Monday, August 24, 2009

Time is Flying...Brussels bathed in blessings

SO I will go ahead and agree with you and say that summer did fly by... Here in Europe everyone is getting back from vacation and people are starting school back up and work.. SO that is nice, our Ward is returning to normal.. SO freak, Emmy has changed sooo much; she looked so old and cute too.. I can't believe she won all that stuff.. lucky little girl.. 
I'm glad that everyone had a great summer.. My summer was great with Elder Nielsen in Brussels..The missionary work may not be as much fun as all that traveling but ... the joy lasts a lot longer .. sorry.. haha.. 
So I am going to have to tell about how much the Lord has been blessing the Brussels Zone.. in the Last 11 weeks we have had 12 baptisms.. there were 2 weeks when we didn't have a baptism, but other than that we have had a baptism each week... and they aren't just poopy people that don't stay active, but really awesome people.... In Brussels 2 there has been 5 baptisms and Brussels 1 there have been 7; so the work is going well.. As a Mission we have been slowing down a little, but our Zone hasn't been affected.. AND the blessings and miracles continue to happen.. there was a baptism last night in Brussels 1... a member referal.. and it was super spiritual and powerful and the Sisters have been teaching an awesome girl named Rachel from Burkina Faso and she has been hesitating about baptism.. and so they hadn't been able to set a date with her.. Well I guess last night at the baptism, she loved it so much and felt the spirit so strong she wanted to be baptized... so there will be a surprise baptism this next Sat..crazy.. also in the other Ward there was this lady from Romania that just showed up to church.. she had went to the Church in Romania and really liked it and one day she just decided she wanted to go to the church that she went to in Romania so she looked it up and found the address.. and showed up with a friend and she said that in Romania the Church is considered the closest practice to the Bible.. so that is awesome as well.. The Elders taught her this week and she expressed the desire to be baptized.. so she will be baptized in a the next month.. TOTALLY AWESOME.. haha.. Also another blessing this week; I think that I have told you about Wilma Vandam a Phillipino lady that was reactivated about 2 months ago... her brother is a Mission President in the Phillipines.. well she has gotten completely active, gotten a temple reccomend everything... She is so solid; well she got back from vacation and she brought her two 15 year old boys to church and told us that we would be teaching them in a week... so... there ya go.. thanks Heavenly Father.. 
It seems like we aren't doing any work because the Lord just kinda hands freebies to us! 
JACQUES TEMFACK.. will be baptized this Friday the 28th.. He is awesome. He is the Cameroonian that is the Urologist.. I told you about how he is a little slow and he wasn't understanding much.. We were wondering if he really was a doctor or not.. .. also we just didn't know if he understood anything and was at all ready for baptism; so this week was the testing week.. We taught him all the commandments and he had no problem with any of them and said he would live them all .. He understood perfectly and .. ya.. all was good. So this Wednesday we had a lesson just going aver the baptismal questions to see if he understood what baptism was and what he was going to promise the Lord.. and IT WAS CRAZY!  That was probably the second strongest I have ever felt the Spirit.. He completely understood that when he was being baptized that he was promising that he would live all the commandments and that he would be loyal to the Church.. I could not believe how well he understood because usually when we teach him he hardly seems to understand.. but then he told us about His 'ACCIDENT' So he did all of his studies here in Brussels, then he went back and was practicing in Cameroon and was a really big doctor, well known, everything.. then he was riding in a car with another doctor and they got hit by a big log truck.. and he went into a comma directly.. they flew him up to Brussels to get treated.. and when he came out of his comma (after a few weeks) he had forgotten how to do everything.. walk, talk, eat.. everything.. he had some pretty intense brain damage ... Well now he speaks and walks and understands very well.. sooo.. now we know what was going on and that he is a normal person and isn't just special!  He is so full of joy, he is great.. and the Ward is really excited for people to be baptized because the recent converts are active.. so .. they don't hate when we baptize someone... 
Another quick story; that was pretty funny.. Elder Nielsen and I enjoy going to Evangilist churches and some how we always get invited.. SO .. we went to this awesome African church yesterday after church.. oh my gosh, it was the most ridiculous thing.. so it was this guy that was the Pastor.. he had a beautiful family of 5 boys and they looked well to do.. they are from Congo.. and they invited us to their church last week.. so we decided to go because the wife wanted us to preach.. haha we were all over that.. so we go and we meet them on our way there.. in the Metro.. and so we are like, "Obviously this is God's will that we go to this church and teach this family".. SO we show up to this really ghetto part of Brussels.. and we go down this street to (what looks like) an abandoned apartment... the door is all broken.. and we walk to the basement of this apartment and the wife is like, "Ahh this is it"... well, we walk into a room the size of your little living room.. there is like 20 chairs and it is just that family and us.. so.. the dad gets up and starts preaching ... it was so apostate.. but we got to talk to them and gave them a Book of Mormon and explained a little.. 
Well... I hope all goes well.. I gotta go but talk to you later..
ELder Von Simonson

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