A great week putting on God’s Armor!

Hello à Tous!

What an EXCELLENT week! The Lord blessed us with opportunities with love and service!

On Tuesday, we continued our theme from last week of helping someone move again! We helped a woman move a pile of wood from her old house to her new one. It was a lot of work, but enjoyable. A member of the branch assisted us, and we were able to have a good discussion while driving between the two houses. We spoke about a lot of things. However, it seem as if the main topic of conversation here now in France, is just how horrible this world is, how everything in going down the toilet and how life sucks. Luckily that is not the message that we present! We were able to turn that conversation into something very positive. We were able to add something that seemed to be missing in the lives of these people; that is HOPE. It is not the “HOPE” Obama promised, 🙂 but hope in a brighter tomorrow. It is the love of our neighbors. We can each be such a great example for those around us. Then they can see in us that all is not only bad. There is righteousness and that good is stronger than bad, and good will also always triumph!

That evening we went and saw the Recent convert Jean-Luc, he had wanted to prepare us a meal for quite a while now, and we finally had the opportunity the other night, it was great! We ate Rabbit!!! and I even got to taste the liver (not my favorite part) 🙂 :). I have fallen in love with goose liver, but rabbit liver just doesn’t do it for me! We enjoyed that meal together with his daughter who is about 15 and not a member (yet), and then we watched “Meet The Mormons” with them. The film touched him, and it hit him that he has become part of a huge family of people who share these values.

The next day something extraordinary happened, when we got up in the Morning we would have never thought our day would play out like this I’ll tell you in a second, but it was in the afternoon, so I’ll talk about the Morning first!

We took a bus out to a city named Digne-Les-Bains where we were going to visit a member family who was in need of a spiritual boost. We get on the bus and head an hour and 20 minutes north towards the Alps. When we arrived and made it to their home, we were able to share an INCREDIBLE lesson! The husband joined the church after meeting his wife. He has been working so hard to progress in his knowledge so that he can get ready to go to the temple! His wife has been struggling with some things recently, so we were trying to help her see the fact that she can be ready for the temple soon as well. Then they can all be sealed for Eternity as a family with their little son! It went so well, and they were able to set some goals to prepare for their temple sealing!

Ok, here is that exciting news!!!!!!

Are you ready?

We leave their house and walk towards the bus station. We have about 45 minutes before the bus boards, so we decide to have a little walk through the city. I notice that there is a small street market, and I love going through those to talk to the merchants. We go through, and I talk to this woman who sells different Herbal teas, and I buy some Herbal Chai (she gives me a lot more than I paid for) and then as we continue walking down through the market we see a HUGE crowd. There is a Lavender Festival. Huge crowd = Not safe for us. We turn and we see a smaller crowd around a super long table, on the table was – here it is – THE WORLDS LONGEST FOUGASSE AUX ANCHORS! 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 It is Bread with anchovy paste on top (it’s not very tasty.) However, It was the Guinness record-breaking one! We were excited and ate a small piece. 🙂 That was a good day! 🙂 🙂 🙂

The Next day we went to Aix to have an exchange with the Zone Leaders, it went very well, I was with Elder Kelsey who is a good friend of mine, was his District Leader back when he was Bleu!

We had a great time and had some great conversations! Then in the evening the Elders From Gap came, and we got pizza with the sisters because the next day we were going to have our Zone Conference!

In the Zone Conference, we spoke mostly about putting on the Armor of God and making a title of Loyalty to our God. At this time, here in France, the only thing that can keep us safe is keeping all our covenants; remaining pure and clean, keeping ourselves close to our Heavenly Father, being worthy of his spirit and ready to follow his direction at any time!

My title of Loyalty is this:

L’Eternel est mon berger, je ne manquerai de rien. Ils me feront la guerre mais IL va me délivrer. Ses bras étendus me rassure, il m’aide à changer. Quand il me demandera m’aimes-tu? Je dirai, oui seigneur tu sais que je t’aime, je t’ai montré, voici mes œuvres.

Which means:
The Lord is my shepherd, and I shall lack nothing. They may fight against me, but HE will deliver me. His arms outstretched reassure me. He helps me to change. When He shall ask me, Do you love me? I will say, Yes Lord you know I love you, I have shown you, Behold my works.

That is the new creed that I will strive to live. I can always look towards this and know I am loyal to my God and that I am his son and am loved.

At the end of this Conference, I gave my Final departing testimony. With just shy of two weeks left of my mission, this might be my last post on this Blog.

My mission has changed me, I have become more capable of loving others and more loving towards all those who surround me. I have learned something important, God lives. He is here, in every smile that we share, in every service that we do out of love, in the laughter of a friend. The Lord lives, and we can be happy.

I share that with you all in the Name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

Here is a poem that I wrote:

In His Labor

The hills and the mountains testify of him,
I try living a life to magnify him.
I feel as if whatever I do cannot be enough,
He promised me blessings and he is not one to bluff.

As I live this life in the labor of love I know the Lord helps from above.
His angels keep me upright all day
He helps me back if I lose my way.
I feel his love when I work as his hands,
Although, I have given up my favorite bands.
I have learned his work is sure and sweet.
One day my master I will meet.

That glorious day will come, when he stretches forth his hand saying “son,
I take thee up, you have done well
Even in the moments when you fell.
I accept thee up on this day
For eternity thou shalt stay.”
Elder Peterson,
La mission Française de Lyon.

P.S See you all very soon!

Couscous

Hello, everyone!

This was a great week here in Manosque! We have been seeing the Lord bless us in some great ways even though we have been a little sick, like I said in the past, when someone in France gets sick, everyone gets sick!

This week on Wednesday, I was ill, so we had to stay in most of the day. Thursday we had zone training, it went super well! We discussed the importance of Obeidience and of having our loyalty to our Heavenly Father first and formost. It is easy to be tempted to do things, not even things that seem “very” bad, that however, means that we are not putting the Lord first. This is his work and as we strive to do it with a full loving heart that we will be blessed.

 I have given these 2 years to my God. I know that he blesses me for my service, what I need to do is to serve him with all of my heart, might, mind and strength and he will bless me and my family.

We focused alot on that, being very consecrated and we know that at this time it is the only thing keeping us safe.  We need to have the spirit with us, we need to work hard to have His loving direction to keep us from danger, we know that he will warn us.

I was really grateful a couple weeks ago for His loving hand in my life. I had just finished doing a baptismal interview in Aix for one of the sisters amis and it was really hot out, like 100 degrees and we decided to celebrate the future baptism with some ice cream.  We started off to the store and as we were walking there, when we were maybe half a block away, I felt the impression that we should not turn the corner onto the main road where the store was…. but I ignored it at first, saying ” well its like a half a block, I can almost see it.  Then, I take a couple more steps and I hear the voice loud and clear, “do not turn that corner, it is dangerous” ok, this time, I listened. I told my companion and the sisters that I felt we chould stop and go back the way we came and take another way to the store. I told them the spirit does not want us going on that road, and so we all listened to the prompting and went another way. We were able to enjoy some great icecream. 🙂

I dont know what could have happened if we took that turn, but I am totally happy not knowing because I know that me, my companion and those sisters are safe!

After the zone traning, I made a couscous and we all enjoyed the meal together. It was reallllllly goooood, not to brag but DANG! It was good!!! 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

On Friday my companion was feeling sick so that day was also gone!

All-in-all. we had a good and spiritual week, but a couple days for rest were also had, being sick in the summer is awful, you just sweat non-stop!

Have a great week! I love you all!

Elder Peterson,
La mission Française de Lyon.

A Great Week for Picking up a New Bleu

Hello, Everyone!

This week was fantastic, here in the mission. I have seen the Lords hands working in my life.

On Monday, I went up to Lyon and spent the day with the missionaries that were going home and with the other training missionaries that were called to train. It was a really good time because a lot of the missionaries going home were my good friends, and so I was able to say some proper goodbyes and spend a few hours reminiscing together. It turned out that that evening they needed someone to drive a senior couple to the Presidents house for the departing dinner and I quickly volunteered my services and was able to drive a little. 🙂 🙂 🙂

We stayed in the office elders “Hotel” apt and we helped the elders get ready to leave and then we said final goodbyes before they went to take the airport express tram at 2AM. We get a call from them at 1:45 am saying the tram was not running till 4:30 am and alot of their flights were at 6:30 and were international so they needed to get going! We leave alot of the other people sleeping in the Apt and the office Elders and Elder Beck and I take the mission van and another car and start to shuttle all of their things and the people from Lyon to the airport (about 35 minutes each way). Then when we finally get them all there we have to help them all get to their gates and through security, it was a blast! 🙂 🙂 At 6:45, we grab some Starbuck’s muffins and watch the sunrise through the airport windows and then we set off back for Lyon. We got to the Apt at about 7:30 in the Morning and all of the other people were showered and ready for the day. 🙂  We went to take a nap; it was a splendid time being up for 27 hours total. I felt it was an unusual but fantastic way to serve the Lord here in the mission. Normally as trainers, we had lunch with other instructors and some afternoon contacting, but we were not able to attend these for reasons of needing sleep. As far as we know, all of those missionaries got home safely to their families! 🙂

That evening we had trainers Training discussion with the other instructors, it was a great, uplifting and spiritual meeting about how we can help the new Bleus understand our mission culture and become robust, and obedient missionaries.  Afterward, we all got Master Tacos for dinner and played some pool and ping pong to finish off the evening together.

The next morning we had to get ready fast and try not to be seen by the new bleus who were sleeping in the same apt. We went to the church and had an excellent meeting before meeting our new trainees. We learned about how to work by and with the Spirit, and how to teach the Bleu to feel it (which is the most important part of the instruction). As well as, following the spirit and just striving to be obedient and pure so that the Lord can use you as a sort of vessel to bring forth his Word.

Then we went upstairs and met the Bleus! It was a big group, and they went through one by one reading their assignments. A super cool one, whose name was Elder Mason went up and read off the City of Manosque serving with Elder Peterson!  My new bleu!

He is a cool, very motivated young man from Fresno California, who is striving to be a good missionary. His French language skills are fantastic, at church when he gave his testimony, all of the member’s jaws dropped, He did a great job and has a great drive to do this work.

That Brings me to the main subject of this week:

I have seen how the Lord knows me; he has given me exactly what I needed when I needed it most. I felt myself slipping, losing motivation and getting tired, maybe even a little Trunky. However, since I got this call to train Elder Mason my energy has increased and I feel young again. I feel so much more driven.

Also in the last couple months, I felt other things slipping, I was repetitive with my prayers.  I did not have the very edifying studies that I used to enjoy. I was becoming lazy, and I found myself occupied with thoughts of movies and music from home. Now, the Lord has helped me. He has given me this incredible opportunity to repent, I love Repentance, it means to change and put my life in order, to follow more closely the Teachings of Jesus Christ.

I feel healthy again; I Feel Spiritual again; I feel Close to the Lord again, and I know He helped me.  It was vital that I put my life in order at this crucial time, for this, I am so thankful.

A scripture that has helped me this week is in Mosiah 26, and it says:

Yea, and as often as my people repent will I forgive them their trespasses against me.

I know this is True, the Lord is there with open arms of mercy, and he wants us to Learn, and to Learn, we must change.

Thanks for reading,

Talk to you next week!

Elder Peterson

My Last Transfer… I am Training

 

 

I can’t believe that I have almost completed my mission.  This is the last six weeks and I have been assigned to train Elder Mason. We are serving in Manosque, France.

It has been a very busy week as I headed to Lyon for preparation and assignment of our new trainees (bleus).

I will write more next week!

Here is a picture of us!

Love you all,

Elder Peterson,
La mission Française de Lyon.

 

 

A Week of Tender Miracles

Salut Mon Amis.

Wow, this was a week of tender miracles, the Lord had really helped me see his hands and feel his love.

This week started off rather hard, having received some sad news of a friend passing away. I began the week with that weighing on my mind, but the Lord was able to show me his love and to comfort me, through the people that surrounded me.

On Tuesday, we did some contacting after lunch and then went to see one of our potentials named Monsieur Williams, as we sat down he started talking about how much he wanted to change his life and start on a better path and really try to build something more with God… So I guess you could say that we got pretty excited. We taught about the restoration and the importance of the gospel and the Book of Mormon, we invite him to pray to know if it’s true, then he stuns us by telling us that he knows it’s true already… Ok… 🙂 🙂 🙂 We
decided to invite him to be baptized in July, he needs to do a lot of preparation for this but I know he can be ready, so we asked him and he readily accepted the date which we had proposed. We were super happy to be able to see him and help him set his feet on this path of discipleship, he is super great and we are stoked for him!

Then after that. we got a bus (because all of the trains are on strike still) up to Toulouse for an exchange with the district leader, it was a good time, nevertheless, my mind was still occupied by other thoughts so I was not feeling the best, it was difficult to lift up my morale,  so we went back to their apt and he did area book work in making calls to old Chinese Amis, given our district leader was actually called to speak Chinese in the mission! Luckily he had a lot of work to do in calls which gave me a moment to calm down and pray and just read scriptures and relax.

The next day we went out to lunch with the zone leaders and the district leader and found a great Mexican restaurant!! It’s been over a year since I have had real Mexican food! We all went out and had a good lunch hour, that as really good to lift the morale and to
really just relax and recharge for some more hard work over the week!  After that, we got to the Gare to see for trains or buses and we got the next bus… 4 hours later we were in Tarbes so that means 2 hours longer than normal….. But on the bright side,   there was air
conditioning which is a rare commodity here in France so that was good! It is interesting to note that a lot of the passengers were getting impatient and upset during the time with all the stops the bus was making, so I guess the strikes are doing their jobs. 🙂 🙂

The next day we went to see a member Patrick and to help him fix his bike and when it was finished we took him out for a ride, we went to ride to his brother’s house which was about 7 kilometers away, the problem was that he hadn’t ridden a bike in a number of years so he was not ready. 🙂 🙂 Needless to say we had to stop often to rest but he made it in the end! We were so proud of him, it was a great time and it was really a tender mercy from the lord to me to do that, it was calming and fun and then when we got to his brothers, they made us dinner and we spent a great moment with the family then we rode back quickly to get back on time! 🙂 🙂 🙂  It was great and I know the Lord put his hands in that day to help us.

We have been able to get a couple new Amis this week and have been able to teach some great people, the Lord is helping us so much, he wants us to succeed and to be happy in our lives here as his servants.

I have been able to gain a deeper understanding and love for the Plan of our Heavenly Father, for what happens after death and for the Love and mercy that will be given to us and are constantly accorded to us.

I know that everyone will get a fair chance to learn these teachings and accept this gospel, it is a gospel of love and that is because we have a God of love, he is great and I am so happy to be his servant at this time.

Throughout the whole week, I felt his love and he showed it to me constantly, he has helped me overcome a lot of me weaknesses this week to become stronger and I know these things will help me for the rest of my life, from when I get home and throughout my marriage and future family 🙂

Thank you so much for all your thoughts and prayers! This next week is transfer week and I might move so I probably will not have much, email time next week so I will apologize in advance, if that is the case.

Love you all.

Elder Peterson,
La mission Française de Lyon.

Bonjour a tous ceux qui sont Beaux

Hello, everyone!

Wow, another great week flew by, I didn’t even feel it pass!

My current companion is pretty fixed in the idea that I am “old” in the mission and that I will be “Dying” soon! I have now been in Tarbes for nearly 6 months. I am expecting to be leaving here in two weeks. 😦  I love it here so much, it is a great place and the people are
incredible.

I had an interview over Skype with my mission president this week and he told me it is going to be really hard to leave Tarbes, I asked him how he knew and he said because he once had to do it, about 35 years ago, as a young elder he served here and he loved everything about it as well.  It holds a very special place in his heart and the same has happened to me. 🙂 I am so thankful for all the time I have had here and I cannot wait to hopefully be able to come back and visit in September at the end of my mission. For now, I am still here and the work is moving along just fine!

This week we got a new Ami and found some potential new Amis! It has been  great week! One of the best parts of the week is really seeing the Lords hand in our lives.

It is quite often that the plans we make don’t work out how we planned them, which is ok as long as we are in the right place at the right time 🙂

For example, this week we were going to ride our bikes about 6 kilometers south to visit a family living in a village, as we set off on the trail (we found a bike trail so we don’t need to bike on a busy, noisy road and it leads us right to the village) my back chain guide
broke off and went into the wheel and gets super bent out of shape…  There goes our plans… So I get off and try to bend it back to shape, but that doesn’t work.

We go and walk the bike to one of our Amis homes that was really close by, luckily they are home!

We get some pliers and work on it for a while but it was pretty pointless, our Ami offers to drive us home and so we put the bikes in the car and we are on our way home.  As I was looking out the window I suddenly make eye contact with a woman on the side of the road. She gives me a big smile as we pass by. I ask my companion if he saw what I saw and
he said yes… But we were not positive, but it looked like that woman we found in the gare a couple months ago. She had been baptized in Rwanda about a year ago and has been coming back to church. However, we thought she lived about an hour away in a village with her husband. Where we saw her walking was in Tarbes, right around the corner from our apt at the HOMELESS SHELTER… So we get out, and throw our bikes in our apt real fast and then get out to try to see if it was her, and sure enough, it was, she has been there for almost a month now but she has ashamed so she didn’t tell anyone, she needed help and felt alone. We called up, the Relief Society president and they got in contact to figure out the situation. Now she will be able to get the help she needs. I know it’s an answer to her prayers and her families prayers.

The Lord completely changed our plans and even had my bike break so that we could help her. She really needed this help and if we hadn’t seen her that day who knows what would have happened! I am so thankful for my Heavenly Father and I know that he loves all of his children and he listens to each and every prayer 🙂

We were able to visit with some of our Amis this week and I am so thankful for the Opportunity to be the Lords hands here in Tarbes.

All of the strikes are still happening throughout France with the supposed end date being next weekend but we shall see. 🙂 🙂 We are hoping we will be good for the 20th because there are a lot of missionaries going home and coming in this transfer!

I was able to share a little message with a lot of people about a tent… In the Doctrine and Covenants when the saints are being persecuted and going through all sorts of trials, Joseph Smith prayed saying “where is the tent that covers your hiding place” thinking that the Lord was hiding from the suffering prophet. In a talk from Henry Erying it says that God doesn’t put a tent to cover him, we put a tent and cover God, in things we do and maybe habits that we create, we are distancing ourselves from the blessings the lord is often trying to pour on our heads.

We really have a great and Loving Heavenly Father.

I love you all! Have a great week.

Elder Peterson,
La mission Française de Lyon.

A Super Great Week!

This week was very good!

We were able to accomplish a lot of the stuff that we planned to get done, and we have seen the Lord blessing us along the way. But, we have eaten wayyyyy toooo much!

On Sunday last week, we told the members that we did not have any electricity, and they responded by inviting us over to eat a lot of hot meals. 🙂 🙂 Almost every day this last week we ate with someone different, and we ate A LOT! It was so kind of the members to react in such a loving way to our situation. It was fun to be able to see a lot of the members in their homes and to share a message to help strengthen them in their faith. The Lord Loves his children, and he knows what they need. It seems strange that people having us over to eat blesses them or is the Lords will, but it truly is. I have seen it this week; we have been able to strengthen the members and talk to them and share things with them so that they may feel loved. It has been a humbling experience to share the Lords words with these people. I have realized more about what a missionary call is all about. I have been set apart to help bring others to Christ, to be his hands here on earth. It doesn’t only mean the nonmembers or the Lost sheep that have strayed away from the Church, but it also includes helping even the strongest and most active members and their families. I pray that I will always be a good and willing servant for the Lord that the Lord might produce miracles through me. I see them, very often, almost daily.

Something beautiful about the Lord is that he cares about us no matter what our situation. If our power was working many of those people might not have had the chance to receive us in their homes and hear what the Lord has inspired us to share. I am super grateful for that. I had never looked this as a lesson in this way until I started writing this post today, but, I know it’s true, and I am thankful for it.

This week we were also able to help our friend from Senegal do some work in his Garden and prepare a place to build a patio. We spent a significant portion of the day working there; he then asked if we could stay for dinner and we readily agreed. 🙂 He and his wife are wonderful
People; they have a beautiful little girl who is four years old.  They
are always willing to have us come over and discuss and share a meal
together and for that, we are so grateful,  but… One night this last
We stopped by to say hi for a few minutes and then the wife comes
into the room and says she is making dinner, and we will be eating with them, we were not going to say no! 🙂 🙂 but there was one problem…We had another dinner appointment right after… We text the people for the 2nd meeting saying we might be a bit late. 🙂 🙂 We eat dinner with this amazing family, and then we go to see a member who was had also prepared us dinner. We eat again! 🙂 🙂 I don’t know how it was physically possible to eat like we had to but we accomplished the task!

We were able to teach a couple of other people this week and have some great discussions about the Bible and the creation which are always a great experience!

Another thing is there is a member who was in Montpellier when I first
arrived in the mission; She was the very first member that I visited in France! Her family lives here, in Tarbes, so she was here the last few weeks to see her family.  It was unbelievable because her as she and me had become really good friends near the start of my mission.  She
speaks good English she was able to help me a lot when I was new and then when she learned I was here she called me and said she was coming to Tarbes. We had a great time with her family the last couple of weeks, and it was her family who served us beef tongue!
Sadly on Saturday, she had to leave back to Paris where she currently lives, but we went and saw her off at the Gare with her family.

It is always really cool to see people that we have not seen in a long
time who are still strong in the faith, it reminds me of the Book Of
Mormon when he sees that his brothers are still strong in the faith he
rejoices and that is exactly what I feel when I see these people, it
brings great joy and all I want is to hug them!

This was a great week! I love the city of Tarbes, and I am so happy to be serving here!

Je vous souhaite tous une bonne semaine et j’espère que vous aurez la
bonne chance!

Je prie pour vous tout les jours.
Je vous aime

Elder Peterson,
La mission Française de Lyon.

News from Tarbes

Hello, everyone !

It’s been a while since I have sent a newsy letter, sorry about that! Anyway, in the last couple weeks, a lot has happened!

We met some great people and got some new Amis, that have a lot of potential.

Particularly there was a great miracle a couple weeks ago in the Gare, we had a couple RDVs fall through so we decided to stop by the Gare to print off tickets. While I  was standing at the machine printing the tickets and then a woman walks up to my companion who is standing a bit away, and she asked if she could talk to him and because he is just learning French he calls to me and was like “hey, she wants to talk to us” so I introduce us and ask what we could do for her. She asked where the church was, I showed her on the iPad and then said “well we could maybe meet up during the week to discuss and teach about the church” then she says “Ce n’est pas la peine, Je suis membre”!!!! (Which means: it’s not worth it, I am a member!)  Anyway, it turns out that she was baptized in Ruanda a year ago and she moved here in December and has been looking for the church since! She had been praying to find it and one day she happened to be there in the right place at the right time. I am sure it was inspired that we would go and get our tickets at that very time. There is a reason for everything and it’s super cool to be able to be the Lords hands here in Tarbes, anyway, a bigger part of the miracle is that when she joined the church in Africa her husband was already here in France so he didn’t know about the church. When she got here he was so impressed by the changes that she made, how she prays and he wants
that in his life. We went out to their home and we were able to teach him, he is a great man and I am so excited to be there to help him to build this relationship with his Heavenly Father.

So that was a great miracle!

We have also been able to re-contact some old Amis, 2 of which have become new Amis, we have J who is from Guadalupe, he is in a band that plays happy islander music and he has a lot of amazing talents and hobbies. He has an illness that requires that he use a wheelchair but that doesn’t stop him from following his dreams and working on his hobbies.  He is very talented and he has built almost all the furniture in his home, the only unfinished thing is his table that has been serving as a work bench for him.  When he completes all his projects, he will finish the table. It is a really great image for him, he works on every part of his life and at the end he will know, it’s really cool, he has accepted the JWs in the past and the Elders back in 2008 so he has a lot of info in his head and we are helping him straighten it out, he thinks almost constantly about God and Jesus Christ. He is a great guy looking for the truth so he can commit and follow the Lord by showing faith in his commitment.

Next, is L he is an old AMI who had been taught and dropped a few times by the elders, we called him and asked if we could see him just an hour later and he was willing so we went by, he has been studying the Apocrypha which is a selection of books published in the original 1611 King James Bible.  They were once positioned between the Old and New Testaments but were removed after 274 years in 1885. The Catholic Church uses some of them still. He been using these in his studies he has found answers to a lot of questions but even more were, been brought to his attention. He really wants answers and during the RDV we discovered that he had never actually read the Book Of Mormon…. Duh, that’s why he is having so many questions! 🙂 🙂 We challenged him to read it, he seems willing and it seems he trusts us. We were able to talk about his studies and that caused him to trust us, having a basic understanding of the Apocrypha I was able have a connection with him and it was great and we are excited to see him again!

We are still doing French class for the member from Cambodia every week and he is improving a lot!

We met a man named Harvey and he wanted English class, he was taught English years ago by missionaries in Toulouse so when he met us in Tarbes he was pretty excited, we have taught him twice now. He is a practicing Catholic… He told us the first day when we set up the English class “do not preach to me, I just want to learn English” then at the end of our little English class, he asked, “so, what is the difference between Catholics and Mormons?” 🙂 🙂  Now, we have started teaching him and he has accepted a Livre De Mormon.we have class, with him every week so we will see how this progresses!

Elder Peterson,
La mission Française de Lyon.

An Amazing Week

Hello Everyone,

What an amazing week!

We saw a lot of success this week, we now have three new Amis and a new engaged for baptism! There is a new member here that was baptized about a year ago in Ruanda and her husband had already been in France when she was baptized but now that she is here we are starting to teach her husband!

We are so happy here with all of the work that we are able to do, we have been in Toulouse since Friday because we came up for Stake conference his weekend and then we are all going to Bordeaux for a conference tomorrow so we figured we would stay here to spend P-Day with them.

I am so sorry that there are not many details this week, but know that I am so happy and that I will write more next week!

I love you all.
Elder Peterson,
La mission Française de Lyon.

Transfers are upon us!

Hello everyone!

Wow, this has been a great couple of weeks,

I have really been enjoying my time here in Tarbes, it is not the easiest place to be and I have struggled for a little bit but it has been growing on me. Now, I am falling in love with Tarbes, you could call it Tarbes fever! 🙂 🙂 🙂

Something about being a missionary, we do a lot of planting seeds and it is kind of rare that we actually see the fruits of our labors. However, this last couple weeks, we are just seeing fruits and the grace of our Lord. Everyone that we have been teaching over the last few months and all the work we have been doing with members has just really started to flourish. We are so happy to see how people’s relation with their Heavenly Father has grown substantially and they are able to find peace, even in these troubled times. 

The other day was transfer calls so we received the news that Elder Brady Haug is leaving me for Geneva Switzerland to the Spanish-speaking ward there, he is very excited because he will be able to work on his Spanish which has been diminishing over the mission. He will do great there although, he is sad to leave Tarbes.

And I will be receiving,Elder Smith from England, he is currently in Geneva Spanish where my comp is going.  Basically, they are trading places. Elder Smith has only served Spanish speaking so far, so he doesn’t really speak a lot French, so I will have to opportunity to help him learn French. 🙂 🙂 He  was called to the France Lyon Mission Spanish speaking but there is only one Spanish congregation. 🙂 🙂 There are a lot of Spanish speakers near Perpignan and the border of Spain.

I am really looking forward to the next 6 weeks, I have learned a lot so far and I am excited to apply what I have been learning, a couple weeks ago we were blessed with the visit of D. Todd Christofferson which was incredible and we were all able to go, I learned a lot and grew a lot from my spiritual preparation and I am now ready to apply it all!

We are back on taking extra safety precautions here on the mission, 

I am sure most of you know about the missionaries that were injured during the terrorist attacks in Belgium last week.  The sister that was hurt, I just met a few months ago as she is French and lives in my mission.  Please, I ask that you pray for them and for all those afflicted by these horrible things, along with the families that lost loved ones. They could use the prayers. 

This week we taught our Amis and we did some more service, I am so happy.

We have seen a lot of progression with some of the less active members here, we have been teaching our ami C with a less active member in her home over dinner for the last couple weeks and it is going incredibly well. 

I hope you all enjoyed your Easter and that you were able to be maybe a little bit more thankful this year for our Lord and Savior and his sacrifice. I know this was one of best Easters I have had in my life, it was simple, we were invited after church to eat with a family and we had a great time with them and then we got home and went to a lot eating appt with our ami C at the less active members house. It was an incredible day of human love and devotion for their Lord. Also, all French chocolate eggs and bunnies are incredible 🙂 

I love you all so much! I wish you a great week! Stay safe. 

Elder Peterson,

 La mission Française de Lyon.