This week I got Steven's chocolate he sent me from Sweden. YUM>>>> He does get the best little brother award.
This week we had a lot of great experiences
- We had lunch with my trainer and her parents who were visiting the mission. WEIRDEST thing ever. She was wearing pants and she didn't even let me back her out when she was driving. So strange. She told us some stories of her post mission awkwardness and told us what the missionaries who have gone home that she has hungout with are REALLY like. It was pretty funny. We had a good time.
- One of our members goes to a "neighborhood spiritual group" and she invited them to listen to us! So neat! We had lunch and talked with 4 ladies all about the church and what we believed. They didn't actually ask that many weird questions, but some of them didn't even know we were Christian! It's so weird. I don't know how people get that idea. One of them was really excited and loved the story of the restoration and was so excited to read the Book of Mormon. The others were just quietly sitting and listening to learn, but she was actually excited. She talked to us for a while after, and I think she will let us teach her more! They asked questions about "well if I don't believe what you believe am I going to hell then?" and asked all about salvation and what it means. BUT I knew the one got it when at the end she said "Ok, so you are not trying to get everyone to be Mormon, but to help people be like Christ." YESSSSSSS.
-We went out to dinner with a member who brought a neighbor who we are going to start teaching. She's so sweet. They have been good friends for a while and she has been to church and learned a lot from her friend, but never has read the Book of Mormon or taken the discussions. Why? I don't even know. BUT she's open, and she even takes her daughter to achievement days, TAUGHT achievement days when the member was out of town, and she volunteered to help clean the church on Saturday. We are going back to teach her tomorrow.
- We had a day of service this week which was neat. The community is building a park and we all (the ward and people in the community) went and helped clean the land on Saturday afternoon. Some less actives came out, and alot of the members were able to talk to people they were working with about the church. Which was wonderful. And it was just fun to wear PANTSSS. We moved bricks and sand and mulched and it reminded me of my days in Uganda building the health clinic.
- We taught the young man who is a former investigator, he has a lot of.. deep questions about the universe, who God is and where he came from, how the universe began, and random things like that. Especially about the Godhead. There was a member who used to have similar questions when he was learning about the church, and we brought him and his wife and had a great discussion and he was able to help answer the questions better than we could! He will hopefully come to church next week.
- So there is a group down here of bible translators. It is an organization that goes to random parts of the world and learns their language and translates the bible into it. And their headquarters are here in Waxhaw. SO there are a lot of people here who definitely appreciate what we do because they are missionaries and have lived in other countries before too. I do love being around people who love the Bible and the word of God so much! There was a couple who belonged to this organization and they gave us water when we were out the other day and it was really hot ( it has been really hot this week!!) and they were asking us about what we do and basically very nicely telling us we were wrong because we believe we can "work our way to heaven" and trying to convert us. We just smiled and said thank you for the water and bore our testimonies of Christ and that only through Him we can be saved. I remember though the first night I came here that President was asking us what we had heard about Charlotte, or serving in the South and someone said "It's the Bible Belt, so I studied the Bible really hard!" President says "the Bible Belt doesn't mean you need to know your Bible better, it means you need to testify of the Book of Mormon more, you don't bring out your bible before your Book of Mormon." I guess that is true anywhere in the world, but especially here. There alot of people that really believe that Joseph Smith wrote the Book of Mormon and it's the story of Joseph Smith's life or something, because they never take the time to listen or read! It's about CHRIST people!
- Yesterday we had a lesson on missionary work in Relief Society. It was different being a missionary sitting in on this lesson, but it's great to hear the fears of the members and understand what their fears really are so that we can help them overcome their fears. BUT at the same time I had to restrain myself from wanting to just take over the lesson and say "GET OVER YOUR FEARS AND DO IT!!" But that's not what Christ would do :)
I know that the Book of Mormon is true! It really does come down to that. if the Book of Mormon is true, the church is true. If it's not, it's not. It's that simple.
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