Monday, September 15, 2014: Sometimes Doing What You Don't Want to Do Is the Best Thing for You

Good morning! 

I'm going to apologize in advance. This things is going to be long! But there's just so much to say about this week! I don't even know where to start! 

So first off, I hit my year mark this week! Woot! Pretty crazy that an entire year has already flown by. I got lucky because we had interviews that day, so we brought cake with us and got to celebrate with President and Sister McDonough! It was tons of fun. It's always so good to see those two. I feel very lucky to have the mission president (and president's wife) that I have. It has made all the difference on my mission. 

Just a few days before interviews, President had decided to change the music policies in our mission. Before, we were allowed to listen to anything uplifting that invites the Spirit. Now, we have been asked to listen to only what has been played in general conference--so talks, or what the Mormon Tabernacle Choir has sung, as long as it was sung in general conference. To some people that might not seem like a big deal. To me that's a huge sacrifice! I struggled to accept it when I first heard about it, but Sister White and I talked about it and both agreed we needed to be obedient, believing that if we were, the blessings would follow. 

Along with that, we left interviews with a renewed determination to find people to teach. We decided we needed to exercise our faith by making sure to get our seven hours of tracting in for the week. By Sunday we had two hours left. About a minute after we got dropped off in our area I turned to Sister White and said, "I'm not going to lie, I have no desire to tract right now." She said, "Me neither" but we didn't exactly have a way out of it with no vehicle (we'd loaned it to the other sisters for the day) and we were determined to get those seven hours in, so we continued on. 

We weren't very far in when we reached a nice, large house with a glass door. The man inside motioned for us to wait for one second. I don't know why, but when I saw him I thought, "This man is going to listen to us." I wasn't trying to convince myself, I just knew he would. He returned, opened the door for us, and before we even said anything invited us right in. Unfortunately we couldn't enter without a woman home, but he allowed us to share our message on the porch. The Spirit was so strong. We briefly shared the message of the restoration with him and then told him about the Book of Mormon. He said, "I need that book. How do I get a hold of one?" We told him he could have to one we were holding. Then he said, "It's interesting that you came today, because I was just praying to God to give me some direction in my life." We promised him that the gospel of Jesus Christ could give him that. And then I just opened my mouth and invited him to be baptized, and he said yes! I'm pretty sure I walked away from that door with my mouth on the floor. Of all the doors we've been knocking since I got to Meridian and all the people we've met, Timothy is absolutely the one we were meant to find. He's so prepared!

I think that experience alone taught  me a lot. First, it taught me to have a little more faith. Sometimes it's hard to tract in wealthy neighborhoods because I just think, "There's no way these people are going to listen to us anyway." But we found him! He seems to be pretty well off but he was humble enough to listen, anyway. Second, I learned that sometimes, we have to do things we don't want to do. I didn't feel like tracting right then. But I think that's Satan's way of trying to stop good things from happening. If we'd decided to skip it and just go home for a long nap, we might never have found Timothy. One of my favorite companions, Sister Parsons, said that her trainer would always say something along the lines of, "I don't want to _______. You know what that means? We have to _______." I thought of that as I was walking away from Timothy's door. It's completely true! Of course Satan is going to step in right as you're about to find the person you're supposed to find. 

 

Third, obedience always brings blessings. This brings me back to the music thing. I did not want to put my music away. Actually, sometimes I don't particularly want to go to bed at 10:30 or back my companion out of the parking lot or keep lunch under one hour or any of the rules we're asked to keep. But when we follow those rules, somehow, even though it might not make sense, it makes you happier, and it brings blessings! We committed to not listening to our music and we committed to seven hours of tracting and in return God gave us one of the most prepared people I have met on my mission! 

 

Sometimes, it seems like my mission is going by very slowly. It's times like these when I feel like it's going by way too fast! It's been a hard journey at times, but I'm going to be very sad when it's all over. 

Me with my "birthday" cakes! I looked at the picture afterward and was surprised--I thought I was seeing an older version of my sister Ellen!

A nasty spider we found while tracting. I couldn't seem to get a very good picture, probably because I wasn't about to get close to that thing! I thought it was really neat how it stitched its web up, though.

One day we woke up, and something very strange was happening--it was cold! Happiest day of my life! Cardigan weather! It was such a momentous occasion we had to take a picture. It's warmed up again since then but I'm looking forward to it cooling down soon! The worst of it is over!

Monday, September 8, 2014: Miracles

I'm convinced. We have found our golden area. 

It's not that we're finding a million baptism-ready investigators, per se. It's just that the people we tract into are just SO nice. It actually makes us excited to go tracting because we can't wait to find out who we're going to run into next! 

Here are the three biggest miracles we experienced this week. First, on Tuesday we went and knocked some doors. The third house we got to was a nice, big house with a gardener working outside, who directed us to the "woman of the house". We knocked on the door and an older lady (probably in her 60s) opened up. Well, in my head wealthy and old means there's no chance of getting let in, so I introduced ourselves and our message, expecting her to turn us away, but to my surprise she let us right in. Her husband was sitting in the front room and he welcomed warmly while his wife (Mrs. Thomas) went to get us some water. We sat down and had a good conversation with them. We talked a lot about their values and beliefs and about how the most important thing you can do in this life is love and serve your fellow men. That was a perfect lead in to the Book of Mormon for me--I opened up to my mom's favorite scripture, Mosiah 2:17, and talked about how when we're serving others, we're really only serving God. Then we shared with them what the Book of Mormon was and briefly summarized the restoration for them. We had to leave quicker than I would have liked because they had a repairman coming and he had arrived, but before we went Mrs. Thomas left the room, and returned with a carton of eggs from their own chickens, a loaf of homemade pear bread, and--my favorite--a loaf of homemade banana bread. She and Mr. Thomas said how much they appreciated us coming into their home and how we were doing wonderful work and we were a blessing to them just by knocking on their door. So nice! Who just gives complete strangers a whole sack of food? I was planning on leaving the Book of Mormon on the couch for them because I didn't want to push them to take it too much--but to my surprise Mrs. Thomas asked if she was going to get to keep it! Needless to say, Sister White and I left with our sack of goodies thinking, "Did that really just happen?" 

Second, here's the second half of the story I told in my last blog post. Remember the lady we left the familysearch card with and offered to come back and help organize her new home? (I'm going to call her Janet in this post) Well, on Thursday we returned, and it turned out to be her birthday! I was kind of surprised she didn't ask us to come a different day. But in any case, we arrived and she took us to McAllister's for lunch (that place is so good!) We ended up just talking with her for a good two hours! It was so sweet because she said we were her birthday gift--and she was the one paying for our lunch! She was just so happy to have us there with her. What was cool was we didn't really do any preaching since we already knew she wasn't interested, but when we got up to leave she said, "I feel so happy! It feels like I've been to church!" It's pretty neat that she can feel the Spirit just by being around us, without us even saying anything. It makes me think of the quote, "Preach the gospel at all times, and if necessary, use words." 

 

After that we went back to her house and helped her dejunk a bit, but really most of our time there was just spent talking, and I think more than anything that was what she needed! No worries, we will definitely be going back to help again sometime very soon :) 

Last miracle! (Sorry, I know this is forever long) On Wednesday we were tracting (still the same neighborhood) and we started up a driveway to another large house. I realized when we almost got there that the house was actually on a different street and we were going in through the side door, so we were about to turn around but just before we did a 16 year old boy (We'll call him John) came outside. Well, I always feel awkward talking to teens, for multiple reasons. So I quickly said who we were just to say it, and he started asking questions. A lot of them. We were there for probably an hour answering questions. This kid is crazy smart, and curious--which is good! After all, where would our religion be if a 14 year old boy had never thought to ask a question? 

What was cool too was his parents came outside a couple of times. I was waiting for them to tell us they'd found Jesus and shoo us away before they corrupted their son (one of the reasons I feel awkward when teens answer) but they just said "Hey" and told us we could go inside if we wanted to. Then later John said, "My family's not the traditional southern family, my mom claims Christian, Buddhist, and Hindu as their religion and my dad was a southern baptist, but they just think it's important that we have some sort of spirituality. What I'm saying is, they wouldn't care if I came to you church--and I want to learn more." Oh my heavens. My jaw must have been sitting on the floor! It seemed way too good to be true! Unfortunately I didn't have a Book of Mormon on me (I'd forgotten to replace the Book of Mormon I'd given to the Thomas family and I try to pack light on walking weeks) so we promised we'd come back and give him one. 

 

And we did! And his parents gave us some gatorade (which is a relief since I'm pretty sure I was gonna pass out) and we had another good talk with him about the Book of Mormon and the power it holds. I think he's more curious than anything but it's a really good start! He wasn't able to make it to church this week unfortunately but I think he will soon. 

I think sometimes I just have to have a little more faith! Lately I've been approaching doors expected to get rejected but this neighborhood is definitely showing me I can hope for more than that!  

Janet and I at McAllister's