Expect Miracles!

On Sunday, we had a companionship study with our district leader and the two elders who are serving as Assistants to the President, who just so happened to be there since they serve in the same ward as us.  We were having trouble figuring out what we needed to do next in our area to continue to see success.  They laid out five things we need to have/do in missionary work in order to see results:

1) Love

2) Hard Work and good plans

3) Obedience

4) Ãnimo

5) Attitude

We decided our attitude hadn't been the greatest.  We have a great attitude in that we like doing missionary work, but we sometimes just don't expect things to go great.  So, they committed us to change our attitude and learn to expect miracles.  If we're doing everything right we can expect that miracles will happen.  So, that's what we're working on this week!

So, expect to hear about a lot of miracles next week because they'll be coming!

Miracle Baptism!

So this week, we had a baptism!   We had been working with an investigator for quite some time (since before I got out here!).  He did not want to be baptized until he was in college (a good year and a half away) and no matter what we did or sad, he would not change his mind.

Then, our district leader suggested we let him interview him The interview lasted over an hour, and he felt the Spirit and decided he wanted to be baptized   :D :D :D yay!

On Sunday, he texted us and told us he was too tired to go to church.  We told him that if he wanted to be baptized that day, he'd have to.   So he agreed willingly without much persistence on our part.  He came to church, all went smoothly. We saw him right before he left , and he's still excited and ready for his baptism at 5:45 so we can start at 6 to be done in time for Seminary Graduation at 7 --- we were on a really tight schedule.

So we go about doing missionary things for the rest of the afternoon.  We arrive back at the church at 5:30..  5:45 rolls around and people are showing up for the baptism.  Everything's great until a member, who was supposed to pick up our baptismal candidate, shows up. Our baptismal candidate is not with him.  The member told us he went to his house, but he was not answering the door or his phone.  We try to get a hold of him, but no luck.

So, we went with the member  to the  house at around 5:55 and start ringing the doorbell - a lot.  Nobody is answering. We kept thinking about the lesson we had had during zone meeting the day before: that if things aren't working out the way they should we have got to "do something about it" and make the miracle happen.

Long story short, we found out his door was unlocked, we found one of his neighbor friends, and his friend walked inside his house to his bedroom and woke him up - he had just been taking a nap.   He came outside still rubbing his eyes, saw us, grabbed his stuff for the baptism, then we all went back to the church arriving at about 6:25.  He quickly changed into his clothes, the baptism started at 6:35, it was over right at 7, and as soon as it was over everyone left to go to seminary graduation.  I was so tired by the end of that!

But, we had a baptism!!!! :)   It was truly a miracle, and - as do all miracles - it required a lot of effort and trust in God on our part.. There was a point where it just seemed like no matter what we did, we ran into a brick wall, but we kept trying, trusting that truly God wanted our investigator to receive the blessings of baptism. We followed the Spirit - and we saw the blessings!

It was truly a great week!

I Love Easter!

This week was truly amazing!  We saw many miracles and felt the Spirit a lot.  I love Easter because it's so much easier for us missionaries to get into people's houses!  It's a special time when we can remember how merciful God has been to us, but really we should be remembering that every week as we take the sacrament!

Baptism!

We had a miracle happen this week.  We had an area goal of two baptisms for the month of March.  We have one that has been planned from the end of April, and we were really struggling to get the second one.  A member in our area has child who had not yet been baptized, due to not having permission from the other parent..  We and the child's "member" parent fasted so the other parent would give permission for the baptism.  Then on Sunday, we were told the permission paper had been signed and the child is going to be baptized in the very near future!!! :)  I'm so excited!

Little Miracles!

This past week we saw a lot of little miracles.  We visited a girl who we had taught the Restoration to a couple weeks ago and she had read Moroni 10, felt the Spirit, and believed it was true.  She is willing to read the entire Book of Mormon and the only thing holding her back from accepting a baptism date is she works on Sunday and knows that once she is baptized, she will be committing to go to church.  She's golden! - It was a nice ending to a rough day :)

Amazing Happenings!

Something amazing happened when we stopped by to see a sister in our area.  Her daughters left a few days ago to go back to college in another state.  They had been in town since July and now they won't be coming home until July 2014.  Because of that, she was super down and she had just gotten home from work when we came.  She invited us in to eat with her.  We ate, shared a scripture, and said a prayer.  She was super grateful to us and told us that she had expected to eat alone that night :(

Fast forward to testimony meeting, she got up and said how grateful she was that God had sent us to cheer her up.  It was so sweet!  I am so happy we decided to visit her home at that time! :D

Praying for Direction From God!

We found some solid new investigators this week, all of which have baptismal dates.  They all have great desires to act, and they are all willing and ready to learn.  We now have more investigators than we've found in a long time!

One of the investigators told us that the night before she met us, she had been praying to know which direction God wanted her to go.  Then, we showed up.  She is looking for the right church.  We taught her the Restoration.  She is so willing!  I love it!

Lofty Goal!

Well, what can I say?  This week was super fun and full of miracles!!!!

 

The mission made a goal to baptize 110 people this month.  It's more than we've baptized this entire year!  Every zone needs to do their part to hit this goal and since my zone is the smallest, it means that everyone in this zone needs to hit their goals.  It's quite lofty, but we have already seen so many miracles!

Miracles!

I am actually super excited to stay!  Last night, we saw some serious miracles.  First off, we found a family of 6 on Monday and 5 of them have Baptismal Dates! :D  We set dates with the Mom and four of her children.  They are fantastic and super willing to act.  They weren't able to come to church yet, but we are hopefully going over today to talk with them again.

Creating a Clear Vision

I am super excited about the way this area is blooming!  My companion and I  realized our area hasn't baptized in almost a year!  But we know we're going to change that :)  We have been incredibly blessed as we've been working to improve every day.  It's super hard at times and sometimes we feel like we're constantly fighting an uphill battle, but we've seen incredible miracles.  We are working on creating a clear vision for where we want this area at the end of the transfer.  We know that if we work hard everyday, we'll be able to achieve all of our goals.