Hello everyone!
The weeks are flying by! I can't
believe that we are in week 5 of the transfer and that it is september
19th, what the heck! I am so so excited for general conference, I need
to start preparing myself for it. I think it kinda works like prayer. We
need to watch and listen with sincere hearts and with real intent,
going with questions and seeking for answers. I know that the more we
put into preparing ourselves for it, the more we will get out of it.
Last
wednesday we had our district meeting in bay roberts and it was my
favourite district meeting yet. A question that was posed was "why do
you want to the gospel to be true?" Some of you may have a firm
knowledge that it is true but some of you may not. So if you don't have
that firm belief, why do you want the gospel to be true? Another thing
that we talked about was going into modes or putting on masks. It's a
lot a lot easier for a missionary to just go into a "knocking doors"
mode or a teaching mode than to actually allow ourselves to change. It's
easy to go into a church mode and then for the rest of the week forget
about what we learned and make no effort to change. When we're fake we
see who we are and then who we should be and then for a certain amount
of time pretend to be who we should be but with no intent to stay as
that person and with every intent to just go back to being who we are.
When we're real and don't go into a mode or put on a mask we acknowledge
the person that we are and see who we should be. First we have to
desire to become that person, then we have to believe that we can become
that person and then we have to start making changes that will bridge
the gap between who we are and who we can be. In district meetin we also
talked about... Blitz week! haha so blitz week is this competition
throughout the mission and it's usually just zone against zone but this
time it's district against district, and abby will appreciate this,
there's 13 districts haha;) we get certain points for doing certain
things and before district meeting I was totally ready to just go into
this blitz week mode haha and just go so hard because I'm competitive
and whatever haha but I ended up having a blitz week change of heart.
The spirit softened my heart and taught me. Of course I want to win
still haha (we are in 3rd right now) but the things that we are
challenged to do are really just things that we should be doing already
and I've realized that the point of the blitz week is to aim for a
lasting change. so it started on sunday and it will end this coming sunday.
So something that is super super exciting is MARGARET GOT BAPTIZED ON SATURDAY!!!
President Pratt called us last week and told us not to wait until her
trial and to go ahead with the baptism so we asked margaret when she
would like to be baptised and she said this weekend (which was last
weekend) haha so that was crazy telling everyone about the date switch
but that was not the craziest part. I keep telling myself that the next
baptism will go more smoothly haha but somehow they just keep getting
crazier. Most of saturday
was spent in the font and it was nasty. The pump was broken and so
instead of sucking up the water it was shooting out old water and a
bunch of other things. In the end margaret was able to be baptized (an
hour later than what the time was originally set as) but the baptism was
so good:) During the talk talk that sister earl was giving before the
ordination, I looked around the chapel and just had this "aha" moment.
I'm starting to finally get it I think. These people have made such an
impact on my life and I am just so invested in each of their lives as
well. At the end of the days we are exhausted. Emptying out a font with
bowls is not the funnest or easiest job haha, planning for and
continually worrying about our investigators and the members is pretty
stressful but at the same time I could just not imagine going through
life without meeting these people. Their problems are my problems and
what brings them joy brings me joy. It's taken time and I'm not fully
where I want to be yet but slowly I am starting to have enough faith to
put both feet fully in the mission.
One last
thought. Last week in our lesson we had with margaret we talked about
gifts of the spirit. sister earl came with us and told us how charity is
the greatest gift. We read from moroni 7 (my favourite chapter from the
book of mormon) and it says that Heavenly Father bestows charity upon
all those who are true followers of His Son. Charity is a gift and is
something that I am continually praying for. Sister earl then asked what
charity is and we said the pure love of Christ and then she asked us
what that is (this is why I love bringing sister earl to lessons). We
said a few answers but then she had us read verse 45 and told us that in
that verse were the 13 characteristics of charity. 45 And charity
Also,
I am starting to say "Where's it to?" instead of "where is it" or
"where is it by" haha and I love it. Oh yeah and It was exchanges this
week so I got to spend friday
with sister Moojalsky! (from mountain view, her family had been
evacuated but they are back in their home now:)) And bailey nelson gets
here in 2 weeks!
love you all<3
love sister wood
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