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| I love New York !! |
Another week has gone by and I now have 3 transfers or 4 and a half months left on my mission. It is such a weird feeling. So much has happened in a year+. I have seen lots of challenges, miracles, and changes happen. I have been doing a lot of reflecting late, and I am truly blessed, and I am grateful for my Heavenly Father. He has given me so many opportunities and great people to meet. Great companions, and so far, a really great mission that is only going to get better. Sister Gass went back home this week, It was weird. It is the first time ever that I have sent a companion home. It isn't the greatest thing in the world. You think more about home, and most missionaries struggle their last few months with different challenges. But, it has just prepared me for my new companion. Sister Seader, who is also going home in 3 months. Ha Ha. I think Heavenly Father is trying to make me trunky or something.. or testing my diligence and singleness of heart. I think it is the latter. :) But, I guess it is needed. I have been praying more the last few weeks than ever before because I have to wake up and focus myself each morning. I think that is good. It helps me rely on the Lord and now that I am getting pretty confident in missionary work and my abilities, it is good to stay humble.
But anyway, this week has been so crazy. I have been stuck in the Zone Leader van for far too long. I have had lots of driving around and getting organized.
On Monday, I kept telling my companion that we needed to start packing... yeah that just didn't happen. We instead went and played scatter ball with the youth. We were so tired, we didn't go as hard as the last time. We then quickly ran and did everything else and started seeing our 'peoples'. Sister Gass had only 2 days to say goodbye to everyone, so we had lunch with Megan, who is a great cook. She will get baptized one day... In the future... she is still a work in progress. We saw some members, and saw Jim and Rachel.
Jim, he is doing so well. He was ordained a priest this past Sunday and has developed a habit of crying now in Church. Just feeling the Spirit! It is just a funny picture, me sitting next to this guy that looks like a mix of Santa and Gandolf and he is crying all of Sacrament Meeting. His next goal is family history and getting to the temple to do the work for his deceased father. He also had developed a habit of Book of Mormon Bashing with people.. it is funny. We have been telling him to be careful, he just loves talking about the Church to random people and then they slightly argue with why the Mormons are wrong. Then he just shakes his head, throws down some bible verses and walks away. We will continue to work with him on how to share the gospel in a more positive manner.
Rachel, she is doing so well. Cutest thing ever, she bore her testimony at church during Relief Society and she talked about how she knows the Church is true and how she was driving in the night and saw this person on the side of the road and had the prompting twice to turn around and talk to them. Even though her Mom taught her to never talk to strangers, she did. What ended up happening is that the person she saw was a run-away autistic teenager that was lost, confused, and wanted to go home and only had her pajamas on. Rachel was able to call the cops and got the girl back to her family. The teenager was about 30 miles away from home and the family was worried sick. She recognized it as her first real experience with the Holy Ghost and is starting to recognize how to feel it and follow it. I twas kinda a proud Mom moment for me. going to get her a calling and get her to the temple! Retention is the key!
Tuesday, all we did was pack and see members. The house looked like a bomb went off. I can't wait to throw away some of the junk that I have collected on my mission. We did see Will. He is doing great also. Nothing big is up with him, but he should be getting the priesthood also this next Sunday. Just plugging away! He did however, find his parent and grandparents and wrote them in his family history booklet! Ya!
Wednesday, I drove to Ithaca. Sister Gas went on up to Utica and I stayed again with Sister Virgin. We struggled a little... we didn't have a gps and I didn't know what was going on, and poor Sis Virgin was overwhelmed with taking over and she is a new missionary. We ended up taking the wrong freeway and went 10 miles east instead of 10 miles north to an appointment. We stopped at a gas station to look at a map. We found out we were totally in the wrong place and then the Elders in another Zone pull up.. haha. So, we drove back and did some Facebook lessons. Also, I met Helen, the cutest little Asian investigator. It is hard to teach her though. There's simple, and then there's international simple. I picked up Sister Seader and headed back home. Just in time to unpack and go to Coordination.
Thursday, so apparently our apartment was pretty disorganized and cluttered. So, Sister Seader went to work and cleaned a TON. I helped too... but then I couldn't find where anything was. haha. We planned, and then we tried to see people. We are at this period right now in the work where we just baptized some people... so now we have to go find some new ones. Sometimes we ask, "okay what now??" and we have to start with the basics. Tracting, trying potentials, seeking referrals, contracting, trying less active and part member families... basically, we have to pray super hard, ad then run around while listening to the Spirit and find new solid progressing people. It takes a lot of faith and with 5 exchanges coming up.. the pressure is on. Thankfully, we saw some really cool tender mercies. I got a prompting to talk with Will's neighbor and she said that we could teach her, so we will pick her up in the future. We taught Derek, and the Spirit prompted me again to check his car instead of going to the 'meet spot'. Good thing I did. This poor guy hit a low and had just injected with Heroin about 20 minutes before hand. I slightly lectured the poor guy, 'aka called him to repentance' and said that he was beyond our help right now. Until he takes the steps to get clean, we can't teach him. Super sad... you can literally see the chains of habit and addiction that is ruining this guys life. Even though he knows the Church is true and has the desire to be a good man. It was just sad to see. But, I think the boldness helped him. We also went to Nadine's, even though we didn't plan to see her, we ran into her landlord. She is the sweetest lady, but was just so tired and didn't have the strength to bring in her groceries. Now she is interested in the Church and we will go teach her this Saturday. By small and simple things, then we ran to go drive to Utica for MLC.
Friday, MLC was great. Super powerful. I learned more about the priesthood, and how the General Authorities work missionary leadership and how with new changes, how we are going to do thing. The Spirit was there so it pumped us up...even though our legs are shaking because basically as leaders with these new exchanges, you kinda have to be 'a model missionary with a model area'. ha ha right. We are perfect models of finding:) I am secretly hoping to be released as a Sister Training Leader and train a new missionary next transfer. That would be sweet! But, I guess we will see what the Lords wants. We had to drop things off in other areas afterwards, so we were stuck driving until 8 pm, for like 4 to 5 hours of driving. Road trips will no longer be a problem for me.
Saturday, finally I was able to fully proselyte. Yayy! We worked and went tracting and picked up this couple, the Lockes. They are a referral from a member and they are slightly interested, but also very stubborn New Yorkers. But, they want their 13 year old granddaughter to be baptized and if we can get her, then we can get the Grandpa. 2 for 1 special! So if it all goes well, Wednesday, that family will be coming to Church. We then got some referrals from the members that we hope to teach soon in the future and tried less actives that I had never heard of before. I met the Peckhams, super sweet and said that we could come back!
Sunday was Church. I love Church! We taught a bunch of less active families after Church. Nadine is thinking more about baptism, but she will take another month or two I think. Also, I taught the Holis-Poley family, they are also known as the Holy Poleys :) Super cool lesson! We brought a member who is a relative and they have a ton of desire. They work a ton, so we don't meet with them as often as they should. It is hard with Church. But, Brian is set to be baptized in April and said that he has seen changes in his behavior and attitude since reading the Book of Mormon. That was great! work in progress.
Now, it is going to be single digits this week. YIKES. Missionary work gets 100x harder when it is cold. But, we will try our hardest. The Church is true!
Go Bronco's!
Love Sister Kylie Williams
