Wow, Monday again? This week has flown by, although nothing
too exciting has really happened. I'm glad that everyone is doing so good with
your health challenge! On the other hand, my tights got tighter this week haha.
Let's just say I'll probably be better off healthwise in Taiwan when I can ride
a bike every day.
Every day this week we've had a solid 8 to 10 appointments,
and I'd say all but 1 or 2 will actually be there. I just don't
understand why we're not finding people who are ready and excited to hear the message
of the restored gospel! Two people even dropped us this week, saying
they've read the Book of Mormon and prayed about it and it's just not for
them. Something isn't right.
So funny experience:
Well, not exactly funny, but whatever. So we call up a
former and ask if we can see her, and she says to call back next week.
Later in the week, we're tracting and somehow come across her house, and she
still said to call her next week. So it's the next week (this week) and
we call her, and she said we can't come over. The 'colored' kids down the
street have been abusing her dog, and so it apparently bites all colored
people. She noticed that one of us is colored, so we just can't come
over. Hahaha so we can't see her because of her racist dog? And besides,
Sister A is pretty much as white as me! (Although she's half black). Haha
people just don't make sense sometimes.
Since next week is stake conference, we had the opportunity
to fast this week, and me and Sis Achziger fasted together to find people who
will keep their commitments and want to come to church so we can actually help
them progress. We're starting from the basics.
We've lost all contact with one of our favorite couples, and that just
breaks my heart because they are so solid! I was sure they would get
baptized. We keep calling or stopping by every day though, because I know
that once we just see them, they'll get right back on track!
We taught our two Gordon College students once this week, and we just
went through the faith cycle. They said they'd come to church next week,
so hopefully they'll follow through! Speaking of church, we finally had someone
come! We've just started teaching a member's stepson, and he's pretty
awesome. He's got a lot of baggage, but he just wants to know the truth.
He'll definitely be baptized though, it's just a matter of when.
We got these bad boys from the older couple
across from Gordon. Love that southern hospitality!
Josue, the Gordon college student who referred us to our investigator, also brought his friend to church. Haha it was almost too
easy! Josue is seriously the best at member missionary work. He's even
going to have a meeting for one of his clubs in our church building, and he
found out that a few clubs on campus like to have people come and share about
their religion. Ahh that's so prime! I'm way stoked for that. I
just wish we could tract on campus or something because the college kids are in
the perfect stage of life to accept the gospel. I'm so grateful that the
college is in our area though! That's definitely a blessing.
We had a really nice fast and testimony meeting yesterday.
"Firecross" Tony always runs up to bare his testimony about
missionary work, and that just sets the tone for the rest of the meeting. Haha
I just love him. It's so awesome to see a lot of members sharing their
testimony of sharing the gospel with others, and I definitely want to be an
active member missionary! I'm still trying to figure out how that works
in Happy Valley, Utah, but I'll make do with what I've got.
I had a really cool experience of watching the Atonement
work right before my eyes, and it was just amazing and so humbling. A
recent convert who comes out with us on team-ups all the time likes to share
the latest and greatest of what's going on in her life. Before she got
baptized, her life was literally a mess, and accepting the gospel was just what
she needed. Recently, some problems have been coming back including crazy
relatives, court cases, DFCS, and what not. It's crazy. But literally
from one day to the next, I saw a change in her. One day, she was about
going to wring someone's neck and the next day at church she was so forgiving
and saw her relative as just another sister in Christ. That was the most
amazing thing to me to watch her being willing to rely on the atonement, and
have it work so beautifully in her life. Heavenly Father didn't take away all
the baggage and everything that was going on, but He just helped her to get
through that trial, ease her burdens, and mend a few relationships in the
process. If the Atonement of Jesus Christ isn't real, I don't know what
is.
I've had to share my testimony of a few things this week,
which were hard in the moment because it was exactly against what they stood
for. I shared my testimony of families, specifically the idea that a
mother and father is ordained of God, to a lesbian couple. I shared my testimony
and the Church's stance on the Word of Wisdom to a good number of people who
smoke, drink, and who knows what else. It's hard at first, but once you share
the truth, it is so worth it. People appreciate that our church has such
high standards, and it's because Heavenly Father doesn't drop His standards for
those of the world. His standards will always be the same, no
question. And I'm grateful for that, because I can see so many churches
here in the South falling farther and farther away from his standards. I
know that I belong to Christ's one and only true church, and I'm so thankful to
be His servant, no matter how hard it may be sometimes. He never said it
would be easy. Christ himself was crucified. So I'm willing to do
whatever it takes to stand up for Him and preach His gospel.
Love, Sister Facer
Did I mention our apartment is a little chilly?
No comments:
Post a Comment