Miracle of the Week:
So, last week I talked about how we met Heather. She is a mother of three adorable daughters. She is engaged to a less-active member. She went to the temple open house and felt an incredible spirit in the Celestial room. She wanted to know more about the whole shebang, everything about Mormons. When we first met her, she was super excited because she had talked to a missionary in the other Terre Haute ward. We got to know her and felt so much love for her. She is so excited about the gospel and wants to be baptized and eventually be sealed to her family. Every lesson we have taught her has been super easy. She is studying for herself and praying to know the truth. The Spirit has prepared her so wonderfully, our job as missionaries, is just to validate the answers she already has found through the spirit. Let me tell you, it never goes this way, she is a golden investigator. We put her on a baptismal date for October 17, a week after they are married.
She mentioned that her daughter is interested in learning, so we taught them both the Plan of Salvation, on a 6-year-old level. The crazy thing is, Heather had read the pamphlet we gave her on the Plan of Salvation, so she did most of the explaining. Moral of the story, the work we did in the temple has already changed so many lives and will continue to change people's hearts. I've learned that we are nothing but tools in His hands. This is His work. He will prepare people and place them in our path at the exact moment we need to meet them. It is crucial that we are doing all we can to be worthy of the guidance of the Holy Ghost. He does bless missionaries. We have had little to no success since I arrived, and before that, but Heather was being prepared for us. The Lord knows what he is doing. All we can do is our best and trust his judgement and guidance.
Little miracle from yesterday:
We have key indicators which are how we make numerical goals to tract our work, in a sense. One of those is lessons with a member present. It is important to have members present for lessons with progressing investigators every time. We haven't had great luck with that but our goal has been to have 3 lessons with a member present each week for this transfer. We had three appointments set up back to back in the evening. We went to the first but I wanted to see if a member would be willing to sit in on our lesson with Taylor and Xandra. His name is Paul. He happened to be home and was willing to be there with us. We had the lesson at his house. The spirit during the lesson was so great. We taught them about prayer and how important it is to pray every morning and night. Paul chimed in with his experience and testimony of prayer. It's incredible how the spirit changes with a member present. They hear a third testimony from a "normal" person, not just a missionary.
The second lesson we had was with Heather. She was feeding us dinner and her mother and father in law to be were there. They were a little distracting during the dinner because she is so talkative, but when the lesson came around, they helped bring the teachings down to Heather's daughter's level.
Anyway, the miracle is that last week we had only one member present lesson, and this week we already have two. The Lord helps us improve when we are listening to the spirit. The numerical goals we have are to help us grow and measure our progress. They aren't the most important thing, the people are. But when we can see what we are doing and hold ourselves accountable, we can set goals for improvement. There is always room for improvement. I know the Holy Ghost lead us to ask Paul if he could be there. And Heather's family is a blessing in and of itself.
WE ALSO FOUND A NEW INVESTIGATOR NAMED MARSHAWN. Our appointment fell through, but we will try him again this week. We haven't given up on him, and won't for a while!
Funnies:
- We ate lunch at an Indian buffet called the Taj Mahal. It was so sketchy and I tasted the barf of it for like 5 hours afterward. Sweet Brother Stander, our ward mission leader, took us. He is so nice and feeds us usually every week. But this was not the best choice. Sister Carpenter and I were both pretty skeptical, and it turns out, for good reason.
- Sister Carpenter and I were witnesses for a wedding. We visited Judge Newton (a member of the stake presidency) at the courthouse for something. While we were there, a couple came in to be married. He asked if we could be the witnesses. They said yes, so we were there as he did the civil ceremony in his office. It was so out of the blue. The mission brings so many new, interesting experiences around.
- We got a pity dinner on Sunday because no body has fed us since last Thursday and we wouldn't have many this week. The Worthington's are wonderful and so funny! They have a little game they play. It's irreverent, but a little funny. When we have dinner with them one of the elders says the prayer and whenever "zucchini" is mentioned, we say "Amen" and the prayer is over. The new people are never prepared, so their confusion is funny! Also, we played a little trick on Elder Reece. They told him the TV was voice operated. So he stood in front of it yelling into the corner. It's not voice operated.. hah! It was really funny! He said "You only have to be 10% smarter than the TV." He probably won't live that one down!
This week has been a ball! Indiana is weird and the people are even weirder, but you can't help but love it! We had a fun biking session at the Griffin Bike Park this morning with all the elders. The mission is the best because the other missionaries are like your family. They have to accept you, love you, and hang out with you. Like 12 instant friends. It's awesome, but really, we have a great Zone and there are so many miracle happening right now in Terre Haute. Sister Carpenter leaves me in about 5 weeks, so t's pretty sad. We're soaking up our time together!
Thanks for all your support! I love you all! Keep writing me! I love to hear from you!
Love, Sister Mondragon
So, last week I talked about how we met Heather. She is a mother of three adorable daughters. She is engaged to a less-active member. She went to the temple open house and felt an incredible spirit in the Celestial room. She wanted to know more about the whole shebang, everything about Mormons. When we first met her, she was super excited because she had talked to a missionary in the other Terre Haute ward. We got to know her and felt so much love for her. She is so excited about the gospel and wants to be baptized and eventually be sealed to her family. Every lesson we have taught her has been super easy. She is studying for herself and praying to know the truth. The Spirit has prepared her so wonderfully, our job as missionaries, is just to validate the answers she already has found through the spirit. Let me tell you, it never goes this way, she is a golden investigator. We put her on a baptismal date for October 17, a week after they are married.
She mentioned that her daughter is interested in learning, so we taught them both the Plan of Salvation, on a 6-year-old level. The crazy thing is, Heather had read the pamphlet we gave her on the Plan of Salvation, so she did most of the explaining. Moral of the story, the work we did in the temple has already changed so many lives and will continue to change people's hearts. I've learned that we are nothing but tools in His hands. This is His work. He will prepare people and place them in our path at the exact moment we need to meet them. It is crucial that we are doing all we can to be worthy of the guidance of the Holy Ghost. He does bless missionaries. We have had little to no success since I arrived, and before that, but Heather was being prepared for us. The Lord knows what he is doing. All we can do is our best and trust his judgement and guidance.
Little miracle from yesterday:
We have key indicators which are how we make numerical goals to tract our work, in a sense. One of those is lessons with a member present. It is important to have members present for lessons with progressing investigators every time. We haven't had great luck with that but our goal has been to have 3 lessons with a member present each week for this transfer. We had three appointments set up back to back in the evening. We went to the first but I wanted to see if a member would be willing to sit in on our lesson with Taylor and Xandra. His name is Paul. He happened to be home and was willing to be there with us. We had the lesson at his house. The spirit during the lesson was so great. We taught them about prayer and how important it is to pray every morning and night. Paul chimed in with his experience and testimony of prayer. It's incredible how the spirit changes with a member present. They hear a third testimony from a "normal" person, not just a missionary.
The second lesson we had was with Heather. She was feeding us dinner and her mother and father in law to be were there. They were a little distracting during the dinner because she is so talkative, but when the lesson came around, they helped bring the teachings down to Heather's daughter's level.
Anyway, the miracle is that last week we had only one member present lesson, and this week we already have two. The Lord helps us improve when we are listening to the spirit. The numerical goals we have are to help us grow and measure our progress. They aren't the most important thing, the people are. But when we can see what we are doing and hold ourselves accountable, we can set goals for improvement. There is always room for improvement. I know the Holy Ghost lead us to ask Paul if he could be there. And Heather's family is a blessing in and of itself.
WE ALSO FOUND A NEW INVESTIGATOR NAMED MARSHAWN. Our appointment fell through, but we will try him again this week. We haven't given up on him, and won't for a while!
Funnies:
- We ate lunch at an Indian buffet called the Taj Mahal. It was so sketchy and I tasted the barf of it for like 5 hours afterward. Sweet Brother Stander, our ward mission leader, took us. He is so nice and feeds us usually every week. But this was not the best choice. Sister Carpenter and I were both pretty skeptical, and it turns out, for good reason.
- Sister Carpenter and I were witnesses for a wedding. We visited Judge Newton (a member of the stake presidency) at the courthouse for something. While we were there, a couple came in to be married. He asked if we could be the witnesses. They said yes, so we were there as he did the civil ceremony in his office. It was so out of the blue. The mission brings so many new, interesting experiences around.
- We got a pity dinner on Sunday because no body has fed us since last Thursday and we wouldn't have many this week. The Worthington's are wonderful and so funny! They have a little game they play. It's irreverent, but a little funny. When we have dinner with them one of the elders says the prayer and whenever "zucchini" is mentioned, we say "Amen" and the prayer is over. The new people are never prepared, so their confusion is funny! Also, we played a little trick on Elder Reece. They told him the TV was voice operated. So he stood in front of it yelling into the corner. It's not voice operated.. hah! It was really funny! He said "You only have to be 10% smarter than the TV." He probably won't live that one down!
This week has been a ball! Indiana is weird and the people are even weirder, but you can't help but love it! We had a fun biking session at the Griffin Bike Park this morning with all the elders. The mission is the best because the other missionaries are like your family. They have to accept you, love you, and hang out with you. Like 12 instant friends. It's awesome, but really, we have a great Zone and there are so many miracle happening right now in Terre Haute. Sister Carpenter leaves me in about 5 weeks, so t's pretty sad. We're soaking up our time together!
Thanks for all your support! I love you all! Keep writing me! I love to hear from you!
Love, Sister Mondragon