For starters, I'm sure you are all wondering how things are going with my companion. I have two words for you.
Belly laugh.
Every day.
(ok, four words, no se preocupe) It is one of the best things in the world to work in the mission field. And its the cherry on top when you are doing it with someone so delightful. Also, its getting hot again! Blue skies are smiling at me :) thus the title of this email. El sol esta lleno de esperanza- the sun is full of hope. I said that to my lil Hermana Davila yesterday as we left the chapel and walked out into the sun, and it was so impacting that we made little quote cards out of it. We are rad.
This week was full of strengthening experiences and funny moments and some straight up testimony builders. I'll start with the fun experience I had this week of being in divisions.
with...drumroll...Hermana Mittlesteadt!
My cute CCM comp! She is an hermana leader trainer now, which is basically an assistant to the president, but a sister missionary and not an elder. She happened to be assigned as my leader, and this week we went on divisions. And lemme tell you, it was CRAZY AWESOME to go out and teach in my sector and just look back at how far we have come. From crying together at night after a hard day of attempting to teach in Spanish to contacting together in the street and telling each other jokes in Spanish. It was what I call a face slapping moment, as we sat at the end of the day in my pension, swapping stories of mission experiences. Like, "wow. Look how far we have come." It was great :)
Also this week, as we left our weekly district meeting, we came across a box addressed to my comp and I, which was odd because we only get mail every other week now, and it was the no pouch week. But when we opened it, we found a CRAZY amount of mail for the both of us. Which can only mean one thing- my pal Elder Bertagna put all our things together and set them where he knew we would find them so that we could have surprise mail happiness. What a gem, right? Got a package from the cutie Katie Miller, chocolates from old companions, and letters from Marcy, Staycia (serving her mission in Costa Rica), and Steve (:D). Thank you, all, for your love. There is nothing like surprise mail to make a missionary giddy.
As for the teaching, we had some great experiences this week. The first was with a little family we are teaching, Norma and Francisco. We taught about the Restoration, which I am totally digging right now, don't ask why, but I am just smitten with explaining how the priesthood was restored. I truly do not know why, but Ill go with it :) as we explained about prophets, Francisco said "But I have a question...what about the papa? It seems just the same as your prophet."
(yeah, don't judge, I don't know if they call the Catholic papa "papa" in English...I hope y'all can follow my Spanglish...) And I don't know why, but I got all nervous and stuff! People can get a little touchy when you get the point of needing to explain that the person they believe is leading them isn't "the chosen".
But I can totally testify of the guidance of the holy ghost, and we were able to, together, testify that the Catholic papa is "a good man of God" (sigh, it sounds better in Spanish. Un buen hombre de Dios), but that we truly know that God is the same yesterday, today and forever, and that he called prophets before, and in restoring His gospel, he will call prophets again. I know that, when we get the point of explaining the big differences in our religions, if we do so with love and with the spirit, we will not offend and we can help others know that what we teach really is the truth.
But, to balance it all out, we had another moment with a new investigator where he was absolutely floored to hear that there is a real life prophet! Alive! RIGHT NOW! His name is Jose, and we found him knocking doors. It was one of those contacts where we walked away feeling like it was too good to be true, because the conversation went something like this:
Hello, we are missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
Oh yeah, I've heard of you guys.
That's great! What have you heard?
Not a lot, but Id like to know more. Can you tell me about your church?
Maybe we could share a short message with you and your family?
We have visits right now, but you can come back tomorrow at 4:00 if you want.
...
Anyone who has served a mission knows that that is just a golden contact :) I love that! And when we came back the next day, he was there and expecting our visit and his family is totally adorable and they sat in on the lesson and when we got to the point of explaining that we have a prophet that guides us, he stopped us and was like "Wait, there's a prophet? Living? Are you for real?"
YES! YES! ITS FOR REAL!
Sometimes, I feel crazy blessed for being born in the gospel- what am I saying, I ALWAYS feel crazy blessed for being born in the gospel!- and just knowing my whole life that we have a prophet to lead and guide us, and that we can always trust him because we know that he is receiving revelation from God. But being here and teaching others about the gospel, and seeing the shock and joy that many feel upon hearing that YES, we have a prophet to lead and guide us, has strengthened my gratitude in this truth that I have always had at my finger tips, and the love that I feel, for and from, our beloved prophet.
(side note. Y'all should search for the picture of President Hinckley "dubbing" Elder Eyring with his cane, and the picture of President Monson high fiving a little boy. I am such a fan girl for prophets
:D)
Another great experience was Nancy and Roberto, inactive members that we have been helping for some time now. After the first visit with them with Hermana Davila, she said that she felt impressed to teach about Enduring to the End. I was impressed...at this point, it feels like we have taught every possible lesson from every possible angle, with a good amount of "Elder Holland Directness" as we call it, and after the first visit, she felt impressed to share, what seemed to be, the only topic that we hadn't taught them.
And we truly can testify of the power of following the promptings of that handy, dandy, still small voice, because we taught enduring to the end as we never have before, talking about the Atonement and repentance and the pure love of our Heavenly Father, and we were all left with tears in our eyes and they were saying"we have to go to church. We've just gotta go back to church."
Guess who came to church this Sunday :) I love that :)
Also this week, with our investigator Erika, we taught the importance of serving others, how it is part of our baptismal covenants to be examples of Christ, and part of that is serving others. But it was funny, we got to her house and saw the day old remnants of a birthday party strewn all around her patio. We immediately offered to help her clean it up before teaching, but she rejected the offer. Meh, its ok, I knew that after the lesson, we could offer again and she wouldn't be able to say no ;)
So we taught the lesson, wrapped it up with our testimonies about the importance of service, closed in the name of Jesus Christ,and then I said: "And NOW can we help you clean your patio?"
We LUAGHED :) And then we cleaned the patio.
And one last little story to finish off this week's letter! There is another inactive member that we are helping right now that has started coming to church after years of not coming, but she would only come if we stopped by her house to walk together. Yesterday morning, we had a meeting in the church and couldn't stop by to walk with her, and when I called, there was no answer. And we were a little bummed out, because we thought that she wouldn't come. But, as we finished up the opening prayer, here she comes, walking through the door!
When we went over to talk to her after Sacrament meeting, she told us that our call woke her up, and that, while she didn't answer, she knew who it was, and she knew that she had to get up and come to church.
I love that :)
Be bold, y'all. Stay rad. Do what you do.
Hermana Harkins
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