So let me tell you about the hugest miracle of the week.
This girl named Sarah was invited to church by some of the members she met last week. She came and bore her testimony the first Sunday she was here and stayed for break-the-fast and we talked and set up an appointment for Tues morning. We then talked to her at FHE the next night and she told us she wanted to convert. She's been to 20+ churches and really felt loved here and she had read the Res pamphlet we gave her and a few chapters from the BoM and they made sense. We then taught her Tues, Wed, and Sat, and she's just going great! We have a goal for baptism and she's just stellar. She has great faith and understanding and desires to do God's will.
We found a couple new investigators this week, one who is from China. I have a new found respect for Chinese missionaries, people from China are starting with very little understanding of even who God is and why it's important. It's a very different way of explaining things than I'm used to since we work mostly with people from strong Christian backgrounds already. It's kinda flipped my teaching on it's head and I'm learning to readjust and explain things differently. She's very eager to learn, we just have to teach really simply, both for doctrinal understanding, and language capabilities.
The elders have been sooo great to us this week. It's been cold and wet and we switch off on car/bike week to week. This was our week for the bikes, but the elders went on exchanges for a couple days and weren't using the car and let us have it for an extra couple days which was really nice in this weather. They also helped us practice better door approaches as we're trying to be better in our finding and it was super helpful, they're super great at those. They are seriously top-notch elders. Transfers were also this week, and one of them is leaving :( but such is life. I wonder who will be coming up here? I also found out that I am not moving areas, which will make this area the longest area I've ever been in by far! I've never been anywhere longer than 3 transfers (4 1/2 months) and at the end of this I'll have been here 6, but since Sis Flanery is going home, I'm 99% sure I'm staying for 7 1/2 months total. It'll be a blast!! Good thing I love it up here :D
I've also been thinking a lot about Charity and pure motivation this week... well for a while, but I got a lot of answers to those thoughts this week. Sacrament meeting we had a fantastic talk about being motivated by love and asking why we do the things we do, and then we watched the young adult broadcast devotional with some investigators and recent converts and I learned a lot from that too!! Go watch it if you have a chance!! It's so good. "Living life with purpose--the importance of real intent" https://www.lds.org/
Anyways, I'm running out of time. But, the take home lesson is the reason why you do something is important. Don't expect to find what you're not seeking. Keep the right focus. Sorry I didn't have time to elaborate on all my thoughts there. If you've ever done yoga, you'll know what I mean when I say small adjustments can make a huge difference. Sometimes you just need to tweak it. Sometimes the poses are easier when you're doing it the right way and just a slight tweak changes the whole thing so that you're actually getting the benefits of the pose. There's a gospel principle in that.
I've been trying to figure out what the Lord needs me to do, but also do it for the right reasons. I feel like a lot of what I do right now is motivated out of duty--which is not necessarily a bad motivation, but it's not the best either. You get exhausted, and the work doesn't change you or the people you're working with nearly as much as when you do it out of love. Love for the Lord and your fellow man. Sometimes all you need is a little tweaking and you get vastly greater benefits from what you're doing. So I'm trying to focus more on love this week, to really reflect on why I'm doing things and to keep my purpose at the forefront of my mind. I challenge you to do the same.
Love y'all!!
Sister Andreason
No comments:
Post a Comment