Lately,  I've been wondering if with all this service is anything coming of it.  I feel that we are not holding our small crew of people and teaching them well enough .  We will have Seminary in one city Korce and have a beautiful meaningful experience and bring it back to our beloved Pogradec and the very same lesson that we worked so hard on for Seminary completely bombs!
Pogradec has become a giant party center.  We play volleyball with them,  entertain them for family home evening, we set up meet and greets with Korce, Tirana, and Elbason.  We try very hard to put a message of Christ and the Prophets voice in everything we do,  but somehow it is not sinking into the hearts of our members.

We serve, feed,  pray over, entertain, teach, preach, clean up after, plan and prepare with the hope that they will see an Eternal Perspective , have a desire to make the most of their baptismal covenant and someday enter the temple.     They have the desire, but not the maturity or the consistency of obeying the commandments, even the most simple of coming to church regularly.

Now in saying that:  I look upon my life, my family's life and wonder.....with all the knowledge of the everlasting gospel and a perspective that flairs out past this life into eternity.... Am I living up to my end of the deal?... meaning Im I living a kinder, more forgiving, more PATIENT life that is required of me because I have been given the extended knowledge and experience with the Holy Spirit over and over again to ...... KNOW BETTER.    Do I have the FRUIT OF FAITH which is Love giving charity, compassion and patience in my service here in Albania?

The  answer:   More Patience is required.   More selfless love is required.  More gentleness to my spouse and to those around me is required.  STOP MURMURING!

I must admit there are a few here I pray for ways to take them with me!  And there are a few that make me look at the calendar to count the months left.    I can sincerely say that my mission to Belgium was NEVER like this one.  Maybe it is because we stay rooted in one city, one branch. Maybe it is that I knew the language there and No I have been so bad at learning this language!  We never leave or get transferred.  In so many ways it makes you so very involved  in  these people's lives here in our city. Their joy is your joy!  Their pains and worries are your pains and worries.   In other ways there is not much room for a do-over or a correction of attitude.

We are teaching in Seminary about the complainers,  those who murmur and forget to trust and pray to the Lord.  I am just like the daughters of Ishmael who married with Laman and Lemuel ----I am holding the Murmuring Banner and I don't even have to eat raw meat and deliver my children in the desert.   Poor me Ha Ha:  I have to play volleyball on the beach and prepare Seminary Lessons that I love!  (by the way,  everyone should download the Seminary lessons and use them as they read.  The Pondering that goes on while preparing my lessons makes me feel like those in the Book of Mormon people are right beside me teaching me)

All in all I am here to SERVE  and it is my choice how I  will serve....with the loving fruit of service or the fruit that is rotting and has flies.


Oh that reminds me: it is watermelon, apricot, peach and grape season ---fresh from the garden and vine everyday!  Fresh fruit every day!   Once again..... POOR ME!  In Pogradec Paradise eating fresh fruit1