Hello! This week I hit my year mark!!!
Crazy!!!
Where in the heck does time go?
I absolutely don't want to take off my tag.
I just love missionary work too much. And I love the Lord too much. He has been so good to me, it's kind of ridiculous.
I get to witness miracles on pretty much a daily basis.
And I love being a STL, mainly because I learn so much from the sisters that I get to go with on exchanges.
Before I begin, I should like to say, I just got fried by the sun. We had a bizone activity with the Spanish missionaries where we played soccer this morning for our PDAY activity. It was super fun, except for the fact that I'm a pale-freckly girl whose skin doesn't like sunlight. I even wore sunscreen, too. Haha. *See picture below
I had an amazing day on exchanges with the lovely Sister 'Ofiu. Let me start at the beginning. The night of exchanges, we were planning out our day for the next day. They walk everywhere--don't have bikes or a car-- so they have a more difficult time, except for the fact that they can talk to everyone they see. Side note- I don't know how they do it, because in this heat it is EXHAUSTING. Kudos to them.
Anyways, I told her about the "appointment with God" idea and she liked it. So we picked 7pm and I looked at their area map and chose the cross streets Fascinating and Entrance.
Well for most of the day we were just out walking and knocking doors, because we only had one appointment in the morning. We knocked on a recent converts door and saw a man across the way. We both waved and said "Hello!" to him. He stopped and said "Hi" back. (If they stop, that's our cue to attack) So we go up to meet him. Come to find out, he had been praying and crying all the night before, and was about to commit suicide because he felt no direction or peace in his life. You see, he was going through a deep depression because his wife, mother, and kid were killed by a drunk driver last year. And he doesn't have anymore family around. We taught him L1 right there on the street and the spirit was so strong. He prayed at the end and said a beautiful, heartfelt prayer and thanked God that He had sent us to meet him. He then proceeded to tell us that we saved his life, because he was thinking about committing suicide that very night. I looked at him and said "Don't you dare do that. God loves you and has a purpose for you here." We asked him if there was a professional who could give him help that we could call, but he said he already had a psychologist. He was excited to meet with the sisters again the next day and gave them his address. It was such a miracle! Except, the other sisters went back the next day for a lesson and his dog was outside and his door was locked...so I really hope nothing bad happened.
We're going to fast forward like 4 hours and skip the boring, heat, and exhaustion that happened during that time. So it is 6:40. We started walking to get to our destination-- Fascinating and Entrance. Now mind you, we had kept praying throughout the day, that God would bless us with someone who would listen to us at 7pm at those specific streets. So now it is 6:54. Sister 'Ofiu says "Oh crap. We are in the wrong area. Fascinating isn't over here-- it's over there!" (She points across the way.) We both look at each other and start booking it. We probably ran a quarter of a mile and looked like wild hooligans as we did so. We also had to run up a little hill. We finally get to our destination at exactly 6:59. We stand all dramatic like in the middle of the 2 cross streets and look around. We see a couple people on their porch step. And then, a man with his 2 sons turns the corner, and walks up to those people, at exactly 7pm. We knew they were it. So we go over to them, all out of breath and panting like fat little dogs. The father asks "Is there anything we can do for you?"
We started laughing like crazy people and then Sister 'Ofiu says "Actually yes. There are a couple of things you can do for us." By this time we have everyone's attention. It is a mother, father, 2 sons, niece, and a grandma. She proceeds to tell the entire story of how we prayed to God and picked these streets and this time. She finished it by saying "And we prayed that someone would be here at 7pm who would listen to a message about Jesus Christ. So will you guys let us share that with you?" The father piped up and said "Yes. Of course, but we are leaving in 5 minutes to go pick up dinner." I said "That's ok. Can we just take 2 minutes?" They agreed. And we briefly taught them the Restoration and bore our testimonies. Both Sister 'Ofiu and I were choked up by the spirit as we taught. And the family was SO engaged! There was a silent reverence that hung in the air as they listened, and they started to move closer to us so that they could hear even better. It was such a tender mercy from the Lord. So amazing. We asked in faith and He delivered. At the exact time and place.
After we left, we said a prayer of gratitude. And continue on our way, talking to as many people as possible. We were heading to a different RCs house and on the way there we both spotted a $20 bill. We ran up to it and were so excited. We looked around to see if anyone was around but no one was. We were talking about what we wanted to do with $20. Then we of course take pictures with it. After the excitement faded, we walked a little further. To our delight, there was ANOTHER $20 bill! We started laughing and screaming. Then we found ANOTHER $20!!! We were ecstatic at this point. I looked around to make sure no one was filming the 2 crazy sister missionaries. I could just picture in my mind those ridiculous reality television series. Thankfully, no one came out to interview us or anything. But we hit the jackpot. $60 bucks. Of course we couldn't return it to anyone, because no one was around. Nut we couldn't just leave it there. So we offered a prayer to God to get inspiration to know who was in need of $60. Sister 'Ofiu recieved inspiration for this one lady. So we find an envelope and a cool BoM scripture and write it on the envelope. And then say "God loves you Penny!" (Name changed)
This was her exact response through a text:
"Hello Sisters...I don't know which apartment you stay in to come by to acknowledge your kindness, but we're extremely grateful! Wee been broke as the 10 commandments with barely enough to put gas in the car to get to the few interviews I've been called to. We JUST paid rent, to stop eviction, today. And it took every dime I had to do it. They say our Father is always "right on time"... And who am I to disagree. He's manifested himself in my situation today, through you! THANK YOU Sooooo MUCH for caring!! I'll keep you posted if anything changes on the job situation. Thanks again!! God Bless you all as well. I'll be in touch. Ttyl."
Isn't that just incredible?!!?!
So many blessings.
Things are going well in our own area as well.
When I was on exchanges with Sister Hadley, we pulled into our apartment complex at 8:50pm. We got out of the car and had just popped the trunk to get her luggage when a furry little dog ran up to me. I had to pretend I liked dogs, for the sake of missionary work, and I leaned down to pet it. I looked up at the owner and said "Hello! Enjoying the nice evening?"
"Oh yes of course"
"Do you live around here?"
"Yup- right over there! (points)"
"Cool. We live right over there (points in opposite direction) with some other missionaries."
"Oh yes! I've seen you all before."
We then start talking and she wants us to start teaching her son who has some drug issues. She takes us to her apartment and invites us in. She gives us water. And then she says "Well, you know, if he isn't interested, I am. So I would like to meet with you."
We went back a couple of days later and taught her about the Restoration. We invited her to pray at the end and she offered such a beautiful prayer. She obviously has a great relationship with God. After the prayer, we have a moment of silence and we wait for them to break that. We sat there for like 3 minutes. Then she piped up--
"Ok. This is what God told me. What you're saying is important. I'm not sure about the whole prophet thing. But I need to keep meeting with you and I need to read His scriptures."
We just sat there, stunned. It was incredible. I've never had someone receive such a clear answer with us there before. It was sweet.
Her name is Anita.
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