jakemcgrathmission: Averagely Great Week (Week Вісімдесят три)

Well, honestly, this week was pretty average, nothing too big or grand really happened, but nonetheless, it was good, as a missionary, you really can't have a bad week. Sometimes days can be long or difficult, but at the end of the week, you can look back and realize that you gave it your all, but people have their agency. This week, we met with most of our investigators and we ended up tracting a lot, which I haven't done a ton on my mission. We set a district goal to track three buildings every week, just to get a bit more creative with our finding so we're not just street contacting always, and we saw a bit of success. Basically, sometimes if we have time, we'll find and stop by a less-active, and sadly since most of the time they don't answer, we'll tract their apartment building, which consists of around 35 more apartments that we can knock on and hopefully have some good conversations. Anyhow, the first two buildings that we tracted this week were not very successful, we had a few conversations, but everyone wasn't interested at that moment. Then, we go to the third building, and the same thing, we go through every door, most people won't even open the door for us and we weren't seeing really any success. Finally, we get to the bottom floor and we have four more doors, we knock on the first three, nothing, no one answers. Finally, right before we knock on the last door, I told Elder Holden that he's gonna be interested. Lo and behold, (however you really say that) the man opens the door and we're able to talk and have a good conversation for a few minutes. He's actually an Orthodox Priest, but he looked and read a bit from the Book of Mormon, and we were able to exchange numbers to meet later!! Wowzers, really big testimony builder to me. Super good experience and helped me further understand the important principle of enduring to the end and then you'll receive a ton of blessings. All in all, tracting was successful this week!

Anyway, the rest of the week was good. In the Lutsk branch, I'm pretty sure we have one of the best members in Western Ukraine. She literally helps the sisters just about everyday and she's super willing to do just about anything. Right now, she's actually preparing to serve a mission herself, so she wants all the experience that she can get. This past week, the sisters had an exchange with the STL's so that meant that they were out of town. So on Wednesday, Larisa called us up after she finished her classes that day and asked us where we were. She met us and we contacted with her for a bit, she's already a really good contacter. Then she was able to help us out on a lesson that evening. We actually met with a new investigator that evening that I had contacted earlier that week. We taught a full restoration lesson to him and he seemed to take it very well. He told us in the lesson that he feels that our contact outside wasn't a coincidence and he wants to investigate the church more. Super good potential and this week, we should meet and teach him the plan of salvation which should help him a lot, especially since he's got a family himself.

All in all, the rest of the week was good. Sunday we had a good amout of people at church and after church, we went out and did a finding activity in center. We asked people what Charity meant to them and we were able to have some good conversations from that and got a few numbers. Things are looking good here in Lutsk and excited to keep working here. Especially since the weather is warming up too! Have a great week everyone and talk to you all later!

Старійшина McGrath

Psalm 24:4 read and ponder these words. The Lord hears all of our cries!!