Church Is For 3 Hours!

Jan. 5, 2015 Letter

Hello my sweet family, 

Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas all arrived to Elder Clawson's doorstep on Christmas Eve!  Thanks to the sweet office couples who drove around the mission to make sure every missionary had their packages.  He looks like a  little kid at Christmas:)

Well I guess it's only been like 4 days since I last wrote you and not a whole ton has changed. 

One thing that I do need to say is that Tirana is a total maze! It's ridiculous! I have no idea where I am ever and hopefully I can finally get a grip on it real soon. 

So basically since I've got here we've been trying to kinda get to know the members. So there are tons of members here and we are working in a ward with a great bishop. We got to meet Bishop Zela the other night and it was great. We introduced ourselves and kinda just shared what we were expecting this coming transfer. 

Snow in Prishtina, Kosovo.

We also met with this one family named the V's. The father has been baptized for like 20 years so that was really cool to see how strong he is in the Gospel. He calls the missionaries Angels all the time. 

We met with Brother Alfred who is a pretty new member. He's been baptized for like 2 years but he is a great guy. Super in tune with the Spirit and he just wants to do good. Later that night we met with a member who is a little less active but we were able to meet with him and share a message and invite him to church which was really cool. 

Ward Mission Meeting was the other day and we got to meet the Ward Mission Leader. He is a great guy. Totally bald head and he looks awesome and he is super nice. On Sunday we got to bear our testimonies and such I got up there and introduced myself to the members and they all judged me:)  I speak with a very heavy Kosovar dialect and accent since I've been there the last 6 months. So I'm gonna be trying to change that a bit. And church here is for 3 hours! I haven't been to church for that long since I was in 2nd branch with Elder Eliason! In Shkoder we were lucky if we got an hour and 15 minutes. 

Saying Goodbye to favorite friends in Kosovo.

Last night Elder Braden and I had to make some new zone goals for the month. I didn't think it was gonna take very long but it took forever! So the situation is that Elder Braden is brand new in leadership. We are both taking over a zone that we haven't worked in for a while and we don't know what is going on with anyone. So we relied a lot on the Spirit last night as we were planning all of that stuff out. 

Today was a good day. We woke up and did our studies and then went to 2nd ward to eat lunch at a Mexican joint. It was pretty good and I got some great nachos. After that guess what we did? WE WENT BOULDERING!!!! President Weidmann approved the only climbing gym in Albania because it's only bouldering and no wall climbs with belays. So when I heard that, I kinda just decided that we would be climbing every single Pday from now on. It was so great to go climbing again. My arms are destroyed and I've got chalk all up in my fingernails and I am a happy camper. I usually don't live for my P-days because I'm usually just happy if I can go out and walk around but today was definitely one of the best P-Days I've had. Then I came here to the internet place. 

Jed talks so highly of this man.  He loves him!  He was baptized just recently and is doing fantastic!

Another favorite friend and Brother In The Lord in Kosovo.  He's got a baptism date soon.  

And there is one funny thing. You mentioned something about Brenna, a new employee at the bakery, and I am actually in the ward that one of her old companions lives in! She served in California with Sister Celi. Pronounced CH-ELLY.  Just ask your employee about Sister Celi because I talked with her at church yesterday and told her where I was from and she said that she'd had a companion from Logan. Small world. 

And a very happy reunion when Jed returned to Albania.  Ersi is AWESOME!  

Well that is about it for today. I will hopefully send ya'll some pics. I love you all so much! Tell Jane way to go with skiing! I hope everyone is loving it there. LOVES!!

Love, Jedediah

Dear Mother, 

Thanks a ton for that email about you and dad living in Cali. It made me kinda take a look at my position a bit differently. You guys basically know what I'm thinking about coming back but I know that God has something important for me to do here. So I was wondering that if you are thinking about sending another fast package, could you send my climbing shoes? My checkered ones? Just an idea. Well I love you Mom. Thanks for being fantastic!!

Love, Jed