Week 2 - Nagytemplom and Faith

What's Up?

So this week was my first official week out in the field and it went pretty well! On P-Day we went to the Nagytemplom which is a large church in the middle of Debrecen! Nagytemplom is the Hungarian name for the Reformed Great Church of Debrecen. Nagy is Hungarian for "great" and templom means "church". It seems that a lot of things in Hungary start with Nagy.

Nagytemplom

Nagytemplom is the symbol of the Protestant Church in Hungary, and it is because of this church that Debrecen is sometimes referred to as "the Calvinist Rome." Nagytemplom is the largest Protestant church in Hungary.

The pulpit

Nagytemplom and me

Nagytemplom clock tower

The Rákóczi Bell

Nagytemplom houses the Rákóczi bell, the largest bell of all Hungarian Protestant churches. The bell was first cast in 1636 from melted artillery captured in a war. It survived a fire that burned down the church that originally stood on the ground where Nagytemplom was built.

Debrecen city center from the tower at Nagytemplom

Nagytemplom was built between 1805 and 1824 and there is an awesome view of the city center from the top of one of the towers.

Debrecen city center from the tower at Nagytemplom

Debrecen city center from the tower at Nagytemplom

From the tower at Nagytemplom

After touring Nagytemplom, we went tracting. We were let in by a 15-year-old named Dani and we plan on meeting with him again this week.

We had a lot of teaching appointments this week which was super cool. We had one on Tuesday with a neni (old woman) and I did my first invitation to be baptized in Hungarian. She replied that she was already baptized, so we will have to teach her about the priesthood authority and to help her better understand the need to be baptized.

Nyugati railway station in Budapest

On Wednesday, we traveled to Budapest for zone training. I was able to see a lot of the missionaries from my district in the MTC and it was super fun catching up with them. Then we had an appointment with a lady we met while tracting. We taught her and her two children. We showed her the restoration video in Hungarian and I feel that she is humble and ready to accept the gospel!

With Elder Haroldsen at Nyugati railway station in Budapest

We taught an English class that was awesome. In Debrecen, there are bunches of 10-story apartment buildings which are intense to climb, but they have great views from the upper floors. In one of the tall apartment buildings, we met a guy who had been drinking, but he was not too drunk, so we placed a Book of Mormon with him.

Saturday was so crazy. Me and my comp were asked to help Jozsi, who is a less active member and is in a wheel chair. It was a strange experience to help bathe someone, and we were nervous about doing it, but later we both felt like we had overcome fears of something different.

Later that day we were able to go to a baptism. There is an American family in the Debrecen branch that has an 8-year-old son that got baptized! The boy's grandparents even flew over from California to be there for the baptism. Their family was really nice and it was fun to talk with some native English speakers for a little while.

Sunday was miraculous. To meet our goal of placing 10 copies of the Book of Mormon, we had to place seven books on Sunday after having only placed three books all week. With faith in the Lord, we talked with anyone we came in contact into and we placed all 7! It was so awesome and I can truly believe that with faith, anything is possible.

The Algerian national handball team

As a fun tidbit, we met the Algerian national handball team, who were walking by on the street while we were placing copies of the Book of Mormon! They were Muslim so they couldn't accept a BOM, but they were really nice and they took pictures with us!

In all, we had a really successful week and we hope we can help all our investigators progress to baptism!

Jó Nápot Kivánok,

Elder Ballard

P.S. As requested, here are some pictures of my apartment. It's not much, but it's home.