May 16, 2016
Dear Family, Friends, and Furry creatures who are adorable (IE cats dogs squirrels and other R.O.U.S.)
This has been another eventful week in the lives of us missionaries
here in the Nebraska Omaha Mission. So to get to the details, and to
not leave you pondering and confused here it goes
MONDAY, Monday Monday MADNESS!!! So lets see, we emailed and then went
and had food, did shopping and went to try people around 6 well that
didn't go so well people don't like being home or letting us in, 😢 but
we decided we would do some knocking in a part of town I hadn't really
been in to knock or teach people and in doing that we saw this house and
I felt I should knock that house but it looked dark so I walked past
and partially I got distracted talking to Elder Porter (A.D.O.S.) and
then the spirit told him hey knock that house so we did and a lady named Christen answered and she was a sweet old lady and her husband is a
member who is less active right now, (health issues) and she had visited
with the sister missionaries and she said she knew she should get
baptized but she was concerned that she didn't know how to swim and that
the water would be to deep and all the sudden, we realized this sweet
old lady had felt the spirit of the lord in her life she knew this was
the path she needed to take but she was scared of going forward because
she didn't understand the actual ordinance of Baptism and so we resolved
her concern and she agreed to meet with the sisters again and the
sisters are starting the lessons and I hope to hear of their success
soon!
Tuesday we had some crazy stuff happen we
had a normal service at the Stuhr Museum it was fun we used weed
Whackers to trim some things the lawn mowers couldn't get and it was
good and we just walked around whacking stuff for an hour or so then we
got to answer one of the workers questions about our church and what we
do as missionaries because everybody wants to know they just don't want
to be pressured into stuff so we just kept it simple and it became a
very spiritual conversation despite being covered in grass and smelling
like lawn mower. We then went to an appointment and the lady was like I
am busy and we were like well can we have five minutes we started
teaching the restoration to keep our promise of a fast lesson then she
made it longer and at the end it was twenty minutes but it was a super
good lesson and hopefully she keeps her commitments. We then had lunch
with the other Elders and went to see a less active member named Rossy,
she is one of the sweetest ladies we have taught and she has a great
testimony she stays here in grand island to take care of her mom with
Alzheimers disease so she has a really good heart and we committed her
to come to church, she is still reading and praying and doing pretty
much everything you could and should do as a member but she just stopped
coming to church and she wanted to come back and we told her make it a
goal, God wants to help you so he will make a way for you to come and
she said okay Elders I will make a goal
Wednesday That was a crazy day we went to Kearney for Zone training and
it was good President Gardner came and the main focus was keeping the
momentum we are not allowed to slack off and do nothing, also that we
have a support group together as districts and as a Zone and that we
never should let ourselves become depressed because we are all part of a
family the family of God and that was a great part of the meeting we
also talked about the light of Christ and the light of Christ is
basically just Virtue PMG chapter 6 virtue change virtue to the light of
Christ it makes so much sense. It was awesome we shared that. Then we
came and had dinner/lunch at a Chinese restaurant and it was good it was
a buffet and I was happy I was hungry and we didn't have a dinner
appointment so it all worked out. We then went to a house of a family who
invited us back it was the bible study thing we sat through last week
if I didn't mention that. Well we were going to share something at the
end but they asked us to go first while they waited for some others who
were going to be late so we took a smidge of time and shared the Gospel
of Jesus Christ and showing a little bit about it from Hebrews and how
that is the foundation and if we don't understand that we
can't understand anything else and we won't comprehend the scriptures.
The Spirit filled the room and they had never looked at it that way and
they were wowed which surprised me but then we went on to have an hour
discussion on why The Latter-day Saints even exist and it was sad because they would ask great questions and then they would refuse to let
us answer them. I avoided all possible bible bashing I could I began to
just teach the restoration and to bear testimony and they felt the Holy
Ghost, there was not one person in the room who didn't feel it and that
was the crazy part but at the end the People refused to Pray about it
and we left on good terms but it was sad but super cool. I know this is
Christ's True church the Holy Ghost could not have been their had I been
telling lies and falsehoods it is an impossibility.
Thursday We got three lessons it was great we saw our investigator we
taught Tuesday and she was like I don't have time then she started
ranting about how her husband is getting into trouble probably drugs and
prostitution and we have heard this rant before and I was like
okay Mrs. we can teach you, or you can vent to empty air because you are
just angry and hurt and that isn't going to help you, we then testified
of how the Gospel has helped us to overcome difficulties especially
disappointment and sorrow and heartache and how it can do the same for
her if she'll let it. And so we testified of that and we are going to
read with her Alma 32 and go from there in order skipping 35 to read 36
that is our long term lesson plan it'll be great. We then saw the Xec
family who is struggling to be active sister Xec's husband is out of
the Country for immigration paperwork and she is basically as single
mother right now and it is hard on her, but she is so strong and she has
overcome so much. We later had a team up with Hermano Leal to see
Eugenia and Pepe they are so sweet and with Leal we taught the plan of
salvation while including the Great Apostasy and he made it so simple it
was amazing basically the great apostasy is the Devil's mist of
darkness to keep us from realizing who we really are as spirit Sons and
Daughters of Our Heavenly Father. When they grasped that they were like
oh ya and so we are ready to help them to really progress it was great
we just have to set a return appointment.
Friday our day went down the drain with mowing our lawn it took longer
than planned and then we tried seeing people and that just went crazy as
well but we did get to see the Arviso Family With Rosa Jesus
and Xavier, it was a great lesson and the kids are so funny and we hope
they keep being that cute forever but sadly they'll still grow up like
everybody else.
Saturday fell apart with
dong an unexpected service project. Helping somebody disassemble a shed,
it was weird because they bought it but don't have a place to put it.
Some people's Kids then we Had a good lesson with a man named Luis, and
he knows the church is true he just doesn't want to admit that he needs
to get baptized again but he wants to help his friends join our church
and so that is super funny
Sunday
was Branch conference and apart from the stake leaders us the branch
presidency we had three people in sacrament meeting it was sad but we
still had good meetings hopefully we can get more people to come this
next Sunday.