1/27/14
Dearest family,
How are y'all?
How's the freezing weather!
Well this week I experienced my first "ice day." In the early morning we got a text from President saying that we should not travel unless absolutely necessary. School was cancelled, places shut down. By mid day all the ice was melted and everything was back to normal. I had to laugh because I remember growing up I would just pray and pray for a snow day and even if the snow was up to our thighs we'd still go to school. And here in Texas of all places I finally got my snow day and it didn't even snow... BUT the lesson learned is that the Lord really does answer all our prayers. He just may not do it in the time or way we desire.
Mom to answer your questions I'm still not sure what to do about school.... does anybody have any advice? Could you find out exactly what day school starts for me and let me know?
Also being Sister Training leader is stressful but great! We have an exchange every week so things get pretty crazy but I love it because I love being able to get to know these other sisters and I love being able to learn from them. I love being able to help them, counsel them, and encourage them. They are all wonderful!
There is only one Sister Training Leader per zone in our mission.
I have some wonderful things to report today!!
So this weeks stared out really tough I'm not going to lie. We always seem to have to resort to tracting and we try so hard but no one that we tract into has wanted us to come back.
Well like I've said many times before the great thing about missions, and life really, is that after the storm the sun always comes out again. It always seems like when things are getting hard or slow it's because he Lord is preparing you and making sure you're ready for the flow of miracles that come.
Well to begin we had interviews with President this week. He is so wonderful. I told him about the struggles we are dealing with and he gave me such wonderful counsel. One of the many things he shared with me was that Sister Cecil and I should read chapter 9 of PMG and listen to the promptings of the spirit to know how the Lord wants us to find and strengthen this area. So this week we did just that! And I got a lot of impressions. One was to talk to the ward counsel about doing a monthly activity at the church that is low key that members feel comfortable bringing their friends to. The other was to do a ward fast together for the missionary work. The other was to see if we could publish an article in the community newspaper about the church and our contact info. And the last one was to find some way to do service that gets us involved in the community. So that's what we've been working on this week as well as continuing to give that hastening the work challenge to our ward members!
I wanted to share something really neat that I've noticed since sharing this challenge with the ward members. On our list of goals that members can choose from there are probably about 25 options to choose from. The easier ones have to do with prayer like "pray for a missionary experience" or "pray for the missionaries and their investigators by name." some are a little more challenging like "invite a friend to church" or "give a friend a Book of Mormon with my testimony in it" etc. Well here's whats amazing! From what I've seen so far usually the parents choose something easy like the "prayer" goals and what's incredible to me is that every youth we've given the challenge too have picked the hard ones. They are the ones unafraid to invite their friends to church and invite them to take the discussions! It is amazing to me to see the great faith of these youth! Truly that Lord has prepared these young souls to come forth at this time. They are better prepared and more willing to share the gospel with their friends more than any other generation. We can learn so much from them! Last night a 6 year old choose to invite a friend to church and an 8 year old decided to write his testimony in a Book of Mormon and give it to his friend! It's so incredible!! If they can do it so can we! Actually what I think is if they can do it so SHOULD we.
Miracles are happening!! This past Sunday I literally felt a shift in the attitude of the ward. They are beginning to trust us and support us! When we brought up our ideas in Ward Counsel they were really excited to help us execute our plans! This was a HUGE miracle!
Not only that but we're beginning to see miracles with the members accomplishing their goals that we give them! We even had a member come up to us on Sunday and tell us he was able to invite his friend to take the discussions! The members are being blessed for keeping their commitments and it is getting them more excited about missionary work!
This was more proof to me that I am not doing this work alone! The Lord's hand is in this. Sister Cecil and I could not have changed these things around on our own. The Lord is the one who has done it.
We saw many other great miracles this week! One was Kimber. She is a less active who was actually a DNC (meaning "do not contact") as of last year. Usually when someone is marked as DNC it is because when missionaries have gone by the person tells them not to ever come back and usually there are more colorful words used than that. :)
Anyways even though at that time the less active may not want to have anything to do with the church I've learned that just because it says DNC next to their name it doesn't mean that that cannot change. I've seen the Lord soften these people hearts and that's what he did with Kimber. Since I've been here we've been trying to meet Kimber but she would never answer the door. Well this last week we went again and guess what? She finally answered the door! As we walked inside she said "Man you guys are persistent. You just don't ever give up!" What followed was a miracle. She completely opened up to us and told us why she left the church. It was neat because she said "I believe that God puts people in our path for a reason. Do you know how many years people from the church have come and knocked on my door and I've not answered. I don't know why but for the first time in years today I decided to open the door." She may not know why but I do. The Lord needs her back. She let us know right off the bat that she wasn't going to come back to church but she was more than happy to have us in her home! She got offended a few years back, and I'll admit she was definitely treated poorly, and because of that she's been inactive for years. But she still reads the Book of Mormon and believes in the principles of this gospel and not only that but she will defend the Mormon church until kingdom come. She is amazing and I already love her so much! She has a busy life! She owns 5 small companies and has two little girls! We offered to do some service with her since she has such limited time and she welcomed our offer and we were able to help her! This is someone that has been on our wards records for 12 years and no one in the ward knows her because she's never let anyone in! I hope we'll be able to help her overcome her barriers and see that living this gospel is the best life decision we can make.
As far as investigators go they are all doing well.
We had a really great lesson with Rosa this week. She has such wonderful sincere questions and the spirit is so good to help us answer them! I've never been one to be good at memorizing and pulling our scripture references but, especially with the investigators we're working with currently, I've had many instances where the spirit has guided me to a specific scripture in both the Book of Mormon and Bible to help them understand! IT'S AMAZING! I don't even know how to describe it! Being a missionary and having this power given to me is so wonderful!
I'm just so grateful to be a missionary. Whether things are going the best they can or the worst they can being a missionary is the best thing! I love it! I love it more than anything in the world.
I hope all is well at home! THANK YOU SO MUCH for all your prayers! They are helping so much!
I love you all!
The Kingdom of God or Nothing!
Love, Sister Gregson
No comments:
Post a Comment