3.23.10

Well its wednesday, which means time to email my wonderful family!!!! Well Im still in Finland... there was something wrong with my visa so i am stuck here for awhile, im not sure when i will be able to go back to russia...... haha just kidding. Im in Russia, but that does happen every once in a while with missionaries, something happens to their visa or passport and they cant get back into Russia. All is well with me though :) Finland was great though, it was so beautiful and clean there. Russia isnt the cleanest country so being in Finland and breathing fresh, clean air was great and also in Finland we can drink water right from the tap and in russia we can only drink filtered water, so that was great too!! I left early friday morning and got back monday. We flew from Irkutsk to Moscow, which was like 5 or 6 hours and then we flew to Helsinki, which was like maybe 2 hours. In moscow we had a 8 hour lay over so we went to the Red Square. It was AWESOME!!!! I took picture, so i will try to attach some. When we were in Finland we went to the temple, which ofcourse was wonderful. We did a session and the baptisms. The session was in Finnish, but they gave us headphone so we could listen in English, but it also had Russian on it, so I listen to the session in 3 languages. Isnt that so awesome to think that the gospel of Jesus Christ is spreading throughout the whole word and being taught in 100s of languages!!! The Kingdom of God is being built through out the whole world, and its great that we have the oppurtunity to help.
So Scott and Amy I have a contact for you, yes all the way from Russia. There is a lady in my branch here, she has been really sick the last couple of months ( i think she had a stroke) anyway we went and visited her the other day and she started showing us some pictures of her granddaughter and daughter. She had a piece of paper with the pictures and it had their address on it, and guess where they live.......... Costa Mesa!!!! Crazy huh!!! Well i got their address and told her that my brother lives there too. Its is really hard for this lady to communicate right now cuz she is sick, like i said i think she had a stroke. Anyway you should get ahold of them, i dont think they are members. I think she is married and has 2 kids. So tell them that i know her mom and maybe you can become friends with them, and then........... introduce them to the missionaries!!!!!!!!!! I forgot the book the i wrote the address in, but next week i will email it to you. So you have a week to get ready and then you start some missionary work!!! So cool huh!! I am way excited about that.
So we have a new investigator, her name is Nadya. I think i might have mentioned her last week. Anyway we met with her before i went to finland and then while i was gone sister reed met with her again. She is really great, and accepting of what we have taught her. I had talk to her at english club and she was very interested and she wanted a book of mormon, so i gave her one. Then we met with her a couple days latter and she had already started reading it and said she really liked it. We taught her about the Restoration, she had some questions, but seemed to really accepts what we taught. We are meeting with her again tomorrow, so we are excited for that. She still has a few questions, but I see great potential with her. So i will keep you informed. As for our other investigators not much has changed since the last email, since i was in finland for most the week. They work a lot so its hard to find time to meet with them. We are trying to find more investigators and ones who the lord has prepared to accept the gospel. Some really great news is that most of the inactive members that we have been regularly meeting with have started coming back to church, which is great. For the church to go here is russia we need new members but also we need the people who are already members to stay strong. Russia is so new to the gospel, so right now the missionary work here is building a foundation. All them members need to stay strong or come back to activity so that foundation will continue to grow. It is growing though. There have been prophecies given by prophets and apostles that say that someday Russia become one of the strongest nations within the gospel and that there will be villages and towns baptized by the thousands. That time is coming, Russia WILL be like that, but right now we are building that foundation. So the work is hard right now, but I see that future for Russia, and i know that millions will be baptized. So we are continuing the work here is Russia, because we know that what the prophets have said will happen. This work is wonderful and i am so grateful to be a missionary!!!

Well I love you all so much and i am so grateful for you!! I hope you all have a great week!

Love,
Mindy