Reactivating someone as well as uniting families!

Hey,

So, I'm in Ukraine.  I woke up and thought that was kind of weird today.  I don't know why, since I've now been here for 6 straight months.  But today it was weird.  I just thought I would share that with you.

So let's see.  My week. . . What happened this week?  It's a bit of the blur at the moment.  Oh!  It's coming back to me, good!  This week, for the first time in months, we were able to meet with some new investigators (that's people that are willing to meet multiple times, not just once).  That's exciting!  We've got a family where the parents are investigating and the son is a less active member.  That's like a gold mine of missionary work right there!  Reactivating someone (a male priesthood holder, at that) as well as uniting families!  I'm excited for them. 

We also met with a guy named N..  I'm not sure if we're going to meet with him ever again, though.  He was way nice and even gave us apples and stuff as a gift.  But he has some strange religious views that he refuses to give up.  Like the fact that he asks God what to do in literally every situation and says that he hears voices telling him what to do (i.e. "Should I have toast or waffles today?" "Thou shalt have toast, Nikolai")  God doesn't want to direct every decision we make, and I'm not convinced that his voices come from a good place.  He also prays in tongues.  This was my first experience with someone praying in tongues.  I think everyone should see it sometime in their life.  It's ridiculous.  Elder Solin said that he would say the opening prayer and Nikolai said "Okay.  You pray your way and I'll pray mine".  Solin started praying, and we heard strange moaning and other unpleasant sounds coming from that man.  I had to try really hard not to laugh. 

The thing about his ideas is that I can point out the scriptures that he is reading that justifies these things.  Stuff about how God hears the groans of our hearts, and there's one (in one of the Peters somewhere?) where one verse says that when a man prays in tongues, he is not speaking to man but speaking to God.  But he's not reading the rest of the chapter.  The rest of the chapter explains that, while it's true that God understands what you're saying no matter what, it's just stupid to pray in a tongue that no one around you understands.  When praying in a group, it is suggested that you pray so that at least one other can understand.  I don't know, but I'm pretty sure that Peter (or maybe Paul) was very clear in that chapter.  That, among other weird things, led us to believe that he is not totally right in the head.  Still a good guy, though.

By the way, thank you for the peanut butter, again!  I've been having peanut butter on bananas most mornings for breakfast.  Reminds me of home.  Love you!

My testimony of the fact that God "gives you in that very moment what to say" grew yesterday.  I was asked to give a talk in sacrament meeting.  I knew the story that I wanted to share (Nephi and Lehi's experience in the prison; Helaman 5), but I was a little worried about how to convey the message.  Honestly, I know that my Russian needs plenty of improvement, and I struggle for some obscure vocab.  I went up with an outline of what I was going to say and some key words.  But once I opened my mouth and started speaking, everything just flowed.  Maybe there was a few slips on my part (for some reason I have a hard time with the word for "darkness" and "prison") but it went well.  Afterwards a bunch of members came up to me and told me that they felt the Spirit very strongly.  That's all that matters anyways, right? 

Also, the Hatches (senior couple) let us use their computer last P-Day to try out some familysearch exploration.  It was pretty cool!  I think I was shown before what my genealogy looks like, but I didn't know how extensive the work already done was.  Porters already trace back all the way to the year 1000 AD?!  And they're from Normandy way back there, called de Porte..  Oh, and on Mom's side, I didn't realize how close our bloodline was to Switzerland.  Very cool stuff. 

Well, that's about it for this week.  Transfer calls are this weekend and transfers will be the following week.  I'll let you know what happens there.  It's a pretty sure thing that I'm leaving, since I've already been here for 6 months, which is unusual as it is.  I love Lugansk, but I'm way excited to get to a new area!

Love you all!  Talk to you next week.

Love,

Elder Brandon Porter