April 2

Përshëndetje familja!

This has been another good week here in Shkoder. I've been super happy and we've been working hard.

To get right into things, we have a few good investigators and are working on raising that number a bit. The one progressing the most for the moment would be Pali. He came to English Course and we had a good lesson with him and Danjel afterward about the plan of salvation. He's not the fastest learner, but he remembered more than expected. Then he even came to church on Sunday and watched about an hour of conference with us. Danjel is doing ok too, he just went to the huge Catholic Cathedral nextdoor instead of our church on Sunday. But like it was Easter and I don't think he quite understands the Restoration all the way yet, so what do you do.

We met with the Jakaj family again, and it was kind of the same as always. They love having us over and they are interested in learning with us, they just aren't willing to do all the little things throughout the week. We're going to have one more lesson as kind of a big push to act or be dropped and hopefully that'll help. But if not, I'm sure things will change when their son gets back from his mission.

We're teaching an English Course in Shkoder and in Lezhe and in Shkoder we've been having people come for the past few weeks, but no one had come in Lezhe. But this week we went out and passed out fliers for a special Easter devotional and ended up having people come to both English Course and the Easter Devotional. Our Easter Devotional was fun, we ended up having one member and four other people come so we sang some hymns and Elder Isufaj and I gave talks. I had a talk planned from our other Easter Devotional from Shkoder, but as we were planning that morning I felt like I needed to share something different. So I pondered and decided to share the story of the disciples who walk with Christ on the road to Emmaus after his resurrection. I talked about how Christ is always there walking with us, we just can't always see it but sometimes we are blessed with special moments where we recognize him and feel our hearts burn within us as we remember the path we've walked together.

The highlight of the week though was definitely general conference. We decided to watch the Saturday morning session together as a branch on Sunday morning in Shkoder and Sunday afternoon in Lezhe. It was so special for all the members to get to participate in the solemn assembly. We also watched it live with Amadeo and it was really powerful getting to stand and publicly declare that I sustain President Russell M. Nelson as God's chosen prophet here on earth. We also watched the Sunday morning session live and that was a super powerful session. I loved all the talks, but the one that really stuck out to me the most was the one by Larry Y. Wilson about prayer and following the spirit.

This week should be great, we'll be having Zone Conference on Thursday which is always super fun. 

That's about it for me. Love you all! Have a great week!

Elder Gardiner