Adventure 321: Lipova September 21, 2015

This is us on our 7 mile trek through Lipova

Look I am overcoming my fear of Heights!

Here are some pictures!! Nothing really new.  Every lesson we had this week the person brought up their fear of the migrants from Syria, they are not at all in Romania, but it is something close to home that they are getting freaked out about.  

This week was fantastic:) Sora Cutler is really one of the best missionaries I know. She is solid in the mornings and her obedience is bullet proof. She is always thinking about our investigators and how we can help them come to church or teach them a concept better. I love her she is such a light to me. 

This week at church Mariana came and so did the family from Portugal. It really was a great sacrament meeting and the spirit was there. As we continue to teach her the gospel through the Book of Mormon we can see that it is taking deeper root in her heart. 

Cati has really changed a lot during these last few weeks. She has come out of her depression and told us when we met with her this week that she feels so much joy in here life now and that she knows it is because of what she is learning. Also committed to stop drinking coffee.

We are in the midst of an investigator pool renewal! We are excited to contact and find the investigators we are going to start teaching anew. 

As far as less active members. 

A couple of less active girls FINALLY came to church. I am telling you it was a great Sunday here:) They have been so busy during the summer, and I really hope since school has starting they will be able to come more.

We were able to meet up with Ioana this week which made me SOOOOOOOO happy:)  When we were leaving were we met up, there was a guy in the back that I was prompted to go back to.  So I walk back and introduce myself.  It ended up being someone from Constanta who I am pretty sure I have met before!! It was pretty cool:) 

We literally taught the BEST spiritual thought for English.  The spirit was so strong and we asked if people could feel it and they slowly nodded their heads.   It was pretty awesome, definitely a highlight. 

Anyways I love you all so much!! 

-Sora Long

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WELCOME TO HOGWARTS!! September 7, 2015

aka Castelul Corvinilor

Well this week is just another normal day in Romania except for the fact that I got to wear pants:) That was a great day. I don't really like pants anymore though... so... that was a new discovery...

​If you look really close our district is on the bridge. Elder Soelberg was nice enough to take this picture!!

​This castle heavily inspires the creation of the Hogwarts castle.  If you notice down on the left there is a willow tree.  I mean I was pretty stoked to be in my own little Harry Potter world. I think I was the nly one in the group noticing the similarities...

Onto more important things:

We had a normal turnout for English here in Arad, about 14 students but we have several that are promising as far as the gospel. One student that came had quite an amazing Story. Noiemi is a brand new student and showed up late for class but ended up being our only student between Sora Cutler and I. She told us that she needed to practice her English for work and that she was so happy we offer these classes here in Arad. We asked her how she found out about the classes and told us her story. Over four years ago she accepted an English card from a missionary on the street and put it in her purse. After she got this new job here that required English she struggled for a long time and really needed a course. When she was looking through her purse she found that English card she had received 4 years ago. She called the number but it was disconnected and looked up online to find the address. She found that the address was only about 10 minutes away from her apartment so she walked over to see if the classes were still happening. When she got to the church she found an English poster hanging on the window telling her that English was starting that week. There are many cool things about this story one of them being that the poster had been hung up on the window only hours before she made her journey to the church.

At the end of that class during the spiritual thought I looked out at the class as we were each talking a little bit about our families and I pondered over a line in a blessing that I had received almost a year ago in my first city. I was told that I would find the person that I was sent here to find. Before that I never thought that we were sent to our missions specifically to find certain people, but that there would always be someone somewhere that we could always help. But I knew that this was something a little more specific. I was pondering this phrase and wondering to myself if I would ever find that "person" before the end of my mission and if I did would I even know it was them? What difference would I make in their life? When I looked at Noiemi the spirit was so incredibly strong it brought tears to my eyes. She is the one. I know that I have helped many people on my mission come closer to Christ, not much as far as watching them be baptized, but I have worked hard and I boldly invite people to be baptized as well as have the belief and faith that they will be baptized and I know many of the people I talked with will one day come to accept the gospel as truth. But in this moment the spirit bore witness to me that Noiemi was one of the reasons I was sent to this mission. For the next 30-40 minutes I felt a continuing fire in my heart that she was "the one." She is one that all of us in this district in Arad are suppose to meet and love and I am so excited. I do not know how we will help her or how much, but both Sora Cutler and I are so excited to teach her. 

This is our cute little FHE here in Arad.  We are meeting once a week to read the Book of Mormon together.

#Selfieatacastle

​I mean seriously!! Coolest place ever!!
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Well until next week!!! Love you all!! 

-Sora Long

Zilele Aradului August 21, 2015

This week has been so cool:) There is really nothing new here really cause I just e-mailed you all on Wednesday.  But this week is Zilele Aradului, the days of Arad:) There is a huge Turg here, or in other words an awesome street.

This one dude is selling Mammoth Ivory pendants and man they are SOOOOO cool!!!! Wish that was legal to bring into the states, oh well! 

We were able to have a lesson with Cati  and Rafael this last week and we were going to extend a baptismal date, but she said she would never be baptized that she knew that the LDS church was the true church of Christ but that she could not be baptized more than twice as she was orthodox, then she was Pentecostal.  We explained more clearly the necessity of authority and the importance of the gift of choice we explained that we were there to help her come to her answer of what church  has that authority.  Then Rafael said, "So what you are saying is that our baptisms are not vaild." 

"Yes," I replied, "That is why you need to find out for yourselves if this true really is the truth you have felt it to be true,  read this book and pray and you will come to know it is true." It was really powerful.  We are going to be working with them really closely and taking Maria the member over more often to really get them to learn the gospel.  They are not reading the Book of Mormon but we discussed the importance of that. 

Now this week: 

So we had one of the most crazy days this past week!!! I mean it was nuts.  First off we headed out to a less actives home.  She was not able to come to church much due to her health but she loves our visits and this summer her granddaughter was there at the house from Bcau and she also wanted to hear about the gospel.  We have worked to teach this little 12 year old girl to pray and to understand her purpose on this earth and it was the last lesson we were able to have with her because she left for her little hom town where missionaries would not be allowed to visit her because of her mother.  It was really sad to say goodbye to Miriem but we know we helped prepare her for those important adolecent years and we are hoping that next summer she will make another visit up to Arad and continue the lessons.

​Sora Gherhdart and Miriem

After saying our goodbyes we headed to a members home, Sora Lidia who is leaving to America this week.  It was our goodbye to her as well!! She made us Ciorba (Some soup) and some crepes and we started to teach her the lesson we had prepared when her sister and mother who are not members made a surprise visit.  There was a point when we were left in the living room with the old Romanian Baba (grandma).  She leaned over to me and asked, "Are you from the church?" "Yes," I replied.  "I do not understand it."

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Later that night we went to teach a lesson to an old student of ours Vera. She had invited us over to her home to thank us for the classes and we were excited to teach her a lesson.  When we had asked her about her family before she said she had three children.  When we were waiting to meet her she showed up in a car.  There was one moment when we were waiting for Vera in the car.  We asked the other woman Marcela how she knew Vera and she replied, "I don't I met her two days ago." She was just doing a quick favor for Vera by giving us a ride! We showed up to Vera's home and were shuffled into a back room 10x10 cement.  We sat there and got to know Marecela and in comes two old women.  One with the deepest crinkles on her face, she would smile and only show 3 teeth. The other was an angry looking old woman who sat in the corner.  Marcela had to leave but she really wants to meet with us this week as well as with her family so that was exciting.  But the adventure continues.  Vera asked us a question, "Why do you not worship the Sabbath on Saturday?" And she would not listen to any of our explanations let alone accept any of them. A blind man came into the room who introduced himself as Mihai. We taught the restoration and Mihai was completely captivated listening to every word. Vera came in and gave us some scarey Ciorba! I mean, for real it was pretty scketchy.  I walked out of the room later to notice in the back that it was a little wood stove in the yard surrounded by hords of trash and things.  I am sure that Vera collects these things so that she can give them away to the needy as she is the most Christ like person I know. She also gave us figs to eat, and they were the number one weirdest thing I have ever eaten

​Here is a picture of Vera and her family from the right: Vera with a yoghurt pail of ciorba, Juliana who was found homeless on the street and Vera took her home. Mihai, a blind man who was taken into the Mama Vera clan and finally Viorica who was living in a hospital for 4 weeks, none of her family (two sons) cames to visit her and Vera came into the Hospital to play some accordian music and little Viorica with her recently obtain handicaps went to her sobing and begged her to take her from the hospital.  And Mama Vera did just that.  These are Vera's three children.

The most depressing part of our week however was when we discovered that our investigator Rafael has Leukemia.  We know he was sick, but we didn't know it was that bad.  That kinda got me down during 3rd hour of church yesterday, but then I realized we just really need to bring that family the comfort that they need. We were so guided to them so we are striving to do what the Lord has placed us there to do for them.

As you will see we had waaaay to much fun at Arad days for P-Day last week.  We gave away almost 1000 english cards at that thng! 

We are reading the Book of Mormon together, I hope you all got the e-mail from president Ivory and are reading it with me!! The sign we made says, To Read together"

Sora Lidia, And cute little Alysia as well as Sora the Cutler

We had the building right behind our catch on fire yesterday, pretty much so exciting!!!

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Mountains to Climb August 19, 2015

This is the view from Castle Cantcuzino. We toured and ate dinner at. It was amazing, it was literally a Hogwarts feast! 

The view from our hotel, If you zoom you can see the Castle Cantcuzino in the back ground, 5 lei to whoever spots it first! 

Castle Cantcuzino from my awesome zoom on my camera!!! SOOOO COOOL! It also had a really large collection of the most famous surrealist painter Salvador Dali.  When we walked in the room we ran out pretty fast because, well, some painters don't seem to really have moral standards...
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Some Romania military guys in front of us, I sneaked a picture, it isn't very good but it was cool seeing them on the street. 

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This is me at Dracula's Castle.  Unfortunately my camera didn't hold a charge long enough for me to take any other pictures...

​Interesting this about the Bran Castle, Dracula, Vlad the Impaler, never lived at the castle, he was held here  as a prisoner once.  But the author of the book Dracula had used this castle as the castle in his story which is based off of Vlad the creepy scary dude. He had killed 23,000 people by impaling them!! What a sicko man!!  It was so much smaller than I thought it would be!!! Also a kid in our mission, his great grandfather was the person who discovered the secret stair case in the castle. Best part of the whole thing, I got a cool secret box and a $5 T-shirt with Vlads face on it:) Yay me! 

Another interesting fact is in the name of Dracula, Drac means Devil, and when you what to make a thing a name to call someone you put a ule on the end for the masculine tense, so Drac + ule= Dracula! And that is where his name comes from, it smacked me in the head while I was there and I thought it was pretty cool. 

We were at this place with 100+ missionaries, I heard someone in English say, "Where are they going?" I mean there are 60 Elders with ties and stuff and 40 girls dressed nicely.  The other person said, "I think they have a special meeting since they are all dressed up!"

The rain was crazy!! It turned our 3 hour drive into a 4 or 5 hour ordeal!! Literally a flood and we went hiking up a mountain after that!  

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Mountains to Climb

We just got back into Arad today from our mission wide conference down at Brasov.  As a mission we worked really  hard to become more obedient and we are earning our rewards in miracles and i this wonderful two day conference!!! We headed down to Bucharesti on a 12 hour train ride, then after that to Busteni on a 4 hours bus.  I mean we came from all over!!! Everyone was there, even pulled in from Moldova to go to this conference. It was a lot of hard work on the part of The office and the mission president.We went to go on the hike and it had been raining, HARD!!! But when we got to the top we had some really great spiritual experiences. Then after that we headed down the valley to the  eat and tour a castle, picture included below! An Elder pulled out his Violin and serenaded every table.  Our mission has become a completely different place.  There will be baptisms and the miracles are everywhere!! Now that I am getting close to the end of my mission, I am proud to be a part of the change that this mission needed.

On the way to Bucharesti we talked to a woman a little bit and the Restoration came up.  We taught her a quick lesson and gave her a Book of Mormon and went back to our seats right behind hers.  We could see that she was reading the Book of Mormon and the pamphlet. She started from the first page of the Book of Mormon and we peeked every now and then to watch her read the book all the way to Jacob!! After she finally reached there after 6 straight hours of reading she turned and gave the book back to me.  "I cannot read anymore my eyes hurt," She said.  I asked if she had liked it.  "Yes, I really do. I read all the way until Nephi died." We Put our testimonies in the cover and gave it to her. She was so cute!!! Then she called us later to make sure we got to Bucharesti safe and sound. But she said she would for sure read the whole thing and follow the promise in the back. I mean, she even read the Isaiah chapters, it was incredible!! 

The Hero's Cross in Busteni. It is the Tallest Summit cross, ehh? Romania has some cool things! Life goal to hike that mountain one day.

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Pictures!!

Obedience Brings Miracles August 10, 2015

Well I am extremely humbled to be surrounded by miracles.

First off we went flower contacting this week.  During training study we tied pass along cards to flowers and watched the district.  Then we went out side and handed out about a hundred or so of these bad boys. It was so fun!!! 

We had a lesson this week with that amazing woman who Sora Allen and I taught last week.  We taught her and her son the restoration and she just cried the whole time.  Her son and granddaughter were there as well.  When we showed them the Restoration video she just started crying even harder.  Then we knelt down and prayed together.  When we had finished I asked her what she felt and she said that it felt as though a sword had pierced her soul from her toes to her head and she had never felt anything like that before. She said she would be baptized if she found it was true. 

This is Cristina, I know Sora Ralls (hem) Keri will recognize her.  She had her missionary farewell this Sunday and is heading to the Leon, France mission. She borrowed my name tag for this picture.  She is leaving this week!! She is the second missionary to ever go from the Arad branch a pretty big step here!! I am so proud of her so will do great things. It was also Alyssia's birthday this week turned 6 years old and she is the cutest, the number one fan of the sister missionaries!! 

We also had an amazing experience with Ana.  She was someone we called up in the Area book this week. Keri, you also taught this woman.  She let us in and we had an amazing lesson with her.  The spirit was so strong and we testified powerfully.  We told her that Joseph Smith was a prophet that Christ was our savior and that Christ had restored his true church on the earth again.  She nodded her head and without hesitation she said, "Cred." I believe.  She we invited her to be baptized and she said she was too old to get into a swimming pool so we read 1 Nephi 3:7 and testified that God would prepare a way if it was a commandment, and that she would be able to be baptized even if she thought she was old. She cried and we discovered the real reason she could not be baptized was because her husband would not permit it.  She cried and told us she would be baptized if she could. The spirit worked upon us to issue her a promise, "If you pray with a sincere heart and tell God your desire to be baptized, he will prepare a way and when he does you will know. When this way is prepared will you be baptized?" And she said yes!! Super exciting.  We left and waved at her gate saying, "Remember that you are my sister!"

A guy just came up behind my computer and asked me, "What is this a cult?" Then peered at my companions screen and as he leaned closer said, "Yep, hem, its a cult." I just ignored him. 

I will not be e-mailing you on Monday this week, I will e-mail you on Wednesday as I will be in the great city of BRASOV! Going to Bran castle and cool stuff like that for our all mission conference.  This is our reward as our mission has really stepped up in obedience, I can tell you that this place is 100% different than when I first came into the mission and that is the main reason that Sora Cutler and I are seeing miracles like crazy. I will tell you all about it in my next e-mail:) Love you all !!
​<3 Sora Long

Sora Kranacs August 3, 2015

Just dropped my memory card inside the computer.  Don't ask how I did it or why there was a hole big enough in the computer to actually do that. All I know is that it is crazy hot inside this cafe this week!!! 

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Went to Sora Krnacs' farm this week and helped her out a little bit she taught me how to milk a goat at my insistence.  She is a wonderful woman!!! I have really enjoyed getting to know her.  

We taught a lesson this week to about 8 kids about the plan of salvation and when we asked if they wanted to be baptized one of them said yes, nd all the others were nodding their heads.  Then their mom, who is a member and wants us to teach her children said shockingly, "Sorin! You want to be baptized?!" He replied, "I don't know..." And she said, "Then why one earth did you say yes?!" I tried to tie it back and said, "You said that you would be baptized it you felt it was true. Right?" And he said, "No." And it was lost all the kids said no.  So close!! We will try again this week and for sure talk to the mom a little more. 

This picture, it is real is all I can say. I know I don't look the best, but take into consideration I was on a farm. 

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I went on exchange with Sora Allen this last week. She is a pretty special missionary, I always knew that because of our time together at the MTC and has always been my good friend here on the mission. When we started our day out we found a less active member and taught her a lesson.  As we were headed back to centru, we walked passed a woman on the street that I somehow recognized. She was carrying cleaning supplies with her down the street. After she passed I turned to Sora Allen and said, "I have made that woman cry before." 

A couple weeks ago Sora Cutler and I were contacting survey style and we had asked people two questions.  The first, Do you believe in God? And the second, If you could ask God one question what would it be?

We had talked to this woman, when asked if she had one question for God what would it be she answered, 

"If he would heal my son."

I testified of the Savior and his ability to heal all who come to him. It was a simple testimony, but by the end she was crying.  Then I told her who we were and that we, as missionaries, help people find answers to their questions for God. We asked if we could meet with her.

"No," She said," I am Pentecostal.  I have my religion and you have yours." But she could not stop crying. We gave her our phone number told her that God loved her and left. 

Fast forward to Sora Allen and I walking down the street. I asked if we should go talk to her and Sora Allen said. "Yeah!" And as this woman was now quite a distance always we literally ran after her down the street. When we got close to her we slowed down and she set down her cleaning supplies.  I turned to ask her a question,"Do you know where the -- Hey! I have met you before! How are you doing?"  Recognition hit her face and we chatted with her for a little bit about her day.  We asked if we could help her carry her stuff home and she said, "Oh I am fine I live just around the corner." But soon she opened up about her hardships.  Her Son is very sick and they are actually headed to a hospital in Timisoara today for some testing. Sora Allen bore testimony of God's love for her and her son and she started crying again.  Then Sora Allen asked if we could come over for a minute and share a message. "Of course!" She said so we followed her to her home carrying her cleaning supplies.  She let us into her small one room apartment that is about the size of our entrance at home. It had two couches and a tv that only showed green and purple colors.  Her son had been sleeping and she woke him up, "Rafael, These are the girl I told you about.  The ones I talked to in the park that made me cry." We had a powerful lesson.  We taught her of the atonement and how it ot only covers sins but pains of the world.  She was crying again as soon as we said the first prayer.  The words where just falling out of our mouths.  The spirit put them there.  Sora Allen bore witness that we did not met again by chance but that we were an answer to her prayers.  We told her we had a unique message and that we would love to come back and share it and Cati said, "Of course!" I said the closing prayer and even then the spirit was giving me what I should pray for. It is the strangest thing when the spirit guides your words.  It is like they are placed into your mind and they fall out. I could hardly remember what I prayed for.  She walked us to the gate and waved us goodbye.  Sora Allen and I left feeling like we had just walked out of a movie moment.  There was a group of shady guys that we had to walk past earlier that day and when we walked passed the first time they jeered at us.  The second time after our lesson it was like we were surrounded by Angels none of them said a word and I wasn't even the slightest bit afraid of them, at that moment we were filled with incredible spiritual power lifting us up. We were effective and powerful advocates of the truth. 

That is all for this week, get ready for a lot of sweaty pictures!! 

-Sora Long