Bueno!
I hope you all had a fantastic first week of school! It's weird seeing all the kids around here go back to school because our lives are so different now and school is not on our minds at all.
Anyways, this week was awesome! We got to meet with the mission president and he's just an amazing president, and I love his wife so much. We went to the French Market last P Day and it was everything you would ever expect from New Orleans. Jazz everywhere, people selling alligator heads, restaurants with alligator on a stick, voodoo dolls, and BEIGNETS! I love my mission and my area if I haven't already said that. :)
I hope you all had a fantastic first week of school! It's weird seeing all the kids around here go back to school because our lives are so different now and school is not on our minds at all.
Anyways, this week was awesome! We got to meet with the mission president and he's just an amazing president, and I love his wife so much. We went to the French Market last P Day and it was everything you would ever expect from New Orleans. Jazz everywhere, people selling alligator heads, restaurants with alligator on a stick, voodoo dolls, and BEIGNETS! I love my mission and my area if I haven't already said that. :)
This week was great in terms of missionary work as well. We were able to get a hold of a lot of people that we haven't been able to contact in a few weeks which was great. One of them was Daisy, one of our investigators. Turns out, she dropped her phone in water 2 weeks ago and hasn't gotten it fixed yet. We were driving to another appointment, but felt like we should drive by Daisy's house and she was out in her front yard with her daughter. Hooray for being led by the Holy Ghost! We set up an appointment for the next day.
I'm going to start a new paragraph for this one because Saturday was just our miracle day. It started off with Daisy's lesson. Daisy is the one that I challenged to be baptized my 3rd day here, and she accepted, but didn't feel ready right away, so we didn't give her a date. When we taught her on Saturday, we just had an amazing lesson, the Spirit was there, our Spanish was just coming to us, and it was great. The best part though, WE GOT A BAPTISMAL DATE!!! WOO!! Now, I know, all of you RM's are rolling your eyes and saying "whelp, good luck" but still this is a huge step for her, and for our area in general, so we're going to work our tails off so that this goes through! That was a great start to our day! Then we spent the rest of the day in Metairie. Everyone we wanted to see was home, which was a miracle, we got a ton of contacts, and we found another one of our investigators who we hadn't been in contact with. Turns out, she lost her crazy job but got another one, and was actually pretty happy about it because her old work was stressing her out like crazy. And the best part is, she's free on Sundays now! Her name is Karla and we love her dearly! She's like our aunt. :) Anyways, she came to church with us yesterday. I was so happy we caught her on Saturday so that she could be there yesterday, and I think she had a great time. We didn't have a ton of time to talk to her after, but she stayed for all three hours, met a ton of members, and seemed really happy. We're going back this week to talk more about it, and we're probably going to challenge her to be baptized too. We have another family, Patricia's family, who we want to challenge to be baptized this week as well. The work is going forward and I'm so blessed to be able to watch it happen. I love being a missionary! Also, another little miracle on Saturday was that the weather was beautiful! When we go to Metairie we just park and then walk around to all of our investigators and less actives, so we were super grateful it wasn't 115 degrees again. In the middle of the day, it did start to get a little hot, but when we asked a random Latina lady for directions to someone's house, she invited us into her house (we helped her carry in her groceries from her car... service really works) and we got to introduce the church a little bit, and she gave us otter pops. We got air conditioning, otter pops, and a little message in during the brief hot spot that day. Miracles on miracles!
I'm going to start a new paragraph for this one because Saturday was just our miracle day. It started off with Daisy's lesson. Daisy is the one that I challenged to be baptized my 3rd day here, and she accepted, but didn't feel ready right away, so we didn't give her a date. When we taught her on Saturday, we just had an amazing lesson, the Spirit was there, our Spanish was just coming to us, and it was great. The best part though, WE GOT A BAPTISMAL DATE!!! WOO!! Now, I know, all of you RM's are rolling your eyes and saying "whelp, good luck" but still this is a huge step for her, and for our area in general, so we're going to work our tails off so that this goes through! That was a great start to our day! Then we spent the rest of the day in Metairie. Everyone we wanted to see was home, which was a miracle, we got a ton of contacts, and we found another one of our investigators who we hadn't been in contact with. Turns out, she lost her crazy job but got another one, and was actually pretty happy about it because her old work was stressing her out like crazy. And the best part is, she's free on Sundays now! Her name is Karla and we love her dearly! She's like our aunt. :) Anyways, she came to church with us yesterday. I was so happy we caught her on Saturday so that she could be there yesterday, and I think she had a great time. We didn't have a ton of time to talk to her after, but she stayed for all three hours, met a ton of members, and seemed really happy. We're going back this week to talk more about it, and we're probably going to challenge her to be baptized too. We have another family, Patricia's family, who we want to challenge to be baptized this week as well. The work is going forward and I'm so blessed to be able to watch it happen. I love being a missionary! Also, another little miracle on Saturday was that the weather was beautiful! When we go to Metairie we just park and then walk around to all of our investigators and less actives, so we were super grateful it wasn't 115 degrees again. In the middle of the day, it did start to get a little hot, but when we asked a random Latina lady for directions to someone's house, she invited us into her house (we helped her carry in her groceries from her car... service really works) and we got to introduce the church a little bit, and she gave us otter pops. We got air conditioning, otter pops, and a little message in during the brief hot spot that day. Miracles on miracles!
Right now, in terms of goals, we're really pushing member involvement in lessons, in finding, and in getting referrals. We talked to a lot of members this week about getting more member present lessons and we have some set up for this week. We also talked to the Relief Society President (who I think should be the president of the United States because she literally knows everyone and is so on top of everything... we love that woman) and got her help with creating a sign up list to go to lessons with us. She's going to help us make a plan for the whole ward to get more people to church every week, especially people that the members bring on their own (people we haven't contacted yet). I really have high hopes for this ward and the miracles we could see here. We're already seeing a lot of miracles, but I know that there is so much potential here just waiting to be harvested. I'm SO excited about the work and I'm ready to hit the ground running and do everything I can for the people here.
I'm starting to understand a little bit more about how Heavenly Father feels about us. With our investigators and less actives, I love them SO much and I would do ANYTHING to get them to come to church and to take steps in their faith. It makes me sad when they don't follow through, not because of my own satisfaction or statistics, but because I love them and know they could be even happier as they follow the principles of the Gospel. I think that's how Heavenly Father feels about us when we disobey. He doesn't just want to control us or punish us, but He loves us so much that He wants to bless us with everything we could have. Also, on Sunday we were in Gospel Principles and we were talking about the Plan of Salvation, and the whole time there was this little girl, probably like 18 months old, running around, and she kept falling every couple minutes and then she would get back up and keep running. It was so cute and everyone was just smiling! I realized that that's what the Plan of Salvation is all about. We're like little kids. We fall down sometimes. We run into walls that were right in front of us, but that we didn't see coming. But when we fall, Heavenly Father doesn't get super mad and wonder why we didn't know better, He just helps us dust ourselves off, stand up, and keep running! I think we need to be a little more patient with ourselves and not get so down on ourselves when we trip and fall, figuratively. Obviously we need to try harder to be a little better, but life is about falling down and getting back up again, and someday, we'll reach our eternal goals.
The Church is true! I love this work so much and I'm so excited about everything I get to do every day. The people here are amazing and I love being able to work with new people every day and try to help them understand that they have a loving Heavenly Father who has a plan for them specifically. None of the words I say in lessons are my words, and I feel so humbled and blessed that Heavenly Father trusts me with the Holy Ghost to speak through me. He loves us all so much! Don't ever forget that!
I love you all so much too! Have a fantastic week, and I'll talk to you all next week!
XOXO,
Hermana Sorensen
The Church is true! I love this work so much and I'm so excited about everything I get to do every day. The people here are amazing and I love being able to work with new people every day and try to help them understand that they have a loving Heavenly Father who has a plan for them specifically. None of the words I say in lessons are my words, and I feel so humbled and blessed that Heavenly Father trusts me with the Holy Ghost to speak through me. He loves us all so much! Don't ever forget that!
I love you all so much too! Have a fantastic week, and I'll talk to you all next week!
XOXO,
Hermana Sorensen