#lighttheworld

This week was a really good week. I really did love all the ideas that our Mission president gave us for #lighttheworld. We really did try to do those everyday and it made us feel a lot better. It just made me feel like I was doing good in the world. Even though sometimes we did not get a whole lot done throughout the day we were still able to help someone out and do something good each and everyday. 

I was super happy that some less actives came to church this week. Elder Millett and I were both trying really hard to get them to church. This week we are going to keep a focus on them and we are going to try and reactivate Yura who is the elder's quorum and his family. That is what we are going to do this week. We are going to keep the lighttheworld going.  

Elder Tenny showed us a really cool thing in district meeting where we can have everyday contact with people. Whether it be less actives or investigators, you just have a member contact them everyday and you can only visit them once a week. If you can help missionaries fellowship with their investigators do it. It means so much more when it comes from members. I am super excited to try it this week.

Merry Christmas!

Elder Sproul 

Patience

We had a less active come to the church this week and introduce us to his friend. That was really cool. Although the friend said that he is very busy right now. I was just impressed with the testimony that this less active had. You knew that he still knew it was true and we are going to stay in touch with him. He was not able to come to church this week because he was in Yerevan, but I think that he is gong to come back soon. 

Then we meet with Yura who is our less active Elder's quorum president and could tell that he just felt neglected. I realized that when we meet with each other that I had some repenting to do. I was judging him for something that he did in the past and I always thought that he was going to be that way. Then he called us in front of the church and I realized that he still does have a testimony and I think that he will come back to church shortly. He was just sick this week. 

We are seeing a lot of blessings in our branch coming from the Lord. You don't know when they will come, but they always will come if it is in line with the Lord's will. Some times we don't realize when they will come. There is a great Mormon message on this. The Lord will always bless us and never give up. 

https://www.mormonchannel.org/watch/series/mormon-messages/continue-in-patience-1 

I love all of you and have an amazing week. Just keep moving forward and everything will be okay. The Lord is there to provide for us we just have to be patient and wait for him to provide because if we are being obedient he will provide. I know that this work is true and our only goal is to reach God and say that I am ready to enter into your kingdom. How sad would it be if you reached that day and he said " I do not know you." Do everything you can to get to know him and to get to know his kingdom.

Elder Sproul  

Christmas Presents

This week was a pretty productive week. I really have been enjoying my mission so much more this past week. Some things that happened was we were able to pick up some investigators who we were able to meet with with Manuk. I don't know what will come of it as of now, but I know for a fact that if Manuk was not there I know that it would not have turned out the way it did if it was just us. As I think back on the most successful times in my mission it was when I was going to meetings with members all the time. Even to members houses I would bring another member. This past week we were able to do that a couple times. We visited Rima and Rafik with some members on Sunday too they wanted us to come with them so we did. You can just tell that they cared that other members cared about them. I really like the recent convert Hasmik and how much she thinks about all the other members. She is always calling us and asking us how the other members are doing because she does not have minutes in her phone. So in short if you can go and visit a less active or a non member with missionaries go and do it. If all you can do is share your testimony do that. It will bring a ton of power into the meeting when it does not come from the missionaries. This will help them and it will help you a whole ton too. 

I love you all and have a great week. Use Christ's atonement in your life. It really is the biggest blessing that anyone can ever could give to you. I learned this week that there are two parts of the atonement. 1 the forgiving power or the power we use to repent and 2 just power in general. He can give us power to do anything we want through his atonement we just have to tap into that energy through prayer and asking him for what we want. I love all of you and this Christmas season #lighttheworld.

Elder Sproul

#lighttheworld

This week was a pretty normal week. I have realized that Anush who is the branch president's wife, is a very good missionary and tries a lot to bring people to the gospel. She talked to us about all the people that she tries to talk to and then she talked about all her relatives. She really wants us to meet with one of them, but he is just not answering our calls. We are going to try again next week. I really want to meet with this guy because he is a 20 year old male and I know that he could be a big strength to this branch. I have met him a couple times at church, but never had an official visit with him. We are still going to try and meet with him this week. 

We had a good district meeting this week on the power of introducing the Book of Mormon. I saw a bunch of different ways that we can introduce the Book of Mormon and showed me some different ways all with the Bible being introduced first and then the Book of Mormon. I really did like that and it helped me to realize the importance of the Bible in the work. 

Then this week we watched the light the world videos and I am prepared to make it a big thing in Armenia. Last year it was not that big of a thing, but this year it is going to be a lot bigger. It just promotes doing good everyday. If you do not know what it is then you can look it up on mormon.org and find out everything about it. It is just all about just being more like Christ everyday. 

I love all of you and I know that this gospel is true do everything you can to retain your testimony.  

Elder Sproul 

Zone Conference

During Zone conference this week we were able to be taught and learn about things that I knew, but have neglected for a long time. The zone conference was how we can introduce The Book of Mormon in a better way to our investigators. They talked about introducing the Bible and how to overcome objections. I obviously know that the Bible and the Book of Mormon are the word of God, but I did not realize that I was totally missing something by passing the Bible when I would introduce the Book of Mormon. When I thought back on my meetings where I did that I realized that people were probably feeling like I was trying to replace their Bible instead of trying to give them more scripture. 

I have just realized this week how good it is to serve the Armenian people. I have not seen the fruits of my labors in the past few weeks, but we have been doing a lot of service and I just feel good when I am able to help someone in some way. As long as I am doing some good in the world everyday for someone that is good for me. That is what I have been trying to focus on. My goal ever day is to be doing some sort of good for someone that day. Try and help someone that is going through a hard time and just do something for them. You will not regret it and you will feel good that you did something for someone just to be nice. 

I know that what I am doing is the Lord's work and I could not do this without him. He controls everything and I just need to be the tool in his hand so that I can be ready to do the task he has for me. I love everything about a mission and I have grown so much. Keep trying everyday to do what you know is right. I know sometimes it can be hard, but these are the things that will protect us from Satan - Reading and praying and going to church. If we do these things we will have nothing to worry about. 

Elder Sproul

Another week in Armenia

This week was a lot like all the others. The thing that we are most excited about is the chance to work with a 20 year old male. His name is Vahe and he is Anush's relative I might have told you about him, but I don't remember. He came to church again this week. We have not been able to meet with him in an official lesson with him, but he wants to meet with us. He just goes to Yerevan every day to go to school and does not have a lot of time. He said that we can meet next Saturday because he is free on Saturdays and Sundays. He speaks English and wants to become a translator in his life. He is studying to become a linguist. We are super excited to be able to work with him and he really does have some promise to be someone that can progress. He really does like coming to church though and that is half the battle with investigators. 

The one thing that I have to say is that in this Christmas season do something nice for someone and light the world with the love of Christ. I know that even if we do something small it will mean a lot to someone else. If everyone did one thing think how more amazing this world would be. I love you all and have an amazing week! 

Elder Sproul

So we played a game and the loser had to put ash on his face so I lost and that is what this picture is​

Another week in Armenia

Okay so this week was a little bit of a slow week, but we were still able to meet with one of our investigators 3 times. Our other investigators were super busy this week and we could not meet with any of them. I guess sometimes that happens people have lives and that is just how it is. Anush's relative said that he would come to church again, but he was just busy this week with tests in school. so we are hoping to be able to visit with him this week. 

Then we met these two guy at his fruit stand. We started talking to him and we were able to talk to them about the church for a little bit and explain what we were doing here. Then we helped him close his shop up and put a bunch of fruit boxes in his car and were able to get to know him and he said that he wanted to learn English. Then it turned out that he was Manuk's distant relative and Manuk told us that he wanted to gather some people together and we could help him with English so that is super cool. That was the best part of the week for sure and he also invited us to go and play soccer with him so me and Elder Millet are super stocked to go and play soccer with him today on our p-day. It just seems like theLlord has been blessing us. Even though we don't have a ton of investigators we still have people that we are trying to teach they are almost all males and 4 of our 5 investigators are below 30. so that is really amazing to be able to be talking with people in the prime age about the gospel. 

This is a quote I liked a ton Believe in “work first and play later.” Fun carried to excess can swallow you up and make life so complicated you don’t have time for spiritual things. I like the quote from C.S. Lewis: “If you don’t choose Christ first, it will make no difference what you choose second.” Put God first and everything will work out. 

Elder Sproul

Two Letters in One

Monday October 22, 2017

So this week was a pretty good week. Minas was able to get the Holy Ghost this week and everything went well on that front. Then we were able to be with Manuk a lot this week he is our branch president. We are trying to meet with a lot of the members so that we can get them to feel that we care about them. We were able to meet with one member and we helped her to put her pej in. The thing that keeps her house warm. I don't know what it is in English. So after that we were able to talk to her for a little bit and invite her to come back to church. She has a grandson that we are going to try and meet with this week. So we will see how that goes.  

Then this week we were able to do some cement work with one of Manuk's best friends. Apparently Manuk has been trying to get him to come to church for some time now, but we just offered to help him and we were with him for a couple hours doing that and then we were able to testify about the Book of Mormon and invite him to church and he actually came. So we are super stocked on him and hope that he can progress in the coming weeks. We have a visit with him for Tuesday and are hoping that we can bring Manuk with us to that visit.

Then on Friday we had a branch council. It was going very well and we were giving a lot of assignments and then Gayane our Relief Society President had some problem with her heart. They said that her blood pressure all of a sudden dropped and that is why she wen't to the hospital. I think it was a fluke thing, but I don't know. She is just laying in bed and taking things easy right now. 

That is basically our week, but I want to finish up with knowing that you are never a lone. The savoir is always there. With training I have been feeling a little alone, but then on Sunday I decided to pray and I just felt the calming love of the Savoir. I love prayer and I am thankful to God everyday that I can talk to Him and council with Him. It really is a gift and we should cherish it. I love you all and have a great week. 

Elder Sproul

Monday October 30, 2017

This week was a pretty good week. I have noticed the advice that president Bostrom game me in an Interview with him has really Elder Millet and I work a lot better together. He really has a strong desire to help these people and I am super happy to be able to see what we can do in the weeks to come. 

Then this week the coolest thing that happened was when Anush the branch presidents wife invited one of her relatives to church. He is a 20 year old man and we are hoping to visit with him this week with Anush and get him progressing. Manuk's family is really hepling the church to grow a ton. 

Then we meet with this other 22yeah old ish man that knows English really well. He just wants to practice his English, but we have been able to testify about the Book of Mormon to him and let him know about our church. Although he is coming for English, he likes meeting with us and I know that he has felt the spirit when he has been with us. So little by little we want to help him. 

Then we were able to set a baptismal date with one of our members brothers. He has a lot of work to do to be able to reach his date of dec 9th, but I think that he can make it. He knows what he has to do to be able to reach it and now he just have to make that step of faith. 

So yeah that was our week. I love this work and am thankful for every day that I can serve the Lord. Try and do something nice for someone this week. It feels really good.  

New Missionary and a Baptism

So this week has been really good. We were able to get Minas Baptized and he is going to be a super good member. This week I am going to talk about President Manuk and make sure that he gets the Aaronic priesthood this week. I don't know what he calling should be yet, but during this week I want to pray and think about what calling would be good for him. 

Then this week I got to pick up Elder Millett. He is a very good Elder and can see him becoming a great elder one day. He already knows the language very well. He can speak it, but it is just a little hard for him to speak right now. He will get it over time. As they say kamats kamats or little by little. I am humbled for the opportunity to be able to teach a new member and thank the Lord every day for the opportunity. 

Then Elder Tenny had a super good district meeting about not wasting time and creating your onion which means to always have layers to your planing so that when one of your plans falls through you will have a back up. 

Another thing that happened this week was Manuk's new goal for the branch he wants 120 people by the end of the year. When he said this goal I was really shocked and did not know how we were going to make it, but then he said that we are going to get all of our less actives back to church. We are going to visit 3 families a week and get them to come back to church. Then he said that he already talked to one family and that one of them was going to come back and then the 2 others want to get baptized. So Just exciting things that are going on for missionary work and Manuk is super excited for it. 

Yeah that was basically our week. Do what the Lord expects of you. You know what you should do. ​

Transfers

Hello everyone!

This week I found out that I will be training a new missionary. Now I will have two "Sons" in the mission. It is going to be very different from my last time when it was out of my training.

This week we were able to help Minas a lot. We saw him almost every day. He has been progressing a lot. This Thursday at 1 he is scheduled to get baptized. He is super excited for his baptism and it is going to be a really good experience. 

During this week I have been loving the fact that I have been putting a bigger focus on my book of Mormon reading. There has not been a day in a really long time that I have not read from The Book of Mormon, but it is just different when you put a time on how much you are going to read instead of pages. Just something that my mission president said that we should put time into reading The Book of Mormon and not pages. So I want to invite all of you to do that so that you can let the spirit guide you.  So every morning I have been reading for 40 minutes and I really have just been enjoying it a lot more. Instead of just getting through my page amount I am just reading and not thinking about it. 

Then this week we have been working with a man called Vachik for a long time. Just about the whole transfer. He has not really progressed very much and he has been saying that he needs to get glasses so that he can read from the Book of Mormon. So I have not had a ton of faith in him because he never really did it, but then two visits ago he said that he got glasses and that he would read in his free time. I was still not being super faithful, but was happy that he said he would read. Then next time we came he was already in 1st Nephi 4. He told us that yeah Joseph Smith set up a church in 1830. So there is progress there and he has support from some members. When they heard that Minas was getting baptized his sisters told us that you will invite him to the baptism and they really want him to get baptized too. So he has some promise. The next step is just getting him to church. 

I love all of you and conference was amazing. I really like all of the talks, but my two favorite ones were Elder Nelsons and Elder Holland.

Elder Sproul

My week

So this week a few things happened that were really amazing and I just wanted to go into those a little bit more. 

1. We had a super cool English class this week. The American corner has put us in charge of an English class and it has been really fun to teach them some English. They put it on Facebook to announce that we would be teaching and the first week we had 1 person come to our class, but this week we had 18 people come to our class. Although it is just kids that we are teaching it feels good to help people learn English and actually help people. 

2. We have been working with one of our investigators for quite some time now. His name is Minas. We are thinking that he is going to make his baptismal date of October 12th.  He did have a relapse of smoking this week, but we were able to talk about it and he said that I know that I should not have done that and he is committed to be done smoking. So if he does not smoke he should be able to meet his baptism. In a meeting the other day, we had given him the assignment to read Enos and it was super cool that he asked us did they really give the record to their son and so on and so on? How long did this go on? We told him for a 1000 years and he was super amazed. Just questions like that, that shows that he cares. So we will let you know how everything goes, but that was my favorite part of the week that he committed to be done again and realized that is was wrong what he did. I have been trying to do the thing that it says in preach my gospel under addiction recovery in chapter 10. I don't remember exactly where it is, but it says to try and not crack your fingers or try to stop doing something that you do without thinking. So I have been trying to not crack my fingers at all and it is very hard. I will go about an hour or so and then without thinking I will just crack them. I have been going longer and longer, but I just can't imagine how hard it would be to quit smoking. 

3. Then our investigator that was a banker came back from Russia. He was there visiting his sister who just had a kid. We did not know if we were going to be able to visit with him again, but we have been calling him here and there to see if his phone was back on and this week he answered and said that we can meet today actually. So I am super excited about that and he is just a great guy. We want to take Manuk, our branch president with us to visit him because they are around the same age and both have young families.   

I love you and have an amazing week! Read The Book of Mormon and give thanks to the Lord everyday that we have the scriptures and we have the direction in our life. It really is a blessing to have them. 

Elder Sproul

Splits with the District Leader

Hello everyone! This week I went on splits with the district leader and it was a pretty good time. Even though he is my missionary leader I was able to help him and teach him some things that would help him in his missionary work. I was able to learn some things from him too. One thing that was a miracle that happened during our time together was Elder Tenny (that's his name) said a prayer that these people would come to the church. These people are less active members that know the church is true, but it was just a miracle when they actually came to the church. We were able to share our testimonies with them. It was enough for them to say that they would come to church and start doing things to come back to activity. This was an amazing miracle and strengthened my testimony of prayer.  

Then we were able to meet with our investigator. His name is Minas and he knows the gospel is true and loves reading The Book of Mormon. His only problem is that he cannot quit smoking. We found out that he only smokes when his grand kids annoy him and then it just helps him to calm down. He said that he is only smoking one a day though and that he would stop smoking. We are just hoping that he is actually going to follow through so that he can reach his baptismal date of October 12. He has been reading the 12 step book which has been helping him. So I will keep you updated on that. We were also able to spend a lot of time with our branch president. We had a ton of branch things to do with him. The church leadership is improving. 

This was basically our week in a nutshell, but I just want to bear my testimony of prayer. It really is something that is real. God hears your prayers and will answer them. Just remember that he will not give us any answers if we are not going to follow through. So just pray with sincerity and God will answer.  

I love you and have a great week. Make good choices!

Elder Sproul 

Miracles

So this week we had a couple of miracles happen that I want to talk about. Two of the miracles that we saw happened were to two people that we were able to meet this week. 

First we were able to meet with a man called Aro. He works across the street from the church. We went into his work place and he expressed interest to stop smoking. So we just talked to him about how we could help him with that and we were able to testify to him that with the Lord he could be able to quit smoking and we were able to teach him about the restoration and The Book of Mormon. As the meeting closed we were able to give him a Book of Mormon and Elder Vincent testified of the peace that he has felt and the peace that he gets because he knows where he is going and then he was asking about what happens after this life. So we will be able to talk to him about in our next visit. 

Then the other miracle that we saw this week was when we were going to the church and this lady asked us if we were the Mormons. She said that she would come to church this week. In other words yesterday. She just came from Russia and she did not have a cell phone, but one of our members knows her and said that she is going to invite her and her son to church this week. I am super excited for her and her son. She and her son were about to come to church and were outside, but they got called to another city right before it started. They will get invited next week and I have faith in that. Oh and our investigator came to church this week. We asked Minas is he was going to come to church on Saturday and he said he wasn't going to make it, but he came. We were super excited on that. 

So that was basically our week. I love you and remember the Lord in all things. I read Revelations 20:12-13 and it talks about how we are going to get judged by books and I am sure that these are the scriptures. So read them and know how you are going to be judged. I love you and have a great week. 

Keep pushing

This week was a good week, but a little difficult. A lot of things just would not work out. We had a lot of plans that we wanted to happen for this week, but it just was not able to happen the way that we wanted it to. Almost all of our investigators ended up being busy this week and then all of the people that we wanted to pick up were also busy. All I can do it just do our best and the Lord will do the rest. There is no point in getting discouraged. This is a new week and a time to start over again. So I just need to keep trying to meet with them and have faith that they will be free this week. Sometimes the Lord wants us to learn something. I do not know what that is just yet, but I want to figure it out. My branch president always says that the Lord will not give us trials that we can not bear. That is true, but we have to realize that he will give us trials because through trials we will learn. It says in the teachings of Brigham Young: "The people of the Most High God must be tried. It is written that they will be tried in all things, even as Abraham was tried"Read D&C101:1-4. I think the this applies to us also. He then goes on to say have no fears, for if the word of the Lord is true, you shall yet be tried in all things. So do not get discouraged if you are going through tough times. The Lord gives trials to make us stronger. So that we can learn all we have to do is to find out what the Lord wants us to learn from this trial. I love you all and this week embrace your trials with gladness

I know that this church is true and we need to make sure we are doing everything that we can to make sure that we are on the lords side.  

Elder Sproul

Goal Setting

Hello everybody,

This week was a really good week. I don't know why that I have never done this before, but this last week we decided to pray about our goals and what we should set as out goals. With goals that were backed by the Lord we were ready and prepared to reach our goals this week. We started out the week a little bit slow, but we were able to pick up one investigator and set one baptismal date with one of our investigators. Then, as the week went on and it came to Sunday we were at 2 baptismal dates and 2 investigators. We did not know how were going to get the one more baptismal date and the 2 new investigators, but we were still confident that the Lord would pull through for us. In the end we were able to only pick up one more investigator on Sunday, his name is Suren and works at a bank and for an insurance company. He has a wife and a kid (oh and he does not smoke!) He is a great guy.  We are super stoked for him and are happy to see where his journey will go and we are hoping to be able to give him a baptismal date this week and meet his wife. On Sunday we were just able to get to know him a little and we talked about how The Book of Mormon changed our lives and how much it means to us. We explained how it came about and you could tell that he was feeling the Spirit. We asked him if he would read and try and find out if it was true. He accepted and it was definitely one of those meetings that I did not want to be anywhere else. 

Although our goals were 3 baptismal dates 2 people at church and 4 investigators and we were one short on each of them I think that the Lord had us set those goals for a reason. We were able to reach 2 baptismal dates on Friday and so I think that if we set it as 2 we would have gotten lazy and not tried as hard. Then on Sunday night we were able to reach 2 investigators at about 8:00 at night and we had an hour to go before we going to go home. We did not have any plans, but we wanted to try and reach our goal of 4 investigators so we just went to walk in one part of the city that was about 15 minutes away and then just make a big giant loop while talking to everyone on the way. On the way we were able to meet a really nice lady and she invited us over to come to her house on Tuesday so we are super excited about that. Although we were not able to reach the 4 investigators I still think that it was because the Lord wanted us to work hard for that last hour. If we would have hit the 4th investigator before that we would have said to ourselves,  "well that is it, we did it" and we probably would have tried to meet with some member that did not really need to be meet with, but instead we were able to find this lady and hopefully can help her to come closer to Christ. In other words, we just need to counsel with the Lord in our goals. In the past I would just talk with my companion and see what we thought was best, but we really should get on our knees and see what Heavenly Father thinks is best. After all, He is the one leading the work not us. This is why I have been super stoked lately and it really does help when you know that the Lord is backing us on your goals. Just helps you to get excited about them. 

I love you and God does really care about everything that we care about. We can ask Him for anything as it says in Alma 37:37. Have a great week and I will talk to you all next week. I know that this is His work, I am grateful to be a part of it and nothing would get done without Him. 

Elder Sproul

American Corner

This week we were able to find the American corner and it was really cool. It is this place that the American Embassy set up for the Armenians to learn English. The Zone leaders told us about it and told us to go check it out. It was just cool to meet people that had some ambition in their lives.  We were able to have conversations with Armenians in English. There are not that many Armenians that know English as well as them. There are a lot, but for some reason we just do not come in contact with that many in Charenstaven. 

Then we meet a super good contact who was super excited to meet with us. So we were ready to meet with him and then he would not answer his phone, so we decided to just let it go and call him the next day. We called him and then he said, that he "did not have time"  I just felt like someone told him not to meet with us because he was super excited to meet with us and then all of a sudden he said that he did not have time to meet with us. 

Then at the end of the week we meet with this man named Ashot and he said that is ready to come back to church. He has been an investigator in the past and he said that he wanted to start meeting with us again. We did not get to talk to him for very long, but set up a return appointment with him for Tuesday. He is a good man and knows how to feel the spirit. He told us that he feels light and good when he is around us. We told him that it is not us, but the spirit and he can feel that always. We did not get to set a baptismal date because he had to go, but we hope to on Tuesday. 

So we are just moving along here and doing missionary work. I don't really know what to say anymore, but just keep living worthy of the spirit and everything will be okay. The spirit will guide tou do do what is right. I love you all and have an amazing week. 

Elder Sproul 

Press on with Faith

This week was a really good week. We had a lot of chances to pick up investigators, but all of the visits just did not work out. One thing that happened was someone called us and wanted to meet with us and we were super excited about it. I asked him if he was in Charenstavan and he told me yes. So we were super excited about it. The next day came and we were 15 minutes early to where he said to meet. We were going to meet him at a park. So we called him and wanted to see if he was still going to come, and then we found out that he was in Yerevan. He said that we gave him our number a few days before, but we did not remember that at all. So we just gave the number to the Erebuni Elders and they took it from there. 

Then we had this man who wanted to meet with us and practice English with us. He called us last week trying to meet with us. We were really surprised that he would call us. We made it a focus of trying to meet with him and get him into the church to feel of the spirit that is in the building. So every time that we called him he was saying that we would be able to meet at night so every night we would be ready to meet with him he would just tell us that he was busy or went to another job, or had guests over. 

I don't tell you this because I am complaining or anything, but because I am happy that we have opportunities to find people Out of the 3 opportunities we were able to find one person this week. So what did we learn from this? Sometimes we try our best and it still does not work out. We just have to remember that it is all in the Lord's time. We are blessed in so many ways and just for trying. In my opinion the Lord does not care as much about the results, but just that we are trying. For instance, we had a member tell us that he does not want to read because he will not remember what he had read. This was my response to him. The Lord does not care if we remember what we read. He cares that we are reading and following the prophet and reading the book everyday. We will feel the spirit and be blessed just for showing our faith in the prophet. So I know I talk about The Book of Mormon a lot, but really it is my testimony and will never be shaken. All you have to do is open the book and the spirit will open itself upon you.  

I love you so much and have an amazing week. Sorry there has not been any pictures lately, but I just have not been taking any lately.

Elder Sproul

It is in the doing that brings results

I have heard this a few times during my mission, but I just wanted to talk about this a little bit. You hear people say a lot of the time that he is really good at this or he is really good at that. When you think about it all the people are good at something are people that just do it. If you want to be good at math it is because you do the homework and the work necessary to get the results. If you want to be good at scripture study read your scriptures. If you want to be good at praying then start praying. If you want to be a good member missionary then talk to your friends about the gospel. It is all in the doing that gets results. Do not think that someone is just better than you at something. They are better than you at something because they did the doing in the past to get the result that they are at today. Sometimes it takes a lot of doing to get the results we want, but we will always get the results that we want if we do the doing that takes to get us there. It is dependent on if we our willingness to make the sacrifice to get to the results.

Other than that we meet a less active named Radik this week and he said that it was time for him to make a change in his life and come back to church and he said that he would come to visits with us 2 times a week. It really is super cool that sometimes having time away from the church helps you realize what you have been missing. He was a super cool guy and knew the scriptures fairly well. He said that he could not come to sacrament every week because of work, but that he would be able to come when work did not call him in. It was a blessing because we do not have a lot of males to go on visits with us and now we can visit some more people with Radik. 

That was basically the highlight of my week and I am super excited to work with him. I know that The Book of Mormon will bless you life and if you say I am not good at studying the scriptures, just give it a try for 10 min a day and if you can not find 10 min in the day obviously you do not want to blessings that comes from the doing. Prophets have said it plain and simple if we are doing our reading we will get blessed. So I will leave you with that. I know this might come across a little harsh, but it is true we really will get blessed just for reading and showing God that we want the results. I love you so much and have a good week. 

Elder Sproul 

Audit

So this week was nothing really different, except we were able to do an activity with the branch and we had an audit in the branch. I don't know if I told you, but a lot of the missionaries here are clerks. In every branch there is one missionary clerk.  In the activity we went to a place called Gardni and Geghard which is just some churches that are in Armenia. They are really cool, but just the same as any other church in Armenia. It was a good activity and we were able to grow closer as a branch. 

Then in terms of the audit. Everything went well. The auditor was really nice. His name is Elder Cook and he came down from Russia. Everything went well. I just feel like doing all these things and knowing the church this well that there is no way that people in this mission will not be bishops and stake presidents one day. I literally have found out so much stuff about the church it is insane.

This week I have been reading the new testament and I was able to finish Matthew. I would like to encourage everyone to read from the like of Christ. It has brought me closer to Christ. and really helped me understand more fully what he went through. I know you have all read it before, but reading it will bring you close to Christ no matter how many times that you have read it before.  

I love you all and have an amazing week. Doing the simple things will bring you more blessings than you can imagine and just think about all the blessings that you do not realize. 

Elder Sproul 

We met an "apostle"

This week I had the opportunity to meet an apostle. We went to the meeting not knowing that we were going to be meeting an apostle and then we got there we found out that it was a guy named Manvel and he was starting his own church. We found him by calling him in the area book. He kept on saying that one of our members that was in a wheel chair did not have the right to preach the gospel because he was handicapped. He brought up the Matthew 9 story and was like he was healed and then started preaching. It was really dumb, I thought because this guy was someone that was paralyzed and could not do anything, while the man in our branch is completely normal and can doing anything he wants, but just has no use of his legs. After all he is an "Apostle" and we need to listen to him, right? It was just super funny. The whole time we were just trying to testify of the truthfulness of the gospel, but he just wouldn't listen and would just try and teach us. So we don't think that we will meet with the apostle again, but it was a funny experience. 

My companion is the first counselor in the branch presidency. This week, he gave a calling to a member in our branch to close the door during sacrament and make sure that no one enters. It was super funny because people were trying to get in and he was just holding it shut. Sacrament went really well though and it was probably one of the better sacrament meetings that I have had in a long time. During the sacrament there was no noise and you could actually think about what the Savoir has done for you and then we learned from all the talks that were given. This branch has a lot of room to grow and I am excited to be able to work here for the next 22 weeks. 

I know that this church is true and it will never go away. I heard this week from someone that our church is crumbling in Armenia, but we have the promise from the Lord that it will never go away. It does not matter if there are 5 people in a meeting. As long as there are people in Armenia we will continue going forward and I know that. I love you so much and have an amazing week. 

Elder Sproul