Week 42

Getting a "Bleu" (fresh missionary out of MTC)

whassssss upppp! 

so the transfer just ended and transfer day is Wednesday. ill be staying here in metz but elder lattin is leaving to antony, he'll be a ZL. I'm going to be going into paris to get a brand new missionary as my comp, straight out of the mtc, so yeah ill be training :) pretty stoked for that! i dont know his name yet, whenever someone trains all it says is "new" on the repitoire where your companions name is, so i'll be finding out there. 

we had an ipad confrence yesterday but we didnt get them then, i think we'll be getting them in a couple days or at the next zone confrence, who knows. 

about a week and a half ago elder lattin and i were heading through centre-ville to get to a street we were porting and this guy aproached us. we were waiting at a cross walk and walked up next to us and said "your the mormon missionaries, right?" we started talking to him and found out that he had met missionaries back in martinique. we were able to exchange numbers and as he left he remarked how he was sure that joseph smith was a prophet. that never happens to us! random people on the street that know who joseph smith was and already have a testimony that he was a prophet! he invited us to his appt to have dinner and he was super super nice! im really excited to meet with him some more. 

luv ya 

elder empey 

Week 41

Free Cokes and Rottweilers

we went on an exchange in Luxembourg this week and i saw this sweet cafe racer! 

one of the coolest things about being a missionary is wearing a name tag, you stick out so much and almost everyone knows who you are. the other day we were walking down a street in centre ville and we heard some yelling coming from behind us, we turned around and saw this tall, 50 year old, French dude running towards us. I was about to book it but he started talking to us and we realized he was a nice guy. he spoke to us in pretty decent english and was telling us how much he loves the missionaries. he was kinda drunk but really nice. he insisted on buying us cokes and we said yes. he took us over to this little pub/bar thing, bought us some cokes, and we sat with him and his friend for a few minutes. we briefly went over the restoration and then left shortly after. so yeah, that was a fun little story of something that happened this week. 

another cool experience from this week. we got a text from this less active that we've been trying to see for a while saying that he was in the hospital and to pray for him. we set up a rdv with him for a couple days after so we could give him a blessing. we got over their and his appt was a mess, it was so sad. he is a convert of a couple years and had never received a blessing before. elder lattin gave him the blessing and after it was over the spirit was so strong, he opened up to us a lot, it was really cool. It seems like hes having a really rough time right now and i feel like our little rdv with him really helped. 

oh yeah, and his rottweiler (or however you spell that) tried to kill me on our way out. he held her back though hah 

i dont have any time left but next week we'll have our ipads to email with and it will be so much easier :) you'll be gettin some good, long, detailed emails ;) hah 

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We got an awesome surprise this last week.  Dres told us to expect a call from his bishop's wife.  The bishop and his wife are both American, but have lived in Metz for 9 years as college professors.  They have 6 kids aged 4-17. They are the Vass family.  Sister Vass's mom lives in the St George area.  She brought a package that Dres had for us.  It had a huge 10 page written letter, an SD card with tons of pics and videos, ties for me, Abe and Hank and necklaces for the girls.  There were other bits of memorabilia from Dres.  Anyway, Amber met up with the Vass family at the dentist here in St. George to get the package and was BAWLING to be with someone who gets to see Dres all the time!  Awesome little surprise.

Week 40

tuesday-we had distric meeting this morning and then started an exchange with the luxembourg elders here in metz. i was with elder jenesse, hes from indiana. we tried to pass by some amis and then tried to do some porting passbacks. we met a super nice old lady that let us pray with her and we're going back in a couple of days. there were 8 people staying in our appt tonight cuz both the luxembourg elders were here for exchanges then the ZLs were both here on an exchange with the other elders, partayy

wednesday-getting ready in the morning with all 8 was a little hectic hah, we went out proselyting and passed by a few more people then ended our exchange. we contacted a cool older guy in the park that seems like hes been prepared to recieve the gospel, he had some good questions for us and we'll be seeing him nex week as well. we visited this really cool african less active guy. he plays guitar in paris for a living. that went really well. some older members expressed to us that its kinda lame that they have seminary for young kids, institute for college kids, but nothing during the week for older single members so we started a little family home evening/institute for older single members and we do it everywednesday. were studying the book of mormon and each of us missionaries takes turns teaching the lesson. we hope to be able to have our amis come to that too so they can understand the book of mormon better. i got your guys' easter package as well, thank you sooo much! loved it! 

thursday-we did an exchange with the other elders in our appt. i was with elder quist in his sector. he is a super cool guy, very selfless and christlike. we went to our dmp meeting in thionville, came back, finished the wallpaper project at the members new appt, and then went to centre ville to meet a guy for a rdv but he didnt show. then we went porting out in this little nice neighborhood. 

friday- went out contacting w/ elder quist, after a while we decided to mix things up and see how porting would work out in the middle of the day. we actually met some really cool people, we met this guy that said no to us at first but he was leaving his house as we were walking away and started asking us questions about our mission. he was super cool. hes a musician and does concerts in england. after we exchanged back, elder lattin and i went and visited a less active lady and her family, she has some health problems and cant come to church. she used to live in the US when she was younger, her dad worked in the pentagon and she has some pretty crazy stories. i got to give her a blessing.

saturday- there are these 3 less active brothers in the ward that we stopped by today. they're pretty cool, one of them served a mission too. we told them about the institute thing on wednesdays and they told us theyd love to come. We went and helped a lady from the ward move, it went super quick cuz she had everthing ready for us and she was just moving down the street. we got to teach our sierra leonian ami today as well. his brother just died back in africa, this guys has been through so many trials the past couple of months. we taught about eternal families and temples. he likes to tell us very long stories that take up most of the teaching time. 

sunday- elder lattin was sick this morning so we had to stay home from church. we did our weekly planning. the raymond family had us over for dinner, they are a super cool family! 

Week 39

Dres' Mission Pres' wife takes alot of pics of zone conf, etc and posts them on Facebook.  Link is on the right.  You can see Dres on the very back row on the left

i wish i could give you guys another play by play, day to day email this week but i dont have a whole bunch of time today so im only going to be able to give you some highlights.

i cut my own hair :)

we got to help tear down and put up some more wallpaper in this girls appt. its really fun being able to do little service projects cuz they dont come around very often

we had a multi-zone confrence in paris and then did an exchange in Nancy with our ZLs

we also helped a lady in the ward move 

conference was soooo awesome! i loved it! i feel like im able to get so much out of it right now as a missionary!

oh and were going to be getting ipad minis april 27th at a mission wide confrence so that'll be cool