Monday, February 10, 2014

Email from 1-27-14

Hi fam! We just got back from playing futbol! So much fun. We were the only hermanas that showed up to play but it was still fun,. Danny and a few other members came to play as well which made it super fun to play with natives and not just missionaries. Always after I play futbol I ask myself why the heck I didnt play in High School. I  have racked my brain trying to think of why I ever quit playing soccer but I cant remember why or even when. I hope there are people when I get back that like to play. It is such a fun game! 

Well, this week was def a good one! Nothing too crazy or eventful to share just that we are still working so hard to prepare Javier for his baptism on the 8th. 

So we have 3 DARLING girls who are all from the Dominican Republic (have I ever mentioned how much I LOVE dominicans?!) two are sisters and then another and they are 13, 14, 16 and this saturday was a young womens activity so we were super excited to bring them. We hyped up this activity all week and they were so excited for it. We went and pick up Anaika first and then headed over to grab the two sisters, Ana Christina and Andreina and on the bus to the chapel (we were running a little late so it was 6:20 and the activity started at 6) I get a call from the young womens president saying she is outside of Madrid and something came up adn she wont be able to make it and that she has no counselors so that we would have to be in charge of the whole activity. We were on intercambios that day so I frantically called Hna Scheu to ask for ideas and thankfully her and her comp were headed to the chapel in an hour so she told me to just play games with the girls until she got there and they would stop off and get ice cream and think of the Spiritual thought. I panicked! Seriously, yes, now I can come up with a spiritual thought on the fly but to entertain 7 young girls, the oldest being our one 16yr old for a whole hour panicked me! We played all sorts of different games but it was just an epic failure and I am pretty sure the girls were just laughing out of pity. Oh well. I was able to talk to the girls the whole way there and back to get to know them better and form a frienship with them which was a blessing. 

Also, we had Zone Conference this week and it was amazing and I left so edified and uplifted with new goals to mejorar as a missionary. We talked about how to really use the Book of Mormon in our lessons and the convincing power this Book has. We did an awesome practica that I loved. We paired off with another companionship and were given a question. One companioship had to answer the question without using the Book of Mormon and then we switched and the other companionship answered the question but was allowed to use the Book of Mormon. It was powerful. The spirit that entered that mini lesson the second we opened the Book Of Mormon and read from it was powerful. You could almost touch it. Then just two days later Hermana Scheu and I had a lesson with our family maravillosa (Enrique y Adriana) and it was tough but SO good. And we used the Book of Mormon to answer every question he had. Enrique unfortunately read a ton of antimormon stuff on line last week so when we showed up for our lesson on Friday he was fired up to try and prove us wrong. The first 5 or so minutes we were both so annoyed because this is never how he has even been. He was going on and on about poligamy and Joseph Smith and random stuff about the Book of Mormon. It was ridiculous and so not like him. He just kept going on and on about the the anti mormon stuff and all the "hard" questions that we heard about in the CCM.  I whispered under my breath to Hermana Scheu "dont get discouraged, just say a pray." We said a silent pray in our hearts and opened the scriptures and literally the Spirit just took over and guided us to several scriptures to answer his questions and resolve all of these doubts. It was truly a neat experience because there were several stuff that I said in contrary to the whole poligamy question that I had never even thought of before, the spirit just kept bringing things to our mind to say to help him resolve these doubts and understand and believe in the truth. It never got really heated but it defnitely was a nice, soft lesson. We walked out of the door, stopped and looked at each other and just said "wow, thank goodness for the spirit. That was incredible to witness" Truly there would be no such work without the spirit. I am so not capable by myself to do this work and answer all of these questions, but with the Spirit as your constant companion and as the true teacher, and with the Book of Mormon this work is possible, hearts are softened, and people are brought to understand and believe in the truth. Makes me think of Alma 26:11-13. There is nothing greater than this work. I am so in love with life and this work its just crazy!

Hermana Scheu and I have been studying consecration and humility this last week as we are truly trying to give our whole hearts to the Lord and hold nothing back. Just every single day I am in awe at how perfect this gospel is and how loving and merciful our Heavenly Father is. I invite you all to truly study the gospel principle of consecration. I have a long way to go and much more to study but day by day I am learning how to give my whole heart to the Lord and have my will swallowed up in His will. 

Also, another thing I have been thinking about a lot lately is how truly truly grateful I am that I was raised in a home where we said family prayer and read the scriptures every single day together. There is power in doing this. Thank you so so so much dad for never lettting our snotty, annoyed attitudes stop you from making us pray and read every day before we left for school and before we went to bed. Thank you so much! 

Thank you so much for all of your love and support! I feel it every day! I hope you all have a great week! 

Love, Hermana Heims

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