Hello everyone!
This has been another great week! I just love my mission, it is such a blessing!!
On Monday we had a nerf gun war as a zone for a p-day activity, it was tons of fun. That night there was a huge tropical storm headed our way, so we got a text from the office around 7:00 saying that we all needed to go home. We headed home, changed into our pajamas, and had just melted butter on the pan to make some icecream tacos when we got another text from the office saying that we could actually go out and keep working because the storm wasn't supposed to hit until much later. We changed back into our regular clothes, went out and visited 2 more people (weren't home), and then came home for our icecream tacos. It was pretty funny.
On Tuesday we did service for a woman in the English ward. Sister Smith and I were in charge of setting up a desk that she had bought from Walmart. We spent two hours reading the instructions, trying to put in the screws, and at the end we had nearly set it up all by ourselves. We were pretty proud of ourselves. That night we went to go visit Jaqueline, a less active member of our ward. She has been less active for a very very long time, but she was telling us that she still remembers the feelings she had in the temple. She really wants to have those feelings again. We brought a super awesome couple from our ward, and they just ended up talking in Spanglish for about an hour, so we didn't have to do much, but it worked out really well!
On Wednesday we had our District Training, and interviews with President. It was our last interview with President Richardson, he will be going home in 3 weeks! It is so crazy! I love President Richardson, he has such an amazing testimony, and so much love for the gospel. Later that day we were knocking doors in a trailer park. It has literally been raining so hard every day this week, and the streets were covered in water! We had to roll our pants up to our knees and practically swim through the streets to get to the doors. It was a lot of fun.
On Thursday we found an awesome new investigator! We saw him sitting outside, so we went to talk to him. He said he would like a prayer, and agreed to listen to our message. I wish I could have recorded his face during the lesson! He is from Cuba, believes in God, but has always been really confused by the different religions. When we told him about Joseph Smith and the 1st vision his eyeballs were as wide as dinner plates. When Sister Smith told him that she had received her own answer through prayer, he was so excited, and just kept saying "wow." His name is Yesmel, he practically invited himself to church. We were so sad when he was not able to come. He has a super random work schedule because he works in construction, and he ended up getting called in for work that day. That night we went to visit some less-active members, and we brought another lady from our ward with us. Her name is Maida. She has the most amazing story, and so much love for people. She is awesome, and her testimony really strengthens mine. She was baptized about 18 years ago, but at one point she fell away. She became addicted to drugs, alcohol, and had such a difficult family situation. However, she was found by some sister missionaries about 2 years ago, and they helped her to completely turn her life around. Now she just loves life, is so so happy all the time, and does not do anything without mentioning at least once how grateful she is for the Lord. She is preparing to go to the temple and be baptized for her mom. I just love her. We ended up running into the mother of one of our less-active members, named Maria (I wish I had kept track of how many people I have met named Maria, the number would be sky high). Maria was a cute little old lady that talked our ears off, but Maida just loved her and loved the visit. It was great!
On Friday we had a cool experience when we were supposed to be visiting some former investigators, but they weren't home so we decided to go visit a recent convert that has been MIA for almost 4 months now. No one has been able to get in touch with her. She happened to be home!! We were able to talk to her, and find a lot of really useful information for the ward. Looking back, we aren't even sure how we decided to go visit her, it was not part of our plans, we just sort of ended up in her neighborhood, and happened to be there at the right time! The Lord works in mysterious ways!
Saturday we ended up having a 2 hour correlation meeting with our Ward Mission Leader who is the most adorable old Guatemalan man you have ever seen! He is on fire with missionary work, and he is so excited to get things moving with our ward. That afternoon we had a tour of the church with our investigator named Celia! We brought another church member with us, and it worked out really well. Sister Munoz took 10 years to get baptized, but she was able to testify about how her baptism has really changed her life. Celia loved everything, but still does not feel like she is ready to take that step.
On Sunday Sister Smith ended up playing the piano in Sacrament meeting, which was slightly stressful because that meant that I couldn't leave the chapel, but we had a bunch of people show up late to church! I enlisted our Ward Mission Leader to go greet them outside and bring them in. Celia ended up coming to church, loved every minute of it, but still feels like she needs more time before committing to anything. We will keep working with her on that. Jaqueline, the less-active member we have been working with also randomly showed up. On top of that, there were 4 other people that randomly came to church that were not members. 1 of them came with a member, 1 of them was a former investigator, and another couple just randomly walked in off the street! This ward is so full of miracles! We will be going to visit a lot of them this week!
One last cool story. Yesterday we were visiting some less-active members that live in a pretty sketchy apartment building. The doors all of have bars over them, and the entrances were all locked. We weren't sure how we were going to get in, but there was an adorable little old lady sitting out on her back porch that offered to come let us in. After sharing a card with her we went for our visit, but they turned out not to be home. After knocking for a little while we decided to leave. One our way back to the parking lot Sister Smith noticed a sliding glass door that was slightly open, and a lady sitting on the couch inside. It was a bit of an awkward situation with the bars over the door and everything, but we ended up getting her attention and she let us inside. She ended up listening to our message, and accepted the invitation to be baptized! Her name is Kardenia, and she has never been baptized before (which is a miracle in and of itself because almost every Latin I've met was baptized as a baby in the Catholic church). Because of that it was easy to explain that baptism is a commandment from God, and easy for her to accept our invitation!
That is all for this week! I love you all :)!
Hermana Monson
This is the trailer park flooded with water!
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