busiest week of my mission

This week has for sure been one of the busiest weeks of my mission. The reason for this is that we had a Missionary Leadership meeting in Budapest and then splits in a whole different city and then when we got back to our own city we had to meet with all our investigators so we ran from teaching to teaching... I don’t think I have had a legit dinner hour in days... But don’t worry mom I am still eating a lot of food, and I am not dying. I am healthy, I do push ups :)

Well sadly I just realized that I forgot my paper that had everything that happened this week on it at home and I can never think of everything on the spot but I will do my best. So this week was full of us giving blessings, getting yelled at during tracting and then miracles. 

I will start with talking about splits because it was really fun and I made a memory that I will never forget. It was snowing almost the whole time we were there and it was the best day ever. What made it even more scary, but great at the same time is the fact that we were riding bikes and the ground was pure ice, I survived so don’t worry, yes probably not smart but it was still so great. We only rode bikes because we had a teaching that was far away and we had to get there in time and we were willing to sacrifice haha. The down side is I slipped a couple times and one time when I caught myself I ripped a hole in my pants. It is fixable so I am not mad and I still think it was worth it because I was able to ride down the streets of Hungary on a freezing day while it was snowing and just say to myself... I am a missionary. This is awesome!!!! haha.

Before that during the week we had a really cool miracle happen. We were tracting one day and thought to look up an old investigator and what ended up happening was his wife was home and she said for us to come up but we couldn’t stay because he wasn’t there but right when we started to talk to her he ran up to us and finished his run, so we all went in together and we were able to eat dinner with them and have a really cool talk. It was really awesome to be able to talk to him again and he told us that he was still planning on reading the Book of Mormon but he just can’t find the time right now and we were able to bear testimony that it will help him in everything he does not just to learn more about God. It was really cool and a great miracle.

Now onto the funny stuff when people get mad at us. I think I will just share one today but the others were also very funny and sad. So we started tracting one day and we didn’t start on a good note because the first woman we talked to flipped out on us for being there and was really mad that we even tried to talk to her and wouldn’t leave us alone and told us to leave but we we weren’t even by her door; we were outside, so she went inside and we moved on and came to this man, we gave our approach and he stayed silent through it all and then said, boys I am not interested, and so I asked well do you know..... And during what I was saying her turns around and picks up the phone behind him and says are you going to leave?? And I was like “what the?” yeah, we will leave so we left and I was just stunned that someone could be that fast to call the cops on us, so we got to his neighbor and he comes out again and flips out on us because it was his cousin that lived next to him and he was a younger kid and he didn’t want us to brain wash him. He wouldn’t even let us knock on the door but we were like well maybe he will be interested, like we believe everyone should get a chance to choose if they want to hear our message or not because it can truly bring salvation, and he was like what do I need to be saved from...? I’ll have you know he was a catholic and knew about sin and all this and this was after him getting very heated and so I replied... Your sins... he really didn’t like that so I just walked away and we moved on. It was pretty crazy and really sad but Hey that’s what I am here to do, we didn’t even raise our voice once!  We just preached the good word. It kind of felt good though to get some adrenaline going... not gunna lie!

Then on Sunday it was the day of blessings. In church we were asked to give two women blessings and it was really cool. They were both blessings of comfort and peace and it was just a cool experience like it always is. Then later that day we were able to meet with this inactive family and one of their little girls was really sick so we were able to give her a blessing also. She was a really cute twin and her mom asked us to give her a blessing so that she could not be sick and so that the rest of the family would not get sick. Then rewinding a little bit this week. We also gave a blessing to a member that has a big test coming up and he asked us to give him one so that he can be able to learn better and be able to concentrate. It was a week full of Priesthood and it was really cool. It is such a blessing that the priesthood has been restored and that we can truly use it in our lives. 

This week has seriously been spent full of just running everywhere and just meeting with everyone that we can. It has been a really great week. This week I have learned that if you have faith and you don’t think that it’s not going to work, but you instead think for the slightest possibility of hope. Then it will work because you will then do everything you can to make that happen and make it so it works out. I love this work and I am thankful to be a missionary.

Love Elder Ure

Cold and Great

This week has been so great but also so cold ha-ha. It actually snowed this week though and I won't lie to you, I think I might have shed a tear. It was the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. I haven’t seen a site like that in over a year (almost two pretty much) and it was the best day ever... after that we just suffered. It was so cold and we are riding bikes still so we just die but it’s fine because we have good coats and the spirit. Am I right? 

I will start off with a really funny but also a little awkward situation. This week a really cool girl let us in. I don’t even know how old she was probably like 25. So we have a really good talk with her and taught her the restoration. She said she works everyday and couldn’t tell us when we could come back but we got her number and planned for this next week. So on the way out I realized that all her doors had English sayings on them from Christmas and stuff. So I asked if she understood them and she was like... uh no but they are cute. So I was like okay ha-ha I can translate them for you if you want. So I started and they were like, do you want to build a snowman, and have a merry Christmas and a happy new year, and then the last one was all I want for Christmas is you. So without thinking about it I just translated it and it came out and I was like uhhh... and she got all red and was like oh really??? And I was just “well we got to go, I hope you have a good day and we will call you later”. ha-ha!  So lesson learned is think before you translate. It was really funny but awkward at the same time. I didn’t know how to recover; I have become an awkward missionary.

We also got the cops called on us again this week so we had a very pleasant talk with them and they asked for all our info and we gave it to them and then once again they were okay cool thank you have a good day. So we just went on tracting. Ha-ha people here must be scared of us. We do dress in all black and have huge coats and we are not really small people so it’s understandable but still funny.

This week we also had a really cool opportunity to be able to go to an old folks home and talk to people there. I was able to talk to a really old guy for a long time and had a really good talk with him about his life and how hard it has been because he was sick for his whole life even when he was a child and now he is like 92... it was crazy! It was hard to sometimes understand him but I loved it. I then talked to an old lady and she also talked my ear off in the best way possible. She went off about her old lady problems and how her grandson doesn’t say enough when he comes and visits. It was really cute and I loved serving there. We are going back tomorrow!

I walked out of serving with such a smile on my face and I was just so happy. I truly believe that service is the key to happiness. I love serving and I think if we all try to reach out and just serve a little even if that is just talking to someone that is lonely the world would be a much better place. 

Sorry I don’t have a lot of time this week. I love you all I hope you have a great week and I hope all is going well.

Love Elder Ure

2017...where did the time go

This week has kind of made me freak out because it is now the year when I come home and I have now been a missionary in 2015 and 2016... that’s really weird for me to think about haha. Time is flying. 

Last P-day we kind of sacrificed our whole day to go and give service to a member who needed a huge boiler moved into his basement. I need to stop telling people that I used to play football, then they just use you to pick up heavy stuff haha, it’s even worse when your companion is a signed BYU football player haha. It was great though we had a good time and were able to share a thought with them and it made p-day a super good day. 

This week I had one of the funniest and memorable things happen to us. We were tracting and when we tract one person is talking to the people on the phone outside the building and the other is streeting and talking to people on the street. So Elder Gentry stops this old lady and we start talking to her. She turns out to be a Jw and is actually really nice. So it wasn’t too bad, but she distracted us because out of no where two cops walk up behind us and are like... boys what’s going on here... so I was like well we represent our church and tonight we are talking to people about our religion. THE COPS KNEW WE WERE MORMONS. Best day ever. Anyway, they asked to see that we had the right to be going house to house and talking to people on the street and so we showed them our little paper that we have to have with us and the cop didn’t even read it because he saw that the date on it was in English so he gives it back and says this doesn’t work and then goes off using really law oriented words and I was like okay I didn’t understand that fully so I called our mission President which was what we are supposed to do and he talked to them. So we got in a conversation with the other cop and she was actually really nice. She was really curious about what we do and where we came from and why we even did it. We had a great conversation with her and when the other cop came back we showed him the paper that we have again and then he finally read it and said... oh yeah this is perfect, thanks have a great night and left. So funny such a waste of time! I forgot to tell you the best part too. During all this the lady that called the cops on us comes out of the building and starts freaking out on us and is saying all this stuff about how no one wants to talk to us and how it’s not even worth it and why we are bothering others and the cop just shut her down and was like... these are two really good kids and you need to go back inside mama. So great. So I can officially say that I had the cops called on me. whoohoo.

This week was full of miracles. We were able to meet with a couple people that have not been able to meet in a very long time and we were able to have amazing teachings with them. In one of the teachings we were teaching about the plan of salvation and it was very powerful. The plan of salvation is very special to me and is one of the biggest reasons why I am serving a mission because I want others to be able to live with their families forever. During the teaching our investigator said to us that she just feels so happy when we meet and she cannot explain the feeling that is in her heart. We were able to testify that that feeling in her heart was the Holy Ghost testifying that what we taught was true. It was a really amazing teaching. We are planning on meeting with her this week and extending a baptismal date.

On new years we decided to look up an old investigator that we have not met with in 4 months because every time we went over she was not home and never answered when we rang. This time she answered the phone! She let us in and we were able to have a quick conversation with her and we were able to talk about how the last year had been for her. She told us that it was one of the hardest years in her life and when she thought back on the year she remembered us and thought about how good she felt when she talked to us. We didn’t stay long because she had guests coming over to her house but we are planning on going back and teaching her this week! It was an amazing blessing.

Also, this week we went on splits and I was able to work with Elder willes. He is this hilarious kid from Cali and he is a total Cali bro. He plays lacrosse and surfs and so we had a super good time together. He even can recite 1/3 of the pirates of the Caribbean movie out of his head so I pretty much watched that this week. It was so cool. 

After that we had a super cool thing happen when we went to a members house and when we walked in she had invited a friend and we are now going to be meeting with him and helping him to quit smoking. How cool is that? The lord really does just do the work for us if we are worthy. So we had a lot of cool miracles happen this week. 

New years here is for real insane. People just blow up stuff on the streets and drink a lot. So we made sure to be inside. We were walking down the street and these kids far off in the distance light something and throw it and we see it like 50 yards away and we are like what is going on... and them boom... huge explosion. Like the loudest firecracker I have ever heard! It was nuts haha. So that’s about how my new years was. Being inside and then waking up the next day and seeing all the frozen throw up on the ground... people like to drink here. Sorry if that was tmi. It was freezing on Sunday though. -13!! So everything was frozen including us. 

Well I want to finish with a quick thought about what we read today for companion study. We read from Joseph Smith history and it was really interesting. He went through so many trials even when he was a little boy. I feel like I need to be more grateful that I am not 14 and how I am having it easy compared to him. With this New Year I am wanting to work on being ‘fast to love’ and ‘slow to hate’ or get mad. I think we can learn a lot from Joseph Smith. I love you all have an amazing week!

Love Elder Ure

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Well this week has been unforgettable. My last Christmas in Hungary. I have no words to describe how much I loved being here and I would not have wanted to be anywhere else. I will start from the beginning.

This week we started the week off by going caroling to church members, which was so much fun. We went to this one really old woman’s house and I about started crying when I saw her face as she opened the door. Pure joy. It was so cute and I was so happy that we could bring some happiness into her Christmas spirit.

Then the next day was Christmas Zone conference which was so much fun and so funny. We had a talent show that we had to do in front of the whole zone and I seriously died. Ours was so awful it wasn’t even funny; we tried to make a remix of tracting in a winter wonderland. WOW it was awful, yaaaa never again will I try something like that haha. It was great though. Still had a whole lot of fun. Sister Szabadkai fed us and she made us fruit soup and this chicken and rice type of thing. It was incredible. I loved it.

Then we were able to watch a movie. It was the same movie I watched last year when I got into the country just this time it was in English, which was kind of lame because now I can actually speak Hungarian to a point where I would have understood it haha. If you have not seen the movie the little prince go watch it. It has a lot of cool symbolism and is a really great movie! We then got to have Santa come which is actually just one of the AP’s dressed up as him but we still got to sit on his lap and got a super cool pen with our named carved into it. So it was a really cool day!! 

Then when we came back from the zone conference we went to this one old lady’s house where we helped her move. This is the lady that gave us coffee and this time she gave us a candy doll of Satan... which was really weird. I think she is up to something but who knows haha. So we took it home. Tried it. It was like fake chocolate and then broke it and threw it away. It was pretty creepy.

Then for Christmas Eve we decided to make a ton of cookies and go visiting and give out our cookies. It worked really well, either we are really cute and they like us, or we make super good cookies. Probably both. haha just kidding it was the spirit touching there heart to let us in. maybe all three??? Who knows haha. That was really fun and we were able to meet with a lot of people!

This week we have been riding bikes everywhere and so on Christmas Eve and Christmas we rode bikes all over the place. So we started the day by going to church and yep... the road was frozen so I ate it super hard and crashed on my bike. I was fine and I didn’t get hurt but it was a great way to start Christmas! With a BANG!

Going back to Christmas Eve we got to have dinner with a member and it was really good. She fed us a traditional Hungary meal for Christmas... fish soup. I actually didn’t die because I usually hate fish but it was actually super good. Missions will change you. haha We also had stuffed cabbage which is like my favorite. So it was a really great Christmas Eve.

Then on Christmas after church we had planned to go to a church member’s house for lunch but their son got chicken pox the day before and so we couldn’t go over there so instead we made a couple more cookie runs and went tracting. During tracting, a man in a mansion let us in and we got to teach this really cool lesson. We sat down and he started to tell us about how he is searching for the truth and wants to know who God is. We had the chance to teach him the restoration and gave him a Book Of Mormon. It was really amazing to see that people are looking for the truth. We set up a follow up appointment and are going to go back and visit him soon. I know that God is preparing people for the Gospel we just have to do hard things like tracting on Christmas.

After that, we went to Bences house and skyped, which was so great it was so good to talk to you all!! I loved skyping at their house and I am so happy I was able to be with them on Christmas. Bence gave me a really cool picture frame with pictures of us in the last couple months. It was a really cool way to end Christmas! The best part was that I didn’t know Bence was going to be there because Ise told me he had to work but he got it off and then surprised us!! It was so cool! 

I want to finish with a little thing that happened this week. A member let us in and I was asked to give a blessing of comfort to her and in the blessing I talked about her strengthening her relationship with her Heavenly Father and coming closer to Him. I want to make this a goal in my own life. I want to make my study of the scriptures more personal, to pray with more heart and to grow closer to my Father in Heaven. I love you all and I hope you have a great week. 

Happy New Year!!

Elder Ure

I love my Savior and I love Christmas

This week has been super sad but super great at the same time. I was able to say goodbye to Elder Howard and send him on his way to the homeland... it was really sad haha. I will miss him lots but this week was also super great because I got my old companion back Elder Gentry. We had a great first half week and I think it will be a really great transfer. 

Before I get ahead of myself I forgot to write something in my letter last week about something we did! We were able to go to Bences house and watch the first presidency’s broadcast! All us guys sat down on the couch and cuddled and listened to the apostles. It was so great! I loved it! ha-ha. 

This week on Wednesday we went up to Budapest and I was able to say goodbye to a lot of my companions. I said goodbye to Elder Lee and Elder Howard. They are the only companions that are older than me in the mission that I had, and now I am one of the oldest! It’s really weird. I found out that 2/3 of my mission is under their half way mark which means we are a really, really young mission. We have third transfer missionaries training! It’s awesome!

I am feeling really old now a days because everyone in my district is super young. It’s kind of weird ha-ha. We had our first district meeting and it went really well! It was a lot of fun to get to know the new missionaries and make some new friends.

Also, this week we went up to Budapest and we are going to be having a new focus as a mission. In the leadership meeting we talked about ways we can help inactive members come back to the church and for this transfer we will be making a bigger effort to bring them back and to look them up! 

One really funny thing that happened this week was when I got the sisters and us lost in the middle of nowhere on our way to our ward mission leaders house. I thought we were supposed to get of the bus but we got off way too early and ended up walking in the middle of no where ha-ha. It was actually really fun and totally worth it so I am happy about it to be honest ha-ha. We walked and then after a while he came and got us with his car. Even the missionaries need saving sometime ha-ha.

Yesterday in church I was able to give a mini talk about the new push that we will be doing to help the inactive members come back to church and to find their testimonies again and it went... ehhh. I wish it went better but I had no time to prepare because they asked me during sacrament pretty much. So that was really exciting and I just explained it and then bore my testimony about the work and that’s about it. 

This week has been crazy and has flown by and I wasn’t able to even write in my journal sometimes because I would be up late making calls to all the missionaries until it was time to go to bed so it has been a crazy week and I am hoping I will be able to write more next week.

Our work is going well. We have a couple people that will hopefully be progressing in the upcoming weeks and that we will be able to help come unto baptism. I hope they will make the decision to follow their savior.

I would like to finish with a little Christmas message. At this time of year I find myself thinking a lot about my Savior. It’s a given because this is why we are celebrating Christmas but I usually think of it in a different way. Whenever my mind thinks of Christmas I think of the reason why my Savior came to the earth and all he has done for me and I think about the Atonement. I remember 2 years ago, the last Christmas I had with my family, I had an overwhelming spiritual experience while thinking of my Savior and having the feeling come over me that he died for me personally and how grateful I really am for what he did for me. I am so grateful and I would not be here with out Jesus Christ and the baby that was born in Bethlehem. I love my Savior and I love Christmas. I wish you all a Merry Christmas and I hope it is merry and bright. Remember your Savior this week because He loves you.

Love,

Elder Ure

The license says "mom" "28" ( His football #)  

ONE-YEAR IN COUNTRY

Well this week has been crazy! The transfer is over and we are already starting a new one. It is so crazy. I don’t even think it is real. 

This week I was able to see my trainer Elder Murdock and it was so fun! We were able to hang out for a little and the even better part was when we were in the mall and out of no where bence and his whole family came up to us and I was able to introduce Murdock and we got a picture together! IT was so fun and made me feel like I was back in Nyiregyháza as a greenie!

This week I had some really fun stuff happen. First off, we helped a lady move one day and it was really easy. She had us move a couch and that was about it and in return she said she wanted to make us hot chocolate and was like it’s not coffee I promise... Well she brings it out and it is the exact smell and look as coffee and Elder Howard and I just look at each other and are like uhhhh… Well what do we do? So Elder Howard takes one for the team and tried it and I can tell right when he tastes it that it is pure coffee. I don’t drink any and just hold it... well minutes go by and we don’t know what we are going to do because she is right in front of me... but the window was open to my left... sooo ha-ha no I did not throw it out the window. Trust me I thought about it a million times but I didn’t. Luckily she just took it back and said sorry that we didn’t like it, I felt bad but we just explained that we don’t drink coffee and that we thought it had some in it. Kind of awkward. 

This story I am about to tell you is one of the scariest, sad, hilarious, and down right awful things I have had happen out here. We were walking on the street after a teaching and I saw a really old women in a wheel chair going up over the bridge and making her way down on the slopped part, so I said we should help her, so when she got close we asked if we could help her, well this made her distracted and she stopped holding onto the wheels to make her not move so she took off down the bridge... So I start running after her for the life of me and I see her headed straight for an electric box... well I got there right after she made contact with the box and I hurried and pulled her away but she already hit it.... So we turn her around and she has a huge smile on her face and is totally fine... she says, “Well I can’t forget about that”, laughs and then rolls away. She stopped herself and was totally fine. We turned around in pure just confusion and couldn’t help but laugh. It was so funny but so scary, so when helping old people make sure they cant go anywhere! 

Then the next day we went out to Narnia. Which we call a really small village that is far from town. We have to take a bus and it is out there. Far away. So we meet with the person that we planned to meet with but only 1 bus comes once every so many hours... So I look at my watch and see that our bus leaves in 10 minutes and we are a 15-minute walk from the bus station. So we hurry and end the teaching and start walking... Well, we see the bus drive up to the bus stop and start waiting for people. So I take off and run all the way down this street and we made it onto the bus right before it started. It was fun ha-ha it’s always an adventure with buses. 

Another funny thing that happened this week was when we were tracting on splits. I saw a really small cute little kitten (keep in mind I do not like cats very much) but this little guy was so cute, and I am pretty sure it was freezing. So I walked over to it and it loved me from first touch. I picked it up and put it in my coat and then walked around from house to house tracting with a little cat in my coat. It was great. I would set it down at times but it would just walk behind us and then when we would stop at a house it would run up to me and rub up against my leg. It loved me ha-ha. So that was super funny ha-ha. 

This week was also my ONE-YEAR in Hungary mark and we had a little party because I had two sisters that are from my MTC group in our district meeting this week. So we had cookies and blew up balloons and had some fun! Its crazy I have already been here from a whole year. Time is flying its not even funny. 

This week we had splits twice so I didn’t really work with my own companion for the last week of his mission. It was fun. We had one split, then two hours together, and then went on splits again ha-ha it was really funny. 

We also were able to have a really cool experience and I was able to give a blessing to one of the sister’s investigators! It went well and it was really cool. I love giving blessings. It is just a really cool feeling to be used by God to bless others.

This week the ward threw a Christmas party that was seriously so awesome! I loved it. It’s called Mikulás and it’s their version of Santa. They had all the kids sing songs to him and then he gave them treats. They even made us go up there and do it. It was so great ha-ha. After they had this huge carriage with horses pulling us around the city and the horses had reindeer stuff on them and we sang Christmas songs and yelled Merry Christmas at people ha-ha it was one of the coolest things I have done here!

I would like to finish with a quick thought about Jesus. We are talking a lot about Him this time of year and he really is a big part of everyone’s life. He can bring light into anyone’s life, light that we sometimes didn’t even know could brighten our day. I love my Savior and I know he makes me happy. I love you all have a great week.

Elder Ure

This time of year is about LOVE

Well this week flew by and I don’t even know where it went. We have been going all over the place and it’s super fun but I think it got me sick. Kind of lame. 

This week we had splits with the APs, which was super fun. We were able to meet with one of our investigators and we had a lesson about repentance. We did a magic trick for him with fire and a pen that you can erase and he was freaking out. He loved it and could not figure out how it worked. We wrote things that were bad and sins on the paper and then if you hold a fire below the paper the pen’s ink disappears. It was super cool. He loved it and it’s really true. I love the atonement and am so grateful for its healing power.

This week I had a goal to have more faith. So I made a goal to find the miracle in every situation no matter what it was. So this week we were visiting a family and it was a hard meeting and I walked out of it trying to think of how I can help the family. So I decided to try and find the miracle. I prayed about it and even had the opportunity to talk to my mission president about it during my interview with him. I was able to have a really good talk with him and got some really good ideas from him. I know what I talked about didn’t really make any sense because it’s really hard to explain but the point is, we can always find good in every situation. No matter how good or how bad. It’s always still going to help us learn. 

So I already talked about this a little but this week was interviews for the next transfer. I don’t know what will be happening with me and I am really excited to find out. I am hoping I will stay for Christmas but that would mean I would be serving here for more than 8 months which is fine with me I love this place! So before interviews I was sitting talking to Sister Szabadkai my mission president’s wife and she had to get up and go give President Szabadkais phone to him. I hear them whispering in a different room and then she comes back out with the phone and says its for you! I was like uh.... that’s my mission Presidents phone and whoever is calling him to talk to me must be someone that I should be freaking out to talk to... So I answer the phone and all I hear on the other line is HEY IT’S YOUR DAD!!! ha-ha It was Elder Murdock my trainer! He came to Hungary this week and I am actually going to get to see him in a couple hours! He talked to me for a little bit and it was a huge surprise! I am super excited to see him and it’s going to be so fun. It was super funny though because it was right before my interview and my mission president knew all about it. Other than that nothing crazy happened during my interview, it was pretty normal.

After that, we went on splits for the rest of the week and I went with an Elder named Elder Szuch. He is a really cool kid and we talked a ton about going home and hanging out together because we both like sports and stuff like that. It was a really fun split but nothing crazy happened during the split to report about. 

Sorry this email was kind of lame. This week wasn’t that crazy but this upcoming week should be supper great with my companion going home and he will want to say goodbye to lots of people so we should have a lot of people to meet with! 

I want to finish with a quick thought about loving those that annoy you. This is really hard and I have had to learn to do this throughout my mission. This time of year I feel like love is really important so I hope you are all loving because I love you all. It’s hard to love those people that we don’t get along with or those we don’t agree with but in the long run, if we love, we will be blessed. Have a great week!

Elder Ure