CHRISTMAS 2015

MERRY CHRISTMAS! This Week Elder Ure spoke to us (his family) on Skype.  It was so great to see his face and talk to him.  He says it is always foggy, he never sees the sun. They ran out of time to buy food and then the stores closed on Christmas Eve. He is frustrated learning the language but loves being a missionary.  That is all for this week.

Skype on Christmas!

  

Always foggy

Christmas Eve Dinner

Christmas

The Branch Building

HUNGARY- WEEK TWO

Budapest in December

So this week has been crazy, painful, super spiritual, funny, awesome, pretty much every emotion. 

I can’t even begin to describe the word frustrating to you. Sitting there all day every day not understanding what anyone is saying gets to you. Me being the person I am I want to know it and know it right away and it is super annoying not understanding anything but I am being patient. It will hopefully come in a year or so hahaha lol. 

We had Christmas zone conference this week in Budapest and that was super fun. I loved going up there and looking around and being able to see everything again. We had fun at the conference and actually got to see a movie!! We got to go see The Little Prince. I would tell you what it was about but it was all in Hungarian sooo sorry. haha. It was still cool to be able to just sit there I guess haha. 

Then later in the week we went to give service to an older lady and got to take her to a play in this big Catholic church. It was a cool experience seeing how other religions do things and just sitting there listening to people sing and be happy. The old lady is super nice and old and she always wanted to hold our hands because hers was cold and because we thought she was going to fall over but I got to just walk the streets of Hungary holding this little old Hungarian ladies hand for a little so it was awesome! 

So, probably the worst thing possible happened this week. I went to a program with an investigator and he said he was going to feed us and we were all excited so we walk up to the door and right when he opens the door I about throw up. Straight salmon smell hits me in the face and I want to pass out. If you know me you know that salmon is my worst enemy. It is disgusting. So, I man up and walk in. Anyway, long story short I had to eat a piece of salmon and it about killed me. I will never like salmon. 

Now onto probably the best part of the week. WE FOUND A FOOTBALL TEAM!!!!!

So we called the coach and he wanted to meet with us right then but we couldn’t so we met with him the next day and he just told us all about the team and how he pretty much puts all his time an money into the team. He was such a cool guy and all of us thought he would be the best mormon ever, haha. We will get him don’t worry haha. Anyways he asks us what we want to do and if we want to play on the team and all this stuff and then we told him why we are here and our purpose an he loved it and wants us to come coach and then share a message after practice!!! So Saturday comes around and that’s when they practice and we show up and they already know who we are because the coach talked about us to them. So we talk to them and see what positions they play and they didn’t have a QB there so ya boy  I stepped in and was dropping dimes. I played QB and also went and ran routes and caught balls. This team is super like rag tag and just a bunch of guys that don’t really know football so it made it so fun haha. Dylan and I were ballin so hard it was so good to play again. They loved us and we are going to coach them from now on and share messages with them! How crazy is that? Two best buds from Highland Utah playing football in the middle of Hungary. Want to know the even crazier thing? The field they play on is literally a farm. You walk past horses and chickens and all types of animals and behind all that is where the field is. SO cool. I love it haha. I will give you more about that next week!! 

Then Saturday we had our branch Christmas party. It was fun I guess but it was hard to have fun when you can’t really talk to anyone so I just kinda sat there. Anyway the cool part was one of our investigators showed up super drunk so that was interesting. He was passed out in the chair and so we woke him up and started talking to him and what happened was he had to go to the hospital because his heart and he has a really hard life and not a lot of money so he drank and was super wasted. He ended up saying that he doesn’t want to live this way anymore and that he is done with smoking and drinking and is going to change. So we walked him home so he would be safe and he started to hug us all and got to me and just started to cry so I just hugged him and said in broken Hungarian that I love him. So in two weeks he wants to be baptized so we will see how that goes. 

Anyway that was my week here in Hungary and I hope you all have such an amazing Christmas and think of the true meaning of this time of year. I love you all!! 

Love Elder Ure 

HUNGARY-Week One

(This back ground info is added by Stacy for those of you that do not know the story....
There is an Elder serving in Hungary that was a friend of Cameron's in high school.  They played football together.  This elder was quite instrumental in influencing Cameron to go on a mission.  Once Cameron's call came, they have been praying that they would get to serve together on their missions in Hungary.  Please read the rest of the story in Cameron's words.)

So I will start by saying that the computers here are all in Hungarian which makes typing and spelling things so hard. This week has been so insane! So I left the MTC and went to the airport (got to talk to my family a lot) and did all that. I would talk more about that but it wasn’t really that exciting, haha. I flew on a plane and tried to sleep... didn’t sleep, got to Hungary and was really tired. By the time I got to sleep it had been 34 hours or so since the last time I had slept so that was a rough start.

We got off the plane and walked out and there was the Pres. and the APs waiting for us!! It was super nice to talk to them and see them. They took us back to the mission home and we dropped our bags off and then the APs took all of us to get some food. We had some rice and chicken which was pretty good but it wasn’t really Hungarian. We toured Budapest a little (see pics)  Then went back to the branch house and that is when I saw Dylan (Elder Murdock)  for the first time!! I lost my mind it was so crazy to see him!! We walked around and talked and he acted like he didn’t know at the time but YES!!!!! he is my trainer!!! We went into a meeting and it got announced and I flipped out!!! We had a few minutes to talk and it was a little emotional. But we became comps and another guy named Elder Roberts!! awesome guy. It has been super fun to serve with both of them. So then I find out I am serving in Níregyhaza!! pretty cool town but it is really communist like and everyone hates each other. Haha

Hungarians are really grumpy but don’t worry I am melting their hearts with my super good Hungarian. just kidding! I don’t understand anything haha. It is really hard to be in a crazy place and not even know what people are saying to me. I love it though. It is super fun and I couldn’t be happier. We got on a 3 hour train to pretty much Ukraine. I am right on the border of everything.  We got to the town and we are walking down the street and this guy stops us, and starts talking to us in English. (which does not happen here. like ever.) So he starts talking to us and brings up that he plays American football and that there is a team here in this town!!! what are the odds!!! Dylan and I started freaking out!!! The very first person I talk to and he brings up football... like are you kidding???  We go to our apartment and walk in and it is pretty nice actually. I don’t have a bed though. I sleep on a couch. It pretty much sucks but I am surviving, don’t worry. We went to our first appointment my first day there and it was way cool to sit and listen to the language I am supposed to know. I don’t think I got more than a couple of words but I bore my testimony and that’s about it.  I got to finally sleep after that. Best sleep ever! Next day we woke up and went grocery shopping and had some crazy experiences. People hate when you sniffle so if you have a runny nose you get wrecked here and also they just walk across the street and cars stop for them so it is way sketchy but you just go out into the street and cars have to slow down. It is way crazy. Also, it gets 1öö percent dark at like 4 every day so that kinda sucks a lot.  I feel like I haven’t seen the sun in months because it is always cloudy and then gets dark so soon.

 I taught some really cool lessons and was able to bear my testimony and it was cool to see it affect people. We were teaching these gypsies (which are just different skin color people and usually are pretty poor. But I bore my testimony and asked if she would pray so she did. She hadn’t prayed in over 20 years. So she was really embarrassed and felt bad but I told her that God wants her to talk to him and that he loves her and we love her and she just started to cry and ran out of the room. I hope it was a good thing because it was really cool for me. The Gift of Tongues is real even if I can’t speak great Hungarian.   Sorry, but I have to go,  love you all,  Elder Ure

last MTC care package binge

Balcony of first apartment

First time seeing Budapest

last time with Elder Verse in Buda

Budapest

First Apartment

Our Hungarian food we made

Níregyhaza    

Last MTC P-Day. I Know that My Redeemer Lives

Well I have more stuff to talk about than ever before this week that is for sure. It has been a long time since I wrote last because of Thanksgiving! So much has happened!!

So last week, the day before Thanksgiving my district got flight plans for Hungary!!! Never been so excited in my life I am pretty sure. 

We have to be at the travel office Monday morning at 3:35 Am... early morning for sure!

Then our flight takes off to Houston, Texas at 8:01 from SLC.

We land in Houston at 12:04 Houston time so 11:04 Utah time. I then have a 4 hour lay over in Houston before flying to Munich, Germany!!!! How cool?? 

Then off to Hungary! I will be getting to Hungary at 4:30 am U.S. time. Which is 12:30P.m. Hungary time so I probably wont sleep for over 30 something hours straight!!! I am pumped hahah. 

It is going to be a very long travel day but I cannot wait. I can’t believe I am almost out of the MTC already!! 

Thanksgiving in the MTC was so amazing! I will for sure never forget the day I had! 

We started off the day with a devotional by Elder Oaks and it was really great. You can read what he said online so if you would like, go look it up! He gave a great talk. Then there were a lot of musical numbers done by the Oaks family! They played a lot of string instruments and were incredible! Last their whole family got together and sang! I can say I have been sung too by an apostle!

We then left the Devotional and went and had our Thanksgiving Feast! (Lunch)

We got to have some really yummy turkey and potatoes and ice cream and pie. Best thing yet at the MTC for sure. It was a great Thanksgiving meal! 

We then had a devotional about our service project and how that was going to work. I am sure you all read about it but it was amazing!! I was a box mover so when the finished boxes of food would come to me I would put them in a pile. It was hard work but was so great! 

The last couple weeks have been crazy for getting ready for Hungary!! I had to dry clean my suits and we procrastinated so the past two weeks I have been without a suit. I have had to wear sweaters and my summer pants all week. haha. 

Also, just a quick funny thing here in the MTC. We call our name tags toast. Sometimes when our name tag starts to come out of our pocket we say "your toast is done" I don’t know if you will think it's funny, but I think its hilarious! haha. 

I also gave a talk in Hungarian Sunday. It was a very interesting experience. I pretty much just read what I had translated on my paper but was able to also bear testimony so that was really cool! My talk was on repentance!

I want you all go listen to the song I Know My Redeemer Lives. The song is truly amazing and has some incredible lyrics. It says how I feel about my Savior in a song. I love that song. Also the song I Believe in Christ. The same goes for both songs. 

Sorry I am all over the place in this email I am just trying to get all that has happened in! 

So I will finish off this crazy rushed email because I don’t have a lot of time with some quick thoughts. The first was actually super funny when it happened. haha

This random branch President walked up to us and said "Elders many are cold, but few are frozen." I thought about that and it really is true. A lot of people in Hungary will be cold and I will have to figure out how to warm them but there will always be people that just won’t want to talk to me and I have to realize that. 

Second, I heard this in a talk, They said to teach with such power that your investigator thinks Jesus is in the Room. If I am able to do this, I know that I will be able to change people's lives. I just first have to figure out how to do this. 

I want everyone to first go watch all the New Christmas Mormon Messages. They are incredible. Then go watch the Mormon message Mountains to Climb. (bring a box of tissues, you will need it.)

Last, I just want to say to everyone, even people that are not of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. If a Mormon missionary knocks on your door, let them in. Hear them out. For me. I promise something good will come out of it. 

I love you all so much and am so grateful for you in my life. I love this Gospel with my whole heart and I know it is true. Let it into your life and it will change you forever.

The next email you get from me will be from Hungary!! I am so excited! 

Sziastok!! 

Szeret, Ure Elder 

The MTC has lights (and we match)

our zone going to the temple

THANKSGIVING—Be Worthy Of The Holy Ghost

I won’t be able to talk about a lot this week because not much has happened because I am emailing so early in the week! I have to email today (Monday) because of Thanksgiving and it just so happens that my p-day lands right on Thursday!

The great thing is that I get flight plans for Hungary on Friday!!!! I only have 2 weeks left!!! It has honestly gone by so fast! I have no idea where the time has gone. So I will try to tell you all about the last couple days even though it has only been a couple days since I wrote. The mtc has kinda gotten pretty boring because it is all the same now!

We did have an amazing experience during a lesson this week. We were having a really hard time with an investigator because she was smoking a lot of cigarettes every day, her family hates the church, and she doesn't believe anything we teach is true soooo pretty tough person to teach right? So in preach my Gospel there is a Jeffery R. Holland Quote about if you truly listen to someone while they speak and ask them about themselves you will always be able to teach a gospel truth to them. So that is what we did. We went in there with only a couple scriptures and our Hungarian Book of Mormon and went and taught. It was the best lesson we have ever taught. We were all flowing off one another and teaching perfectly. It was such a testimony to me that if we listen to he spirit we will be guided and know what to say. Also that Jefferey R. Holland knows what he is talking about. It was really cool.

 We had a Devotional Last night because it was Sunday and it was pretty good. The guy that spoke was super funny but also taught a lot of good stuff. Nothing really hit me super hard though but later that night I received some really awesome personal revelation about some things that I would like to share. I was thinking about my Companions and how they are always with me and how weird it will be when I don’t have one anymore. Then the thought came to my mind that I always have a companion as long as I am living the way I am supposed to. The Holy Ghost is always there to lead and guide us in our lives. We can be led and guided every day of our life as long as we are worthy of that. It is an amazing gift to have. Without the Holy Ghost I would not be able to be a missionary. He is the teacher, I am the tool. I can’t learn Hungarian, But with the Holy Ghost I sure can speak it even if I don’t even know what the words mean that I am saying. Be worthy of the Holy Ghost. It will guide you and bless you in your life more then we can even understand.

 Last I want to say, never let your faith be difficult to detect. I wish I was better at this before my mission. There are a lot of things that I would have done, But me telling you now, let your faith show. It will changes lives.

Tell next week!

Sziastok! Szeretek Titeket

Elder Ure 

Middle elder is from Hungary

Our pregnant teacher

MTC WEEK 6

Well it has been another week already. I can’t even believe where the time goes. So much has happened this week I don’t even know or probably remember all of it. So this is my schedule everyday. 

Wake Up: 6:30

Get ready: 6-7:05

Breakfast: 7:10

Class: 7:35-11:30 Which is when we study for an hour and then have a teacher who we usually teach as a fake investigator or learn a lesson in the language. Once again our teacher only speaks Hungarian. 

Lunch: 11:30-12:20

Class again: 12:20-3:30

Gym: until dinner

Dinner and then personal study, companion study, and language study until 9:30 

Then go back to the dorm and get ready for bed and sleep and then do it again!

This obviously changes depending on if we have a devotional or not but not by much it is usually pretty much the same.

We have choir practice on Sundays before the devotional and Tuesdays. We perform on Tuesdays. This Tuesday we sang “Have you done any good” and it was so awesome!! We sing in the tenor section which I don’t even know what that means but hey I like it so it works for me! The Choir director is the same one for the tabernacle Choir and he is literally amazing. He tells the best stories and is so spiritual. I love him. 

So Thanksgiving is coming up and it will be a different p-day for me because obviously that lands on a Thursday. I think I will be emailing either Tuesday or Wednesday. I am not sure. We get to do a service project and I am so excited! It will be so fun. We are going to serve food I think to people. I don’t really know but I know it involves food and people hahaha. 

An update on the accents. I fooled them!! They totally believed me and thought it was real. I lasted all the way until Thursday night before I told them that I am actually a normal mormon Utah boy haha. I was still proud of myself that I was able to make them believe me. When I told them, they all freaked out and laughed and thought it was awesome!! 

This week my package from home included some "Walking Dead, Zombie nerf guns"  It was awesome! (Thanks Dad!!)  I loved the Guns! We took them and before we gave a devotional to the Albanian Distirct one night, we sneak attacked them and shot them up. It was great!

I have officially lost three pounds at the MTC. The food here is keeping me alive slowly. I think I would die if I had to stay any longer than 9 weeks though! I actually have become more fit from working out and eating all the time so that’s nice. 

So this week I got very humbled with the language and just Hungarian in general. Our teachers told us that they have been teaching us the foundation of the language and not really how to speak correctly. So I have been saying everything wrong this whole time technically. That is Okay though because they now are teaching us the harder things that make how we actually speak  correct. We will get there sooner or later. haha. 

We Skyped a real member straight out of Hungary the other day and it was so cool but the hardest thing I have done yet that is for sure. She was a member right in Budapest and spoke so fast. Add that on to a bad Internet connection and it equals me not knowing one word she is even saying. So I will hopefully learn more in the next two and half weeks so I can understand so I don’t die out there. It was really cool to hear a native speaker and ask her questions and bear my testimony to her!! 

So in a lesson this week we almost made our investigator not interested anymore by sharing a scripture from Isaiah on accident. We looked up the wrong chapter and verse and we thought it was about something completely different but didn’t know what it said because it was all in Hungarian obviously so our investigator asks "what is the house of Israel?" In Hungarian and our jaws just drop so I just tried to say that it’s the church and changed the subject. It was so funny but could have been bad. haha. 

Well I will finish up with some things that I have learned this week. The first is Love. Love is the most powerful thing in the world and if we love who we teach we will teach with a new purpose. I heard a quote that said "when you don’t know what to say or what to teach put yourself in the shoes of your investigator and convert yourself." I really love this because it is so true and has really helped me think about what the needs of the people I am and will be teaching. 

Next quote is "The most powerful thing is what you do, Not what you say" Being a missionary is a lot about how I act and who I am. You have to have the attitude that you are a representative of Jesus Christ and that people see that. This applies to everyone’s life. When I have a family I have realized the way that I am going to teach my children is by who I am and what I do. We can all teach people through our actions. You are always being watched. Be who you would want your children to be. 

Last I realized something about prophets. If you truly believe that The prophet of the church is a true prophet of the gospel and he testifies that Jesus Lives and God loves us, How can we doubt? I have no doubt that this Church is true. It has been testified unto me by the The Holy Ghost and has changed my life. I love this gospel and I love all of you.

Love,

Elder Ure

All my food packages under my bed!!!!

Elders going to Albania

Elder with the same CTR ring

 

MTC Week 5

This week has been Awesome!!

I have learned so much in the language but it also gets harder and harder every single day so that is always a challenge. I also am always super tired. Pretty sure that’s how Satan is getting me here at the MTC because that’s about all he can do. I am studying hard though. Dont worry! 

Grammar for the language is a killer though. I don’t even know what some of the grammar rules are in English so put that in Hungarian and it does not mix well. There are so many conjugations and vowel harmony and linking vowels and plural k's and agglutinated Post positions sooooo ya, it will come sooner or later. That is a work in progress. 

The best dinner ever happened a couple nights ago. They gave us Chick-fil-a and I about died eating it. It was so good! (Shout out to Stockton, Peyton and Heather for that one day when we went and got it). It pretty much saved me and also reminded me what real food tastes like. 

It also snowed for the first time and I loved it. Snow is my favorite thing in the world so I was a happy Elder Ure that day. It was also funny to watch my companions because they are Cali boys and never had really experienced snow before so that was funny so see them get all bundled up in their coats like it was Negative 3 degrees out.    

I was able to host new missionaries this week also! This is when you get to pick them up off the curb and take a picture for the family and then rip them away from their family for two years:):):):)

JK it wasn't bad at all it was actually really fun and I was able to help out some new guys that were having a rough time saying goodbye. I was able to show them around and give them advice and kinda see what it is like from the other point of view!! It is still hard seeing moms cry leaving their son but cool at the same time. 

So we had some very funny experiences with the new Finnish elders in my zone. When they first get here they have to go through an orientation by the zone leaders and we tell them all about the MTC and give them a tour. So my comps and I decided to try to pull off accents and pretend we were from other places again. This time we had to talk though. So I was British, Veres Elder was a Hungarian that only spoke Hungarian and a little English and we would translate for him, and Dixon Elder was Australian. So we go in there and because Veres elder doesn’t speak english and Dixon was too scared to actually use the accent I was stuck speaking the whole time pretty much. The funny part is one of the new guys was from lone peak and he recognized me and asked if my name was Cameron and I was like no I have never heard of that name before, my name’s max. Then later that night one of them asks me where in England I lived and I was like... UHHHH so I get on the computer and you can look at maps on there and I find a random house and say that is mine. They all still believe me so I am going to see how long I can last!! It has been so funny. 

Also some funny stuff happened teaching lessons this week too. We messed up the words and said 'God dies our prayers' instead of 'God hears our prayers' and our investigator just started laughing at us and we were so confused. Then this same lesson we gave her a card with our number saying for her to call us if she ever got the urge to smoke so we could help her not (she is a smoker by the way) but we didn’t know how to say that in Hungarian so we said "call us if you ever want to smoke" hahah it is was funny when we figured it out but we got the point across. 

I will end with some quotes that my Dad sent me…

"Because of the Atonement all failures are changeable and temporary, Except the one that occurs when we give up, so whatever, you do, Don’t you ever give up," I love that. Don’t ever give up when it’s hard. And last, "If you aren’t in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?"

We all go through hard times. Those are the ones that test us and make us better. I know through the Savior and with perseverance we can do incredible things. I love you all so much. 

Elder Ure 

first zone leader

Favorite elder going to Finland

snow day!

MTC Week 4

First Companions in the World

Well this week has been a rollercoaster of emotions and events. It has hands down been the best week of the MTC yet though. Such a hard but rewarding and just awesome week. 

So I will start off by saying that we successfully made the sauna and it was very nice. It didn’t get super hot but we where able to still sit in it and feel good and relax. We plan to make a better one next week though. The blankets we used let in too much cold air so we are using thicker ones tonight probably. 

So this week both of my companions and I got new callings because the Finnish Elders are leaving Monday!! I will miss them. They are all such great guys. So I have been called to be a Zone leader with my companions, A district leader over our district, and a Sacrament coordinator. So that is going to be some crazy new responsibility. I am very excited though! It will be all  new and I can’t wait to take on the challenge. They said that no one has ever had as many callings as I am so that's a first. Pretty cool right?

I had to say goodbye to Kade this week and that was tough. He is going to be such and amazing missionary and I am so excited for him to be out there already though!! I miss having him to have talks with at night already though! 

I had such an amazing fast Sunday though. Best one I have ever had in my life. I wasn’t even that “Hungary” all day and that in itsself is a blessing. Anyway, the most amazing part was after sacrament when all the elders meet and talk. The lesson was on repentance and it pretty much blew me away. I have always been really hard on myself and could never get myself to forgive myself for anything. I would always just dwell on it and it would be awful. Well while I was sitting there listening, one of the Finnish elders said something that changed my life. He said, "when you have truly repented and done everything that is necessary and you can feel the spirit again that is when you know you have been forgiven." Right when he said that I felt literally arms of love rap around me and the spirit poured over my body more then it ever has in my entire life. I have never felt the spirit more than in the MTC and I wouldn't want to be anywhere else. I know that my Savoir lives and died for me. He saves me. The witness I have of this after this experience is unshakable. I know the atonement can heal everyone. I love my Savior. 

The language took a leap this week. I was able to start understanding more and saying more. I still am having a really hard time but it is getting better. I am studying so hard and praying for the gift of tongues. I will get it sooner or later. I am not too worried. 

Halloween was a little hard. Missed everyone so much because I know how much fun you guys where having.

Thanks to Grandma Ure, all the elders in my zone where able to enjoy a awesome Fiesta Night. Me and another elder put our chips and salsa together and pigged out will all the Elders!! It was so much fun. 

Well I will end this week’s email with a quote from a devotional that I liked. 

 "Jesus Christ and God The Father were the first missionary companionship". this blew my mind. I am acting in place of Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father. I am doing what they did in the beginning. This changed my perspective a lot. It made me realize how special I am and how important this work is. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. I love you all so much. Another week down!! Half way to Hungary! 

Love, Elder Ure