Zone Conferences with the Area President!

It was such a fantastic week and I was able to learn so much! 

On Monday we were able to meet with a few of our great investigators.  We were able to start by eating some really good peach cobbler and then we were able to teach the plan of salvation!  It was really good and we committed them to come to read Alma 40-42 and to pray about the truth of it.  They were able come to all 3 hours of church and they really seemed to like it.  The talks were really great and we were able to have a good 3rd hour where we spoke about the Self Reliance program.  On Monday night, we were able to meet with a new investigator that we found on the street a few days before.  He is really open to learn and wants to find out if there is a good, in his words, "I want to believe."  We spoke about the Restoration and he liked it, we are going back tonight.

On Tuesday we were able to meet with someone else who was given to us by the sisters.  She is older and we are really trying to find out what her needs and concerns are.  She has been taught everything and just has a few things that are holding her back from being baptized.  I really think she can get there, she is reading daily and she is praying about baptism.  We were also able to meet with another of our families as well. They are striving to have family prayer together every single day and they told us they were all going to come to church. 

On Wednesday and Thursday we were able to have the Zone Conferences with Elder and Sister Johnson.  They along with the Szabadkais were able to instruct us so well and I really left the conferences being filled with the spirit.  Some of the quotes from him that I really liked, were, “We can’t learn the Gospel without living it…In order for someone to have a converting testimony he/she needs to live what he/she is learning" (he compared this to wanting to go to the NBA without putting in any work),  “In order to understand teaching, we need to understand learning... We are not here to just teach the gospel but to ensure that these people are learning”,  “Being a perfectionist is a losing proposition, you can’t do it, but Christ can."  Sister Johnson said,  “Life is hard, not the Gospel”, “We need to obey with honor and exactness”, “We can’t change others, but we can change ourselves, and when we change ourselves, others will be sure to follow.”  President was able to speak about how as missionaries we are participating in every part of the harvest, not just planting the seeds or harvesting, but every part (and every part is so wonderful).  Sister Szabadkai was able to speak of Humility and how to combat pride.  We spoke about some of the points in my favorite talk, "Beware of Pride" by President Benson.  It was amazing.  On Wednesday, President Johnson had an interview with elder Lowe and I and then us together and then he was able to come and inspect the apartment (he said he was impressed).

On Friday, we were able to have the MLC meeting and there president Johnson spoke on leadership.  He said that the way he can tell if a mission is good is if he would feel comfortable having one of his grandchildren serve there.  He then told us that he would love to have one of his grandkids serve here. I am so blessed to be here with the Szabadkais, they are amazing!   We were also able to give a training and it went well. 

I love you all so much and have a great week! 

Gentry elder

Transfers!!! (this was from his letter on 3/12/2018)

Well it was a really great, busy week! Transfer weeks are always some of my favorite weeks of the transfer because you get to see so many new faces and get you meet all of the new missionaries.  We were able to pick up 6 wonderful new missionaries at the airport on Tuesday!  It is 3 elders and 3 sisters and they are full of fire and ready to go!  We were able to go streeting a little bit and I am always so impressed at how sincere the testimonies are of the new missionaries.  They do not know how to say a lot, but what they say is true and is from the spirit, you do not need to be a master at the language to be a great missionary that is for sure.  That night, we were able to have a wonderful meal provided to us by sister Szabadkai!  We were able to go around the table and bear testimonies and it was a really wonderful experience (all the new missionaries bore it in Hungarian which was so cool to see).  Then elder Lowe and I took them up to the castle in Buda and there we read the dedicatory prayer for Hungary given by President Nelson in 1987.  

On Wednesday, we were able to give a training to all of the to be trainers.  After we trained them, the new missionaries came in and were paired with their trainers, it literally feels like it was just yesterday that I was a new missionary and they told me that I would be going to serve in Győr with elder Ure!  After that, we took the Érd sisters to their apartment (they are whitewashing it so they had many bags).  That day we did a lot of planning, etc. and that evening we were able to have an absolutely amazing dinner with the departing missionaries!  Sister Szabadkai made hortobágyi palacsintas and they are literary so so so good, I will have to make them when I come home, they just will not be as good as Sister Szabadkai's cooking!  That night we took the departing missionaries up to Gellért hill and took some pictures.  

On Thursday, we had a really wonderful meeting with the Szabadkais where we discussed the preparation we will need to do for President Johnson's visit this upcoming week!  President showed us this really motivational video that Lou Holtz (I forgot how to properly spell his name, he coached at Notre Dame, works for ESPN, and has a lisp).  It was really inspirational and it got us really pumped up! 

We were not able to meet with a ton of people this last week but the teachings we had were great!  We were able to find a new investigator yesterday and the other investigators are progressing well.  I love you all so much, have a great week!!  

Interviews and Baptism!!!

It was a really really great week!  I am so happy to be able to stay in Buda again with Elder Lowe!  I love it here so much and I truly think that we are going to see a lot of miracles this upcoming transfer, I am really excited.  I love it here so much and I love being able to be around the Szabadkais because I can learn so much from them.  They are great examples to me and I am grateful that I can be with them.  

We were able to have interviews this week up here in Buda.  Elder Lowe and myself were able to have a 45 minute meeting with each of the companionships in the mission.  We were able to review all of their area books and every missionary planner and were able to review the principles of organization, planning and accountability.  It was super amazing and I was able to learn a lot of things from the missionaries as well.  We have such a good mission the missionaries really do strive hard to be diligent.  President Szabadkai has done a really great job of creating a culture of obedience that is super amazing to be a part of.  In one of the trainings a little while back (I may have already quoted this but I love it so much), President said that the key to happiness is 1. Faith in Jesus Christ 2. Obedience 3. Work.  I love that so much and it is something that I want to apply for the rest of my life.  As president says, " If you are not happy as missionaries, then I would ask you to repent!" I love that council so much!  If we are not happy, then we need to change something in our lives to be in better harmony with the Savior and his teachings!

We were able to have Krisztina's Baptism on Saturday and that was super amazing!  Csepai András baptized her, and the bishop confirmed her on Sunday!  She was able to bear her testimony in Sacrament meeting and it was so amazing, she is so amazing and so prepared.  Yesterday we had a Zone Day for the Budapest Zone!  We got our goal!  We played basketball and football at the stake center, and then we watched the movie Megamind, it was funny.  Yesterday evening we had family night at the Szabadkais!   We had some investigators there.  We spoke about overcoming problems in Christ, we read about Ether and also talked about the Brother of Jared.  We also spoke about Baptism.  It was great!  Now we are going to the airport to pick up the new missionaries, it will be awesome!   I love you all so much, have a great week!

Gentry elder 

It was truly a really fabulous week!  The best thing that happened this week was definitely one of our awesome investigators!  When we were on exchanges a few weeks back, Elder Lowe and Elder Garrett were able to tract into a woman from Romania.  She lives really close to the branch house and lives right now with her daughter and her two daughters, let us not forget there giant Akita dog.  The grandmother is the definition of being prepared!  She has been baptized into a couple of churches and has been searching for the truth for years but has not been able to find it.  She said that the 1st time she was in church she was looking for a mistake in the way that we did things (like she was able to find in the other places she attended), however, she was not able to find any (it is almost like this is the true church or something like that :).  We were able to bring up baptism with her this past week and we invited her to be baptized on the 3rd of March, she accepted.  She drank coffee, however, ever since she heard that coffee was not allowed in the gospel, she says she fills sick whenever she drinks it, she does not drink it at all now, the spirit really works.  Her daughter also wants to be baptized but we are going to give her a little bit more time.  The Lord truly placed them in our path!  

We were also able to go to Miskolc this past week.  I was able to be with Elder Terry from my MTC group and we were able have a good exchange.  We were able to find many potential investigators and were also able to find a new investigator over there in Miskolc.  It was a bit snowy on the way over there and on the way back but the Lord was totally able to watch over us and it was all ok. 

We were able to have many teaching appointments this past week and the investigators all seem to be progressing really well (the biggest problem right now is getting them to come to church as they all, or at least most, will say they will come, however, in church last Sunday we only had 2 investigators). 

We were able to meet with many other investigators this past week where we discussed the Plan of Salvation and the truths and blessings that come from the Book of Mormon.  We are teaching one family that is half American and half Hungarian (the mom is from America).  We had to meet with one investigator in a restaurant as our member wasn’t able to attend as something came up.

 The Lord is blessing us so much and we are working hard.  Have a great week and I love you tons!! 

Gentry elder 

Új érdeklődők megint! (New Leads Again)

It was another really wonderful week this past week and the Lord again honored us so much! 

On Tuesday we were able to host the Dunaújváros elders for an exchange here in Buda.  I was with Elder Neumiller and we were able to focus on talking with everyone and having effective studies.  We were able to find some super cool potential investigators  and we had a really great lesson with a wonderful family.  We were able to originally meet them in the summer, however, they got super busy and were not able to meet for about 3 months. They have a daughter who is 8 years old that asks very intellectual questions.  We met with them (the daughter was at her grandmas house though) and taught about the restoration, it was great!  Then we were also able to meet with another investigator.  We had planned to speak about the Plan of Salvation, however, the spirit took it another way and we spoke about the Word of Wisdom.  She said she would try to live according to it and at the end of the lesson we gave her a blessing of strength (to live according to the word of wisdom) and of healing (her eye was bugging her). It also went well.

On Wednesday we were able to greet the new Hugnarian missionary, elder Rusz!  I sent a picture of me with both of the Hungarian missionaries (elder Katics and elder Rusz).  He is serving in Békéscsaba and is going to do a really good job, he is actually from the Buda ward originally.

We were able to meet with a couple other new investigators on Saturday (found from tracting and streeting) and both of those lessons went really really well.  On Sunday we were able to have a really amazing church session.  Johanna was able to speak and it was literally so amazing!  She spoke about the role the Book of Mormon had in her conversion and about how God knows what is right and how we do not need to rely on our own strength.  President taught priesthood and he spoke about what it means to show forth true love towards our fellow men.  Love equals time and in order to truly love we need to put off the natural man and become saints.  

I love you all so much and wish you all a great week!! 

Gentry elder

Zone Conference Week

This post was written on February 5, 2018 (we're a bit behind...)

It was a really amazing week for us and the Lord honored us so much.  Every day (Monday to Friday) we were able to take part in a 5 hour zone conference!  They were really really great and I learned so much!  Elder Lowe and I were able to give a training in every one of those conferences on the importance of finding.  Everyone on earth is our brothers and sisters and they need to be reminded of the truth that we have been blessed with.  It is our duty to open our mouths and raise a warning voice to as many people as our Heavenly Father puts in our path.  That was the basis of our training and the Zone Conferences in general were really amazing. 

On top of Zone Conferences, we were able to do some really great work this week and the Lord honored us more than I can express in this letter.  We were able to get a total of 9 new investigators this last week and we had 3 of them in church.  The coolest story happened with a single mom and her son.

They met with the missionaries about 1 year ago and we felt like we should look them up. When we arrived in the area, we were able to search for their home but were not sure which one theirs was.  I then saw a mom and a son going into a house and I had a feeling to follow them in.  It turned out to be the right house and the mother and son turned out to be the mother and son we planned to look up.  We had a great lesson that day and we came back on Saturday with a member who helped a lot.  They were able to come to church and they loved it.    

This work is so amazing and I am so honored to be a participant in it.  I love you all and wish you a wonderful week!!!  

Gentry elder 

As the title said, we were able to get a new car this past week.  I told to myself that I would not drive a Hybrid in my lifetime, however, I am doing it and it actually drives really really well!!  It is a toyota yaris 2018 and is pretty fun to drive.  The only problem is that it does not have a built in CD player and our phones are too old to be able to access its Bluetooth. It is ok though because we listen to the ipod that you all sent me #alliswellinzion

This week we were also able to make a new edition of the Hungary Budapest Mission Handbook.  We were able to get it all printed and it is ready to give to all the missionaries at Zone Conference this week. 

We were also able to hold a good Mission Leadership Council this past week where we were able to discuss the weekly planning session, goal setting, the daily planning session, and using time wisely.  It was really good, went for 5 and a half hours and I learned a lot!

We also were able to find 3 new investigators this past week.  One is a man that is originally from California but is no teaching English here in Hungary.  The we were able to meet with someone after English class and we found another while tracting, she told us to come back and we did.  

Our other investigators are doing well. 

I love you all so much and wish you all a csodálatos hetet!!  

Gentry elder