Week 39 Athens, Corinth and Thessaloniki

"The Temple of Zeus the Olympian" Apparently if you leave the Acropolis chapel, cross the road and into the park you come across this rather grand historic site. Construction started in the 6th centenary  BC and it was intended to rival the more famous Parthenon. For various reasons the temple was not completed until around 132 AD but its glory was short lived and it was in ruins by 267 AD. Much of the stone being used to build churches and houses around Athens. More HERE

In other news Elder Teal went on splits with the missionaries serving in the Piraeus district of Athens. "I was in Piraeus for one night this week as Elder Velasquez (our DL) had an exchange with Elder Burton here in Agio Dimitrio so I took his place in the threesome over there. I really like that area, it's very pretty, and there are lots of busy areas for street contacting"

Elder Mead and Elder Donker

Coming up this week, he is going back to Thessaloniki to spend some time working with the missionaries there. 

One of the roles of a Zone Leader.

"Tomorrow (Tuesday) afternoon we fly to Thessaloniki for exchanges! We'll be there until Friday morning, so will each have two exchanges whilst we're there, one day with Elder Deighton and one with Elder Clarke. We're looking forward to it! "

"We had so many small miracles as usual, but I wanted to share one in particular. We met a man on the metro earlier in the week and got his phone number, but were never able to reach him on the phone. A couple of days ago we were door knocking in a completely different area, and who should open the door but the very same man! It was incredible, such a huge city and we found him in his house!"

"This week we had a lesson with H, the French speaking guy who's learning with the Sisters, but we had a lesson with him as well, it's a complicated story! But he's doing really well and loving everything that he's learning, and is very excited to get baptised on May 2nd! Wooo!

We also had a second lesson with A, who is the man who has parents in America who are church members, He is Christian Orthodox and knows a lot about it, but is very open to learn. He speaks very high Greek and it's great practice for my Greek, I love it! We had a really good lesson, and he's going to come to church on Sunday"

We haven't had any food news recently, but this week we have.

"Some Greek food we cooked ourselves at home this week from scratch, 

but we bought the pittas and fried them ourselves"

"We had a nice chat with a man who said, since you've given me a gift (The Book of Mormon), I will give you a spiritual thought and proceeded to talk briefly about the change that Saul/Paul went through. I think this mission is quite unique in the way that it's people are so religious, within a minute of talking to someone you can have jumped to quite a complex theological topic sometimes"

"We had a nice conversation with a woman from Kenya and I said the only phrase I know in Swahili which she liked a lot... Akuna matata, it means no worries !"

"Both of our talks went really well Elder Burton did a great job to say it was his first time, he spoke for 10 minutes" (Sunday Sacrament meeting in Greek)

Week 38 Athens

"The Temple of Zeus the Olympian" Apparently if you leave the Acropolis chapel, cross the road and into the park you come across this rather grand historic site. Construction started in the 6th centenary  BC and it was intended to rival the more famous Parthenon. For various reasons the temple was not completed until around 132 AD but its glory was short lived and it was in ruins by 267 AD. Much of the stone being used to build churches and houses around Athens. More HERE

In other news Elder Teal went on splits with the missionaries serving in the Piraeus district of Athens. "I was in Piraeus for one night this week as Elder Velasquez (our DL) had an exchange with Elder Burton here in Agio Dimitrio so I took his place in the threesome over there. I really like that area, it's very pretty, and there are lots of busy areas for street contacting"

Elder Mead and Elder Donker

Coming up this week, he is going back to Thessaloniki to spend some time working with the missionaries there. 

One of the roles of a Zone Leader.

"Tomorrow (Tuesday) afternoon we fly to Thessaloniki for exchanges! We'll be there until Friday morning, so will each have two exchanges whilst we're there, one day with Elder Deighton and one with Elder Clarke. We're looking forward to it! "

"We had so many small miracles as usual, but I wanted to share one in particular. We met a man on the metro earlier in the week and got his phone number, but were never able to reach him on the phone. A couple of days ago we were door knocking in a completely different area, and who should open the door but the very same man! It was incredible, such a huge city and we found him in his house!"

"This week we had a lesson with H, the French speaking guy who's learning with the Sisters, but we had a lesson with him as well, it's a complicated story! But he's doing really well and loving everything that he's learning, and is very excited to get baptised on May 2nd! Wooo!

We also had a second lesson with A, who is the man who has parents in America who are church members, He is Christian Orthodox and knows a lot about it, but is very open to learn. He speaks very high Greek and it's great practice for my Greek, I love it! We had a really good lesson, and he's going to come to church on Sunday"

We haven't had any food news recently, but this week we have.

"Some Greek food we cooked ourselves at home this week from scratch, 

but we bought the pittas and fried them ourselves"

"We had a nice chat with a man who said, since you've given me a gift (The Book of Mormon), I will give you a spiritual thought and proceeded to talk briefly about the change that Saul/Paul went through. I think this mission is quite unique in the way that it's people are so religious, within a minute of talking to someone you can have jumped to quite a complex theological topic sometimes"

"We had a nice conversation with a woman from Kenya and I said the only phrase I know in Swahili which she liked a lot... Akuna matata, it means no worries !"

"Both of our talks went really well Elder Burton did a great job to say it was his first time, he spoke for 10 minutes" (Sunday Sacrament meeting in Greek)

Week 37 Athens - Zone Conference

He is Risen !

This last Sunday was Easter in Greece, The Orthodox church has a slightly different calendar than elsewhere. In many Eastern Orthodox countries it is traditional to greet people on Easter Sunday with the phrase " He is Risen" to which the person you greet replies " Truly he is risen "

"I used it loads of times yesterday it was great. They also say Chronia Polla which is what you can say for any celebration and means many years, so I could go up to people in the street and say "Many Years! Christ is Risen!"and it's not weird, it was great haha"

General Conference 

This week has been full of meetings and Conferences. On Sunday the members in Greece watched General Conference. The semiannual meetings broadcast from Salt Lake. They watch a week later than other countries to allow time for the talks to be translated into Greek. 

"It was good, we watched conference at Halandri Chapel. We had showings in Greek, English and French. Elder Burton and I went into the Greek one (we were the only missionaries in there), and it was really good!"

Zone Conference

During the week the missionaries in Greece had Zone Conference which is a monthly meeting to train, inform and inspire the missionaries in there geographical area or Zone. As the Zone Leader this time Elder Teal had more involvement in preparing for and organising this meeting.

President and Sister Everitt (1st Counselor on the mission Presidency) 

It was their last Zone Conference

The Greece Zone 

How was Zone Conference?

"It was this week just passed, it was really good! We learnt a lot, and leadership council on Friday was really good as well

We talked about the Saviour's method of teaching and about things that Elder Bednar taught at the last Mission President Seminar. I'd send you my notes but they're in Greek!"

Other things from the week.

"I had a package and  lovely letter from Julia Peel  and a letter from you, that was together with a letter from the young women

It's been a really good week, we had 3 new investigators. two of them are now being taught by the sisters as they speak French, but we will be having scripture study with them at the chapel twice a week. The other we will be teaching, which is great! The two french speaking guys are from Cameroon and are so ready for the Gospel, it's amazing. 

They were at general conference yesterday and loved it

This week I learnt how to say a few phrases in Walof, which is the language of Senegal! we taught the first two lessons with the French speaking guys (one of them speaks English), and I found that I could understand most of what they said and their questions, I just couldn't vocalise my responses without slipping into Greek! And it makes much more sense for the sisters to teach them anyway as both of them speak French fluently

My highlight was having B. and H. ( French Speaking investigators) at Gen Conf, 
and them enjoying it so much!"

"Practicing our reaction when people don't want to take a pass-along card."

Some insights from Elder Teal's journal

"The lesson went really well, one of the best of my mission. H especially said that what we were talking about was especially for him, and he feels exactly the same as Joseph Smith did. They both accepted baptismal dates and committed to read and pray about The Book of Mormon. It was so great to teach people who had come to learn and were ready to accept and make changes in their lives. And it was so great to see it in their eyes when something clicked into place and they understood."

"We went out to the beach front to do some contacting. As we were walking along a jogger stopped and said Hi to us in English. It turned out he was a church member from Germany who hass just moved here for work. He served in the Alpine Germany mission 3/4 months ago, so knows the missionaries that I was in the MTC with which was strange. It's such a small world for the church in Europe, everyone knows someone who knows everyone!"

"We were close but a bit lost, so we started to ask people for directions. One man said he'd tell us what to do  whenever we get lost - ask at the florists. He said they deliver flowers to the houses so always know the nearby streets. So, we asked and he was very happy to give us exact directions. I'm grateful for helpful florists."

"Elders Deighton and Clarke stayed with us last night and we had a lot of fun with them!" 

Week 36 Athens

Elder Teal must have been too busy to take pictures this week ! So decided to take a couple while emailing today. His comment was "one and a half selfies" Only when we opened them did we understand what that meant.

"Hi everyone! I hope you've all had a good week! You've all been talking a lot about Easter in your emails, which is strange because we've not had it yet here. In the Orthodox calendar it's a week later this year, and it seems that church just follows with that, as nobody was saying Happy Easter yesterday at church, just talking about how it's coming up! I don't know if our church has an official date for when Easter is, or if we just follow the Western calendar as a course of tradition, but anyway, it's next week here!"

"Things are going great with Elder Burton, we're getting along really well and having a lot of fun. It's somewhat harder to be disciplined enough to speak 100% Greek now that I have an English-speaking companion, as some times I just want him to understand what i'm saying without it taking a while, or I want to make a joke that he'll understand. That's something that i need to improve on, as my Greek improved so much during my time with Elder Tornar because I used it literally all the time, and I want to do the same now. It will also help him to improve quickly, which he is doing already,"

"The highlight of the week would be our lesson with E. We also had lots of little highlights with some of the lovely people we talked to in the street, but I'd be here all day if I went into detail about each of those!"

"We had a lesson yesterday with E. whilst he was here at church, as it didn't make sense to teach Gospel Principles to just him about the Priesthood. Instead we changed the lesson and taught the Restoration. He knows it all already and knows it's true. We also had A. with us from the English branch, and he has such a strong testimony of the Book of Mormon which really brought the spirit into the lesson. It was also the first time I've heard the sound mmm mmmm (like for food) used to describe the Book of Mormon, he's a funny guy."

"E. loved church, he said it was everything he was expecting and more. In Priesthood he was asked to introduce himself, and proceeded to bear his testimony of the church, the living prophet, the restoration and his desire to serve in the church. I think people were a little shocked, it was great, especially when I made eye contact with Elder Klestrup who was translating for Elder Perry, as he almost couldn't believe what he was translating haha!"

This is really exciting for us at home, as I have become friends over that last months with E. and we chat each week via Facebook. This week was the first time he has been able to attend church. We wrote a joint blog post with E. a few weeks ago that can be found HERE

Talking about Temples.

"I really took it for granted before my mission how close the temple is. I loved going, and every time wanted to go again straight away, but after seeing the sacrifices that people here have to make to get to the temple, my appreciation of it has increased so much. I remember at the MTC when we went at the same time every week, we would always see some of the regulars that were there doing a session at the same time as us. I want to be one of those people after my mission, and go as often as I can! And it's great that we can go there just to enjoy the gardens and the spirit of the place as well!"

Each week Elder Teal sends us a picture of each page of his journal. He knows we use selected items to include here, but they are not written with that intention, they are more of a direct look into the life of a missionary.

"... we talked to a lot of nice people, including one man who didn't want to talk to us in the beginning, but warmed to us, and said. 'you can tell just by looking at your faces that you just want to do good, without gaining anything from it.' He also said that we should give his congratulations and greetings to our parents, for raising such good children, which was nice of him"

".. I sat outside in the sun and learnt some words. My vocabulary is quite big now, I'm not sure how many words even approximately, but there are still tens or hundreds of thousands that I don't know, mainly because Greek has so many more words than English in general. 

For example the verb which means, I hum a tune" 

"For our evening meal we had pasta with creamy sauce. Although when we came to make the sauce we discovered it was sweet cream for cakes, not normal cooking cream. 

We made it anyway, and it wasn't nice"

In other news

This Easter weekend has been the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Days Saints Semi Annual General Conference. Every April and October the church gathers to listen and be instructed by the Prophet and Apostles. In Salt Lake a 20,000 seat conference centre, built by the church for such events is full for every session. Around the world members gather in churches to watch conference via internet and satellite feeds. It can also be watched in your home via the Internet.

Click to enlarge

We attended several 2 hour conference session, this talk was one of my favourites. The speaker is President Dieter F. Uchtdorf, one of the Prophets two councilors.

Watch more HERE

Ο ΖΩΝΤΑΝΟΣ ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ

Ο ΖΩΝΤΑΝΟΣ ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ - THE LIVING CHRIST

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