Christmas Time Is Here

 December 11, 2020

We (Elder Springer, Elder Herr, and I) have been celebrating Christmas over here since November 1st.  The three of us have been living together for the last 8 1/2 months. I've been spending all my non-sleeping time with either Elder Springer or Elder Herr for the same amount of time. 

The three of us would not deny that it had been a tough time. We need some Christmas. Luckily this year, we have a way better environment to celebrate. If you remember last year, we only had a 2D (paper) tree on our wall. If you take a look at our living room this year, you'll notice an upgrade. We may be getting a nice New Year's gift too, but we won't be sure about that for a couple more days. Stay tuned.

 

We are preparing for our friend Davit to be baptized on December 20th. This is super exciting because the is the first person that any of us have taught from start to finish. He is so awesome. He has made some awesome spiritual growth and, even better, he has grown his relationship with his dad. He'll be having his interview on Wednesday and if he passes, he'll be ready to be baptized the following Sunday. The service will only be us three, Davit and his dad who is also the branch president. We're all very excited.

Anyway. Hopefully this next Monday, we'll have some more news. In the meantime, read "A Christmas Carol" and, of course, read the scriptures. Bye! 

 

--უხუცესი ფიშერი 

Some Guesses and Some Gratitude

November 23, 2020

გამარჯობა მეგობრებო,

We're still here in Georgia waiting for something to change. While we've been busy for a big positive change to occur, we have had a mix of developments. The size and quality of these changes vary, so I'll let you all form your own opinions on them. Feel free to send some clarifying questions if you feel I didn't give enough information for you to form an opinion.

We are back in Stage 0 meaning we cannot meet with anyone in person. We are basically back where we were in March/April-ish, BUT with some important differences. 1) There are only three of us. 2) We only have two apartments to worry about. 3) We have a lot more structure to work with in terms of missionary work, Facebook being the biggest. We are continuing to meet with President Alex for language tutoring, but with some extreme social distancing. Other than that, our number of meetings has severely decreased because people just don't like meeting with the missionaries over video. In-person is absolutely superior I guess.

We also put up some decorations for Christmas. We have a lot more than I had last year, and it really just brightens up the apartment and brightens our spirits. Christmas music has also been in the background a lot lately. One more bit of positivity.

Elections here in Georgia caused some unrest. Just about everyone we talked to, for weeks, was really upset. Because there was talk of fraud going around in both the state of Georgia and over here, we saw some videos of people confusing the population of the country with the state and being worried about massive fraud. ABC also used footage of a voting station here in Georgia when talking about the race in the state. Lots of confusion. I think we should just call this country Sakartvelo. It would make it easier for everyone.

In speaking with the mission leadership, we have some guesses for when missionaries will be coming back to Georgia. The Area Presidency thinks between January and March (there is literally no way). President Picard thinks June. Well, there is a bit of a time discrepancy there. President Picard is also considering bringing us down to Armenia until new missionaries come back (the current possibility of this is about 1%). Now, if you hear about these possibilities for the first time from the leadership in Armenia, you might be compelled to be pretty upset and worried and sad. Unfortunately, this was the reaction of my companions. Elders Springer and Herr did not consider either of these things to be realistic possibilities. I, however, did count these to be possible. Now that someone said them out loud, it makes it more real, but having the idea in my head for months made it a lot easier to not be devastatingly upset. I've just had more time to consider the positives and negatives of the situations. I have more guesses for those possible futures. If I go the rest of my mission with no new missionaries, I'll be fine. I've been considering it for months. As time goes on it is just more and more realistic. We have contact with the Elders and Sisters that will be coming. I may not meet them on their missions, but I can still answer questions. I can still organize the resources for them to use, both language and otherwise, for when they get here. I'll do what I can with the resources we have. I can do my best to make sure that everything is in the best order it can be before I leave in June.

To end, we have gratitude. What a great thing to express. What an easy thing to express. What a hard thing to express. Sure I'm thankful for "all my many blessings", but do I recognize what these blessings are? Let's go through a few:

-my cheap Georgian trombone

-the written language

-the spoken word

-international postal services

-pens

-stairs

-elevators

-innovators

-laws

-Georgian 

-English to Georgian dictionaries

-wheels

Ya, the vast majority of this list we might take for granted. I would even say that most of these should be taken for granted, but that in no way should stop us from recognizing our gratitude for them. Anyway, let's show some more gratitude this week. Okay? Great, sounds good.

--უხუცესი ფიშერი 

 River going through Tbilisi

Georgian church near our apartment

One More Hold-up

 October 26, 2020

ძვირფასო მეგობრებო,

 

First off, here's another update on Sister Mafi. On her way to Yerevan from Paris, the Picard's got word that Sister Mafi's flight to Tonga was canceled. She is now in Armenia with the other two sisters. Right now, it looks like she'll be there until December. She has been saying from the very beginning that she thinks she'll be going home in December. It looks like she will be correct on that front.

 

What else is new? Well, we're back to Phase 1 and we will probably be back in Phase 0 in the next couple of weeks. That means not only that we can't use public transportation, but we will be stuck back in self-isolation. The case numbers here in Georgia are bad, but elections are also coming up at the end of the month. There is talk that after the election, the government will put the country in a nationwide lockdown again. That's really unlucky, but at least this time around, we have more tools at our disposal for missionary work.  We'll be getting a laptop soon for the apartment, making it even easier to do missionary work in quarantine.

 

My studies are moving along well. I've now finished reading "Jesus the Christ" by James E. Talmage, The New Testament, and I have begun reading the book of Isaiah. In getting through Psalms there were some wonderful prophecies and beautiful prayers. Growing up, I never viewed Psalms as very great. They certainly are not all on the same level. Proverbs are the same. It's an interesting book and has some great maxims, but some are just not good and some are just really repetitive. Ecclesiastes has a few good passages. Songs of Solomon are just terrible. The difference between Songs of Solomon and Isaiah is so vast, I almost can't describe it and I will not try in this email. I will say that the chapters of Isaiah that are found in the Book of Mormon are especially great and understandable. I highly recommend the Bible. I even more highly recommend the Book of Mormon. The scriptures sure are great.

 

The work is good and the work is sweet. Have a great week and a great month. See you soon!

 

--Elder Fisher

 

Study Time

 October 20, 2020

Lots of time is spent studying especially since we moved back to Phase 1 this week.  (This means no public transportation - we walk everywhere.  No meeting in people's homes - only outside or at the church.)  More time will be spent with online teaching and proselyting again.

Playing the "chocolate chip General Conference trivia game" with the Herr family

Little Teeny Update

 October 19, 2020

 Dearest მეგობრებო!

A couple weeks ago, President Picard made an outstanding move. Some of you may be aware that there is currently a hot conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Well, as we all know, governments care about wars. Soooo, President Picard used this conflict as leverage to get Sister Mafi to the top of the list of getting Tongan citizens home. Let's fast forward to today when we get a call from the Picards saying that Sister Mafi will be leaving tomorrow morning for Yerevan. Now we're down to 3 Elders in the country. We're one step closer to getting missionaries back here.

--Elder Fisher 

Last four Georgian missionaries at dinner ...

and in the park

 Final day with Sister Mafi before she flies to Armenia.

 

We Will Still Weep for Zion

 October 4, 2020

Dearest All, 

This week we had some good meetings:

Darejani- This is a sister that Sisters Gehring and Workman met back in November. She was very interested in the Gospel and loves the Book of Mormon. She believes strongly in the prophets of the Georgian Orthodox church and has a big problem with proxy baptism. She does however have a great relationship with Mzia, the Relief Society president, and President Kikiani, the branch president. When we met with her we had dinner with her and her granddaughter, Salome. We shared a message about General Conference and said she would watch it in Georgian, so we will send it to her next week. Salome also offered to help us with Georgian by sending us some tests based on her secondary school exit exam prep book. It should be fun and helpful for us. 

Lado- He is still working to prepare for baptism. We taught about prophets and sustaining them. He was very excited for Conference and he stayed up to watch every session live in Russian. We gave him the October 2014 talk by President Nelson about sustaining the prophets. It explains the process and necessity of it very well. He was equally excited to read that. We also asked him to pray about the assurance of having modern prophets called of God. This was one of his apprehensions when we went over the baptismal questions. Certainly, he will receive an answer in the affirmative. 

Lado the Jehovah's Witness- One young man, 18, that we connected with through the Facebook page. He has read the entire Book of Mormon and loves it, but he does not believe it to be the word of God. Likewise, he does not believe Joseph Smith to be a prophet, nor does he believe that Christ and God appeared to him. He does however think it is good literature that was in some way inspired of God. He was however very insistent when we met with him that The Book of Mormon could not be scripture comparable to the Bible. We gave him some challenges, but we likely will not meet with him again any time soon. 

General Conference was a needed experience for me. It was an absolute delight to hear those serving under the divine mantle God has given. The talks given on Zion were especially interesting to me because that is a topic that has guided many of my studies over the past few months. After a couple mentions of it, I felt the timeliness of my studies and of this conference with all that is going on in the world. I may have shared this before with you, but I will say it again. The short time while I was in a district with Elder Nilsson, Sister Gehring, and Sister Workman was a Zion-like experience. The others may not agree with my assessment, but hear me out you three. Certainly, there is much we lacked, but the effort was there. We were unified in so much. Even in the disagreements we had, we listened with openness. We did not discount each other's ideas. Love abounded. This occurred on a small scale. It was a circumstance that was difficult to replicate. While the number of us here in Georgia is the same as was in my previous experience, working towards being of one heart and one mind is more difficult. The effort with us four is there, but we are all in very different places. As long as that effort increases, we are certainly on the right track. I feel that the effort is increasing because it certainly has increased since we began being together three months ago. 

For me, Zion and Israel were topics of great interest, but there were other major topics that stuck out that I'm certain are applicable to each of you. Mercy, repentance, trials and refinement, patience, progress and tolerance, and many more. The words of the prophets are always needed. Sometimes they are of good cheer, sometimes they are of chastisement, but each one is needed. Whether or not you decide to listen to or read the addresses given in General Conference you can always turn to the scriptures. No matter the medium by which we take in the words of God, we'll be helped. Just be good boys and good girls. 

სიყვარულით, 

უხუცესი ფიშერი 

On September 14, 2020 We visited Chronicle of Georgia (or Temka Rocks as the missionaries call it.)  This is a monument of huge pillars of rock with Bible stories carved.  The monument overlooks Tbilisi and the Tbilisi Sea.   We went early in the morning to watch the sunrise. 

Monument to Saint George

Language study at President Alex's home.

  

Two Evenings and an Afternoon with a General Authority

 September 14, 2020

Two Evenings and an Afternoon with a General Authority

გამარჯობა ყველას! 

So, we've gone through ups and downs this week. For a couple days, we thought Sister Mafi would be going down to Armenia. Well, she didn’t, and she won't until after the elections on Halloween. Remember the politics here are super weird. They have protests all the time about something or other. I never know. If I weren't leaving in 9 months, I might care a bit more. 

The crowning event of the last couple weeks was the devotionals with Elder and Sister Bednar. We had three meetings with him. One with all the missionaries from the Eastern European Area, one for the branch leadership in the Armenia/Georgia Mission and one for general membership of the mission. In the last year, I've grown to love Elder Bednar and the way he teaches. In listening to his devotionals and reading his talks, I've come to recognize a number of principles that I associate with him. He touched on almost all of them in the missionary meeting and all the remaining ones in the other two meetings. Here is my list that I've come up with:

-conversion to the Lord vs. testimony

-the gift of discernment (+being quick to observe)

-person revelation (specifically "hearing what isn't said")

-doctrine, principle, application

-meekness

-just being a good boy or a good girl

-faith in connection with other doctrines/principles

-effective teaching methods (always by example) 

-the Character of Christ 

He didn't explicitly speak on all of these and in fact he taught much more. I simply enjoy these themes a lot. That is one thing I've noticed is common among good teachers. They will always go back to their main themes. Brother Brad Wilcox, Brother Hugh Nibley, Elder McConkie, President Oaks, President Nelson, etc. They have material from decade to decade and you'll notice a cluster of common themes. The number of themes may not be small, but there's a noticeable focus. Not only does this site their passion and knowledge of the doctrines and principles, but it is a testament that what they teach is true. It doesn't become obsolete and there is always more to be taught.  Is there better evidence of an eternal truth?

There isn't much else to say. Study the scriptures. Bye. 

--Elder Fisher 

 

On the metro

Barbeque at President Alex village home