BE REAL AND LOVE THEM!!!

July 21, 2014

So this week was an interesting one! :) 

Interesting becasue we did a lot of fun activites this week that broke up the usual to do of missionary work.  

We did a lemondae stand of Friday that was a HIT!! The Elders in our zone played in a community basketball tournament.  It was 3 on 3 basketball.  They were all dressed up in their proselyting clothes (white shirts, ties, and slacks). The sisters set up a free lemonade stand and talked to all of the people there. At first, Sister Akin and I felt very stiff. We didn't know what to do (this wasn't the "normal" missionary work we were used to....we had never done a lemonade stand before.)  We both realized that these people just wanted us to be thier friends and be "real" with them (as they would say). I'm pretty sure the missionaries were some of the only white people there. I love how friendly and open everyone else was. They let us come in and give them lemonade and let the Elders play basketball with them. It was a really neat experience. Once we both relaxed, we had a really good time!! :) Sister Akin and I ended up talking to one of the referrees (who happened to be the most respeced man there). He was really interested in what we were doing and we ended up giving him a Book of Mormon and sharing the Restoration with him.  Another cute little story: we had this little boy that came up to us and asked us how he could be like them when he grows up!! 

The other fun thing that we did was an open house on Sunday. Our stake opened up the church for tours and members brought their friends and people came to see what the church was like. We also had the mission's New and Returning Member Fireside there at the Mt Vernon building. It was really fun to see people come in and see the church. I remember being in the chapel before there were a lot of people in there and felt so much peace!! I love the Spirit that is in the chapel!! 

I also learned a great lesson in planning inspired goals that will help us to reach the potential that God has for us! 

On Monday we didn't do our usual preparation day activities. (So if I repeat a little bit of what we did on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, bear with me!)  We did our weekly planning. We hadn't done a good weekly planning session the entire time I was here. So we buckled down and did it! I felt that we were setting goals that God wanted us to. Sister Akin and I both felt inspired to do certain things that week and to focus on certain areas of the work. One of them was geting to know and visiting the members. ( I will talk a little more about this later.)  

Tuesday we went to District meetings as usual. We had a really great District meeting. We set goals as a district of things that we wanted to work on.  I was so excited about going out and working after that! It was a big pick me up! I felt that the Lord was really on our side and that he wanted us to accomplish these goals!! One of the goals we wanted to work on was getting 7 member visits this week.  We only had one or two set up, so on the way home from District Meeting we were calling members. We got two appointments set up for that night!! The Lord truly blessed us becasue of our willingness to set a high goal and ask members if we could come over and meet with them! And we hit our goal this week for meeting with the members! 

Here is another quick story that I remembered on Tuesday that helped me to be so excited about going out to acheive the goals we had set: 

I had a really neat experience with Sister Donato two Saturdays ago. We did a little biltz in their area and we prayed together that we would find three new investigators. I was the voice of the prayer and I remember the Spirit specifically directing me to pray for patience in our work today. And I asked that as we exercised patience that we would see miracles!! Well, we did! The last person that we talked to became a new investigator and said that she would be baptized on August 30th! It was a testimony builder to me of the power of prayer. 

Sister Udall with Sister Donato.

So God does hear and answer our prayes. He will help us to acheive the goals that we have set with his guidance. So don't be discouraged when the results don't come right away. It will take time and patience. (Whether it's patience for 1 1/2 hours or for days or months, the blessings will come!) God has promised us blessings when we do his will. 

It was a really great week!! God is so good to each and every one of us!!
I love you all! Have a great week!

Love,

Sister Udall