June 29
Okay so this week was nice! one of my favorite parts was district meeting. We are really trying to find the people who are actually prepared so we have started a new contact. Way back in the day, Hermana Bowen was taught a way to contact with a baptismal invitation. at the end, you ask "if you knew without a doubt. if God told you that our message was true, would you be baptized according to the manner that Jesus Christ himself was baptized?" and if they say "no", you move on. if they say "maybe" or "yes" then you fix another appointment because a lot of time, especially with the spanish culture, they will say "yes you can come back" just to be nice. It has been very good! Elder Jaramillo talked to us a little about how in DyC 4, it says that the "field is white and ready to harvest" it doesnt say that the field is ready to be planted. Sometimes we find ourselves planting seeds but that shouldnt take long. We are not out here to be planting. We are here to harvest. The field is white and it is it time to harvest. It also made me think about something that i remember from seminary about Wheat and tares. it is in Matt 13 i believe. A tare looks just like wheat but when you get close, you realize that the tare is actually a weed. at first sight, they look the same and you cant tell the difference but when you look closely you can. in the scripture, in verse 30, it says to gather the tares first then to bring the wheat to the store house. sometimes we have to talk to the "tares" before we can harvest the "wheat". but we are pulling the tares so we will be seeing some new wheat here soon!
we finally found s again! she is doing super well! she is looking for a job so that she can come to church on sunday! but it is something that she really wants to do so we are praying and searching! J is great! we are having family night with her and a member family that lives across the street tonight. R is great! we had asked her to read the book of mormon and sadly a lot of the time, people really dont even when they say that they will. But she read! she read 8 chapters in one day! I have been thinking a lot about something Haden learned from Elder Kapishe of the seventy and he said that you should visit your progressing investigators 4-5 times a week! so i figure if it is from the seventy, its probably pretty good advice. so we have really been trying to visit more often. and it has been going well. Except with S. she has been sick this whole week so we havent been able to see her this week because she wouldnt let us come over. But we have been able to stay in contact with her. and besides them being sick, they are awesome!
I had a really cool expierence though. we went to a lesson with a family and the family was really busy but they invited us to sit down. They had some family friends sitting there too and so we asked if we could share our message with them and they said why not? We shared the message of the restoration. it was super great, toward the end, we decided to show the restoration video the spirit was super strong and they were really into the video. I started to say a prayer pleading with God that he would let them feel what i was feeling. I could see it in their faces. the spirit was super thick in the room. them i realized what i was doing. I truly cared for these people. I wanted nothing more than for them to accept our message because i know of the goodness that it can bring into our lives. two people that i had only known for 5 minutes maybe 10. This week I really was able to feel a little more of the way that our Savior Jesus Christ feels about every one of us. its amazing to see all of these people and he knows everyones name and loves them perfectly. Its incredible to think about.
it has been a great week. I have been able to see our investigators progress and at the same time feel myself draw a lot closer to God.
-Hermana Stevens July 6, 2015
Honestly, not a lot has happened this week.. Right after emailing, Hermana Bowen sprained her ankle really bad and she went to the doctor on Tuesday and he said she had to stay off of it for 3 days. So we were basically confined to our apartment for 3 days. We just did a lot of updating the area book, and drove around to find Spanish houses in areas we don't work much. The good news is we found 50 potentially Spanish houses that we are going to try this week! We also had a fiesta with our Branch! Spanish ward parties are way funnier than dumb white ward parties.. Sigh.. Haha but really. Also this week, we get to start using the planner app and the area book app which is the moment I have been waiting for! *ahhhhhh! (Angel choir)* This week has been lots of ups and downs. We hardly got out so that was a down, but we found more places to progress the work! We received almost 15 referrals which for anywhere besides Utah I think is amazing so we were able to start contacting them yesterday. We had really great lessons with R and J. But M said we can't see her until next week! And then we had nobody at church when I knew we would this week. But it's okay! We had a really good work day yesterday and I have a lot of faith that the Lord is preparing people for us. We just have to find them! We had a really great zone training on Friday! The zone training along with hardly being able to work for 4 days really reminded me the type of missionary I want to be. I want to be the best! I want to be the most faithful! I want to the The most obedient! I want to be the most trustworthy so that the Lord will bring me to the people who are ready! I'm a work in progress but at least I know it! This week I am going to work extra hard to be the best that I can be! There is this song that I have been listening to forever because it is one of the only CDs I have and it is called "more". It's a terrible song I really hate it but the lyrics are true! Here is a part that says "I climbed this far, you raise the bar, you want my all" it reminds me of something of of the district leaders in my zone did. He told his district to get their hand as high as they could. They all raised their hands up, he said that's the best you can do? And they started to get on tippy toes. He said that's it?! Then they started climbing desks and chairs to get them as high as they possibly could. He said "look where you all are now. And look where you first stopped. You can always do a little bit more." And that brings me to something my dear friend Elder Langston told me. He told me that in the end he wants to say "I did all I could and then I did a little more." That's what I want to. I don't want a minute wasted. I want to be completely exhausted when I am done! Here's for a new full week! Thank you all for everything! Love you!
Hermana Stevens
