Life is Beautiful

Dear Loved Ones

Another great week, I don't know if there are weeks that aren't great in Aix en Provence, but this ones was super great. I am horrible at writing in my journal so I am going to give you a daily look at the week and so that I can use this later in life to remember

Monday- We spent most of p day just goofing around the apartment and went out and taught a man named mr kotbi, he is very very muslim, and we are not going to keep seeing him, he was really kind and it is a good discussion but he is not ready to accept the Christ or our teachings. We caught a lizard (see photo attached) and we ate at dominos pizza, it was delish. It was a day that i felt like I was back in the states because I ate at dominos, God bless America and God bless Fast food.

Tuesday - We went and got the oil changed in the car and then we went and taught Francoise, she is hesitant to accept a baptismal date, but we felt the spirit verying strongly at the end of the lesson, because she offered a very sincere and very powerful prayer, she is leaving for the weekend so she won't be able to come to church this week. We also went and taught Ginette with Bernard and Sr Sirieix, she accepted to be baptised the 5th of November and she is awesome, she had an accident last week and she broke 2 ribs, we gave her a blessing and she won't be able to come to church this weekend either because she is on bed rest. we might have to push back her date, but either way she is great and she will be baptised

Wednesday - We spent the morning doing contacting with our board out in the streets, after lunch we went and knocked doors. The we went and saw sophie and her friend jeanine who wants to learn more about the church. We ate with them and it was a really great moment. Jeanine is a little bit older and we are going to try to get her to come to relief society because I think it will help her see the blessings of the church. After we had english class, Elder Claflin was helping Clementine ( a member ) and a friend with their english home work, so i taught my 7 college students about how to talk about university life in english, it was way funny and we are going to try to get them to come out to institute because they would all love it.

Thursday - We spent the morning doing contacting with our board out in the streets and we met lots of really cool people, I hope that we will get to teach them this up coming week. Lots of young students that are interested in the goal of life and what they can do to be happier and more successful in life, easy answer "the gospel!". We then had to start getting ready for the zone conference, we had 45 missionaries from our zone and montpeiller that we had to welcome, we had to get the chapel ready for Elder Caussé (the 70 that came to talk to us) That was hecktic but we got everybody to an apartment and got the chapel ready for the friday

Friday - we had an Awesome zone conference with Elder Caussé he brought the spirit and taught alot about teaching and using members, he wants us to be alot closer to members and to teach alot more, he said the contacting is on a much lower priority, that is a huge change for what I have been doing for the past year a half, but the spirit was strong and we are going to follow his teachings as close as possible. We spent practically the whole day with him and then we sent of 45 missionaries and had to organize the church for a stake meeting that elder caussé was having at the church. We also had to pick up 14 Elders for the saturday zone leader counsil with elder caussé, there was a work train that derailed close to bordeaux and it messed up the whole country, we had got get missionaries at the trainstation until 2 oclock in the morning with president murdock and then get them to their hotels, we were the only people with a car so we did alot of taxiing these last 2 days. It was crazy but super fun and tiring

Saturday, we had another great time with Elder Caussé, we did the taxi thing for all afternoon we cleaned up the chapel and then we got on our knees to find out what we could do with the time that was left, we felt like we need to call a young return missionary that is in the ward, we called and he needed a blessing and he wanted our help, it was wonderful to be an answer to his prayer. He is awesome and he is going to be teaching with us more and more.

Sunday - France was in the rugby world cup (they lost 7 to 8 ) and so we didn't have an amis at church and there was a good number of members that happened to miss church as well, we did have a miricale, an old ami came to church because she didn't have work, she is from madagascar and her name is robine, she is really cool and asked if she could have the lessons again so we are going to teach her tomorrow. Then we went and knocked doors, the 2nd door was a man from africa name christian that was interested in what we were doing, we taught him and are going to see him this week, we then hurried off to teach greg, greg is great we taught him and ate with him (see attached photos) We invited him to prepare for baptism for the 19 of november he is going to pray and doing his best to have an answer and is going to take the lessons for a month and he said that when he has his answer he will be baptised!!!!! I love him, and I am excited to help to find his testimony!

There is my week!, at the end of friday the longest day of my life, I came home to a care package from mom, the timing couldn't have been better! Thank you so much!

a happy happy birthday to day and a whoo hooo to jodi for a new car that is super cool, Mom don't die from chasing grand kids around all day! I love you all and I expect to start getting news about babies!

This work is true and the savoir lives!
elder smith