Tuesday, May 11, 2010

11 May 2010

Well, it feels really great being back to full-field, but that is probably because we are really busy. For some reason the work just exploded in Liahona 4th! We found 9 new investigators last week, which I think is more than any week my entire mission. Yesterday was the 1st day of the week and we already found 4 more! And most of them are promising investigators too. Some of them might take a little time to fully accept the gospel, but I know that there are some ready for baptism this transfer. We have seen a lot of miracles as well, big and small. Here are just a few:
  • We found a little family where the daughter loves to sing primary songs. She already knew "I am a Child of God" from past missionaries. She really is going to pull her family along and she is only 9!
  • We've met a lot of really great members in the past week, who are so willing to help us out, so we have places to just drop by and get water when we run out.
  • Elder Perry came to the VC last week and we happened to be there, so we got to say hi to him along with the other sisters. I remember when I first met him in Budapest and being surprised by how tall he is.
  • We went to the bishop's house to ask if he knew of any families that needed service because we are really struggling to find ways to serve them and we were immediately able to help a family for almost an hour.
  • I got to talk to my family.
  • We got a referral for a little family and went to see them yesterday and it turns out they are former investigators that seem a lot more ready now. They aren't in the area book so we never would have been able to find them otherwise.
  • We had 3 investigators at a Family Home Evening last night. We do these "Noches de Hogar" every Monday with one of the recent converts in our area and he keeps finding more and more people to come.
  • We go home exhausted every night and wake up exhausted every morning, but it feels great.
Those are all such great miracles and I am back in the habit of writing them down every day, so those are only a fraction of them.

In other news, our investigators are great. Hna. McBride and I have such a great love for each of them and they all have difficulties that only the gospel can solve. One of them in specific is Juan (or Alfredo... they always seem to give us different names since they have so many, they give missionaries their given name but they go by others...) Juan is Daniel's brother-in-law. I can't remember what I have written about Daniel, but he is an investigator that keeps telling us that he wants to get baptized, but he is really flaky and doesn't understand the weight of the commitment. He is hardly there for appts and hasn't come to church yet, so we are backing off for a little while to see if he shows any signs of commitment. Anyways, Juan is his brother-in-law, and Daniel calls him "the athiest". On the contrary, he is a much better investigator. We had a lesson with him at the end of last week. We had just stopped by to invite them to church and he told us he didn't want to commit to coming because he didn't feel comfortable. We sat down and talked to him for a while and he really opened up. In front of us just appeared this broken, lost young man. He recognizes that he has faults, but he doesn't understand that he doesn't need to all of a sudden be perfect, but work towards it. We talked to him about the love of God and shared the story of Enos. He said that he looks around and sees all these happy people and feels like he just asks and asks God for things but never thanks him. We committed him to say a gratitude prayer. I know that he will be able to feel the love of God for him individually through that. We are really excited to teach him about repentance because we know that that is what he needs to understand. He, like all of us, needs to recognize that that is why Jesus Christ came to the earth, so that when we make the mistakes that we are going to make as humans, that there is still hope for forgiveness and happiness. He isn't a horrible person with horrible sins, but anyone who has committed even the "smallest" of sins and doesn't know that they can be forgiven feels just as hopeless and weighed down as the person with the "largest" of sins. The beauty of the Atonement of Jesus Christ is that it is there for all of us and it will cover all those who suffer. The love of God is something that is so infinite but it can be individually and personally applied to each and every one of His children. I know that Jesus Christ is our Savior and that it is by him, through him and of him that all miracles are brought to pass.

Love you all!

Desde Mesa, con amor,
Hermana Ladd

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