Family and Friends of mine,

I can't even describe the weird awesomeness of this past week.  I'll try to though, from the beginning;

So, the first part of our week wasn't super eventful.  We attempted to visit a couple of area book contacts, and most of them were unsuccessful, if not just altogether uneventful.  We went to one household on Tuesday to try and meet with this older woman, but she wasn't home... or at least, we never got the chance to find out.  Her drunk son actually came out first and started chatting with us.  He was one of those funny, still pretty coherent but not so productive people to talk to.  At least, that's what we thought at first.  He totally gave us a referral.  He gave us the address of his X-wife, told us that she had talked about religion and searching for truth before.  BAM.  So, we'll be contacting her soon.  We know that the family has had contact with the missionaries before, so this is actually a more legitimate lead than just a drunk man's referal.

Next big thing that happened was that I went on exchanges!  On thursday, I was with another Elder in our District named Elder Molinette (I think that's how you spell it).  He's basically the biggest ray of sunshine taken and wrapped up in a human body.  He's amazing.  We chatted with a BAZILLION people.  Most weren't interested, but we had about 6 meaningful conversations throughout the day, and shared a whole lot about the Book of Mormon.  We ended our day with a sketchy meeting with some guy in front of the Tam-Tam (Aka, Ukrainian Walmart).  I hope that his companion and him get a chance to follow up with that one.  The man we met with (whose name evades me because it's a big Ukrainian name that isn't Ihor), was sincerely interested in learning something about our church.

My Next exchange was with Elder Jolstead, and he is a zone leader.  He has been out for a year and six months I believe.  His Ukrainian is really great, and he understands almost everything that's going on, even Russian sometimes.   Which makes this next part actually funny;  We tracted into this apartment with (what we saw from the doorway) a woman and her kid.  She at first said, "NO!" and slammed the door.  So, we just turned and started knocking on her neighbours door... just in time for her to stop us by opening the door and inviting us inside.  We discovered that this was actually a Valentines day pity party that we had stumbled into, between her and her very drunk, very russian friend.   They were both not entirely co-herent.  Elder Jolstead tried to tell them that we don't drink, simply explain the gospel, that, no, we don't drink, we haven't got much time to stay and party, and no... we don't drink... again.  Then the woman who let us in flat out asked him, "Will you marry me right now?".   I was surprised by the quiet dignity of him telling her, "No ma'am... we're missionaries... that's against the rules."  Honestly, I don't remember how we made it out of there.  But we did.  

And then.... YES! We had a baptism in Lutsk! Our investigator, Bohdan, had finally gotten through all the lessons, so he could be baptized after an interview.  He basically would have been baptized on the first lesson if he could.  I think he may have been baptized right on the street if we asked him to.  He's a genius man, and figured out the first principles and ordinances of the gospel by reading the Book of Mormon, not by us telling him.  After he went into the water, he came out and told us all that, "You are all looking at a new man!".  He's just flat out incredible.  We will get the chance to teach his family soon.

We also met a man Named Artur.  not Arthur.  Artur.  He has a serious belief in God, and after explaining the authority of baptism, agreed that he would be baptized again if he knew these things are true, and then he invited us back!  We get to teach the Plan of Salvation! YES!~

Anyway, A lot happened this week, and I wish that I could explain everything that happened, but I haven't got all the time in the world! 

I love you all, and I'm praying for you!

Elder LeBaron