Hi People!
Well this week was an adventure! Literally, every day on a mission is something new. Before I came on a mission, I thought that I would get bored eventually having the same routine every day, but holy smokes I couldn't have been more wrong! Yes, we still get up at the same time every day, study at the same time, and go to bed at the same time, but every day holds all kinds of adventures and miracles and it keeps you on your toes. Even studying is different every day because it's like having an appointment with the Lord first thing in the morning, and you have no idea what He's going to teach you that day. I love studying so much! This week I finished The Book of Mormon again, and it just gets better every time.
First, I want to tell you all about Tuesday and how amazing it was. I was on exchanges with Sister Crane, who is the sweetest thing ever, and we just had the best day! Here is how it went: First, an appointment we had set up got pushed back a couple hours, which kind of threw us for a loop because that was in south Baton Rouge, and we were planning on working south for a couple hours, then north for the rest of the day to conserve miles. We didn't know if we should stay in the south until our appointment, or if we should just go up north and come back. We said a prayer, and we both really felt like we needed to go north, even though it didn't make sense with miles. I had only been in the area for not even a week at this point, so Sister Alder just wrote a list of people and addresses in my planner to try to see. So we go to the first one, and she's a less active lady, and she was so excited to see us! We had the best lesson ever with her. But that wasn't even the best part. So her husband isn't a member, and she told us that he's been reading the Book of Mormon and that he wants to know more and wants to join the church. So that's cool! They're changing their work schedules in the next few weeks so that they'll be home more often, and then they'll have Sundays off.
Well this week was an adventure! Literally, every day on a mission is something new. Before I came on a mission, I thought that I would get bored eventually having the same routine every day, but holy smokes I couldn't have been more wrong! Yes, we still get up at the same time every day, study at the same time, and go to bed at the same time, but every day holds all kinds of adventures and miracles and it keeps you on your toes. Even studying is different every day because it's like having an appointment with the Lord first thing in the morning, and you have no idea what He's going to teach you that day. I love studying so much! This week I finished The Book of Mormon again, and it just gets better every time.
First, I want to tell you all about Tuesday and how amazing it was. I was on exchanges with Sister Crane, who is the sweetest thing ever, and we just had the best day! Here is how it went: First, an appointment we had set up got pushed back a couple hours, which kind of threw us for a loop because that was in south Baton Rouge, and we were planning on working south for a couple hours, then north for the rest of the day to conserve miles. We didn't know if we should stay in the south until our appointment, or if we should just go up north and come back. We said a prayer, and we both really felt like we needed to go north, even though it didn't make sense with miles. I had only been in the area for not even a week at this point, so Sister Alder just wrote a list of people and addresses in my planner to try to see. So we go to the first one, and she's a less active lady, and she was so excited to see us! We had the best lesson ever with her. But that wasn't even the best part. So her husband isn't a member, and she told us that he's been reading the Book of Mormon and that he wants to know more and wants to join the church. So that's cool! They're changing their work schedules in the next few weeks so that they'll be home more often, and then they'll have Sundays off.
BUT WAIT. There's more! So after that, we had an appointment with Carmen, the lady I talked about last week, and holy smokes. Sister Crane is an English missionary, so I translated for her. The craziest thing happened during the lesson. We were teaching about the plan of salvation, especially about how faith, repentance, and baptism are part of the purpose of life, and I had this scripture in mind that I wanted to share, but for the life of me, I could not remember where it was. I looked over to Sister Crane to give the time to her, and she says, "So there's this scripture in Alma 34..." and it was the EXACT SCRIPTURE that I was thinking of! She had no idea what we had just been talking about because I hadn't translated what I said yet, but the Spirit still could work through her PERFECTLY. Then, towards the end of the lesson, we challenged her to be baptized, and she said yes! We tried to give her a date too, but she said she didn't feel ready yet because she didn't understand everything, but that she feels like this is right, so she wants to keep learning. Then, I turned it over to Sister Crane again without translating, and Sister Crane pulls out "how to begin teaching" from Preach My Gospel, even though we were towards the end of the lesson. She said, "It's not possible to learn everything all at once, but as you continue to read The Book of Mormon and pray, and as we keep meeting with you to help guide you through this, you will come to know that these things are true." Gold. Pure gold. And she had no idea. So I was freaking out during the lesson, and then afterwards Sister Crane says, "I had no idea what was going on! Sorry if I said super off-topic stuff!" I said, “ohmygosh, Sister Crane, you have no idea!!” Then, we both had a freak out moment together because the Spirit is SO COOL! Even though we weren't all speaking the same language, the Holy Ghost could still be the perfect teacher and guide our words.
THAT'S NOT ALL. So THEN Sister Crane says that we should tract the neighborhood around Carmen because we had about a half hour before we were switching back. We knock on the first door, and we meet this super sweet lady who seemed really interested but was half asleep, but she let us set a return appointment. The next door, another really sweet lady opens up and we have a really good conversation with her. She ends up not being super interested, but she gave us water and told us where some people that might be interested are. Two of our favorite things! Plus, I honestly don't mind when people aren't interested, as long as they do it in a nice way. Some people just aren't prepared yet, and that's okay. Then, the third door (our last before we had to leave), I could tell it was a Hispanic home and we knock on the door, and this guy who doesn't look Hispanic starts talking to us in English. He was really nice though so we talked to him outside for a little bit. Then, he mentions something about Honduras, and I said wait... where are you from? And he said Honduras! So I started talking to him in Spanish and his eyes got super wide and he opened up a ton because he spoke Spanish a lot better than English. As we're talking, I asked him if he's met with missionaries before, and he said, "oh yeah, I was baptized when I was eight, and we went as a family for a while, but then we moved and we kind of lost contact, and when we moved to the states, I had no idea where to find the church." Um okay. It's not every day you find a member. He told us that he lived there with his whole family and he opened the door and I kid you not, I heard angels singing the hallelujah chorus because behind the door was this huge, adorable family all sitting down eating family dinner. When he opened the door they all said "hola!!" It was a real life Clark Griswald "hallelujah" moment. They were in the middle of eating, and we didn't have much time, but we set up a return appointment (which we have since followed up on and we taught almost the whole family!). It's not every day you find a part member family who loves missionaries and is super excited to see you and wants you to come back and teach everyone.
Meanwhile, that appointment in the south that we were worried about cancelled, so we would have been wasting our time waiting in the south. God really does have a plan and will lead us if we let Him.
THAT'S NOT ALL. So THEN Sister Crane says that we should tract the neighborhood around Carmen because we had about a half hour before we were switching back. We knock on the first door, and we meet this super sweet lady who seemed really interested but was half asleep, but she let us set a return appointment. The next door, another really sweet lady opens up and we have a really good conversation with her. She ends up not being super interested, but she gave us water and told us where some people that might be interested are. Two of our favorite things! Plus, I honestly don't mind when people aren't interested, as long as they do it in a nice way. Some people just aren't prepared yet, and that's okay. Then, the third door (our last before we had to leave), I could tell it was a Hispanic home and we knock on the door, and this guy who doesn't look Hispanic starts talking to us in English. He was really nice though so we talked to him outside for a little bit. Then, he mentions something about Honduras, and I said wait... where are you from? And he said Honduras! So I started talking to him in Spanish and his eyes got super wide and he opened up a ton because he spoke Spanish a lot better than English. As we're talking, I asked him if he's met with missionaries before, and he said, "oh yeah, I was baptized when I was eight, and we went as a family for a while, but then we moved and we kind of lost contact, and when we moved to the states, I had no idea where to find the church." Um okay. It's not every day you find a member. He told us that he lived there with his whole family and he opened the door and I kid you not, I heard angels singing the hallelujah chorus because behind the door was this huge, adorable family all sitting down eating family dinner. When he opened the door they all said "hola!!" It was a real life Clark Griswald "hallelujah" moment. They were in the middle of eating, and we didn't have much time, but we set up a return appointment (which we have since followed up on and we taught almost the whole family!). It's not every day you find a part member family who loves missionaries and is super excited to see you and wants you to come back and teach everyone.
Meanwhile, that appointment in the south that we were worried about cancelled, so we would have been wasting our time waiting in the south. God really does have a plan and will lead us if we let Him.
Yeah, that was a good day! But then the next day, we found out about all the craziness in Baton Rouge which I'm sure you’ve heard about. The rest of the week we were on very tight restrictions. We have boundaries of where we can and can't go, and even within our boundaries we're not allowed to go to sketchier neighborhoods, which is where some of our investigators are. We've been on lock-down basically, making a lot of phone calls and teaching lessons over the phone, baking a lot, reading a ton of scriptures, and playing badminton in our apartment. Good times! We're hoping things settle down and that people will stop being dumb so that we can go out and work again.
Sorry this was so long. I was just super excited. Tender mercies are all around us! We just have to keep our eyes and hearts open to find them!
Les quiero mucho!
Hermana Sorensen
Sorry this was so long. I was just super excited. Tender mercies are all around us! We just have to keep our eyes and hearts open to find them!
Les quiero mucho!
Hermana Sorensen