December 30th, 2013

I hope the holiday season has been awesome for all of you, its been absolutely the best for me.

Not too much time today so I'll try and write fast. First off, I have been reading from Our Heritage recently, about the start of the church and pioneers and such. A quick thought from that. There's a part where it talks about some sacrifices Brigham Young made when he was still a new member. It quotes him saying how he literally had nothing. His boots were even borrowed. But he followed the words of the Prophet none the less. I also read about Zions camp. Zions camp was a march of a military group put together of about 230 people. It was ultimately unsuccessful in its purpose, but from the experience, just a few months later, 79 of the 82 positions filled in the quarom of the 12 and the 70 were filled by men who were tested and grew through the zions camp march.

I have found that sometimes we need to experience our own personal zions camps before we see the success in our lives. Here's a quick story I shared with my mission president:

"I want to share a quick experience first. One of the first weeks here in Szolnok Elder Shuck and I were re-opening the companionship and ended up doing some "prayer finding" where we would pray and then try to follow the Spirit for where to go. One of these times we came across someone who was nice to us but who basically said she didn't want anything to do with religion because her parents disowned her for not joining their religion (Jehova's Witness)."

Just a few days ago we went through that building again and ended up at her door again. We ended up talking for about 45 minutes at her door and she invited us back the next day so that we could give her our stop smoking program. Well, that program fell through because she was at the doctors but we have contacted her since and are still planning on meeting with her."

I don't know if she will ever accept the gospel, but what gets me about this story is that when we first contacted her I probably had no idea that just a short time later (about 2 months) she would open up in some way. It is truly incredible how the Lord works and it is so true, I believe, that miracles are happening every day, whether we realize it or not."

My Christmas was totally amazing here in Hungary, and I thank all of you for the awesome gifts you picked out. I loved them all. They're all just great. Presents arent needed to have a good Christmas, but all these gifts definitely made it seem like I was having Christmas at home. Thank you all so much for your wonderful ideas.

Just this morning me and my companion had two AWESOME programs. Completely. The first was with a 15 year old boy (he seems like 17 though Id say, super mature) Anyways, his Mom is a member but lives in England, he started meeting with missionaries when she lived here and has only met a few times since she left, he is awesome and reads from the BOM, and believes it to be true. His name is Ákos.

The next program was with a really sweet, fun family we just found yesterday. Incredible family. Today we met with Gyöngy (mom), daugther Elizabeth, 19 yr. old, and daughter whos name I forgot, 6 years old. It was incredible, we taught the restoration and they seemed very open. At the end we said a closing prayer and the Mom was just amazed she kept saying how good she felt and that she really felt a real peaceful feeling and just kept talking about how she felt. Its so awesome that God gave us prayer. Its so real. People, not just these people, but lots of people can really feel a difference when we pray. Its so true, God hears our prayers. I know it. And He answers them too.

I was sad not to get to talk with those who weren't there, but I send my love to all of you from Hungary for the Holidays. Ill be at a ward party tomorrow night from 7-9 for new years eve building a gingerbread temple.

Much love
Elder Shoop