almost 99% positive that I will be here in Pitesti for at least 3 transfers, because this is Elder Ekin's 4th transfer here, and missionaries rarely stay in one area for more than that so once he leaves, I will have to be here to get a new companion because they won't want to whitewash my area. We'll see! 

Icy Pond in Pitesti, Romania

Well, that's pretty much all for now. This week's gotten pretty cold. It was -4 C Sunday morning and lightly snowing on our way to church. There is a pond in one of the parks here that is already freezing over! I've attached some pictures of it for you to see. I love you all and hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving! (No. Romanian's don't celebrate Thanksgiving :(  ) Say hi to everyone for me! Oh and about the whole Skype stuff, there's a member here who has a computer with a camera, so as long as we can get internet access at the church, we'll be able to Skype on Christmas!! 

Love, Elder Myers

Doamne Ajuta

"Doamne ajuta" is a salutation that Romanians use a lot. It means "the
Lord helps" or "May the Lord help you." I've always liked the fact that
however lightly and nonchalantly it is taken, faith in God and Jesus
Christ are very much a central part of Romanian culture. Even if most of the
people don't really go to church or live their religion, the idea that
there is a God who created us and that there is a Savior who suffered for
our sins is still a big part of the Romanian world. I feel like it really
is such a unique culture, and there are many things that I love about it.
There are many things about it that drive me crazy, but I've always been
one to try to focus more on the positive side of things.


It's been a real challenge being a missionary for God's Restored Church and not becoming
negative or cynical. How blessed am I that I have such amazing parents
and an amazing mission president who are inspired to always know just how
to help me. In today's weekly email, President Hill talked about measuring
success and how it is not measured just by how many baptisms you have or
investigators you have. He referred to the parable of the sower in Matt. 13
which I have studied and thought a lot about on my mission and encouraged
us to see how it doesn't matter whether or not the people accept our
message, what matters is whether or not we are conveying that message
clearly and powerfully through the Holy Ghost. Which ties back perfectly
into the things that both of you said about being a part of setting the
foundation, and preaching the gospel through the power of the Holy Spirit
of Promise. 


The fact that one of the Holy Ghost's names is the Spirit
of Promise, has a very big importance, especially in missionary work.
Through sacred covenants made at baptism and in the temple we are making
promises to God, and God is making promises to us. And those promises are
sealed by the Holy Ghost who bears record of all truth and of the Father
and the Son. The Spirit is essential in what we do as missionaries. Through the promptings of
the Spirit we make promises to those that we teach that they will recieve
an answer from God that the Book of Mormon is true, and that they will
receive blessings for keeping the commandments.


 There have been times when
people have told me that I can't promise them that God will answer their
prayers. Who am I to say what God will or won't do? That is when I 
wish I could make them understand the calling that I have, and the
truth that has been witnessed to me by the Holy Spirit of Promise -- that I
am representing the Saviour in a very literal way. Not to boast of myself
or of my calling. I will be the first to confess that I am not a perfect
missionary or the perfect example of the Savior by a long shot. I'm just 
like everyone else, I have weaknesses and I have strengths,
sometimes I make good decisions, often times I make bad decisions. I have
always felt, and always will feel like I will never be able to fill the
shoes I have been called to wear, but that's the whole point isn't it? 



In Heather's last email to me she talked about Paul confessing his own
weaknesses and saying that the Lord's grace is sufficient for all of us. As
long as we do our part, of course. In Ether 12 (one of my favorite chapters
in the BoM) Moroni teaches us how God gives us weaknesses so that we can be
humble. Humility, is really such a great gift. It allows us to become more
like the Savior because when we see our weaknesses, we can then understand
other people's weaknesses and we have an opportunity to put
ourselves in their shoes.


 So yes here am, brick by brick, contributing
to the foundation of God's Church in Romania. Ever since I came here I
realized that there is a good chance I will not see many results from my
labor for a long time, but I take comfort in the promises that were made to
me in my patriarchal blessing, and I continue to do my best every day. I'm just so incredibly grateful
that Heavenly Father is a merciful God, and understands when I fall and
make mistakes, because let me tell you, I fall a lot, and I make a lot of
mistakes, but I always do my best in any situation.

Well I wish I had more time to tell you more details about what actually
happened this week, but the clock is ticking and I have to go. I love you
all so much, and wow I can't believe that Aunt Eva wants to make that
contribution to me! Tell her that I am so incredibly grateful for her
selflessness and charity. I hope you have a wonderful week, good luck with
the writing mom! Even if you don't make the quotas don't stop writing, your
going to write a really, really good novel. 


Love,
Elder Myers

Happy November!

Curtea de Arges, Pitesti, Romania

Thanks a ton for all the adorable pictures of Ember and Tristan! And those first few paragraphs of your novel were captivating mom. I'm not just saying that! I don't think that not reading any fiction for a year has dulled my sense of literature, if anything I'd say it has sharpened it. I loved the analogy you carried through with the spider, and just from those few paragraphs you learn a lot about your writing capabilities, as well about the character's personality. I never thought that a discription of a college student going to class could be filled with so much detail. Keep it up, it's going to be a really good novel! To be truthful, it was really refreshing reading the product of someone else's creativity. I miss so much not having hours in each day filled with creating something. Sometimes during the day I'll have a song idea or just random tunes running through my mind that kind of make up the soundtrack to my day but I never have any time or the capability of taking it any further. Oh well, I guess I'll have the rest of my life to do that right? 

These past few weeks have been fairly cold. In the mornings it will get as low as 2 or 3 degrees Celcius, and throughout the day it's usually between 8-10 degrees. Sooo I guess respectively that would be mid-low thirties in the morning, and then mid-high 40's during the day? I love seeing all the fall colors around. There are a lot of trees in Pitesti for a Romanian city. Last week we never ended up carving pumpkins -- we couldn't find any! So we ended up playing pool for a while and just staying in the apartment. Today, however we went to this place called Curtea de Arges where there is a famous monestary, actually it is depicted on the back of the 1 leu note. That was pretty cool, we met two Americal girls, Rachel and Justeen, who were teaching English in Istanbol that were spending a few vacation days in Romania! That was super random, but it was cool to talk to them and hear about what Turkey is like. One of them lived in Ukraine for a while too. They told us that they were in Brasov the other day and ran into missionaries there too! 

Curtea de Arges, Pitesti, Romania

This week week has been pretty challenging, and in the end we still don't have any investigators. We had a miracle lesson on Tuesday in the blocks. The four of us were doing group block knocking, where we will both knock blocks next to each other and see who will get a lesson first. We would switch companions every other block and while Elder Staheli (Elder Martin's companion) and I were together, the second door we rang on the intercom opened up the door to the block, and when we knocked on the apartment door they immediately let us in. We taught the Restoration to a family of four, the parents in their early 40's, a 14 year old son, and a 10 or 11 year old daughter. This was the first time someone had let me in their apartment in I don't know how long. The lesson went really well, the Spirit was really strong and they were such nice and open people. We brought up things like why we don't drink or smoke, and talked a lot about how the gospel has blessed our families. The father did most of the talking, and at one point he asked us "ok, so really, why are you here? You want me to change my religion right?"  He then talked about how his family has been Orthodox for over a hundred years and that we had some nerve asking them to change their religion.  I asked him if God told him that the Book of Mormon was true, and that this church was His true church if he would change religions, and he said yes. So we left the Book of Mormon with them asking them to read from it and pray about it. They said they would. We then set up a return appointment for Friday at 7:30 pm. 

Then at the end of the lesson, we find out that the little daughter plays the guitar! So she brings it out and I played my Romanian song for them, which they loved. I went home that night feeling more happy, excited and satisfied than ever before! And all throughout the week I kept just thinking about that family, and actually getting pretty nervous about what would happen. I was convinced that I had finally found someone that was truly prepared to recieve the gospel at that time and I felt like it was such a huge answer to my prayers.


Then, on Friday about an hour before the scheduled appointment the dad called us and told us that he had talked with his family and they decided that they would not change religions and we didn't need to come over that night. The higher the climb, the greater the fall, and after that phone call I was crushed. I didn't know what to think, what to feel, anything. I just layed on our couch for a good 20 minutes processing everything. Then I went into another room and offered up one of the most sincere, heartfelt and pleading prayers I have ever given. Saturday I did my best to pull myself together, to make myself have the desire to do any kind of missionary work at all.

We ended up playing soccor for a couple hours with some kids, and then that evening one of the members, Marius, who is the Branch mission leader, planned a family night so we went to that as well. The excerise mixed with the games and laughter at the family night porved to be exactly what I needed to help me put myself back together. Sunday went by, pretty much just an average day, we were able to visit a less active member with Marius. She reminded me a lot of the Nuti girls from Brasov, if you remember when Elder Simmons and I taught them. And today, today was nice. Right now I'm just trying to figure out how to balance everything. Being a District Leader, a companion, a friend, a branch member.


 I really liked what you shared from Steve Young's talk dad, and from reading that I kind of feel like a lot of my inner struggle and failures have been because I've been putting too much focus on my own performance and haven't been reaching out to my companion or the other Elders or the members as much. So far my whole time here in Pitesti I've felt distanced from the branch and the district, and I think a good portion of that is my own fault. 

Thanks for the perspective-broadener, as always. It also really helps me to know that you went through similar experiences on your mission, dad. And what you said about being a parent and having to watch your kids go through struggles helped me understand why I feel like my prayers haven't been answered, and I why I've been feeling like I haven't been receiving much guidance from on high. I'm starting to understand what it means when Heavenly Father steps back for a while and lets you do more of the work. It also gives me just the slightest glimpse of what it must have felt like for the Savior, when he was suffering on the cross and for those last seconds of the Savior's mortal life the Father drew His Spirit away. Christ spent the last moments of His life completely and utterly alone. I can't even imagine what that would have been like. Even Christ Himself cried out in anguish, "Father, why hast thou forsaken me?" I guess the fact that God is in a sense "leaving me alone" is a good sign that I am doing my best, and that I am doing enough because he trusts me enough to make it through my trials with as little help as possible. Right now I can't really say that realizing all this makes it any easier, but at least I'm understanding a little more why I'm going through these challenges. 

I hope you all have a wonderful week, and here's some pictures of the monestary we visited!

Love, Elder Myers 

Happy Halloween!!

Halloween party in Pitesti, Romania

How perfect is it that Halloween has fallen exactly on P-day?! Today we're going to by some pumkins from the piata, take them back to our apartment and carve them! I'll send you some pictures of them next week. Sounds like you all are getting ready for an awesome Halloween! On Saturday the branch had a Halloween party, and it had a pretty good turn out. There were only a few members, but the few members that came brought a bunch of friends! We played some games like bobbing for apples and the one where you have to eat a doughnut hanging from a string without using your mouth. It was pretty fun, it was also one of the most chaotic social functions I've ever been to. Lets just say that Romanians have a very different concept of how to plan and organize a party!

That's awesome that the journal turned out so good, I'm sure Raul will be really exited to get it! It's so weird thinking about things back in Brasov, I'm just totally out of the loop. I don't even know if he's been baptized yet! It was supposed to be last Saturday I think. Thanks for sending me that summary, I can't wait to read excerpts from your first chapters! It sounds like you've got a good intrigueing and attention-catching plotline planned out. Just from reading those two sentences I can only imagine all the different things you can do with the story. It almost sounds like it's got a little bit of a Hunger Games flavor to it. Good luck writing!! 

Wow, so it's the last day of October, and we're about halfway through the transfer already! You asked what we've been doing for p-days, and the answer would be not a whole lot. My first week we went bowling at one of the malls, last week we just stayed in my apartment and played Monopoly, and then this week we're carving pumpkins, like I said. There are a couple of cool places that we'll go to eventually, there's a monestary close by that is depictied on the back of the 1 leu note, and theres also a fortress that was owned by Vlad Tepes, so we'll be going those eventually. I kind of want to wait until it snows to go there, because it would be sooooo pretty. Plus two of the Elders here have already been to both places, and they'll probably be transfered out next transfer. 

This week's been pretty eventful, on Monday night the zone leaders Elders Johnson and Pettit (Elder Johnson was one of my zone leaders with Elder Vekony when I was in Brasov and Elder Pettit is in the MTC group ahead of me) came up for exchanges. I spent Tuesday out with Elder Johnson, and he really helped me a lot. I have a ton of respect for him, he's definitely one of the missionaries I've really looked up to in my mission. He helped me understand the Romanian culture a little better, and he helped me start to kind of pull myself out of this rut I feel like I've been in. Mainly he helped me improve my attitude about everything. He helped me realize that a big part of the reason why the work has been so dissappointing and frustrating for me is because I haven't been having very much faith that my day to day efforts are really making a difference. He told me how he was in my exact same position, in his third transfer of being senior companion, and things were going pretty rough for him. He told me that what was bringing him down was that he didn't have any faith in himself, that what he was doing on a day to day basis was really making a difference; and  that once he realized that he started to change is attitude, and things really started picking up.


The next couple days after that exchange, I decided that I was going to change my attitude about the work, and people started coming out of nowhere that we would talk to on the street and who would listen to us and tell us that they actually WOULD like to meet up and to hear our message. This week we've met a couple families that hopefully will eventually become more interested and read the Book of Mormon, and things just felt better over all. Towards the end of the week things started slowing down again, and I found myself starting to slip back into the negative attitude and mindset I had before but now I know how to recognize that, and I know how to combat it.


So then a day after the exchange, President and Sister Hill and the Assistants came to Pitesti for interviews, and those went really well too. President Hill is such an incredible man, and does so much to really try to understand and get to know the missionaries in the mission. Then Saturday was the Halloween party. Oh yeah, and then Saturday night/Sunday morning was the end of daylight savings. No one in my district knew about it, and so we all showed up to church an hour early! It was weird when what we thought was 10:00am rolled around (that's when church starts) and there were maybe three members at the church.

Right now, mom and dad, I just want to give you a big thank you. Gosh, reading my weekly emails must be stressful for you lately, they've pretty much just been me being dramatic and talking about all the problems that are going on. I'm really sorry. Thank you for always emailling me back with encouragement and a positive attitude! Thank you so much for your advice, dad. Just so you know, the analogy you shared in that quote made perfect sense, and really helped me understand the situation I'm in better. 

Thanks once again, and I hope that your don't worry too much over me... things have been hard lately, but deep inside I know that I can always turn to the Lord for help. And let me tell you, I've never put so much value and importance on my prayers as I do now. I have learned to make prayer my emotional outlet, since I don't really have a guitar with me, and I have been developing a stronger testimony of the power and necessecity of prayer than I have ever had. I know that Heavenly Father always listens, and that's the key. He always LISTENS, which means that He always understands me and he knows how to help me the best. 

I love you all so much, and am looking forward to some pitctures of Halloween next week!

Love, Elder Myers

P.S. Here's some pictures from the Branch Halloween party!

Buna Dimineata!!!

Pitesti, Romania Oct. 2011

Hey everyone! 
Well, I guess Dad must have a pretty heavy workload tonight, I'm still waiting on an email from him, but no worries. I really really appreciated what you said in your letter, Mom. These past couple weeks have been really challenging for me, and as always you've helped me to remember that my feet are supposed to be below me, on the ground, and that sometimes you just have to put one of them right in front of the other rather than trying to invent a new way of walking. 
I completely agree with what Sara said. This year has gone by really fast, but in some ways it has gone very slowly. Because I've spent so much time walking around and contacting people on the streets, in the blocks, and at people's houses I've had a lot of time to think. Sometimes that's a good thing, sometimes that's a really bad thing. I always tend to overthink things whenever I'm faced with challenges, and that usually only makes it worse.


Something that being on a mission has helped me to do though is to make decisions quickly and confidently. For example, when you see someone on the street and the Spirit tells you to talk to them, you don't have time to sit and think about what the best thing to say to them would be. You just have to walk up to them, open your mouth, start talking, and hope you don't end up looking like a fool. More often than not, when this happens they end up rejecting me before I get two words out, but every once in a while someone listens. Sadly, even then most of the time when that happens the people still reject me and my message, but I guess what is important is that I was acting as a vessel for the Holy Ghost. It's really hard not to be apprehensive about talking to people and knocking on people's doors when most of the time you receive very, very rude responses; but, I know that this is what I'm called to do, and I know that I'm never left alone. 


Nevertheless, I think one of my main goals is to come back home with the same hope for Romania that I came in with, and to not become cynical. I hate cynicism, and yet I've found myself developing that kind of an attitude about missionary work in this country from time to time. 

Park near Shane's current apartment in Pitesti, Romania 

A really cool experience that happened to Elder Ekins and I the other day while we were out searching for an in-active member and contacting along the way. We were walking through a small neighborhood park when a family of a mom, dad, and a little daughter who couldn't have been much older than 3 walked past us. The parents passed us, but the little girl stopped in the middle of the path and just stared at me and Elder Cox for at least a whole minute. The parents tried to get her to come to them but she would just whip her head right back to us and stared me square in the eyes. I tried saying hi to her, and she would let out a little smile here and there until her parents finally took her by the arm and pulled her towards them. We went after them and told them that we have a message to share about how families can be eternal, and they just told us no thank you, but as we walked away the little girl would turn back every once in a while and give us a huge smile.


I had some similar experiences in Brasov when I was serving with Elder Cox. One time we were contacting in a big park and a man was walking his little daughter who was around the same age as the other girl I just talked about. We were about ten feet away from them when the little girl saw us, got this huge grin on her face and came running straight toward us with her arms stretched out. I probably could have held out my arms and she would have fully embraced me, but her dad caught up to her and kept walking past us. She too kept looking back at us with a radiant smile. 

Then there was another time when we were on the bus, and a little toddler aged girl was with her dad sitting right behind us. She would turn around and touch our heads, to get us to turn around and look at her. We would play "peek-a-boo" like this and every time we turned around she just busted into giggles. On top of these three experiences there have been so many times when we are walking past families with babies or small kids, or contacting them and the kids will just stare at us, or give us shy little smiles. They must see something their parents don't. They completely recognize us as servants of the Lord and radiate an unconditional love towards us that is one of the most precious and touching things I have seen on my mission. If only they could communicate to their parents the importance and joy of the message we have to share.

Well my time is pretty much up. I'm sorry I don't have much more to say....tonight the zone leaders are coming down for exchanges! Hopefully with six missionaries in the city for a whole day we will be able to get things picking up a little more. I've attached a few fotos that I've taken around Pitesti. There's a gorgeous park here that is pretty much just a big forest. 


I love you all, and hope you have a wonderful week! Oh yeah, I remembered one more thing I would like with the package, if it's possible. CHRISTMAS MUSIC!!!!!!! I'm so excited for Christmas! 


Elder Myers