We visited our ward mission
leader for a couple minutes to pick up invitations for our upcoming ward talent
show. He asked us if we had any idea
what we could do to represent the missionary organization. After brainstorming a few ideas, he got super
excited and said, “I know some magic tricks!”
He named a couple we could do with a group of people. Then I asked him how he learned magic tricks
and said, “I watched YouTube videos.”
And then boom, in my mind came little Daniel and his 5 star video
tutorials on magic tricks. Now I’m
wishing I had paid better attention to that wise little D-Man.
I
found it interesting that just this week I was thinking a lot about our minds
when we sleep, and then in Dad’s email, he talked about the same thing! This kind of repetition always strikes me
profoundly and usually means that God is trying to tell me something. So as I pondered the power of our minds as we
rest and sleep, I pondered how I can use this time during the night to not just
let my mind wander, but to be spiritually uplifted. Alma 37:37 came to mind and I thought of how I
can “lie down unto the Lord, that He may watch [me] in [my] sleep.” I always pray right before I got to bed so I
can go to bed clean, but there’s more I can do.
I am going to set aside 5-10 minutes before my personal prayers to have
a ‘personal devotional’ so I can be more filled with the spirit as I close my
day with prayer and be spiritually fed even in my dreams. I think I will read and meditate part of The
Living Christ and really think about what each word means. We’ll see how this goes. J
Woah,
that was fast. In my dream last night,
all I can remember is that we were talking to someone who was interested in the
gospel, and as we walked away from their house, I noticed that there was a
dentist office right next door. Then I
woke up and basically forgot about the dream… until we were walking to lunch
today. Our area is the city so sometimes
you can’t tell if it is a business or a house.
As we walked, I just happened to look up at the house we passed and in
big letters I read “DENTISTA”. And then
my dream flashed into my memory for a split second, and the talk of Elder
Rasband from conference flashed in my mind of responding to the first
prompting. So as we passed the dentist
office, I stopped my companion and asked to stop for a second to contact the
house next door. We weren’t sure if it
was a house or not, so we just knocked anyways.
A man opened up and we told him who we were. We talked for a minute or two and he said he
needed to leave to get to work, but when we explained what we do, he got way interested
and said, “would it be possible if you could come visit me tomorrow? Please!?”
It was the most genuine contact.
We’re going to see what happens manana!
So
we passed by for the dentist guy, but he wasn’t home, but God wanted us in that
street for a DIFFERENT reason. As we
walked away, Hermana Morais noticed a lady behind us carrying a grocery bag and
asked if we could help her. The lady
spoke very little Spanish and didn’t understand us. So we asked where she is from and she said, “Egypt!” And in my mind, I thought, “wow, so she
speaks Arabic.. yeah, chao communication…. But we can still server her!” So I started speaking super slowly and pronouncing
my Spanish the best I could, ‘Can we help you with your heavy bag?” I even acted it out holding a fake bag and
carrying it for her. I felt pretty dumb,
but hey we’ve gotta communicate somehow.
So as I was making a fool of myself (and I’m pretty sure she thought I
wanted to steal her bag), my companion said, ‘hey, I think she speaks English.” And I turned and looked at the lady and asked
in English, “Do you need help?” And she
said, “oh good, someone who speaks English!
Much better…. Please come in. I
live right here. “Score! So we walked
inside and met her husband and we ended up teaching them the restoration in
English! (which was actually so hard because my mind wanted to change the
gospel words into Spanish). But, it went
so well and they were really receptive.
I’m pretty sure they are super Muslim, but they want to read the Book of
Mormon in English so that’s a good start.
We
went to Hermana Paulina’s house to ask for references. When we got there, she began telling us how
crazy her life is with her 8 month old baby.
She wasn’t able to sit down because she was running around. We asked her how we could help and I swear she almost started crying. She didn’t want to make us do anything, but
we didn’t really ask if we could help, but rather what can we
do. We helped her fold her laundry and wash
the dishes so she could feed and hold her baby.
It was so sweet being able to help her.
(and an eye opener at how CRAZY life is with babies). But we finished organizing and the baby
calmed down and so we watched the Easter video, Prince of Peace. It was so powerful to be in such a crazy
environment and then literally feel the peace of the Savior. The peace was so much stronger than the
noise.
Yesterday,
we had exchanges and Hermana Little came to Cachapoal with me! She just started her mission and so it was
fun getting to know her and share the initial excitement to be
missionaries. I literally feel like I’m
still new. I learned a lot from her!
We
purposefully scheduled our appointment with Magdy and Nadya (the Egyptian
couple) for today because they don’t speak Spanish and Hermana Little is still
learning, so we taught in English! They are
pretty set in their Muslim ways, so I’m not sure how much longer we will visit
them because if they don’t want to do more than just listen to us, we can’t
spend our time there. BUT, today when we
taught about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon, the Spirit was so
STRONG! The truth is so powerful.
Oh
and it rained today. It is perfect
weather right now. I LOVE FALL!!
We
had a beautiful Sabbath day. In this
ward, the Bishop plays the piano and it’s the cutest thing watching him move
from place to place on the stand. And
when the music director isn’t here, we lead the music.
One of our recent converts
Manuela was sick so she couldn’t come to church. We went to visit her with the elders so we
could be with her and they could give her the sacrament. It is ALWAYS so powerful to me when I get to
see the worthy priesthood holders give someone the sacrament in their
home. There is something so incredibly
touching when there is just one piece of bread and a tiny sip of water and the
reverence of the two young men individually blessing and passing it. It is truly so personal and individual. God works one-by-one.
This is my reaction when I saw my neighbor from Highland, Shania Alcazar, on the front page of the New Era
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