I Shook the Hand of an Apostle...TWICE!

Hey everyone!!! I am so sorry for the late email. I know you probably hate me, and when I tell you why you'll probably be jealous of me, but I hope you still love me because I love you!!

This week was a really great week. Even though we have been dealing with all these issues and problems, we managed to find many new and amazing people to teach. We met up once again with Raul, but this time he brought his friend Marta along! And we taught the plan of salvation to them both and it was really great! The spirit was super strong and they both had great questions. One question was from Raul asking if homosexual people can reach the Celestial Kingdom. We knew this would be a rough subject, because we know he is homosexual, but we answered it to the best of our ability, saying that God does not limit any of his children. We have our own choices and as long as we follow the example of Jesus through baptism and continue on this path, we will reach the Celestial kingdom. It will be a topic of discussion for the future but he felt the spirit and he really appreciated the answer. The sad part about it all is that Marta can't meet with us anymore (parents...) but she really loved the meeting and we hope she came closer to Christ because of it! We also started teaching this English student named Giulia who came up to us and said she wanted to do 30/30s. It ended up being an hour-long discussion about Jesus and how we can follow his example. In the long run, it was very meaningful because she and her sister came to church this Sunday. She told us that she really felt something during church and that she feels very happy about it. We hope to meet with her again soon because she really has a desire to come unto Christ.

Another fun story is that we finally had exterminators come and kill the bedbugs so we are now free (hopefully) of this problem. We had to travel to and from Arad almost every night this week and it was not fun let me tell you that. But we are fine now and we can finally sleep in our own beds!!!!!

So here's the reason we didn't email Monday. We had a special missionary meeting in Bucuresti with Elder Quentin L. Cook of the Quorum of the 12 Apostles. He was accompanied by his wife and Elder Sabin of the 70 with his wife. Needless to say, it was pretty darn awesome!!! We get there and we are studying and stuff and the spirit was so strong. And then Elder Cook walks in and it's even more awesome! We then were able to shake his hand and he was just so happy and had an attitude of gratitude for us missionaries. That was so amazing. They all spoke to us and it was really amazing. Some highlights were as followed....Elder Sabin talked about how we should cheerfully suffer our pains. We go through hard times and it's easy to get discouraged. But if we are cheerful and bear our burdens with patience, we will be blessed. Be righteous and you will receive peace now, and eternal life in the life to come. Then Elder Cook talked about the urgency behind missionary work. We must be urgent while preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. He told us to be careful to not let in to the temptations of the adversary. And then he gave a apostolic blessing that as we love the people here in Romania, miracles will happen. That was just super amazing and I am so blessed to have that experience. And then, of course, you need a closing prayer to close things off. So I was that person saying that closing prayer. Right in front of Elder Cook. So when I finished, I turned around and he says to me how it was a beautiful prayer and that he was thankful for it. And then I shook his hand for a second time!! That was the icing on the cake hahaha. Yes, it was a great experience.