this week seriously flew by! i swear i just emailed you yesterday... i feel like i'm in some sort of time warp where days feel like weeks and weeks feel like days, and the weeks are slowly speeding up! its crazy. its been sooo hot here, i honestly dont know how i'm going to survive the summer. its barely spring and i'm miserable! and its not even humid yet... oh boy:)
we have had some awesome successes this week though. friday, in particular, was a great day! we taught this one guy, and the whole time he was "wow this is true", wow this makes so much more sense" etc etc. he told us that if it weren't for his wife being so anti, he would convert right there! so we are working on his wife:) he knows that its true and he wants to be baptized but he doesnt want it to cause a fight with his wife, which is understandable. so all of y'all should pray that her heart be softened! we also taught this sweet hispanic lady, she is seriously precious to me. we met her in her front yard, we were actually there to talk to her neighbor, who is a less active but they werent home. so we went over and asked if we could pray with her. i said the prayer and by the end she was in tears! so we came back a few days later and she told us that she was able to get a job, and she has been trying to get a job forever:) she told me that when she started her first day, my face came to her mind and she remembered the prayer i said and she knew that god had helped her to get a job. she has 5 kids, ranging from age 21 to 2, and she loves her family so much. they aren't all living together, and that is her biggest wish, is just for her family to be together... so we taught her the plan of salvation :) we invited her to be baptized and she said yes, and her whole family too! she is so sweet! we also met her brother, who she is living with and he told us that he is still looking for his faith, and asked if we could come and talk to him sometime (umm yes!! every missionaries dream, right?) later that same day, we met with this younger guy who we have taught a few lessons to, but he has been avoiding us for like a week. so we finally caught him, basically forced him, his brother and his brothers wife to sit down and listen to us (hehe) and by the end, HE was the one who asked when WE could come back! he was ready to drop us! but heavenly father softened his heart, gave us the right words to say, and sent his spirit to testify:) they still aren't ready for baptism, but they are at least progressing! it was seriously an awesome day!
then, because there must be opposition in all things, saturday we spent all day out in the hot sun trying to find people to talk to because all of our appointments fell through:) it was an adventure, for sure! did i tell you about the lady who is getting baptized, but is moving so she will be baptized in her new ward? well my companion and i got permission from the mission president to go to her baptism!!! i'm so excited, i'm so scared too though because it almost seems to good to be true! i almost feel like something bad is going to happen and it will fall through. but honestly she is awesome, she has so much faith! i think the adversary is just trying to put doubt in our hearts. thats april 13th though and we are sooo excited!!
i'm glad to hear that everything is going good back home! i love getting letters and emails from everyone:) keep em comin!! please:)
one thing that i've learned a lot about this week is humility:) it was the focus at our district meeting this week, and i had the sneaking suspicion that it was meant specifically for me! the main thing that i learned, is that God's way is better than ours. he knows better! he knows what other people need, and he knows what we need. I was reading a talk called The Challenge to Become. And it talked about how our church, unlike other worldly institutions, is not focused on learning and gaining a knowledge of things. it challenges us to become something or someone. simply having a testimony, knowing it is true, is not enough. we have to act on that, and through our actions our nature will change. we will become the person heavenly father knows we can be. and i promise that that person is better than anyone we could make of ourselves. and that comes from being humble and submissive! by taking the rules that heavenly father gives and living them faithfully, by accepting challenges and pressing through, by loving and serving God and others, we can become LIKE HIM. do we realize how incredible that is? i know that i dont always, and sometimes i like to think that i know better. i have a picture of who i want to become in my head and thats a good way to do things, a good thing to work towards. but Heavenly father also has a picture in his mind of who we can become, and by submitting our will to his, we can become that person:) and thats the best way, thats the smart way. thats the main thing that i have learned this week:) well i love you all so much! you are always in my heart and in my prayers! have an incredibly super fantastic week!
love always, sister rowland
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