Ya know, I just have the best mission President ever :) Just what my family has always said..."We are all crazy, but life would be boring if we were normal." We are kindred spirits, my mission President and I :)
In other news, this week was wonderful! We had another visit from a member of the 70 to train us on this Pilot Plan that we are doing to reactivate inactive members, and it is so great! We are so excited to be a part of it! The best was when he spoke on the importance of feeling the spirit- that, as missionaries, we learn from and then teach by the spirit. That we must study in the morning to prepare to follow the promptings of the spirit during the day to know what it is that we need to say and how we need to say it. I dont remember who said this, but in the October 2013 Conference someone said "I know that I am teaching with the spirit when I learn something new from what I teach." It is so crazy true! When we truly prepare and are worthy of the spirit, we can be instruments in the Lord's hands and be his mouthpiece. It is SO rad.
We had an experience with that this week. We were teaching an inactive couple, Nancy and Roberto, The Plan of Salvation. They know everything about the gospel, a middle-aged couple, have gone to the temple and everything. It seemed almost silly to teach them The Plan of Salvation, but we felt the prompting and followed through.
And the thing is, as missionaries, it is easy to fall into a pattern of teaching, especially when it is one of the lessons that you teach a lot. Like the Plan of Salvation. It is easy to say the same things every time as we try to teach simply so that the people we teach can understand. But it was very different with them - we taught in a way that we never had before, saying new things and testifying in new ways of the doctrine that the four of us have been learning from years and years. Where we usually spoke of resurrection and the final judgement, we reminded them of temple covenants and enduring to the end. Where we usually teach about our life on earth, we reminded them of patriarchal blessings and participating in the Sacrament.
And the best part of it all was that we KNEW that it was the spirit working through us. That we were saying these different things because we felt to say them. And that is when you know that you are doing something right as a missionary- that the spirit can work through you to say the things that the people you teach need to hear.
Also this week, we had the most wonderful, adorable thing happen. Allow me to introduce 2 new characters- Alfio and Jesus. Both inactive members that we are visiting, and both a little different. Alfio has a problem in his head and is a bit like a childlike teenager. We are working on reading the Book of Mormon with him and getting him to church because it helps him to keep from smoking. Jesus is a 30 something year old and is blind.
They both came to church this Sunday and ended up sitting next to one another, and clicked instantly. I'm serious, they are best friends. We had a plan to visit Jesus later Sunday afternoon, and as we walked to his house, we talked about how he and Alfio are perfect friends for one another, just the right kind of different. And who should we find at Jesus's house?
Alfio. Of course.
And it turned out that we couldn't stay and chat because they were getting ready to leave to visit another one of Jesus's friends, who is also blind, so that Alfio could read the Book of Mormon out loud to them, because he loves reading it so much and kept saying that it is amazing and that everyone needs to read it, and since they cant, he will do it for them. It was the best thing EVER.
Lots of little miracles like these two happened this week and it was wonderful :) Being a missionary is the best ever. Be bold, stay rad, do what you doooo :)
Hermana Harkins
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