Christ is Risen!

Hristos a inviat! Christ is risen! I hope you all had a wonderful Easter. I know I did. We got together with the entire district and the two senior couples here and had an Easter dinner. I ate enough food to last me the entire week. Worth it. If you haven't seen the Easter videos put together by the church yet, you should definitely check them out atlds.org.

This week we spent some time getting a residency permit for Sora Sayre so she can stay in Moldova longer. You can only stay for two transfers without one. Looks like she could be staying her for awhile. I won't be getting one as I only have two transfers after this one. I'll be heading back to Romania for my last transfer. Anyway, we met with a lawyer and had Sora Sayre's blood tested (to find out what type it is), took a trip to the American embassy, and met with a member who helps us with bills and things. We got all that taken care of just in time to have it completely processed and good to go before her time in the country runs out. 

We were able to meet with some members this week, one of them being the branch president's family. They have two little kids who are adorable. We went into their apartment and took a seat on the couch and immediately their kids start going back and forth grabbing all of their toys to show us what they have. They were so funny. As we began our spiritual thought though, the feeling in the apartment changed. A peace filled the room as we talked about our Savior and all that He did for us. It was really cool.

The other two members we visited are less actives. The first of the two has a physical disability that makes it hard for her to come to church. I enjoyed getting to know her, and despite the hardship, she has a desire to come to church again. She is a such a sweet woman. She's interested in learning how to do her family history, so hopefully we'll be able to help her with that. We'll be meeting with her again this week.

The second member we visited teaches people English for a living. She's also an artist. She does sketches of people and water colors of flowers and things. She's interesting to talk to and will tell you exactly what she thinks. She's pretty awesome. She also has a cat named Richard. What makes Richard so special? He loves hard boiled eggs. We brought one over for him. It was so funny to watch him perk up just at the sight of the egg. When the egg was actually cracked open, Richard started to beg a little, rubbing against this member's leg and making cute little noises. His flattery paid off and he finally received his egg. I think he approved of our visit. 

Oh I forgot. We had another visit as well with an adorable little family! The wife is a member but the husband isn't. They have two little girls. It was great to visit them and to see a picture of the temple and of Christ hanging up. The husband only speaks Russian and we only speak Romanian, but it all worked out. He can understand Romanian okay, but can't speak it. In the end he was very willing for us to return and visit.

To conclude, I like to bring things back to our Savior. I went on an exchange with Sora Kelly this week and one of the things that we talked about was the atonement and applying it into our lives. She told me how she's recently been realizing how the atonement not only just for the forgiveness of sins. Being on missions, sometimes it's a lot easier for us to realize just how many weaknesses we have. It can be very easy to be overly hard on ourselves. But the thing is, Christ knows about those too. He knows our weaknesses. He knows how we feel when after something happens we look back and think, "Why did I do that? Why didn't I do it this way?" We're not perfect beings yet and both He and our Heavenly Father know that. But because of the Atonement we can eventually become perfect. Christ will help us down the road to perfection. He will strengthen us in our weakness. He can because He understands them perfectly. He's proud of the efforts we make even if we fall up short. He will pick us up and help us to do better the next time. I'm so grateful for a Savior who understands me completely, and because He does He knows how to heal me, strengthen me, and bring me back to the Father. Jesus Christ lives. He really did pay the price for our sins. He really did die for us and He rose again. Because of that, we too will rise again from the grave. We will become resurrected beings. This life is not the end. Because of Christ, life has purpose and meaning and hope!

I love you all! I hope you had a great Easter.

Love,

Sora Adams

Reaching the Promised Land

Hello. Hello. Hello!

I hope all is well on the homefront. Here's the latest from Moldova. It's been raining like crazy. Well it actually isn't that bad except for this main street that's right by our aparment that could use some drainage help. The other day, the street was pretty much a river. We attempted to cross it at the end of the day, looking for shallow spots. Yeah. That didn't work. We made it home with drenched feet and lots of laughter.

We had zone training meeting this week. All the missionaries in Moldova came down to Chisinau. It was pretty great. There's been a big push to start using family history in contacting. I haven't really tried it yet. That's what part of our training was about. I love family history, and I'm excited to get to do it again when I go home. It's a little more tricky here as many of their resources haven't yet been digitilized, but steps are being made in that direction and there's still the old fashioned way of doing research. Anyway, I hope that's something that will catch fire here. We also spoke a lot about making goals and making Heavenly Father a part of that. I'm sure I've talked about that before, but I really do know that we receive extra strength as we bring our goals to the Lord, whatever they may be, and He will help us to achieve those worthy goals. 

We were able to have two lessons this week, both with people we'd met with the week before for half English, half gospel lessons. Our first one was with a middle aged woman. We had asked her to read the introduction to the Book of Mormon and she had! And she expressed some interest in continuing to read. We talked to her about the Restoration. She was very attentive. Sora Sayre and I both felt very good about it afterwards. We both took part in the lesson (Sora Sayre was so happy to have been able to speak), and even though we're not perfect with the language I felt that the spirit was with us adding power to the words we could say. I felt the spirit later as I reflected on the lesson later and felt that Heavenly Father is proud of us and our efforts. This woman wants to meet with us again and to show us all of her pictures from when she went to the Holy Land. 

The second person we met with is a college student. We had planned on talking to her about the Restoration as well, but it turned into more of getting to know each other and talking about different traditions here versus in America. As we were talking with her, we both felt that it was okay that we didn't go with what we had planned as we both felt that this was something she needed to help build up things before we continue on with more of our message. And she was able to ask us a couple of questions about how we do things, so we had the opportunity to bear testimony on a few principles such as prayer. She stayed for our sports night afterwards. (Our sport was spoons. It was still wet outside.) I'm hoping she'll come to more things in the future.

So we have institute here in Chisinau. This week we've been talking about the book of Ether in the Book of Mormon. (Side Note: Institute, like church, is half in Russian and half in Romanian. It's quite the adventure. I'm starting to learn some basic Russian words. Hello. Goodbye. Thank you. That sort of thing. End of side note.) We talked about the Jaredites and their experience of building the barges and crossing the ocean to the promised land. I really liked something that the teacher pointed out. She noted that when the Jaredites arrived after almost an entire year of being in this barges at sea that they immediately gave praises to their Heavenly Father. We talked about how it couldn't have been easy to make that trip. There's a few things I've thought of that makes me grateful that I didn't have to make that trip... But I love what our teacher said. She said that the Promised Land was even more beautiful to them because of the trials they had endured and overcome. It made me think of life in general and how I feel that that applies to certain aspects of my life. Some things are more sweet to me because of the trial. I have learned some precious truths and gained greater trust and assurances as a result of some of the trials I've had to face. In my mind I thought of the Celestial Kingdom as my own promised land, and I thought of how beautiful it will seem to me to arrive, to be greeted by my Savior who will tell me, "Well done. You made it." And then to be there with those I love for eternity. The trials are worth it if that's what is waiting for me at the end, and I know that if we are faithful, that IS what is waiting for us.

How grateful I am for this gospel and to know that this life is not the end. Every life will have trials,
 but we can have peace and hope through our Savior. Because of Him, all is not lost. Because of Him, we can have everlasting life. I testify that He lives and loves us and will strengthen us in our trials. He has taken on all the pains of the world. He will lighten our burdens if we allow Him to.

Have a great week!

Sora Adams

Greetings from Moldova!

Greetings from Moldova!

Although similar to Romania, I definitely have adjusting to do. There's a lot more Russian here. I can buy dairy products in bags instead of tubs. Sometimes I speak to people in Romanian only to be greeted by blank stares because they only know Russian. But so far so good. It's beautiful here. My district is great. I'm serving with senior couples which I love. All of the investigators and members I've met so far are amazing and full of smiles. Basically I know I'm going to love my time here.

Oh, and Sora Sayre is awesome. I'm second transfer training her, but I seriously feel like it's the other way around. She's got everything together. She's making efforts to speak (we try to speak as much as we can in Romanian) and take part in lessons, and she's doing great. She serves everyone. Seriously, the first thing she thinks in every situation is, "How can I help?" She is a great missionary and I'm grateful for this opportunity to serve with her.

We've already been able to have a few lessons. They were 30/30 lessons. I'm not sure if I ever explained what those are, but they are lessons where we teach English for the first half and then talk about the gospel for the second half. Each person we met with accepted a Book of Mormon if they didn't already have one and agreed to read the introduction so we can talk more about it later. We were able to set up future lessons with most of them, and we're looking forward to meeting with them again.

General Conference was amazing. I hope that you were all able to view the sessions. They were all shown at the church at different times so I was able to see them. The last session wasn't but I was able to watch that earlier today at one of the senior couple's homes. If you didn't have a chance to see it, I highly recommend that you make some time this week to do so. You can watch it all at lds.org. How blessed we are to live on the earth at a time when prophets and apostles are upon the earth! One of the things that stood out to me was the emphasis on loving and serving each other and how we can bring people to Christ through extending love to them. It made me wonder what I can be doing so that people can feel more of the love of our Savior through me. I want people to feel that because I've felt it, and there's no greater feeling then feeling loved. As one of the apostles said, the best way to serve our Heavenly Father is to serve His children, and I think that's the best way to help bring them onto the path towards our Heavenly Father's presence. 

Some talks that I liked in particular were those shared by President Uchtdorf, President Monson, and Elder Bednar. I loved how Elder Bednar explained how we are strengthened and healed through the Atonement not just as far as sin is concerned but with all of our pains and sorrows. He read one of my favorite scriptures concerning the Atonement:

 11 And he shall go forth, suffering pains and ^aafflictions and^btemptations of every kind; and this that the word might be fulfilled which saith he will ^ctake upon him the pains and the sicknesses of his people.

 12 And he will take upon him ^adeath, that he may ^bloose the bands of death which bind his people; and he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according tothe flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to ^csuccor his people according to their infirmities.

I know that through the Atonement of Christ we can receive strength to overcome not just sin but our weaknesses, our fears, and our heartache. All three members of the godhead work together to "bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man." All three of them want us to make it back to our Father in Heaven and will help us get there. I hope we will follow the great counsel of all those who spoke this weekend, that we will love and serve one another, that we will live in thanksgiving daily, and that we will be faithfully obedient, knowing that whatever Heavenly Father commands is for our benefit. Another thing I loved was the assertion that we were saved for this time--that we were prepared! We were taught before we came to earth, and we are given the tools to return. None of us were sent here to fail.

How grateful I am for this gospel and for our Savior who makes all things possible. I know that Heavenly Father is aware of each one of us personally and He will send angels to bear us up just as He has promised. Life is good, and it's preparing us for something even better, an eternal life in the mansions of our Father with all those whom we love. When times are rough, remember that you have a savior who suffered all and will lift your burdens and lead you back to our Father.

Have a great week!

Sora Adams

So Long Bucharesti!

 

After just one transfer here in Buc I'm heading off for a new adventure in a new place. In fact, I think I'll take a step out of Romania for a bit. Do you remember how my mission is the Romania/Moldova mission? Well, they're sending me to Moldova. I'm going to Chisinau! I'll be second transfer training. I was pretty shocked, but I'm also really excited. I hear good things.

This transfer we had a little initiative to use piano lessons as a means to meet with part member families or nonmembers in general. Sora DeRuvo and I haven't had the opportunity to do any of these lessons until this week. There's this great member who's here for school. (She's been a member for a little over a year and was actually taught by one of my former companions.) She came with a friend for lessons. It was so great. Sora DeRuvo taught her friend while I got to talk to her a little bit. They only had a certain amount of time so we didn't get to talk about the gospel or anything, but that's okay because apparently we made an impression. We received a text later from this member telling us that her friend loved us and how kind we were and couldn't stop talking about us. She showed some interest in coming to activities and institute. Hopefully that will work out and Sora DeRuvo will continue to work with her.

We ended up having one final exchange this week. It wasn't required, but we discovered that if we want we can go on exchanges with the other STLs in Buc. We decided we liked that idea so that we could talk to someone else about our goals and learn from each other. I did an exchange with Sora Bischoff who is still quite young in the mission. First of all, I am so impressed with her language skills. I was actually a little intimidated at first ha ha. I should have jotted down notes on all the things we learned and the insights we shared because I feel like we had really good conversations and I can't think of any of them right now! Anyway, it was a great sunny day, and we found this great park, so we got some good contacting done. We actually met some really cool people. No one was really interested in learning more about our message, but for the most part they were still really nice. Even if people aren't ready to hear more about our message I just hope that we can have a touch for good in their lives, and if the only thing they learn in that moment is that people from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are nice people then I'm okay with that.

We had a great activity on Saturday with the Korean family in our branch. Have I mentioned the Korean family? Well in case I haven't I will tell you now. First of all, I love them. I can't get over how much a love them. They are amazing. This is why. They've only been here for a few months. They don't know any Romanian and the only one who knows a bit of English is the father. And yet they come to church every single week. They spoke in church last week and the spirit was so strong. They obviously have such strong testimonies. I believe they moved here because of work. Anyway, our activity on Saturday was to make some Korean food with them and then feast all together. They taught us to make sushi (no raw fish) and there was some noodle dish and some meat dish that I couldn't tell you what it is, but it was very delicious. I helped by cooking up the meat. Sister Lee and I couldn't communicate except for the few words we could both understand (okay, off, salt, that's pretty much it). She had Brother Lee tell me a few things, but for the most part it was just hand gestures, smiles, and laughs. As this process went on, my heart was just so filled with love for this woman. She's beautiful, has a great smile, and we were able to get along despite a major language barrier. Basically it was just great to share in their culture with them, to include them, to just be united as branch members in love and fun. Basically that was one of the highlights of my week.

I feel that there are many small little thoughts I want to leave with you as I draw near to the close of this e-mail. Perhaps I can fit it all in.

Thought 1: Look for the tender mercies of the Lord in your life. I promise you that you can find them daily. Some days they may be harder to spot, but Heavenly Father is a part of your life. You are literally His child, and He is very aware of you. Even in hard times if you have your spiritual eyes open you can see those little tender mercies. Maybe your trials won't be taken away in that moment, but Heavenly Father never requires you to go through those trials alone.

Thought 2: Prayer is a very real thing, a very real connection with our Father in Heaven. He answers our prayers. Maybe it won't be in the way or timing we expect, but He always answers.

Thought 3: We don't always know all the answers and that's okay. Not everything will make sense to us now with our mortal minds. Things just take time to be learned and we are all on different levels. We don't all have the same mind. As we seek answers and come to the Lord with our questions He will guide us and add upon the knowledge we have. He knows us best, therefore He knows how to teach us best and what we are ready to learn.

I think that'll do for now. I know that perhaps sometimes I repeat myself, but these are the things I feel like sharing again and again because they are true and I see them in my life. Last but not least, I am so excited for General Conference this weekend! I can't believe it's been six months! I'm so excited. I didn't get to hear the women's conference, but hopefully I'll get the chance soon. I encourage you all to take time for General Conference. We have been blessed with a prophet on the earth in our day who guides and directs us. I know that if we follow the counsel shared in this meeting that we will come closer to our Father in Heaven and our Savior and we will remain on the path towards eternal life. Do not take this opportunity for granted.

I love you all. I pray that you will find comfort in times when life is hard and that you will be able to see the tender mercies of the Lord in your life. Open your heart to Him. He will hear you. He will bless you. He will not forsake you.

Have a wonderful week.

With love,

Sora Adams