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July 17 - Week 3 Phone Miracle and Killer Demons

We had some interesting experiences this week.

On Tuesday I had a big boost of energy and spirit that definitely did not come from me, so whoever was praying for me on the morning of Tuesday, July 11 France time, thank you. 

We had a couple language studies with a member in the ward. He's a native French speaker who's fluent in English and a really great teacher, so he's been a big help with specific questions we have, and also about correcting our accents. Those have been awesome.

We had a small miracle with our phone. First off, our phone is oldest, tiniest, most inefficient thing I think I've ever seen. Getting used to that is just about my biggest challange here haha. Anyhow, It has a very small amount of space to store messages and other information. One afternoon, the memory was full, but it was also trying to receive a new message. When we deleted other messages to make space, the incoming message was lost. We had sent a number of messages to many people that day, so it was important to know who sent it and what it said. With no way to find out, we decided to pray to know who had sent the message. We knelt to together and asked God who sent the message. After the prayer, the same name came to both of us at the same time, we texted the person, and sure enough it was them. It's in the little things.

Every French person we talk to emphasises very very heavily the importance of working with the members, particularly here in France where the people and country in general are pretty closed off, especially when it comes to religion. For example, when we talk to people, often they take one look at our nametags and say,  "oooooo ca m'interesse pas" (I'm not interested). However, when members refer people who are interested, it's the complete opposite. They're very receptive, they say they love the things of God--it's night and day. Our efforts of working with the members have started to pay off, so we're going to continue in that strain. Though this week will be difficult because we're spending more time outside Troyes than in Troyes. Finding days, exchanges, legalities in Paris, Zone conference...it'll be interesting I guess to see the different cities we'll be going to, Auxerre, Compiegne, and of course Paris. I suppose it's a good thing to not want to leave my area. I want to work with the people here, I can feel my love and desire to serve them grow.

We had some guy approach us one evening as we were walking home. He was gesturing to his throat and stomach, and I thought he was saying he was sick with heartburn or something and wanted a blessing of some sort. I didn't understand his French, but later Elder Thomas said the guy was saying there was a demon inside him trying to kill him. So that's another fun misunderstanding. We saw him again the next day, and he seemed the same, but we're not sure if he's 100% there. He said the demon was making his stomach bigger (the guy has a big gut), but he was also really casual about the whole thing. You would think if there was a demon trying to kill you, you'd be a little desparate. We didn't feel really strongly to continue with him, that and it was kinda shady, so we just let him go. 

Here's some pictures, including the phone.

 - Elder Johnson




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