What a crazy awesome and fast week it has been. After last week with mission conference, my companion and I had some pretty high goals and started going to work and implementing them. Because of it, I have had the best week here in 3 to 4 months while in Carthage. Things really do happen when you are more obedient and show the Lord your faith to do the hard and uncomfortable things. Last week we had a super consecrated P-day and we ran around and did everything possible that we are supposed to do (clean the car, house, laundry ). NO time at all and we were pretty tired. That night we saw Angelica again and she voiced concerns about being agnostic and understood what we were teaching, but had a hard time believing it. So we just did our best to testify and left.
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| Chilling with the Elders |
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| The Johnson Family |
Tuesday, we had a great district meeting and talked about our goals and our purpose as missionaries. We then kicked off our exchange with the Watertown Sisters, whom I love dearly! Sister M came and stayed the day with me and we went to work. Me and Sister B before exchanges had felt that our plans we made for our 2 sets of Sisters were wrong and that we needed to change the dates and order of who goes where. Later, we came to realize that it was all the Spirit because our Sisters have been struggling with things and they needed us at that specific time. It was awesome to see. Even while it rained on me, Sister M went to the Ivy's and taught the BOM with a kids' copy and that went well. They are awesome and trying to get to the temple in the next few months. Yay for sealings. We saw Angelica 'Gelly' again and felt prompted to also teach her the BOM kids version with the picture novel feel. She got more out of that lesson with the pictures and the stories than with the last 3 lessons combined all due to the pictures. We invited her that night to read and pray about it. We also started getting referrals. One from a member, one from missionaries down south etc. It was sweet!
We had a great dinner with a member. Gotta love tater tot casserole. We then had some dropped appointments, so we tried a less active family on post and BAM... we found another awesome family. The Daniels are great and were looking for a church. The Dad hadn't been to our church since he was 16, but the wife was like "Sure, I am open minded! I want to learn more". We will be teaching them next week. :) But I know that they are going to go somewhere. We just have to be patient.
We went to another area to tract. It was a total of 15 houses on this 1 street at about 7 pm at night. All harsh rejections and my companion was struggling. Finally we get to the LAST house and this cute old man named Bill lets us in and we taught him on the porch. He is 87, loves Mormons because his favorite general while serving in the Army was a Mormon. We taught the restoration in 5 minutes and then he said that he was moving back to Maine in a week. He loved the message and wanted to share it with his non-believing friends and gave us all of his info and told us to pass it on to the Maine Missionaries. So, Bill was great and helped my companion with her testimony by finding someone via tracting. It's a harder method, but it still works.
The next day, we exchanged back and had ice cream while it was 40 degrees. Burr! We then saw our less actives and we have the best ones. So many are preparing to change their lives and go to the temple. They just still struggle with effort and routine/repetition of the gospel. But, still they are great! We had dinner and went to go see one of the people we found last week.
We then continued to another little town and knocked on some doors. We found a catholic that gave us 5 referrals and we tried them all. One liked family history and another is a State Trooper that we will try and see this upcoming week for a return visit. Go figure!
Thursday was the BEST DAY EVER. WE saw a family and the husband agreed to be baptized by the elders. To help the family along, we teach the wife. She has been progressing a lot more lately. It is awesome! We then saw a new family and she made us Beard Hats! They are the best invention ever. It is a knitted hat, but it has a knitted beard that buttons in when it is cold outside. I look like a man... in it, but it is so warm. You can either google it or look on Pinterest if you're curious. Unfortunately, we can only wear them while shoveling snow.. or else we would confuse people walking down the street.
We saw another family and then we saw Angelica. We walked in and the family is like.... "Gelly has something to tell you.." so she teared up.. said that she prayed and that "she felt Heavenly Father sit right next to her and she felt forgiven for past sins and He said everything will be okay" and then felt "super warm" in her heart for 10 minutes and knew that the Church was true. We then asked her if she would be baptized and she said YES right away. So she is getting baptized next Saturday. She will go from being an investigator to baptized in 3 weeks!!! So prepared. So sincere.
We then got to go to the barracks for the first time and taught Bev. the Plan of Salvation after dinner. That was sweet!! Barracks are weird though. We saw Sister M and had an awesome lesson and she wants to come back to Church! Ahhh. It was Awesome!! But then the best part was when Abby heard Gelly wanted to be baptized and she started crying. Then her mom did, then we did, then we all group hugged and the daughter went over to a member neighbors house and told the 12 year old daughter who then cried and they hugged and the whole time me and Sister Branch are like "What the heck is going on! Why are we so happy? This gospel is true!! Probably the best day I have had on the mission!
Next day... kinda still was on Cloud 9 and made us slightly loopy. Weekly planned. Saw other less actives. We prepped for Gelly baptism on the 24th and Cameron's on the 31st. We had dinner, saw other investigators and contracted more Head Quarters referrals. Sister B then got sick and we went in early and I cleaned and she slept.
Saturday Cameron passed his baptismal interview. We went to Super Saturday and said Hi to everyone! We tried potential and people we found last week, but it didn't work out. That's okay because we are persist ant! Saw Gelly, gotta fit in 10 lessons into 8 days.. Ha Ha. Found the cutest 9 year old members that are living with Grandma and they want to come to church. We taught Taylor a successful lesson. Ya-woo! So there is potential... we will see what happens!
Sunday was Stake Conference. It was broadcast into Watertown and not as many people showed up as we would have liked. Stake Conference separates the actives from the super actives. We came back and had homemade grilled cheese with a member and made baptismal programs. I met a new RC family in the ward and the 16 year old daughter is a total solid potential investigator. In about a month and with some prayer, she could be a quick teach and baptize member. Apparently, I am supposed to just teach solid youth here. Everyone I have really ever taught is between 9 to 24 years with the average age of 18.
The Gospel IS TRUE. This upcoming week is going to go fast. Me and Sister Branch got special permission to do a 24 hour blitz up to Norwood and help them find new people and have fun and uplift them. Thursday is Zone Training meeting and personal interviews with the President. Saturday we have a baptism and we slowly have to start parking because we are officially moving to Evans Mills on the 13th of November, but it is a long process to get everything ready.
Keep being awesome everyone !!!
Much love,
Sister Kylie Williams
