Будинок Влада!!! (House of Power!!!)

Привіт все! This week was really one for the ages. I hit my halfway mark in the MTC, saw my cousin Elder Calder leave for Arizona, watched the missionary devotional with my cousin Elder Horsley, and got to go to Влад's house! It was amazing! I have loved the MTC so far, and it was crazy when I hit my halfway point on Sunday! I've been a missionary for an entire month already, which seems surreal. I felt like I had just started the MTC 5 minutes ago, but NOPE I'm more than halfway done so I don't know what happened in between my five minutes and five weeks marks. I really don't have that much time left in the MTC, which is getting me so nervous and excited at the same time! I still have a long way to go with my Ukrainian (and even though I can't speak it very well, my Ukrainian emailing skills may just be top notch [but also not really]), but it really is coming along, and I cannot wait to get to Texas and start working! That time will come, but for now, I'm content to keep being a zoom junkie and renaming everyone in my personal meeting room. Another part of the MTC that I have also loved is having my cousins being missionaries with me at the same time and being able to see them, which is a definite mega ultra plus of being at home. I got to see my cousin Elder Calder the night before he went off to his reassignment, and that was awesome. Definitely one of the highlights of my week! He's such an awesome missionary, so I'm going to be taking notes and making sure that I live up to the Calder family standard haha. That bar has been set high! I have also loved getting to spend time with the one and only German speaking Elder Horsley, and we had the opportunity to watch this week's missionary devotional together, which was so much fun! As I'm sure many of you know, he's a complete beast and even though he's only a week into the MTC, he's a powerhouse of a missionary. And now for the big question of this email: who on Earth is Влад? Well, Влад is an electrician who came to work on my family's pool house around a month ago, and I had the pleasure to meet him then. He is so awesome, and his family is so nice! He and his wife are both from Ukraine, and their oldest son was born there as well. They have three kids, and they all just speak Ukrainian at home even though they all know English. Elder Hasson and I set up a meeting with them last week and on Sunday we got to go to their house and get to know them better and also share a short message about the Book of Mormon with them. It was awesome! They're such a cool family, and I absolutely love them! Also, someone needs to break the news to my district that disco skating is the move. If anyone knows any person of authority who can validate this claim, send them my way because I have apparently tarnished my social standing due to the fact that disco skating is pretty much the best and I need some serious backup if I want to fix my reputation. They're going to have to be on the same level as Jan-Michael Vincent or up though, so if you can't find anyone, that's understandable. For my spiritual thought this week, I want to share with you another quote from Elder Key, who, in my opinion, is basically a fountain of eternal wisdom and hits us with these banger spiritual thoughts every day. One of the days this week, he said something that really stuck out to me. We were talking about faith, and Elder Key made the point that "God wants us to have faith and to trust in Him. Being confused is not a part of this faith he wants us to have. God wants us to KNOW how to follow him, not to be GUESSING how to follow him.". Not only is that so powerful, it is so true. God knows what is best for us, and He has given us the teachings of Christ and the prophets as a guide to follow in order to attain the things He has set aside for us to do and become. He is not trying to confuse us as we walk the path back to Him: He's trying to guide us. That's why He has given us two distinct books of scripture, and that's why He has given us the teachings of the prophets from thousands of years ago and even today. God loves us, so He has given us many different sources to which we can turn for guidance. When we turn to the teachings of the prophets, the Bible, and especially the Book of Mormon, we can learn what we should do and know what action we should take in order to become our best selves. Oftentimes, when we turn to wordly sources for knowledge, we come away confused, as there are many different contradicting answers we receive, or the singular answer we do receive is vague and unclear. The truth of the world may change depending on the year or circumstance, but the eternal truth of God will never change. I would invite you all to find this eternal truth, and to apply to your own lives. As you consult the scriptures or the words of the prophets, I promise you that you will find greater personal clarity in your life, and you will be more confident about what actions are truly morally correct and in line with the teachings of Christ. As we follow the teachings of the Savior, we will not be confused, but rather enlightened, and we will be blessed with a joy that can only be felt through Him and His infinite Atonement. When we come unto Christ and our faith grows, we suddenly find that everything is so much clearer, and I promise that each and every one of us has the power to gain this clarity for themselves. Well, until next week, I love all of you! Have an amazing week, and remember that our Heavenly Father loves YOU! - Elder Horsley

^ Elder Hasson in the flesh! ^ Vlad and his family ^ See you in two Elder Calder