Eli Mail 2/23/15 (Zaandam, Netherlands) Letter 30

Before I begin, big shout-out to my awesome little brother Reedie who today is having his "verjaardag." Happy Birthday, Reedie!

There were a couple of really awesome miracles that we experienced this week, and they all sort of collided together at the end of the week. Saturday we went off to Bronno's house, our Ward Mission Leader, for our routine weekly counsel. He's a person who you'd call an idea man; he loves trying different ways to get the word about the gospel to the world, and I really appreciate all of his efforts for the missionary work here in Amsterdam. Anyway, we talked about a number of things, and he really wants to just blast Amsterdam with flyers and all sorts of other publications, to really get people curious about the church. So, we headed off as a group of missionaries and flooded a market in North Amsterdam – just good old fashioned contacting. Afterwards, my companion and I continued for a while longer, but even after a full afternoon filled with great gospel-orientated conversations and piquing peoples' curiosity, we ended up with very little actual potentials. On the train ride home I was thinking of what we could do. I had been working my hardest, more than ever in Zaandam, but the numbers and results just didn't seem good enough. And as I was thinking about this, I heard the "beep" of our phone going off, indicating a new text message. I pulled out the phone and there it was, a referral from church headquarters. It was a man named Jacob Vis, a resident of Zaandam, who wanted a Book of Mormon. It was just a gentle reminder for me that as long as I do my best, keeping the commandments, being obedient, and just doing my best, blessings will come one way or another. (We called him that evening, and he agreed to a lesson for the next day! More on that soon).

The following day was Sunday and, man, it was a cool Sunday. I'm not even sure where to start. This African guy from Nigeria showed up and told us he just moved to Zaandam for the next five years and was looking for a good church to join (too good to be true, right?) So, yeah, we had an investigator at church that wasn't even technically an investigator. We have an appointment with him soon, so I'm looking forward to that. After the church service we did a movie and lunch thing where all the members were invited to stay after the service to watch the new Bible videos about the Life of Christ that came out recently. I loved watching them and want the DVD so bad, now! For those that haven't seen them or heard about them (you probably have, though, I'm most likely out of the loop) they are amazing, and I would recommend watching them online.

That afternoon after church we taught that Jacob Vis guy I spoke about earlier. I was a little nervous when I first saw him waiting at the doorway for us, pulling a long drag on his cigarette. But luckily he warmly greeted us and invited us in. Apparently he's really into the Youtuber who's Mormon, named "shaytards" and a number of other popular Mormon people like Lindsey Stirling and her father (who's supposedly an author, which I never knew).  He showed us a couple of YouTube videos and told us all about this "shaytards" guy, which from my understanding is a just a V-log following a Mormon family. It was really cool to see how just people on YouTube had enough influence to get him curious about the Mormons even enough to order a Book of Mormon. He's a really funny guy, early 30s, and he's a postman delivery guy. So, yeah, we taught him the first lesson, and he said he had a really good feeling about it. Super cool!

Overall, I'm experiencing the sweet fruits of my labors right now, and I hope we can all say the same at some point in our lives, despite disappointment and hardships. I really do find joy in this gospel and would invite everyone else to also discover that for themselves. I wish I had enough time to talk about this past P-day, but I'll just give a two-word hint: ice skating. Have a good week everyone, and don't forget to shoot an email to me whenever you feel inspired to do so!

Love,

Elder Andrew

Ice skating

Eli Mail 2/16/15 (Zaandam, Netherlands) Letter 29

Hello, fellow readers, friends and family! This week in Zaandam was work as usual, including a good number of fun activities and appointments. And for all those who are wondering: I talked about it with a few members, and the "dagelijkes krant" (daily newspaper) had a special issue, so yes, Valentine’s Day sure did happen.

This week I'd like to begin with Tuesday. I had an exchange with the Zone Leaders, so I had the privilege to work a day the beautiful city of Alkmaar, a classic, fresh-looking North Holland city and a place known for its tulip market. We spent most of the day on the bikes, and at one point Elder Neptune and I were discussing the new goal for the zone: travel contacting. And right when we had started talking about it, we did it and pulled over our bikes to strike up a conversation with a man walking on the street, and we got a potential right off the bat. It was awesome and just a testifier to me of how the Lord's hand really is in our daily lives.

That evening we enjoyed a dinner appointment with a part-member family that are tulip farmers. They have a big parcel of land and a nice, cozy little home out in the farmlands of the Netherlands. After a mixed dinner of all sorts of potato based foods, we got to take a look in the barns and check out the process of growing tulips properly, sorting them, and wrapping. It was pretty cool, and each of us got to take tulips home.

As far as the missionary work goes, Elder Da Silva and I had a really awesome miracle this week. We have had the goal this transfer to teach one Restoration lesson with a baptismal invitation every week, and so far we've been able to reach it. But this week the lesson we had lined up didn't go through, so we were really nervous about how we were going to pull this one off without a planned lesson. So, Thursday morning we prayed that we could teach the lesson that day, even though we had no planned lessons. We set off, but at the last minute decided to work in North Amsterdam instead of Zaandam. We grabbed a train and headed on our way. I wasn't sure which part of North Amsterdam to work in, whether to take Bus 34 or 33, but in the end I decided on 33. Right before we got on I had a really good feeling about it, not really knowing why. And there happened to be a member on the bus, so we talked with him on the ride there, and it was really great to talk to him, since I didn't know him too well. We got off at his stop and parted ways. We did some exploring and eventually found ourselves doing bell-ups, the last thing we really wanted to do during the afternoon on a Thursday. But as we were belling up a big apartment complex, two women came to go up to their apartment, and they made a comment like, "You're not gonna have any luck here, only Muslims live here!" We quickly replied back and discovered they were converted to Christianity. On a whim I just asked if we could share a 5-minute message and, to our great surprise, they said, "Sure!" We followed them up to their apartment, having no idea what was going on, and they graciously let us into their home. It turns out it that this mother and daughter are very active Christians that converted from Islam not too long ago. They were very open to discuss, and we shared a very powerful first lesson with them. It was a real blessing that day and a cool, direct answer to our prayers. In the Bible dictionary it says prayer isn't for the intent of changing the will of God but to align our will with His. I highly recommend doing a good study on prayer and reading the Bible dictionary's description. So, yeah, that was our miracle for the week. We'll see where it goes with them!

That's all the time I have for this week. I hope everyone is doing well – and don't be afraid to shoot me an email once it a while. I love hearing from you all!

 

Eli Mail 2/9/15 (Zaandam, Netherlands) Letter 28

Long time no see, everyone! These past two weeks just flew by, so I'm excited to delve a little into what has been going on here in the quaint, little town of Zaandam. The weather these past two weeks has taken some twists and turns, for better or worse. I was a little perplexed when we received snow, rain, hail, and sleet all in the matter of one afternoon. Come on, Nederland! Make up your mind with the weather!

January 27 was a fantastic day – missionary work at its best. We had a zone training in the morning, and we learned about "teaching like the Savior" and also more about teaching the first lesson to new people. The beauty of it was that we got to apply it that night in a first lesson with a referral. His name Dirk Karten (Derrick is the English pronunciation), and we had set up the appointment weeks in advance so I was kind of wondering if it'd actually go through. But luckily it did, and he had invited his whole family around the table for a "good religious discussion." We nailed them with the Spirit, and we were all choking up when we read Joseph Smith's account of the first vision. It was a very memorable experience, and Elder Da Silva and I grinned the whole way home.

The work here has been going okay so far, I decided to kind of "clear house" with our investigators, and we're pretty much are starting from scratch again, just because people were being people – no solid appointments and not too much commitment-keeping. We had planned a week ago or so to have a "sports evening" on Friday, which we usually have a few times a month. But after a number of last minute calls and texts, we weren't thinking it was going to go through. My companion and I were eating dinner right around nightfall when we finally decided to cancel it, and almost immediately after the decision snow started to come down. We hadn't made a solid back up plan, and I looked out the window in terror. The reason I mention this experience is because at that very moment I decided it was going to be a fun night. And it was, all because of the choice. Some nights are hard in our mission, but if we want to have fun, like with any circumstances in life, we can choose to make it so! So, there's my "two cents" on decision making for the week. We can't control our surroundings, but we can control our own reactions.

We've enjoyed a fair amount of dinner appointments lately, one of which was with a Brazilian member (the only active member in Zaandam), and she whipped up a delicious meat and rice meal that concluded with these homemade chocolate ball things. Quite wonderful. As far as everything else goes, it's just work as usual, knocking doors and talking to a lot of people on the streets. We are also working a lot in North Amsterdam, a part of our area that I've sadly been neglecting for some time now, and we are finally getting some great work done in there.

I'm excited for this coming week, and I hope you guys all are, too. I've also seen the blessings of doing three simple things in my own life and in the lives of members, and that is reading the scriptures, praying, and going to church. Pretty simple formula, huh? Well it is, and it can really make a big difference in our day-to-day lives. I know that to be true. Stay awesome everyone, and I appreciate all of your prayers and concern for missionaries out it the field! Have a great week!

BULLET

·         Elder Da Silva and I made a homemade "hot sauce" last week, it contains 10 very hot yellow peppers that we found at an Indonesian store in Zaandam. "Alle rechten voorbehouden." Oh man, it's something else. While preparing it, there was a blast radius of about 10 feet where just smelling it made you go into a whirl of coughing and sneezing. It was fun, especially to try it and put it on food. [EDITOR’S NOTE: According to a photo Eli sent, the creative young chefs made their own label and named the creation, “The Devil’s [Flatus].”

A misty day in Volendam.

Surprise Sunday Picture!

PARENT'S NOTE: On Sunday a thoughtful Sister in his Amsterdam ward photographed Elder Andrew and his five missionary compadres and emailed the picture to all the moms. "We are so impressed with these guys in our ward. Thank you for sharing them with us!" Later, she also wrote to us, "My husband and I love Elder Andrew! He is such a kind-hearted, humble and fun person. You raised a really wonderful kid, and we have learned a lot from him, and what a great example for his siblings. I can tell that other ward members and fellow missionaries feel the same as we do."