One month in the mission field

This week a ton has happened and I want to start off with my P-day. We went into the mountains with a member 

and ate Horovats. That is how it is said in Armenian and I don't know how it is said in English, but it is part of a pig. 

So we went up to the mountains and made it over a fire. I have a few pictures of how we made it. It was so good, 

almost tasted like bacon. We had it with hats and I made it into sandwiches like I always do. Something I like about 

Armenians they always have bread and you can eat it anyway you want as long as there is bread and there always is. 

Later in the week we all went down to Yerevan. All the missionaries in Armenia went to say goodbye to our Mission 

president, President Carlson and his wife. They have been serving here for 3 years and you can tell how much they 

have changed Armenia in just the 3 short years that they have been here. We went all the way down there and he 

had an amazing devotional about what you need to do in life if you want to succeed in life. They basically said the 

things that dad says all the time. We need to be grateful, work our butt off, they literally said that, and be worthy. 

There were a few more, but I don't remember them all. I wrote them down, but it isn't with me. I think the important 

thing is if we want to have a good life is remember that everything if from the Lord and if we think that way we won't 

get greedy if we have a lot and we will always be grateful for everything that we get.

Then after the meeting I was going to do a split with another missionary in my district. I went up to Alivardi, which is 

about an hour and a half north of Vanedzor by car. It is so beautiful up there, I showed you some pictures last week it 

is where we went on the hike, but on the split I think I was able to help out Elder Grammer a lot. When I was with him 

I realized that he was not doing the best at talking to people on the street. So I think my example of talking to 

everyone really helped him out. Oh yeah and the picture of the dog is a dog that just follows the Alivardi Elders 

around, so it was following us around. It will come and go, but it will find them and follow them for quite a while. 

Other than that we have a baptism coming up this Saturday and I am super excited, but we just have to have one of 

the members of the Mission presidency come up and talk to her because she has had an abortion. She didn't know 

that is was wrong, so you can not really blame her. I think everything will be fine, so as long as everything goes well 

with that we should be good to go for Saturday. 

I want to challenge all of you to find someone that you can share the gospel with. The gospel really blesses families 

and I just want to challenge you to talk to one person about the gospel before next general conference in October. 

Elder Hallstrom gave that challenge to people in Ukraine and now I am just passing it along to you, but just talk to 

at least one. If you can talk to more great, but at least one before October. 

I love you all the church is true and we just need to share it with everyone!

Elder Sproul

Armenia is beautiful

This week I want to go into what Armenia is really like now that I have been here for 3 weeks I can say 
a little more. So I want to first start off with transportation. We get from place to place in either a taxi, 
marshootni which is like a van that everyone just piles in, the bus, or my personal favorite is hitchhiking.
So we try and stay away from taxis because they are expensive, usually like 600 drum I know a whole 
dollar and 50 cents, unless we are traveling a long way to a village it would be like 5000 drum to go 30 
minutes out and back. 12 bucks still not that bad. Taxis don't make that much money at all. The next 
thing is marshootni, which you only use in the city. It cost 100 drum per person a whole 22 cents to get 
from one end of the city to the next. So it's definitely cheap. Those are the ones we try and use the most 
if they are running they stop at 8 so sometimes we have to use a taxi at night. Then the next is the bus, 
which we use to get to villages out side of the city. Depending on how far it is either 200 or 300 drum a 
person, which saves a ton of money where it would be like 2500ish one way to a village. It is funny 
because nothing is made for tall people here and I always either have to stand like 90 degrees in the bus 
and marshootni because we always give the seats up to the women here. Armenians are so polite at least 
in that aspect. On the bus when we are going to be in it for a long time I just try and stand in the entrance 
which a little lower because of the stairs. Then lastly there is hitchhiking. We have been doing that to 
get from the villages back to Vanedzor. I love it because we almost always get picked up, not like in 
America where you wouldn't ever pick someone up. This week we were trying to get back from a village 
and this guy picked us up that was going to Yerevan from Russia and we were able to preach the gospel 
with him a little bit. It was really cool and luckily we had an extra Russian restoration pamphlet. I don't 
know why we had it but we did, so cool. So yeah that is how we have been getting from place to place. 
Now into what happened this week.

This week started us with climbing a mountain in Alivardi, which is in my district, but not my zone. We 
were doing a whole district activity. The mountain was so beautiful and I loved it. Climbing up was alright 
because we had a trail, but we were trying to get to the top and we kind of got lost and we couldn't climb 
back down the same way we came because we had to climb up this little cliff that we could go up, but not 
down. So we kind of just made our own trail down, but as were were doing that it was all thorn bushes and 
my legs and arms got all scratched up. Totally worth it though and would do it again in a heart beat. 

Our investigators are doing alright. The work it tough out here, but we just need to keep trying hard. One 
just went to Russia and will be back next month, so we are just waiting for him to come back. He is ready 
for baptism and another one just fell off the face of the earth. We found out that he ended up not having 
money for his phone and we couldn't get a hold of him, but he isn't even in the city. We don't know 
where he went. Lastly we have one investigator that is doing really well, she is coming to church and 
seems like her testimony is growing, she just needs to read more and figure out if this is really true for 
herself because she says she feels the spirit when we are around, which is good. Other than that we have 
been doing just normal missionary work and serving the Lord. This week we got to serve this lady in our 
ward. We helped her dig her garden so that it would be ready to plant. I love service and she does a lot for 
us. So the least we could do was do a little service for her in her garden. 

This week I grew in that I am beginning to realized how to recognize the Holy Ghost more. One of the 
days I don't remember all of our plans fell through. So we prayed for guidance and we were just walking 
around and we meet these two nice people at a bookie place none the less. She said that she is only free 
on Tuesdays and she would come to the church to meet with us then and the guy knew everything about 
tennis you could possibly want to know. So it was cool talking to him. We were only able to give him a 
pamphlet because he works 12 hours a day and doesn't have time to meet with us, but planting the seed. 

Say you prayers and thank the Lord for everything he gives you. You are all extremely blessed. I love 
you and have an amazing week.

Elder Sproul 

I forgot to say this, but this week I had sacrament out in a village with only 6 people. It was so amazing 
and the spirit was so strong. Definitely the only church in the world that would go out of their way to 
give the sacrament to 6 people. Kind of felt like Joseph smith times!

Cow liver and heart... Not yummy

This week was a little different than the other weeks that I have been here. So first of all it has been raining everyday this week and has been raining for like 2 weeks now. I think that it is about to slow up now, but you never know here in Vanedzor. This week was a little different than the rest because we got to go to Yerevan for Friday and Saturday and we had an auditor come to Vanedzor on Thursday. So I felt kind of bad because that was like three days where we didn't  get to very much missionary work, but all of those things needed to be done. While in Yerevan it was cool because I got to see all of my the missionaries that came in with me and see how they were doing. It kind of a reasurred me that they were having the same struggles that I was with the language. I just need to keep reminding myself that I have only been here for 2 weeks and it will come in time. I saw them because I we all have to get residence cards basically visa stuff. Then I got to go on splits because I was going to need to be back there for priesthood training the next day. Being with someone new helped me a lot. I think because I didn't think of him as someone above me like I do with my trainer. I was contirubuting a lot more and I really loved it. 

As in terms of my investigators we had two come to church this week. They are doing good. One of them is going back to Russia for a little bit and we are going to have to wait for him to come back so that he can get baptized because he want us to do it. He is ready and can be baptized but we just have to wait for him to come back. Our other investigator is doing really well. It has been 2 days since he has stopped smoking and is doing good on that. Other than smoking he is ready. So the work here is moving forward just need to stick close with them so that we can bring the spirit into their lives. 

This week while on my splits, I grew a bunch. I realized that I could say more than I thought. So that's how I grew the most this week. I am going to start saying more in lessons. Even though it is heard to understand. If I feel it is right to say then I just need to say it. 

Keep reading everyday and saying your prayers. God will always answer your prayers, just sometimes it isnt in the time that we want it, but he will always answer. 

Elder Sproul

Ps stay away from cow liver and cow heart. I ate that this week and it was nasty. Did not agree with my stomach at all and I was throwing up last night, but dont worry I am fine and it's gone now. That picture was the cow liver and heart. Oh and one of my members named S wanted to say hello to you mom. He is amazing and the strongest member and always will go on visits

with us.  

Happy Birthday Mom and Brendan

First off I want to say Happy Birthday to Mom and Brendan!

So this week I realized how beautiful Armenia is. Literally the most beautiful place I have been in my entire life. It is just the most green place I have ever seen. So this week we have been teaching some of the same investigators. One of our investigators relapsed and started smoking again. He said he just smoked one time and wants to stop, but it is just hard to stop, especially when 80 percent of people in Armenia smoke. We are going to try for the end of this week to see if he can get baptized. We have 2 planned for that day. So lets see how that goes. We just need to make sure we meet with him everyday and stay close with him so that he gets to experience the spirit.

So this week I found out that Armenia is one of the most beautiful places because of the villages. We got to go to two villages this week Debet and Margahoviet. They are so green and in these villages a lot of people farm so that they can eat and make a lot of the stuff they have. It is cool how self sufficient they are and how much they can do on their own without having to go to a store or anything for most things. 

Oh yeah and this week in these villages I had some real Armenian food. I'll tell you that they are famous for their bread and have that with every meal. Brendan would love the bread here. The bread is good they call is hats kind of but the a is said like awful so- the bread is good, but the cheese and this yogurt type thing were pretty nasty. The cheese is super super salty and just isn't good and then the yogurt was - I don't know how to explain it, but it wasn't good. Look up matzoon and you will know what it is. The only this is when I had it, she served it warm so it was more nasty that it usually would be. I guess it is just something I am going to have to get used to here. 

This week was amazing and I feel like I have grown a bunch. I know I have said this a bunch, but the Book of Mormon is the most correct book of any book and Joesph Smith would not have just made this all up. This is the true church. Say your prayers and and read everyday. Thank Heavenly Father for everything you have. He blesses us so much and it is the least that we can do it offer our thanks through prayer. I love all of you guys.

Elder Sproul