Buenos dias hermanos y hermanas!
Let me start off my weekly recap with the miracles! Late last week, Hermana Clement and I thought it would be good to fast with two of our investigators to support them as they prayed about what they should do to progress in the gospel. Saturday night, we learned that neither of them would be attending church so instantly, the natural (wo)man in me kicked in and I was like, "Well, I don't want to fast anymore!" Fasting has always been really hard for me, especially when it's not fast sunday because I just love to eat. Sunday morning came around and I was about to eat breakfast until something stopped me. I told myself, "24 hours of hunger is well worth the many blessings and miracles that the Lord will give me." We left for church on an empty stomach, putting our faith and trust in the Lord. After the Sacrament was passed, a familiar looking family walked into the chapel and sat two rows in front of us. I was trying so hard to recognize them (sometimes hispanics all look the same to me..my bad)..Hermana Clement leaned over to me and asked, "Do they usually come to church?" And then it clicked, it was the Arroyo family! An inactive family that we had visited and they hadn't come to church in YEARS. Like when we shared a message with them, it was like teaching investigators..We were so shocked that they just decided to come to church!
Then, a couple that the elders have been working with walked in! Paula, is expecting a baby and she's not a member, and her less active boyfriend sat right by us. The elders came up to us afterwards and asked if we could teach them instead because Paula is always home alone when they go over..So we got another investigator!
The miracles didn't stop there though...Gabby Lopez, a single RM in her late twenties who just moved from Mexico, asked us if she could get a ride home..She's currently living with her cousin and her cousin's family and she's literally been in the US for two weeks..Not thinking, I said yes...And then after third hour of church I told her that we couldn't because it's against the rules..Then we remembered that we needed a woman to come with us for an appointment that we set up for right after church. So we brought her along (that's allowed) but the investigator wasn't home. We didn't have enough time to see someone else before our lunch appointment with the Arrellano's so we told her that we would just bring her home on our way to lunch. When we got to her house, she said, "Do you want to meet my family?" uhhh of course we do! They aren't members and we jump at every opportunity to teach people haha...Expecting it to just be a "hey I'm hermana seymour" sort of thing and leave, I didn't bring my bag with me..Welllllllll Gabby is the greatest RM ever and was like, "Can the hermanas share something with you??" It was Gabby's cousin, Mariana, and her daughter who were present and we taught them about the power of prayer and feeling the Spirit. They noted that Gabby is always happy and they think it's because she's "close to God"..We testified to them that as missionaries, we're here to help them get closer to God and experience the same happiness that Gabby is always feeling. Gabby bore her testimony to them that she had been praying for her family to receive the Gospel and now look, there were two representatives of Jesus Christ sitting in their home. Mariana began to cry and she invited us to come back for Thursday, when her whole family would be home.
For the past two weeks, we've been fasting to find the Lord's prepared people and look, slowly but surely, we are finding them! Fasting is one of our most powerful tools that the Lord has given us.
Listening to Gaby also made me realize this: We are the answer to people's prayers. People are praying both here on the earth and in the Spirit World for their family to hear the Gospel! When we think of angels being sent to us we usually imagine a beautiful person dressed in white, right? But the Lord sends US, His children, to be His hands, to be His angels. The more I understand this, the more I realize how important of a decision it was to serve a mission. Sure, the Lord would have found another way to see his work through, but I have the privilege to help Him and His children.
Gaby is sooo amazing..She was a teacher and worked for the government in Mexico..She served her mission in Mexico City West and for her last transfer, she got to switch to the South mission to be companions with her sister! The entire time we were in the car, she talked about her mission..Man, I hope I'm like that when I go home! It was crazy to hear how different everyone's mission is..For example, she baptized 8 people a week and sometimes 14! Holy cow! She said that they'd never tract an entire street because they never had the time! She said, "We don't have time to waste!!" She doesn't know a lick of english and she speaks soooooo fast! I feel like if I were to ever travel to a spanish speaking country, I'd feel like the language I learned on my mission was tex-mex because I won't be able to understand people haha..But being here in the city is actually awesome because everyone just came here..rather than being in the country and they've been in the US for 30 years haha..
Another lesson I learned this week was that of gratitude..As we sang. "Cuenta sus bendiciones" (Count your blessings) during church it hit me: When the number of blessings you count is greater than the number of trials you count, you are a grateful person. How many times do we sum up all of our many problems but forget to think of our blessings? TOO MANY!
Lastly, I want to recap teaching "Jeff"....or...dad :) Following up on our lesson about faith, we taught him about recognizing the Spirit and having the faith to receive an answer. We shared and discussed scriptures from D&C 8:2-3, 9:8, and
11:12-14...At one point, when we were talking about the verses in section 11, he pointed out the use of "verily, verily"..He said that a couple of weeks ago in church, someone talked about the scriptures' use of "remember, remember" and "verily, verily". It is not used frequently but when it is, it means, "Hey! This is really important so pay attention!". I was blown away that he remembered that AND applied it. The Spirit truly does bring all things to your remembrance. We continued on and then transitioned to the subject of baptism. I asked, "Have you ever thought about being baptized?" He said, "Yes, but not very much...like I said before, I've already been baptized." :| Oh dear, not this again...I thought we had explained the priesthood pretty clearly. Hermana Clement asked, "Who baptized Jesus?" "John the Baptist." He answered. "And why did he baptize him?" "Because he was his cousin..." He said, answering with a grin, knowing that that was the answer we weren't looking for. Daaad! We laughed and he said, "..because he had the authority to do it."
A bold prompting came to my mind and I feared that saying it would offend him. I reminded myself that it came from God so therefor, it was good. So I asked, "Do you believe that the person who baptized you had the authority and power to do so?" He said, "...yes..." I continued, "Where did he get his authority then?" Stumped. "I don't know..he went to school and got a certificate." he answered. I asked, "Do you believe that he received the power of God, the Priesthood, through school and getting a certificate?" He shied away from the question and said, "They're good people who dedicate their lives to God and doing good.." We acknowledged that yes, they're doing good and then we invited him to think/pray if his baptism was done by proper authority. When then asked if he had ever thought of the pros and cons to getting baptized and he said that he has thought about the change that would occur with his family and what his family would think of him. We invited his to pray and then develop a list of pros and cons and hopefully when he finishes it, the pros side is longer than the cons haha...Hermana Clement bore her testimony and said, "The Lord asks us to take a leap of faith, like Indiana Jones, and asks you to make a decision and then wait for the answer to come." She said it so perfectly, I wish I could remember it better." I added my testimony and said, "I second that! Dad, I think that you're going to have to tell yourself..." the Spirit put the words in my head and I said outloud, "oh boy, I can't believe I'm going to say this...'I'm going to be baptized.' If you tell yourself that and prepare to be baptized, the Lord will tell you that it's right." He smiled with surprise and I continued, "Will you do that?" He said, "I will work towards it!" I wish that yall could have been there because it was so powerful and so amazing to have the spirit do everything!
We finished and we asked him to say the prayer...holy moly..he prayed about EVERYTHING that we had discussed throughout the lesson and sincerely asked for it to sink into his heart. wahoooo! the gospel is true!
ahhh...my fingers are tired! this has been a really long email and I hope yall enjoyed!
look for the small miracles and you'll realize that they're everywhere!
Love,
Hermana Emma Seymour
No comments:
Post a Comment