My Armenian is Getting Better (And the Russians Are Coming)

July 10, 2019

My Armenian is Getting Better (And the Russians Are Coming)

გამარჯობა!

      This week has been great!  I have decided that Tuesdays are always the best day.  Only one period of class.  Devotional and devotional review are both amazing!!  The speakers are super great and the insights that everyone gets in our district meeting are always enlightening.  Brother Muir is gone for the rest of the week, so I have had substitutes that don't know the Georgian language so I have to just work on my own.  So far I have had a Russian teacher, Brother Belnap, and a Ukrainian teacher, Sister Stromberg.  Apparently, a good number of you may know Brother Belnap if you learned Russian at the MTC in the past 2 years.  Crazy number of connections with him.  I also had some really good doctrinal discussions in English with both subs.  The spirit was very strong and I gained some new insights each time.  With Brother Muir being gone, the Armenians have lost a source of humor.  His ties are hilariously short all the time.  And he always looks unimpressed.  We love him.  But he needs to fix his ties.

       The Armenians had an English fast this week.  That means very little communication with them throughout the day.  Luckily, I am able to understand a good amount.  They all had their "NO ENGLISH" signifiers, so that everybody knows that they can't communicate with them.  I put on a little tag that said "ENGLISH TRANSLATOR".  Since I have a better understanding of Armenian than anyone else at the MTC, I am able to help others communicate with the Armenians.  Sometimes it turns into a big game of charades where they include some Georgian and other Armenian words I know.  It is fun to do that, but a bit unfortunate that I can't easily speak with my district. Whatever, it's important for their development.  I don't really get that opportunity, but there's a reason God has for me learning Georgian alone, so it must be for the best.  

       Independence Day was good.  We had a short devotional with our zone about religious freedom.  We were forced to stay up late and watch the fireworks.  My companion and I were not fans.  Choir this week was good.  The normal choir director was not there, we had a sub.  Elmo Kek.  Brother Elmo Kek (This may or may not be the correct spelling of his last name).  That is right his first name is Elmo.  As a result, Elder Lott has decided to name one of his children Mo.  He has good list.  Almost as good as mine.  Today we are getting 22 new Russian speakers.  It's so crazy.  There are so many new missionaries here today.   

       To end, I would like to have a word with you all on the power of asking questions.  I'm finishing up this email and, my companion, Elder Butterfield is doing some study on The Book of Mormon.  He going through and finding each time it refers to Jesus Christ.  There's some ambiguity in who is being discussed.  The God of the Old Testament, Jehovah, is the same as the God of the Book of Mormon, but sometimes it does appear to be referring to God the Father.  About ten times as I've been writing emails today, he's pulled me away to ask who is being referred to.  We discuss, reread, look at footnotes, and we come to an answer each time.  He asks the same question, but in a different way each time.  I learn and he learns.  I've seen the power of a good question do a lot.  Be able to answer good questions.  Currently I'm reading Jesus the Christ by James E. Talmage.  The insights in that book are incredible.  Of course I will recommend The Book of Mormon to you all first because its insights are unmatched, but both are worth your time.  Not only should you be able to answer questions, we should be able to ask excellent questions.  Ask me questions.  Ask your parents good questions.  Ask your spouse good questions.  Ask your heroes and teachers good questions.  There is a lot to be learned on both ends from a good question.  

ნახვამდის!  

--უხუცესი ფიშერი

Elder Lott staring at Crazy Aaron Putty

Elder Butterfield and Sister Mittens the cat eating breakfast.

Elder Fisher dressed as Brother Muir

Elder Lott and Fisher at the temple looking at the fountain.

A re-creation of the above photo

Aaron Is Crazy

July 3, 2019

Aaron Is Crazy

გამარჯობა!  

       This has been a week and a half.  It's strange that I have so much to say, yet I feel like I can't say any of it.  There's been a lot of learning this week.  It wasn't a language week or a gospel week, but certainly a mix of both.  I made quite a bit of language progress through Wednesday to Monday, and I got some amazing gospel study done from Saturday to today.  For language, I was able to summarize each point of the first Preach My Gospel lesson in Georgian in at least one sentence.  My favorite was probably: Joseph Smith translated the Book of Mormon through the gift and power of God.  The only word I didn't know was past conjugation of translate.  I love this language.  As for gospel study, I am now studying.  1) The Infinite Nature of Christ's Atonement  2) Last Words of the Prophet  3) Power of Words   These are fascinating topics.  I was reading in Revelation 12, and verse 11, amazingly enough, covers some of these topics.  In our district council meeting yesterday, I brought up several scriptures relating to these topics.  I love when I can bring my studies into those meetings because I can gain greater insights from each of the missionaries.

       Last Wednesday, we met with our new mission president and his wife again.  They are so cool.  They are French, but his ancestry is from Armenia, and has friends from Georgia .  They have a love for the people of Armenia already and they are so ready to serve the Lord.  

       We all got pretty sick this past week, which was not fun.  It makes learning the language harder and studying harder and sleeping harder and eating harder and waking harder and giving our goodnight hugs harder.  All around, not a good time. A more positive first this week is our first TRC.         Nobody really knows what it stands for.  Maybe Teaching Resource Center, but if that's what it is, saying "we have one TRC a week" just sounds weird.  Previously, we taught our teachers while they acted like people they met on their missions.  This time we were teaching return missionaries as themselves.  It was way different.  We teach two people for twenty minutes each.  One of them was actually Brother Muir's wife.  Crazy.  We have another one scheduled for tomorrow, but I don't know who would volunteer to come on Independence Day.  We'll see.

        Anyway, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is true.  We here in District 9F know it, and we want everyone else to.  Like, KNOW it.  Literally everyone.   I have learned that, much like Nephi in the Book of Mormon, I delight in plainness and in truth.  I implore you all to study the words of God.  Find simple pure truth and delight in it.  Until next time.  

ნახვამდის!      --უხუცესი ფიშერი

Study of the first lesson in Georgian

President and Sister Picard with District 9F

Translation (In Both Senses of the Word)

June 26, 2019

Translation (In both senses of the word)

გამარჯობა!

       Well boys, we did it, our second week at the MTC is no more.  Let me tell you, I for one had a great week here at the old Missionary Training Center.  The new mission president training was this week which means something very exciting for us.  Every member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and the First Presidency was here this week.  Elder Butterfield and I were joking about seeing the prophet's car, which was a Toyota Highlander.  This was the meme of the day.  Well, a couple days later on our way to class, we really did see the prophet's car.  It drove up to one of the buildings, President Nelson got out and Elder Uchtdorf greeted him.  WE WERE RIGHT THERE!!!  They waved at us as they went in.  It was pretty neat.  On Sunday, our devotional was given by Elder Holland.  Sitting on the stand was every member of the Quorum of the Twelve, President Oaks, and their wives.  Elder Holland's message was so simple, but gave us a lot of discussion material for our district council meeting.  We are growing sooooooooooooooooooooo much here, it is insane!!

       Well, you see, I don't have too much to say, so I will have to fill this out with a dream I had.  It probably won't be very entertaining for you all, but it was to the district, so here you go.  

       ACT I:    We start out in a building much like our residence buildings, but different.  All the cabinets are gone and replaced with different sized beds.  The sisters are also with us for some reason.  We end up discovering the existence of what we will now be calling the laundry society.  They meet in the basement.  All you have to do to be inducted is let them do a load of laundry for you.  Oh, and my roommate from last semester Elder Wing (Davis) was there too.  He went down to the basement to see if it really was that easy to be inducted into the laundry society.  He didn't think he had enough laundry, so I gave him some of mine.  I go down a bit later and find my pajamas strewn across the floor.  This was of course completely normal sounding to me.  To get your laundry done it had to fit into this really small bag.  End of act one.

       ACT II:     We are back in our room (the entire district is there, although I don't remember seeing them, I just had some feeling that they were there.)  This act is short and it consists only of two little six-year-olds.  Some random girl in a camp counselor outfit was reading a bedtime story, then these two little boys just got up in workout clothes.  We asked where they were going and they said they wanted to go to the gym between 10pm and midnight because no one was scheduled to be there at that time.  Like, WHAT?  Does the gym get busy for six-year-olds right at 12:01am?  Really weird.  Okay end of act two.

       ACT III:     In this version of our room, there were a huge number of windows.  It was super bright outside, I was trying to close all the blinds, but for some reason it was incredibly hard.  I had to make some curtains with the extra blankets for the thin upper windows, and no one seemed to care that it was really late and really bright outside.  While this is going on, Sister Goldrich and Sister Wall were getting at each other about whose math skills were better.  They were going at it.  For some reason they knew exactly what high school math classes each one took at what schools they went to.  It was weird and then it ended.  

       This week, ძმა მუირი (Brother Muir) was not here for a couple days, so I had several subs.  Sister Hopwood, one of the Hungarian teachers came in and I taught her some grammar and we labeled stuff in the room with Georgian.  The other days, I had Brother Richmond and Brother Alvord, which meant that I would be joining the Armenians.  It was okay.  I kinda just did my own thing whilst they spoke in tongues.  It was pretty fun to study with them.  They get mad at how many cognates are in Georgian.  Computer, Internet, telephone, university, school, mouse.  Library, church and problem are just Spanish cognates, so there are some good parts of Georgian.

       I have been studying the last words of the prophets in each of the standard works.  I am starting with the Book of Mormon.  It is really interesting to compare them, because they are so different.  I just finished Alma the younger, and his are very interesting.  Of course we have his teachings to each of his sons, but his true last words are interesting.  They prophesy of the destiny of the Nephites.  He says that 400 years after the Lord comes, the Nephites and Lamanites will destroy themselves.  That's about it. Then he just leaves and is never heard from again.  That is something that is not very common in the Book of Mormon.  Mormon gives his commentary that he may have been translated like Moses, but that is really it.  Pretty unique as far as last words of prophets go.

       So much more has happened, but I do not feel like typing it all out.  And that's the way it is on this the 26th of June 2019.

ნახვამდის!  

--უხუცესი ფიშერი

Brother Alvord - Armenian teacher

Love Is the Key to Being One

June 19, 2019

Love is the Key to Being One

გამარჯობა!  --> Triumph/Victory/Hello

        As of 12:15 today, my district and I will have been at the MTC a full week.  Let me tell you how awesome it has been.  My district is the greatest of all time!! It is comprised of eight elders and three sisters.  Elder Butterfield is my companion and he grew up in Saudi Arabia, so he has interesting childhood stories.  The others are Elders Kamber, Christensen, Frazer, Crook, Shamshoian and Lott.  We also have Sisters Wall, Salle, and Goldrich.  They are all speaking Armenian with me learning Georgian.  You might think that this would be a challenge since we spend six hours a day in class, primarily learning our language with at least an hour more of language study.  You are certainly correct if you thought that.   The languages are not similar at all except for the word "true" which is different by one vowel tagged on at the end in Georgian. 

        Georgian is going fantastically!  Out of about 2000 missionaries here at the MTC, I am the only one learning Georgian.  My two teachers personal tutors, Brother Muir and Sister Parsons are really fun and have been very encouraging and helpful in the language.  Towards the beginning of the week Brother Muir mentioned that the Armenian missionaries always want to know which language is harder.  He said BY FAR Georgian.  Of course, the next day, the Armenians ask which is harder, and their teacher said, BY FAR Georgian.  It may have to do with the fact that verbs can be conjugated about 114 different ways, but maybe it's something else.  I say this not to demean any Elders or Sisters that are learning other languages like Russian or Finnish, but to be fair, there are recognizable characters in your alphabet.  

        The Armenians are so great to me.  They ask to learn some knew Georgians words, so they can say "hello" / "victory" and "thank you" and "Elder" and "Sister" in Georgian.  The sisters are even writing a song about me to the tune of "Prince Ali" and including some Georgian in there.  (This is primarily because Elder Fisher in Georgian sounds like "ookhootsesi peesheri" and to them is pretty close to Prince Ali).  Apparently I am "smart as ten regular men, definitely".  That's pretty nifty, I would say.  Despite the fact that I am alone with nobody to practice with, I am keeping up with them.  In certain areas I am ahead of them and in others they are.  The Gift of Tongues is 100% real and there is no doubt in my mind that we have been recipients of it.  

Food is fine.  Not great.  Not my own cooking by any means, but it's fine.  Schedules, are packed.  Exercise time is a true blessing.  The zone is very inviting.  Everything is great.  And most of the time I love everyone.

        The first couple days at the MTC went sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo slow.  It was not too enjoyable to be honest.  I wasn't sure what to think about Brother Muir and I didn't meet with Sister Parsons until Friday, but after that and a few experiences with the district, I started loving the MTC.  Which is good because we'll be here for eight more weeks.  We had a whole bunch of workshops and beginning language studies.  Sunday, we had sacrament meeting with our zone.  This includes Estonians, Latvians, Lithuanians, Russians, Armenians, a Ukrainian, and a Georgian.  We are supposed to speak our language as much as possible, so we sing and give talks in languages that not everyone understands.  It is amazing how strong the Spirit can be even when we do not know what all is being said.  Elder Crook is our district leader and he is doing a great job.  

        Sunday evening, we went to choir before our devotional.  The choir director is very entertaining and has amazing church history stories.  Neither of these were the highlight of the night.  The greatest was the "film" we watched.  It was a devotional given about seven years ago by Elder David A. Bednar.  He spoke a great amount on overcoming the natural man and developing the character of Christ.  He gave a powerful example of a sister that when she had all reason to look in and not look out to others, thought only of others.           

        Tuesday's devotional was Elder S. Gifford Nielsen of the seventy.  He made some very good remarks, but afterwards in our district council meeting, we focused on his few remarks on being one.  Being one with God, Christ, our companions, our district, our zone, etc.  It is crazy the tangible love that was present in the room.  Over the past week alone, we have grown so close as a district.  We spend as much time as possible together.  We eat together, we go to choir together, we walk to class and everywhere else together.  There is definitely a deep feeling of love between us all.  We made goals to pray for each other by name and to have district prayers and several other goals.  I literally CANNOT describe the love that is found for each other.  This may be because we are a split district in language or our different personalities or just our change since entering the MTC.  I really don't know, but it is noticeable.  The other missionaries in our zone barely know us because we are constantly together.  Our zone leader, Elder Woolf, said they can't call us by just our names because we are just the Armenians.  

        I can read emails all throughout the week, so give me something to read.  I can however only respond on Wednesday, so don't expect a response until then.  103 weeks left.

ნახვამდის!  -->  Goodbye      --უხუცესი ფიშერი

First Zone Leader - Elder Hunt with Elder Fisher and Butterfield

In the MTC Courtyard taking a break.

Some classroom work.

Elders Crook, Shamshoian, Fisher, Butterfield, Frazer, Lott, Kamber, Christensen, Sisters Wall, Salle, Goldrich

Elder Fisher and Butterfield on P-day

MTC

June 12, 2019

Jacob entered the Missionary Training Center in Provo, Utah.  His parents as well as his sister, Elise, and her children were there to say good-bye.

See you in two years!

Being a Pre-MTC Missionary

June 9, 2019

Being a Pre-MTC Missionary

გარმერჯობა, ყველას!

Before we begin, I want to lay the groundwork.  I don't know how these emails will be.  I don't know how much detail there will be.  I don't know what I'll be willing to share, but we'll find out.  This is a much bigger audience than my previous weekend recaps from college, so I find myself making references that many of you may not get, but just ask or go along with it.  Another primary reason for this email is to ensure people have my email address.  If you want my emails to be sent to another email or know of someone that isn't on the list that wants to be, let me know and I can make the change.  Additionally, if you made it onto this list by mistake and do not want my emails, please let me know that as well. 

Alrighty, let's just jump right into it.   I am now, officially, a set apart missionary of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.  I got set apart Friday, giving me four days when I am a

missionary outside of the MTC.  This allows me to send this email on a Sunday and several other things.  I have been able to listen to some wonderful books and do some extra study that I would not do if I were not yet set apart.  

One fantastic book by Bruce C. Hafen & Marie K. Hafen, Faith Is Not Blind, is an amazing book that gives a wonderful approach to looking at faith.  What I love about it is how applicable it is to learning knowing things of spiritual, scientific, and historical nature.  A professor I had last semester, Steven C. Harper, emphasized learning things like a historian.  In history, there are no certainties, but you can get really close by analyzing all evidences, proofs and facts.  The same can be said for matters of faith.  We can take things as we've been told them.  Blindly follow the things we are told in school or in church.  If we do that, we can miss many of the enlightening nuances that come with certain gospel or secular topics.  We must learn for ourselves through both study and faith.  

One pitfall that is present when we start to do so, however, is this added level of complexity.  With new facts, questions and nuances that we introduce ourselves to, we can start to question the basics that we thought we knew so concretely.  Although we may start to doubt, we should not let that repel us from learning, nor should we let it cause us to step away completely from believing.  A problematic piece of new knowledge should not repel.  Take imaginary numbers.  As soon as you learn about square roots, they say you CANNOT take the square root of a negative number.  Years later, what do they tell you?  You can, it is just called an imaginary number.  Have you been lied to?  No.  Because for almost everyone in the world, imaginary numbers are useless.  A normal person cannot root a negative number.  Only electrical engineers use them.  They are a very interesting concept, but an unimportant complexity (no pun intended)  that is unneeded for almost everyone. 

[After typing this analogy I realized that dividing by zero might be more relatable subject, but that is a bit more useful, so I'm keeping what I have.]

That is the final stage of learning and faith.  Being able to dismiss or make peace with all the complexity that we find in our study.  When we find a contradiction or ambiguity in commandments or doctrines given by God we need do nothing more than look at them through the lens of the Atonement of Jesus Christ.  All things, our loving Heavenly Father has done for our benefit. Oftentimes, God does not explain Himself fully, but we need to have enough faith and trust to know that He is doing it for our and others' good.  All of this is explained better and more fully in the book.  Again, it is a great read for both religious and secular contexts.

This email is much longer than I planned on.  I go into the Provo MTC on Wednesday, so I'll be able to see any emails you send until then.  After that, we get time on Wednesdays to email.  I will always try to keep my mass emails succinct.  I'll try to respond to as many emails as possible, but I will prioritize some before others.  For example, my mother and that's probably it.  Time for this fun adventure to begin.  TTFN.  

ნახვამდის!  

We spent the day in Salt Lake City at the Temple, Visitor's Center, and Conference Center.

It was a great day with family before heading to the MTC in Provo.

Set Apart

June 7, 2019

Jacob was set apart as a full-time missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints by President Boyd Esplin of the Anchorage Alaska Stake.

His parents and sister were with him at this special occasion.