Road Trip! (3/27/17)

Scripture of the week is John 14:27

Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you; not as the world giveth give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.

I hope that you all know that i know that Christ truly is the Son of the Living God.  The He lives, He suffered for our sins, our troubles, our pains, everything we have been through he understands it perfectly.  I know that God loves us and knows us and cares for us.  The peace that i have found through my Savior, is so much more than any peace that the world offers.  I know that because of Christ salvation is possible.  We can be strengthened and be happy and become the people God wants us to be, all because of Him!  I love my Savior so much.  I am grateful for him, He truly is the Prince of Peace.  The Savior and Redeemer of the world!  Ok, sorry, I will get off my soapbox.  Love you all so much!!

Road Trip!!

This week was a crazy one but it was a good one! So at the beginning of the week we had some work to do and we kind of thought it would be a normal week you know? So we had like district meeting and just kind of normal stuff and yeah it was great. Then one day we were street contacting and we get a call saying that we need to go to every single district in the mission to deliver all of the stuff for the new Easter Initiative! It was crazy! So we spent the rest of the day getting together all of the stuff that we needed and planning the trip and stuff.

So on Thursday we set off at 7 in the morning and we went to Vlore, then to Elbasan, then Pogradec, then we arrived in Ohrid (Macedonia) at 8:30 at night and slept there! I will go through each one: 

Vlore was really cool! My old companion, Elder Rogers is serving there! He seems to like it a lot but I think it is pretty hard work. It is right next to the sea so it is hot and humid there! It seems really nice though. But anyway we just got there and we gave our training about the Easter initiative and watched the new video and yeah, it was super awesome!

Elbasan was really really hot. That is the city that I started my mission in and I am glad I was never there during the summer because it gets so hot! We all call it "Hell-basan" because of how hot it is. Anyway the training there went well, we read John 14:27 and talked about how Christ's peace is different from the peace the world offers which is so true! And I am so grateful for that! 

Then we went to Pogradec, it is so beautiful there! When my family comes to pick me up I will definitely take them there. There is a really pretty lake and a cute little city it was great! But yeah the training went well there. The Spirit is always so strong as we train the missionaries! Also, Pogradec has only been open up to missionary work for not very long but it is doing so well! After the training we went to dinner with the senior couple there and met the first family baptized in Pogradec it was so amazing!! They had such an amazing, fresh, sweet spirit to them it was so great to see!!

Then we went to Ohrid and gave them their training and we were beat! A whole day of driving and training it was crazy but it was great!! All of the trainings went really well... But we were so tired at the end of the day! Ohrid had a pretty small apartment so me and my companion, Elder Miller had to crash on a little pull out bed on the couch it was great! 

So the next day was another early morning start, at 7 AM we drove across Macedonia from Ohrid to Skopje, then to Prishtina (Kosovo) then to Gjakova (Kosovo), then back to Tirana! I will tell you about each one again. 

Skopje was really good! It is kind of overwhelming driving across Macedonia because all the signs are in Cyrillic so like you are never really 100% sure that you are going the right way, you know? Anyway we found our way and even found our way to the church building without getting lost! It was a good training there. The district in Macedonia is so great it was awesome to be with all of them! 

Then it was off to Prishtina! My old home. It was good to be there. We got some Turkish Doners while we were there it was SO GOOD. The training there was awesome! All the missionaries there were taking notes and participating and we were all really in-tune with the spirit it was so great! 

Our final stop was in Gjakova! We were SO TIRED. We got to Gjakova around 5 PM. The training was alright.. I hope they enjoyed it because we were so tired we were trying to be energetic but I am sure we were just monotone and looked stoned haha. It was still get though! 

Then we drove home.. and got back at 9 PM!! It was crazy!! 2 days full of driving and giving trainings. We got home and me and my comp just crashed it was crazy but it really was so awesome because we were able to feel the spirit so much with all the missionaries it was such a great experience! I will attach some videos of me and Elder Millers trip :)
The rest of the week we just had such a hangover from all the driving.. we were so dang tired! Every day ha it was crazy. On Saturday we played football with a bunch of members it was fun. ANd yeah that was pretty much it! We have been working hard in our area when we have the time. We have been doing a bunch of street contacting which is always so great to do. Anway that is pretty much it for this week! Love you all!!

Elder Farnworth 

Transfers (3/20/17)

Scripture of the week! Omni 1:26 
"And now, my beloved brethren, I would that ye should come unto Christ, who is the Holy One of Israel, and partake of his salvation, and the power of his redemption. Yea,come unto him, and offer your whole souls as an offering unto him, and continue in fasting and praying, and endure to the end; and as the Lord liveth ye will be saved."

This week has been a good one! We had transfers so my time with Elder Rogers has come to an end :'( It has been such a great time with him I can't believe it is already over! Those 4 months just flew by man it is crazy. But my new companion's name is Elder Miller! He is a pretty cool guy I am pretty excited to work with him this transfer it is going to be loads of fun! 

Me, Elder Miller, and Elder Coka! 

(Albanian from Tirana that just started his mission)

Okay so at the beginning of the week we had transfers which is pretty crazy every time! Everyone just comes to the office and they are getting stuff and running around and it is crazy! Then on top of that we had to give a training to all of the District Leaders which was super good! Our President has really helped me to rely on the Spirit as I train and to really trust on the Spirit to guide my wards. So at the beginning of the training we were kind of talking about what the District Leaders need to do to best fulfill their calling and we ended up talking a lot about the importance of personal study. I was lead to read a quote from Preach My Gospel given by Boyd K Packer that says: “True doctrine, understood, changes attitudes and behavior. The study of the doctrines of the gospel will improve behavior quicker than a study of behavior will improve behavior.” And we talked about how if we want to become better leaders and better people it all starts in the morning, with our scripture study. If we want to become more like Christ we need to understand his doctrine and his word!

Elder Miller, Emiljo, Olsi, Me 

So the next day was pretty good as well, the new missionaries flew in! So we had to take them out to work for like their first day in the country. It was pretty fun! I called our recent convert, Olsi, and asked him to come and act like and investigator that has a bunch of questions and stuff so me and the new kid went and taught him it was really fun!! 

The rest of the week was pretty boring. We did a bunch of finding which was great! We spent hours and hours on the street street contacting so that was really fun as always ha. This transfer is going to be pretty fun I think with Elder Miller but we are really going to be working hard too! The other day it really hit me how fast my mission is going ha I don't have that much time left I gotta make ever second count!! 

A quilt we made for our recent convert, Olsi! 

Loves! Elder Farnworth 

Blessing on blessings (3/13/17)

These girl in our ward's sister brought us American food!!! 

This half week has been so awesome!! I know I just wrote a blog email like a few days ago but a lot has actually happened since then actually! It has been a great week. So last Thursday we had a meeting with our mission president where we discussed where each missionary will go for the next transfer. The meeting ended up taking 6 hours! It was crazy. I really like being with our president though he is such a spiritual man. At the beginning he was kind of just sharing with us some spiritual thought and stuff and that man is so great! He is so knowledgeable of the scriptures and everything it is so great to work with him he has taught me so much! 

So on Saturday we went over to this members house to have dinner. Her family is all Catholic and she is the only Mormon and a few missionaries have tried to come and teach them before but it wasn't that successful. So we went over and shared a spiritual thought about families and how important the family is and the mom loved it so much! The Spirit was so strong in the lesson it was awesome! And then on Sunday she came to church which was her first time in such a long time it was so awesome!! She told us that after the lesson that we had she could just feel the love of Christ in her house so much and that their family all prayed together and it felt so good for them it was awesome! I was like it was the spirit yo! She asked us if we could come to her house again to give her a blessing so we are going to do that this week it was so awesome! 

Also this week we were able to meet with these 3 really cool girls that had a ton of questions for us. They were really Muslim but were really respectful and open to what we had to say, it was awesome! There was one that I was talking to where the message of the Restoration just kind of clicked with her and she said that it just made so much sense it her. Then she got the Book of Mormon and asked me a bunch of questions about it and every time I would read something from the book I could just tell she felt the power of the words it was awesome! She really loved it. Then there was another girl that was asking us a lot of questions about life and what we believe after this life. When we taught her the plan of salvation she kind of just started crying but she didn't know why she was crying I was like I probably have an explanation why you are.. Anyway I guess it is kind of hard to explain the lesson just over email but it was a really powerful lesson. The Spirit was so strong. Then they ended up coming to church the next day as well and seemed to really like it! It was really cool. 

Also our recent convert, Olsi, got called to teach Sunday School! He was really excited about his lesson and prepared a bunch of scriptures and stuff for it it was so awesome. He invited his sister who wasn't a member to come to church and see him teach the lesson. He did such a good job with the lesson I was really really impressed!! It was so awesome. Then after church we had a lesson with him and his sister and she got really emotional during it and was like "I am so grateful for the change I have seen in my brother.. I thank God every day that he met you" And at that moment the Spirit really testified to me the blessing that the atonement really is in peoples lives and how important the work that I am doing truly is. I felt so good during that lesson. His sister is now working towards baptism so pray for her!! 

Last picture with the district 

This week was really awesome we truly have been so blessed throughout it. The sad part of it is that might time serving with Elder Rogers has come to an end! He is going to be transferred to Vlore and I will get a new companion called Elder Miller. It will be sad to see him go I have gotten really close with him but I am excited to serve with Elder Miller now! He is great.
I feel really blessed to be a missionary right now. I don't know who said it but someone said that missionaries are like the people at the front of the battle line.. so they are the ones that are equipped with the most weapons and the most protection. He compared it to the Spirit and how because we are missionaries we are equipped with the Spirit more abundantly and with tender mercies of the Lord. I have definitely seen that that is true. Week after week I am able to see the blessings that come from God. I love being a missionary!! 

Elder Farnworth

Mission Conference (3/8/17)

The Adriatic South Mission

Mission Conference! My mission is so small it is crazy. That is my Mission President and Elder Moreira in front. 

This week was really good! It was pretty busy but it was still really great. So at the beginning of the week got the assignment to go to Kosovo to meet with all the missionaries there and have a devotional then do an exchange with them. It was really great! We were in my old area, Prishtina, for the devotional. It went really really good! The devotional was so Spiritual! We discussed about some of the people that the missionaries were working with there and how we could help them progress to baptism. It was great! The meeting went pretty long though, I ended up not eating any food until like 3 PM. I was really fine with it though. Normally before my mission and at the beginning of my mission I would kind of be stubborn about food and always need to eat every meal and get grumpy if I don't. But now I really can just go and sometimes I will forget and realized I haven't eaten all day. I will definitely have to try to be better and remember to eat! Ha but anyway so after that I went to a place in Kosovo called Gjakova, to do an exchange with the missionaries there. It was a lot of fun and we got a lot of work done on the exchange. We met with two guys that they have been working with, and had such great lessons with them! The Spirit was so strong there. It was awesome! 

We made American Cheeseburgers while we were in Gjakova. 

They were amazing..

Not really much explaining this one. 

Missionaries are weird haha, sorry. 

So when we got back from Kosovo we were filled with stuff to do. We had a bunch of meetings in and devotionals because one of the old Mission Presidents came to visit, as well as Elder Moreira from the area 70 came to visit! It was great to hear both of them talk. The old Mission President was telling some great stories about some of the older members here in Albania and their conversion stories. It was amazing to hear about all of it! Some of the members went through so much before they joined the church it was crazy. Then we had a few meetings where we heard from Elder Moreira which included Stake Conference and Mission Conference. Stake Conference is always such a great treat! I love seeing all of the Albanian members come together they have such a great spirit! And I love seeing all of my friends from my old area's that was always a treat! 
Mission conference was pretty great too. Elder Moreira is such a goof but at the same time he knows so much about the Gospel and is really spiritual! The conference was so great it was awesome. Then the next day we had a Mission Leadership Conference with Elder Moreira and that was really great as well! It was pretty crazy. It was just meeting after meeting after meeting this weekend but they were all so spiritually uplifting it was great! At the end of it I was just so pumped about the Gospel and for missionary work I loved it. Also, I forgot to mention that before all the meetings I bought a new suit and some new shoes... I was looking fresh. I mean, I believe that you have to look your best to be able to feel the spirit more ;) But yeah that was pretty much my week! It was a really great one. Also today we went on a really cool hike to this monument place up in the mountains it was a lot of fun. I will send pictures! Love you all!!