Miracles and More

May 4, 2009

Dear home and family and everyone,

I have had an amazing week, and that makes for a lot to write! Ok, least exciting to most exciting.

We are doing a service project for this school for kids with mental handicaps, and though we're not allowed to work with the kids, we are doing some fun fix-er-up type stuff for them. Last week we spent 4 hours working on their garden (which is the saddest piece of dry, weed infested soil I think I've ever seen) and we didn't have any of the right tools or anything. And there was a frog or toad buried in the dirt! I was digging up some of the dirt with a shovel to get the roots of the weeds out, and lo and behold a frog jumps out of the dirt which completely surprised me since it was kinda camouflaged and I didn't expect a living thing besides the weeds to be in that patch of land. And so four of us did that while the other 2 Elders worked on scraping off the paint and rust on the front fence and re-painting it. We didn't even come close to finishing it in those four hours, so we'll be working on it for the next few weeks.

This past week was Zone Conference which means that I had my first mission interview with President Lundberg. It was fun talking to him and being accountable for the things I've learned so far and the work that I'm doing. Our zone consists of my city (Arad), Deva, Oradia and Timisoara, and we combined conference with the Cluj-Napoca zone as well. It was fun seeing all the people. The sister that got delayed at the MTC from my group is now in Romania, and she's in Cluj, so I got to see her and that was super fun.

In Zone Conference I got to bear my “baby testimony” which is what they call it when you're brand new in the mission, and my companion got to bear her “dying testimony” since in 1 ½ weeks she'll be gone, or in other words is going home. (If you think that the church has a culture and language of it's own, mission language is way more confusing.)

My companion and I also performed the musical number for conference and we learned a lot and it was really fun. Yesterday at church 2 former sister missionaries that have been home since February came and visited, and one of them was my great-grandma. (so my trainer is my mom, her trainer is my grandma, and the trainer of my companions trainer is my great-grandma who is Sister Griffeth, and she came to Romania to visit.) It was fun to talk to them about their missions and about what I am doing now at the beginning compared to what my companion is finishing, and yeah. Good times. ...So that is all the not-as-interesting stuff.

Now I want to tell you about miracle day. The night before miracle day was Tuesday night and we went to go teach Ani (who as I believe I mentioned before we got enough money for them to get married and she wants to be baptized). When we went there we found out that she just found out that there was one more thing that had to happen before the Primarie approved their wedding. Her soon to be husband, Lica, had been married before and was divorced forever ago, and she had to got to the archive record building and get the papers of divorcement and turn it in to the Primarie by 5 pm the next day. (Getting married is so difficult when your government is corrupt.) So she was worried about it, but we decided to set her baptismal date in faith that all would be well, and we set it for this Saturday the 9th of May. Ok. So the next day (Wednesday = miracle day) we were doing lessons and interviews at the church, and of course we forgot our phone, which annoyed us at first (because it was kinda an important day to have our phone with us) but we kept going and in the middle of our interview with the Assistants, Ani came into the church and said that she couldn't get the paper. They said it would take them about 1-2 weeks to find the paper of divorcement and so they wouldn't be able to get married on the 7th and so they would then have to get more money and re-take the analysis that had been the speed-bump before and it was crazy. She said that she was disappointed, but that if the Lord didn't want her to get married right now then it won't work out, but if He did than something would happen. My companion's reaction was “Of course He wants you to get married and start living the law of chastity which is one of the biggest commandments, as soon as you can! And we need to do something if something is going to happen!”

We were determined that there HAD to be something that we could do. We finished up with our interviews and such, and then tried to put our thinking caps on. And the answer came: Call Gabi Oanta. Gabi Oanta is the most mysterious man I think I have ever met in my life. He's pretty much an eternal investigator of our church, who wants to get baptized and acts like a member, but can't get baptized for reasons only known to him (we suspect it is work related, but we don't even know what he does for a living.) All we know is that he will do anything for the missionaries, and has the most random yet important connections of anyone I've ever heard of.

So we called up Gabi and he said he would do what he could, just go home and he would call us in a little bit. Ok. We started praying and were ready to leave the house as soon as Gabi said “GO!” He called and then we went to the Archives place where Gabi found the “head-honcho” lady who didn't think it was possible to find, but she would try any ways. We gave her the information and she couldn't find it because all the info we had was wrong except for his name. We didn't even have the correct year that he had been divorced. (Sora Thompson and I were praying sooo hard!) But through Gabi in his snazzy suit and his great connections and business mind, and of course with the help of the Lord, she kept looking. And in 45 minutes, not the week they said it would have taken, the paper was found. Yay!

But there were still more stops to go to. We went to the Primarie to turn in the paper and to make sure that everything was in place and there was a little bump because she doesn't want to take his name, she wants him to take her name. Weird, but ok. So we got that figured out, and by the 3rd stop I didn't even know what we were doing, just that Gabi knew what we were doing and that the Lord was hearing our prayers and so I just kept following it. Finally Gabi walked out of a room and said “It's done, I'm done, we're done.” And in the time frame of 1 ½ hours, just one hour before the Primarie wouldn't have accepted anything else and canceled their approval on the wedding, everything was settled and final! After thanking Gabi profusely for his help and being completely relieved and saying many prayers of gratitude in our hearts, we called Ani.

Sora Thompson talked to her and said “Ani, on the 7th of May 2009 you will be married to Mircea Bonici at 1:30 at the Primarie in Arad. Are you ready for this?” She said Yes! And after an excited scream started to bawl on the phone. It was amazing. Now time for perspective (because the miracle isn't over). At the beginning of the transfer, Sora Thompson and I wanted to have some things happen in the work, and so we decided that we would do all we could do to get these things happening. One thing we decided to do was to pray in every prayer for three things: 1. for Ani and Lica to be married before the end of the transfer. 2. for Lica to quit smoking and 3. for Bogdon to quit smoking. We also had a special fast for these three things the weekend before all of this happened.

Since we had given Lica the commitment to quit smoking he started smoking double, but on Tuesday (night before miracle day) we asked him and he had only smoked 5 cigarettes! Apparently since our fast, it's been hurting his chest each time he smokes, so he had been smoking less and less! And Bogdon had started out with smoking 3 packs a day and had got down to 1-3 cigarettes per day and after the fast the desire to smoke left him. He went on a picnic with his friends who were smoking, and put a cigarette in his mouth, but couldn't light it. “I don't want this” he thought, and he hasn't smoked since in the past week!

And now with Ani and Lica being married, it took work, but the Lord performed miracles. And the neat thing is that the Lord allows us to be tried so that we can increase in our faith. The Lord knew that we wanted these things to happen (not for our benefit, but because we love these people and know their lives will be blessed through them) and that we would do anything to help them to happen. Which is what happened on Wednesday, our day of miracles. Something got in the way of what needed to happen for these people's lives to be blessed, and we did all that we possibly could in faith, and trusted the Lord that He would do the rest, and it happened. Now we are for sure having a wedding on this Thursday, and Ani is going to get baptized on this Saturday. I love it! The Lord's hand is in our lives and it can be seen at any time when we are striving to keep His commandments and do what He asks us to do. The blessings that come from it are amazing. So that is my story for this week, and it's amazing.

I love the gospel of Jesus Christ. It is through the Atonement and our own actions and choices to follow and live according to the Gospel that brings about the most powerful and amazing changes in our lives. It truly is amazing to me, and I am so grateful. But I love you all so very much! Don't get discouraged in life's little trials, but look for the joy. I promise it is there somewhere. I am doing great, and I hope that you all are doing great as well. Give hugs to everyone for me, and I love you lots! Talk to you next week!

Always, --Sora Karina