April 4 Letter

Zivijo Družina in Prijatelje!
This week has been amazing! We had our Easter Concert on Saturday and it went really well! We were all fasting for our mission because we Pres. Hill set a goal for the mission to double the number of baptisms for this year. We had 28 last year so we are shooting for 56 this year. That means we need to have 28 by June 1st! It is a big goal but I know the Lord will provide a way! We already have 8 for the mission but we need to pick up the speed if we are going to reach it. anyway. The concert was a neat experience for me because as I sang I truly wanted everyone in the room to understand the words of each song and to realize how important the Atonement of Jesus Christ is and what it can do for them. I felt the spirit so strongly and my desire to share the gospel with these people grew. We also had some of the members and missionaries bear their testimonies which was also very neat. We had one of our English class students come. her name is Urša, she is in a wheelchair and doesn't have a lot of control over her body but she speaks well. She is beautiful and has such a sweet spirit! I really would love to teach her the gospel. For English class we teach English for about 50 min and then we close with a spiritual thought. This past week our spiritual thought was on the great apostasy and the need for a restoration. It went really well and all of our students took an Obnova Pamphlet! I really hope we can get some investigators from the class because they are all soooo cool and I want them to have the gospel in their lives! Not to mention the fact that because of their personalities they would help the church grow so much! anyway I'm thinking way ahead here... but that is a good thing right? Anyway we had a lesson with Tadeja this week and she told us that her dad had asked her if she would still get married in the Catholic church (her boyfriend is a member of the church) and she said no, becaue of the truths she has found she is going to marry Andrej in the temple!!!!! She said she and her parents had a good discussion about the church and they weren't thrilled but they weren't furious either! So basically Tadeja will get baptized...at this point it is just when. She hasn't talked any more to them about the baptism though so we will see!
Pops I think I may have miscommunicated about the lessons we had last week. the 12 lessons we had were a combination of member lessons and lessons we had on the street. We also count our spiritual thought in English class as a lesson. We still have only taught 1 actual 1st lesson out of preach my gospel to a potential investigator (Gospa Mili) and she is not interested. Tadeja (as our only investigator at this point) has had all of the lessons out of preach my gospel and so we have been reviewing some and doing spiritual thoughts with her. Anyway We hope that with our fast and determination to work harder we will get some more 1st lessons and some new progressing investigators soon!
We tried a new tactic this week while contacting. We contacted everyone we saw who looked 30 or younger in English! We had a ton of success!... Well more than we have had before:) We got 3 phone numbers and an e-mail address and taught some principles from the 1st lesson to several people. unfortunately 2 of those 3 numbers were fake... but we are making progress! Everyone here younger than 30 knows atleast a little bit of English. It isn't great way for me to learn the language but it is a great way to get their attention!
Ok. Now for General Conference! Wasn't it amazing!!! I got to watch 3 sessions which I hear is not common at all. I was so grateful because there were so many things said that I needed to hear. it is truly amazing how the Lord speaks through his servants to help all of his children! it was also really neat for me to watch Conference as a missionary. It gives it a completely different perspective. I kept on thinking of different members who could be helped with a certain talk and how I could apply everything that was said to missionary work. It is pretty cool how a change in your circumstances can change the meaning of conference! Anyway I have to go. I love you all, thank you for your prayers and support!
Love,
Sestra Powell