First off, your emails made me so happy this week. I can't believe Chris Sciaretta is going on a mission! oh my goodness taht is so amazing!! my heart literally skipped a beat when i read that. And know what's even crazier is that he's going to ITALY. His family is super italian and i remember back when people would talk about him serving a mission he would say "honestly the only place i would really want to go is italy, otherwise i don't know about the mission". I just think it's so funny how the Lord knows us so well and maybe it really did take a call to Italy to get him to go or to get him to go and serve diligently I dont know, but it made me smile :)
Thankyou too mom for the uplifting stuff. I like what you were saying about what president checketts said. We are put into callings and out of our comfort zone, and then when we are comfortable in that capacity, we have learned what we need to and are released. I actually said that to someone the other day too when we were talking about transfers coming up and i was like yeah i don't always feel like i know what i'm doing so i know that i will stay in this calling to figure it out hahah. i love this though. We had a really good district meeting this past week and justl ittle victories each day make me happy and more confident. i need that confidence SOO bad and it's just so hard for me to muster it up and then keep it with me. So when district meeting went really well it was just nice to know that i had a part in making it run that way and everybody seemed to learn something from it or at least participate and it was fun. This past week was FUN! That's when i know i'm doing something right. And not to say that the past few weeks haven't been fun, it's just that something felt off and i know it was me cause i would get down so easily and just be a bum. BUT this week was awesome so let me tell you about it
We have this family that we are teaching now, Victor, Ruth, Elisabeth, Jaime, and Alberto.They live in independence and we found them from and oym (just talking to them on the street). the past two weeks we have had contact with them but they have been super busy. The promising thing thogh, was that even when we didn't have much time with them, they kept asking us questions and we always seemedto have the answer. And Jaime read all the introduction stuff to the book of mormon (ill tell you more about him in a bit), and he watched the restoration movie on his own. So they are pretty sweet and we saw them a few times this week and got to actually sit down and have the full restoration lesson with them and then just answer a bunch of questions that they have had from going to different cuhrches. I will tell you more in a second.
We also found this guy named shane. He is the nicest guy ever! I'm serious, whenever we go over there he makes us want to cry he is like so nice hahah! But, he has a lot of health problems and learns a little bit slower than others. So we taught him on tuesday and invited him to be baptized on the 12th of february. He said yes and then paused, and asked, "do i need to bring anything for that day?" AHH i was like you are so awesome!!!! But no, we will just help you get ready for that day. He said okay and now we are just working with him as much as we can. He doesn't retain things very well and has cerebral paulsy on one side of his face and just has lots of problems. But that also makes him soo humble and receptive. So that was tuesday full of cool, awesome things.
Wednesday, we got to go to the portland temple!! what?! surprise right? That was amazing, we had a member drive us up there and then we went through a temple session with half of our zone and it was sooo special. It was just what i needed and i just felt so good. I felt like i took a lot in and more importnantly just reallly felt the spirit and it was awesome. Right before we were leaving the temple too, we were walking down some stairs and one of the elders in our district said, "man, it's a lot easier to get out of the temple then it is to get in". And i didn't know if he meant it literally or figurativly, but either way, it's sooo true. How much easier is it, to follow the world, to fall into temptation, to take the easy route. And yet, we give up the blessings of eternal families, life with our heavenly father and savior, and so many other blessings that just require obedience and endurance. It takes EFFORT to get into the temple worthily, but literally no effort at all to come out. It was just an intersting thought i had and liked and just want to emphasize the importance of doing the little things pray, read, and go to church. Those three things will strengthen our testimonies more than anything. So the temple was incredible and then after word we got to go to deseret book and buy some awesomestuff. So i got two little easy readers for the book of mormon and the old testament in spanish so i could learn the stories better and not just the good verses. And also to help teach little kids. I bought two pictures too, the one of the strippling warriors that we have above our computer, where it says "all prsent and accounted for" (i love that one so much!). and the other one is the picture of jesus smiling that i think we had on our computer too haha. They are great and i bought the dvd "the prophet the restoration", the one they show in the visitors centeres. It was only 4 bucks :)
So taht day was also amazing. We found a few new peeps to teach but most of them didn't turn into much. thursday was good and friday too but Saturday was incredible!
We taught a lesson early in the morning at like 10:30 that was kind of out of our way, and then we had lunch and went to these apartments that we had hit up and found some potentials. We jsut went from door to door visiting people that said we could come back and taught one lady too. She was really nice and we are gonna go see her tomorrow. But after that we had a chapel tour with Victor and his family the ones from before. So we go up to indy, grab them all and they are all super dressed up nice! We look at each other and just smile haha, but then i freaked cause i remembered that one of them was a 7th day adventist and went to church on saturdays so i thought they might be expecting a church service hahah but they weren't so it was okay hha! they followed us to the church and we forgot he key at our apartment ughh, so we ran back to get it really quick while they waitied. (i was soo frustrated), but they were so sweet and patient and so it was all good. We showed them everything and it went sooo well! Victor's whole thing is that rleigion is just a business. So we assured him that all tithing and offerings go to the church and that NOBODY is paid for their SERVICE. He totally ate up the church and just loved it! Their whole family did. And then they asked about how we baptize people and we asked if they wanted to see the font at the stake center which is huge and gorgeous! haha it was built like a year ago. So we went there too and we all were in the baptismal font and had a mini lesson. (i don't know if it was totally appropriate but the spirit was there). Then we went into the chapel and thye asked more questions and things. The coolest part was when we were walking in the hallway and looking at all the pictures and there is one of moroni burying the plates. ANd jaime, says, "oh mira, es mormoncito" referring to him as mormon's son. And elder gomez and i look at each other and smile and say yeah man that's Moroni, mormon's son. And then jaime goes into this crazy description of moroni and how he buried the plates and then appeared to joseph smith 7 times ovre the couse of some years and eventually guided him to the plates and.... yeah he knew the dates and everything haha i felt kind of guilty he knew more of the little details than either of us did :/ haha but it was soo awesome! they all just loved it and were talking about being baptized and everything. The one obstacle is that elisabeth and jaime aren't married but asked us if they were allowed to be married through the church and so even that is looking up. We taught some more lessons later that day afterward but they were the icing on the cake man they just made us soo happy. And we had members with us for most of our lessons and everything!! it just went soo well. Then on sunday, they came to church too and loved it! Well 3 of them came because the other two had to work but they told us that for htis next week they will be able to get off. But they loved it and it was just amazing. They told us that right when they walked in the church, they felt something different, something good that they couldn't explain. It was just like Heavenly Father said , okay these poeople are prepared and boom, let them feel the spirit soo strongly. Honestly we have had some of our most spiritually led lessons with this family. They are amazing and awesome things are going to happen this month with them.
Ahh i love being a missionary! This work is so awesome. Even when i get down, which i tend to do often, the Lord brings us up and it's up to us if we want to be happy. We have to make this work fun and realize the importance behind what we're doing. I feel like we thought less about ourselves this week and that made us work harder and with more love and we enjoyed the spirit more too. It just was awesome!
Anyways guys i have some pictures for you from christmas that a member took and also some from the temple and some other random ones. But i want you to know i love you so much and have been praying for each of you individually! I honestly love you guys soo much and it was cool going to the temple this week and being reminded so strongly of the importance of eternity. In the end of the session i was just thinking of being there all together again, and just how happy i will be when that day comes.
I love you and if you need anything let me know.
Y me siento que mi espanol esta mejorando. uso el preterito y imperfecto mejor y nada mas les queria decir que les quiero y estoy contento y estoy trabajando duro. Les doy gracias por al apoyo que me dan y por sus testimonios de esta obra. Yo se que somos una familia eterna y que Jesucristo vive. los querio :)
elder edwards
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