Christmas Commitments and Country Line Dancing

This week we didn't have nearly as many chances to teach as we wanted, but it was good anyways -- we talked with a whole bunch of people on the street. We had a cool thing happen. Our former engagee lives in a small ville outside of Narbonne, and doesn’t have a cell phone, so after he dropped the first Rendez-vous it was almost impossible to get a hold of him. So the fourth time we tried, was the last time. We decided that we couldn’t afford to keep going out there for nothing. He was there!! He said that was his last day before he moved to Perpignan, so we were able to give him those elders his number and teach and testify one last time about the Book of Mormon to him before he left!

This was a super cool experience. Plus we talked with his cousin, a very sad person. He was telling us how he does a lot of bad things, because he's unhappy, but would quit if he could find a girlfriend or wife and family. We tried telling him that the best way to find happiness was to quit all those things before hand, and try to find Heavenly Father. He said there’s no way he could do that, he'd be too unhappy for the time in between. It struck me, and made me think of Ether 12:6, how the reward doesn’t come until AFTER the trial of our faith. Later we taught a lesson in church on missionary work. We didn’t know we were going to beforehand, but go figure. It was good. Life is good here in the south of France.

This week we got transfer calls, and I'm staying a third transfer in Narbonne, still with Elder Taylor, so that's super awesome, I'm excited to stay here! One of the biggest reasons is because we set a baptismal date with one of our ami's this week, he's been taking the lessons for a long time, but only just now committed! The date is set for Christmas Eve, so I'm praying that I get to stay one more transfer to be able to see it happen!

French Countryside

We also had an American Night this week with the Branch, which was super fun. We had hot dogs, played some card games, and taught them how to country line dance! Funny seeing all these French members trying to dance like Cowboys. I was considered the authority on proper technique because I'm from Texas, so that was interesting.  I'm not the world’s best country dancer, but it turned out well anyways! We also went on our bikes to this tiny ville called Salléles D'Aude, which was fun, despite the fact that the less active member we went to find, no longer lives there. The bike ride was an hour, but the vineyards were beautiful.

Then we had stake conference this weekend, which was super awesome. It was so much fun to see all the missionaries there, and all the members we've met on exchanges and such. Plus the talks were really good, they had two return missionaries speak, and that was awesome! Our mission president was there, and he taught and asked the stake to have the missionaries over more often, not only for their ami's, but for them personally, he testified we can bring the spirit into their home, and them proved it by having two of the Zone Leaders come up and teach a three minute lesson on the Savior and testify, which was powerful. The Spirit was there in abundance. 

Fun in District Meeting