WELL I'm sure you have seen the news, my boys in
NOVO are getting quite famous among the American and russian news articles.
Well things are going down right now in our mission, I can't say all what is
going on on here but let's just say we have 2 elders still in Russian custody
and we still don't know how much longer they will keep them there, some high
people (Apostles and others) making some calls.
We were on the nice beaches of Sochi Monday
Morning, as I thought things couldn't be better than right now, I've got a
great compnion, great area, it's beautiful, we finally have some work starting
to come up, life is good. We ate at our branch Presidents house that night and
during dinner we had a call from the APs that we need to back our bags and the
apartment and leave that next morning. It was a very emotional experiance for
us and President's family. They give everything they have for the church and
now they knew withought our help would be a giant load, also they treated us
like their sons. Predident gave us both blessings and we gave him one, it was a
moving experiance. He went to our house and we stayed up all night packing our
apartment and movin git to his. President Martino (Eastern Europe) called for
all the missionaries in the moust southern cities of Russia to leave and go
North. Which is tragic because they are literally the most progressing areas of
the mission. Well we got Permision to go visit Tuapse one last time with our BP.
So we left Early Tuesday morning with all of our stuff and drove 3 hours to
Tuapse and had a last Hurrah with President Denice. We gave someone a bap date
and a new investigator all in this tiny town and we met with some INactive
family. It was all an adventure one that I can't describe here. Denice dropped
us off on the train late that night and we woke up in Rostov (mission
headquarters). We spent the next few days with the APs and helped them out
since they were running the mission now , since our President was down south
visiting the Elders in Custody every day and figuring out the court stuff.
We had half the mission in Rostov and it was
crazy, the mission is a mess right now so many differnty things were going on
and than we had a a call from President telling us some bad news that I can't
talk about here. But things are going down in our mission, but I am praying it
will all go back to normal soon. President moved us up North to Samara to go
help this little branch of like 20 babooshkas and only 2 priesthood holders,
but we live in Samara right by the main branch and have to go over an hour to
this other small city at least twice a week. Besides that we are just
going to hype up the other Elder and Their work and find and find because we
have nothing else to do.
-In Rostov I found these guys and invited them
to our gamenight so I gave their numbers to the ZLs because I don't have a
phone, and they caught me getting some other guys number later and they called
the Zls and said they were coming to game night and bringing the cops because
they know who we are. Well under the circumstances in our mission all the
missionaries were freaking out, I tried texting and calling them but they never
responded, I called the bluff though and they didn't show.
-My old comp and I both got pulled out of the
south and were in Rostov, so we decided to go to my first area because we
served their together, so we wnt and met with some members and an old
investigator. It was a crazy trip, we met with good ole Ganadi and he hasn't
changed a bit. Their can't be a man with crazier driving He was drifing and
speeding around in his ghetto mobile and he just goes around a line at a red
light and cut in front of all of them and he realized there was a cop car in
there, so the siren went on and pulled him over with us in it, He told the
police he worked for them a while ago and his wife worked for them and to be
honest I'm pretty sure it was a lie but they some how let us go with nothing
and he came in and told us the Lord was with us because we were there.... Oh
Ganadi. Well he showed us his house that we helped build that was now complete
and it was gorgeous.
-We got to Samara so much snow! and we had to
split taxis because we had so much luggage, my comp had the phone this time and
I went in with my maybe a little buzzed taxi driver and the airport is maybe
and hour from the city and in the middle of nowhere the taxi breaks down, I'm
just out here in a snowstorm with my boy Vlad and he tries his vodka in the
engine or whatever they do and after 30 min we get some other taxi to find us
and I dip to our apartment.
-My comp and I have both never been to this
city, we are legit white washing with nothing, no list of anyone and nothing to
do but make something to do, It will be fun, it will be an adventure.
We won't be going back to Sochi anytime soon,
and it makes me sad to think that they members down there won't have any
volunteers for a long time, but I know it's all in the Lord's hands and He
knows what he is doing even when we may not see why. We are excited to see how
we can help bless the people here. thanks for the prayers, seriously.
Elder VAnBuskirk
It feels like my 3rd year in
Russia. I had a winter, left ode 6
weeks in Sochi, and went back to winter…
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