Well, I don't even know where to start! There is way too much going through my head right now. We are busy, busy, busy!
We went fishing this morning with our friend Nikki! The country girl totally came out and it was hilarious! We're sitting there, while she puts all the bait on, tells us everything we need to know and talks about all her knowledge while wearing blue jeans, cowboy boots, and a pink camo hat. We were looking over a nice pond with blue skies and sunshine. Lots of bugs around and a dog that wanted to jump in the pond and then splash us. It was pretty great! Did I paint a good enough picture?
One thing I learned this week is that everything you thought just happened in movies, happens in real life down here in Alabama! I'll spare the details, but let's just say things can get pretty crazy!
September is going to be wild and we are preparing for baptisms every single weekend! Christy will happen this week which we are so excited about! She is incredible and has such a strong testimony and really needs the gospel in her life (along with everyone else!). And the Elders are having two baptisms as well!
I don't even know what happened this past week because I'm like 4 days behind in my journal! But things to look forward to this week include zone training tomorrow and temple on thursday!!! And then next week Elder Kopischke from the Seventy is coming so that should be awesome!
This week I've been studying some old notes and I came across a quote that says
Obedience brings blessings
Exact obedience brings miracles
As this new transfer begins I told Hermana Wong that there were a lot of goals that we should make as a companionship and that as we focus on being exactly obedient we will be even more blessed than we are now! Later that day we had an awesome lesson with Alejandro at the temple. Really what happened is that Brother Campbell taught the lesson and fluent spanish and Hermana Wong and I sat there smiling and nodding haha! However, the miracle is that Bro Campbell offered to bring him to church for an hour so he could get a church tour and see sacrament meeting and then take him to work on time. It was the most amazing thing ever! This man has been learning about the gospel for months and so ready to be baptized and we thought he would never have the opportunity to come to church until he found a new job. Sacrifice brings forth the blessings of heaven. Thank goodness for Brother Campbell. When Alejandro walked into the church yesterday, he had the biggest smile on his face! It. was. the. best!!!
On thursday we participated in some pretty crazy prayers. One was with this guy who is our age that is pretty confident and called himself a real life thug. But he's trying to change and knows he needs to be better and started smoking some weed the night before but then threw it away because he knew it was wrong. Don't be impressed yet because he still has a lot of work to do haha! however, we had him say the closing prayer and we're standing in a circle holding hands (people always want to pray like that down here) and he is saying some powerful stuff. And then pretty soon he's preaching,
his voice is getting louder
he starts quoting scripture and Martin Luther King
then he starts repeating phrases
and then I lose it. Like I could not control my laughter and I bust a little bit but try to keep it quiet but then Hermana Wong starts giggling too and then it's game over.
I was just praying that it was going to be over soon so that we weren't too distracting. So that was a great start to our morning haha!
That night we went to go stop by this family's house that we hadn't seen in a while. The dad is a less-active and he comes out and you could tell he had been drinking a little bit but he decides to start talking to us about accepting people for who they are and not judging people if they're trying to follow Christ and then we go inside and he gathers his whole family around and decides to have a prayer. But not just one prayer. No. Every single person had to say a prayer. So once again, we're holding hands in a circle and Hermana Wong starts and we go around until both parents, all 3 kids, and I had all prayed. Yup, 7 prayers. Good stuff. He then wanted to make a game plan for his family to have them become closer to Christ. And he was ready to have us come over and teach the lessons and reminded us to pray to find out what the spirit would have us say and decided that he needed to have a lesson on strength. And kept saying how blessed they were to have us there. It was quite the visit and I came out of there not even knowing what to think. However I did learn a few things. Regardless of whether the Grants join the church or not, we know their faith will be strengthened and that as we rely on the spirit, it will touch their hearts. I don't remember the little details of what he said that night but I do remember how I felt. There was definitely an increase in confidence and a desire to continue to go and do because there is a reason why I'm here. And that we are all children of our Heavenly Father and that as we see people's full potential, it makes it easier not to give up on them. We can't give up becuase you never know what someone is going to decide to make that change and decide that they want to live differently.
I went on an exchange this weekend and it was so awesome! Sometimes change is nice and it can be fun working with different missionaries and seeing what their strengths are and how you can work together in a different way. Plus, a lot of their investigators are hispanic so I got to speak more spanish! Probably the highlight of the 24 hours was getting a call from a recent convert that was in Atlanta for the night before getting deported back to Guatemala the next morning. We talked to him for a while and then sang him Abide With Me in spanish. It was such an awesome experience to be able to lift someone's spirits and bring peace into their life during such a difficult time. The spirit was so strong and I couldn't believe that I was able to connect with someone over the phone in a different language and that I was able to help them grow closer to Christ, even if it was simply through a song. The gospel is true and is universal!
I had some other experiences this week with music and so my invitation is to use music for good this week! Either to influence yourself or others. But listen to some uplifting music and see the difference that it can make in your life!
After hearing about the football game and helping Deantra with her BYU application, I was missing Provo this week, but being in Alabama is pretty great too :) I love my life! And in respect to football season, check out my planner for this transfer. We just won't let those Auburn fans see it ;)
Make it a great week!
~Hermana Blackner
No comments:
Post a Comment