Monday, November 5, 2012

"We are not worker bees, we are not drones - we are children of the Most High God"


Hi Family!

This week went by soo fast.

So Monday this sweet lady Sister Baird took us to lunch at Cafe Rio and to do our grocery shopping and such. We went to the church to watch the Elders play basketball for a little bit and then we went to a corn maze on the west end of Provo with our district. Then we went to teach Justin and Stephanie. We taught them about the Law of Chastity, which they already understood and agreed with. Justin is so great. At one point he was like, "Now when I think about being morally clean, I think about my future family. I think if Stephanie and I try our hardest to put God in the center of our marriage, our children will have a good example of what a successful marriage looks like and it will help our family be more unified. I know how special the powers God has given us to create life are and I want to be careful with them. I want my sons to learn to respect women as they see the way I treat their mother, and I want my daughters to grow up knowing they are so valuable." Every time Justin speaks about what he's learning and understanding of the Gospel I feel the Spirit so strongly. He's seriously incredible. After Justin and Stephanie we went to visit Robert and Misty. Robert got baptized just a few months ago so we like to go visit them when we have a chance. Misty opened the door and just started crying. I guess Robert has been really sick. We asked if there was anything we could do for her and all she said was, " I just really need my husband to get better." So we said a prayer right there with her. Sister Cha loves her so much and tried her best to comfort her. We called their bishop as we stood there in the doorway and asked him to come give Robert a blessing. We saw them the other day and Robert is all better!

Tuesday we spent most of our afternoon contacting on campus. I ran into lots of people I know; I love seeing familiar faces. I know that's not ever gonna happen in Spain! After dinner we went tracting in some apartments we cover. We got so many referrals for nonmembers and less active people we can teach! People are always surprised when we tell them there are 3000 nonmembers on campus, but that's because everyone always assumes everyone else is a member! A lot of the ones we're planning on contacting are athletes who come here to play sports. I can't wait to go back and talk to to some of them. One of the referrals we got was for this Chinese girl named Nina. Her English is pretty good, so we get to teach her. She asked us to come in right then and teach her! We taught her about our purpose as missionaries and read the introduction to the Book of Mormon with her. She's so interested, it's really awesome. Our other appointment with her last week fell through because she was sick, but we're meeting with her again tonight.

Wednesday was so good. It was my 7 week mark in the mission. We started our morning at the temple. Sister Cha and I had been struggling a little bit due to an argument we'd gotten in the day before. But it was incredible how much the temple helped us. After we left the Celestial room, before we headed down the stairs, she just grabbed me and we hugged for a good minute or so. She started crying and just said, "I'm so sorry, I love you." and I apologized too. It changed everything, and things have been so much better since. I love the temple! We get to go twice a month and since October, November, and December are all in this transfer, I get to go six times this transfer! After the temple we had a lesson with Connor. I'm pretty sure I've already said so, but I love this kid so much. He's so receptive to everything we say and he wants so badly to find the truth for himself. I love it. Our lesson was on the Plan of Salvation, which I was really excited for because of his dad's cancer. I wanted to tell him that I know his family can be together forever, and I wanted him to know it too! At 5 we stopped working for the day and we met at the chapel by our house to have our party with the Elders in our district. The AP's brought us Little Caesar's (sooooo gooooood) and we watched the first Narnia movie. I forgot that it's actually pretty good. When Azlan came and roared everyone was quiet and I just said, "I love lions, they're so attractive." I thought I said it in my head, but I guess I didn't. Everyone judged me so hard. It's okay, only Hadley and Amy would understand. We love lions.

Thursday we spent 4 hours in our booth in the Wilkinson building on campus and didn't get a single referral. The only good thing that came out of the booth was I saw Amy! Homegirl just waltzed in through the doors and I about peed my pants of excitement. It absolutely made my whole day. And I met this kid, who's reporting to the MTC in February and who will be serving in Madrid! Yay for Madrid missionaries! After the booth we went to dinner with a family in one of the wards we cover. She's from Mexico, and her husbands from here, but he served in Nicaragua, so he and Sister Cha had a lot to talk about. Sister Hunt made the most delicious meal ever; fish, bread, salad, rice, and this yummy yogurt/fruit thing for dessert. It was basically heaven in my mouth. And you know the picture called "Lost and Found" of the boy sitting on the bench with his bags and the Savior sitting next to him? Yeah, well that's one of her sons. He's famous! She gave us both a copy of the picture so I'll probably send it to you. They were the sweetest and I hope we get to go eat with them again. That night we were invited to speak at a Relief Society preparedness meeting. We bore our testimonies, talked about why we decided to serve a mission, and how we prepared. It was really awesome. We have another one tomorrow.

Friday we met with Ashley. This girl is awesome. I don't know if I talked about her before, but her parents are inactive, her grandma's a member, and she has never been baptized. We had planned to teach the Word of Wisdom, but we both felt impressed to talk about fasting. It was a really cool lesson and since the upcoming Sunday was Fast Sunday, the three of us decided to fast together. Ashley asked if we could fast that she would have the courage to talk to her parents about her desire to be baptized, and that their hearts would be softened and they would be supportive of whatever decision she made. We'll see her tomorrow and I'm excited to talk about how her fast went. After we had this really awesome dinner with this family from Africa. African food is so good! I want to eat it every day please. After dinner we went tracting in the same apartment complex as before. This time we met this inactive kid named Paul. He was a super strong member of the church until about a year ago when his girlfriend broke up with him and married another guy. Now he spends like 3 hours a day waxing his car and that's all he cares about. I think we're going to have a Family Home Evening with his apartment soon.
Saturday we had five lessons planned and three cancelled on us, so it was kind of a bummer day. But, we taught Connor and things were so much better since it was just the three of us. We taught him the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and focused on faith and baptism. He explained a little more why he doesn't want to be baptized until his dad's out of the hospital. It's really important to him that his family be there to support him, so he wants to wait until things are better with his dad's situation. We also told us about a cool post he saw on Facebook. One of his mom's best friends posted that she got hit really hard by the hurricane. A lot of damage was done to her house and she didn't know where to begin to get it fixed. Two hours later he saw another post that a group of people had shown up to her house ready to help in whatever way they could! Guess who those people were. The Mormon Helping Hands in their yellow tshirts! I guess one of the men in the group had a feeling to turn down her street and then they happened upon her! Connor was really impressed by their sensitivity to the Spirit and how willing they were to serve her. The lesson that followed was incredible and it's so great to be able to see Connor coming closer to Christ every single day. We went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner and it was yummmm. Jessie was working so I got to see her and it made me miss work. Saturday night we taught Tabitha. We met her a couple weeks ago. She's had kind of a crazy past and she's been through a lot, but she's on date for baptism on the 16th of this month, so we're helping her get ready for that.

Yesterday we went to three different Sacrament Meetings. My favorite, though, was church with Connor. Before the meeting started he told us an experience he had that morning. His Bishop felt impressed to call him in to meet with him. He didn't know about the situation with his dad, or that he was meeting with us. But he offered Connor a blessing and he told us that it was a really special experience for him. The testimonies that morning were perfect too. Three different people got up and bore testimony of the Plan of Salvation, saying that they had friends/family with cancer, but that they knew they would see them again. HOW CRAZY IS THAT? It's incredible how aware Heavenly Father is of us and how big of a part the Holy Ghost plays in missionary work. I know Connor felt the Spirit and I hope the testimonies of the members of his ward really helped him. Last night we had a lesson with this girl Doria. She was being taught by the Asian Elders, but since her English is really good, they transferred her to us. She's getting baptized this Saturday! She's so willing to obey every single commandment that God gives her and she cannot WAIT to get baptized this weekend. It's awesome.

Well, I think that's it. Saturday we have Mission Conference with Elder Bednar! I can't wait. I love that guy. I met him like 7 years ago or something when he came to the Olathe Stake Conference. I can't wait to see him again. I hope I didn't forget anything. I love you guys!

Love,
Hermana Munden

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