Pelletiers

March 12, 2018

This week has been very interesting.

The first half of the week was really slow. Not many things were going on and it looked like that was going to be the pattern of the week. On Thursday, we weekly planned and it went a little longer, but every person that we are or want to be working with had a goal and plan as a to do. It was really nice to have everything in front of us, with no loose ends. That night, as we were trying to set up a visit with a less active youth, he told us that he was feeling a little sick and wouldn’t be able to come to any dinner appointments with us for the next little bit. We asked and he accepted the offer for a blessing. We went that night, talked for a little bit, and gave him a blessing. A couple days later, he told us that he was sick in the hospital, but that he was very grateful for the blessing and said,”Your blessing worked substantially, Thank you so much”. The power of prayer and blessing are real.

On Friday, we had District Leader Council where we discussed the Gospel of Jesus Christ and it’s essential role in our teaching. The Doctrine of Christ is the what and the why of the Gospel. They encouraged us to teach members, investigators, and the missionaries in our districts the Doctrine of Christ (Faith, Repentance, Covenants, Holy Ghost, Endure to the End) and to have it at the center of everything we do. We taught it the other day at Sister Vogel’s house, and I realized that it explains the science between scripture study. We show our faith by opening the scriptures, we repent and keep our end of the promise by actually studying them, and then Holy Ghost is given to us because of our study. This increases our faith and helps us to continue in an upward leading habit of daily scripture study! That is cool, right?! This is our new lesson that we are excited to teach to families as we help them discover ways to reach out to others.

On Friday, the morning was a little slow, but we went to an early morning appointment. When we got there, I felt like we should walk down the road that we had just come up. We did, and eventually, when it felt right, we turned around and went up to where we thought his house was. The building number was 124, so we were looking out for it, but couldn’t find the building. There was a man getting into his truck, so we asked him,”Hey! Do you know where building 124 is?” He replied,”There isn’t a building 124.” We asked him if he was sure, and he said back,”Positive, I’m the building manager.” It doesn’t seem like a big miracle, but of all of the people that could have been up there where we were looking, the Lord put, just at the right time, the building manager of the entire complex, who also knew with complete surety, that a building 124 didn’t exist. With that, we knew that the person in the fictional building 124 wasn’t interested, and that it was time to move on with our day. It was a really cool tender mercy.

After that stop by, we had studies, and it was very refreshing. We had a rich study session, and during morning prayers, it was a lot more personal than I’ve felt in a long time. I thought of Elder Kikuchi’s Ensign Article from August 2009,”Opening the Heavens”. Follow that counsel and you will have MUCH more peace in your life. The Spanish Elders, recently, have found a lot of people that speak english. They gave us a BIG list of people, so we went to find those people. After a spiritual prompting hit Elder Smith, we went to see Elberta. She was very nice, and welcomed us in. Henry, her husband, founded a church and was the pastor for 30 years. Elberta knows the scriptures VERY well and we had a very good conversation with them. They didn’t accept baptism, but Elberta understood exactly what we were talking about and it seems like, with a little bit of help, they could accept the gospel. We had a lot more cool experiences that day, like visiting Guy. He told us that somehow, we came into his life at just the right time and have really helped. Guy was a member referral and we were THRILLED to meet him. I know that God works through each of us to bring truth to others. We also made a really good dinner 🙂

One of the most amazing things from this week though, was a lesson that we had with the Pelletiers. Gary works in the same building as Br. Marble and has been seeking for truth lately. Br. Marble offered to have us teach him a little about what we believe, and he was interested to learn a little. This has been one of the first times on my mission that we have taught a full family that was referred by a member. Basically, Gary and Lauren have a lot of questions. They soaked up everything that we were talking about and were noticeably surprised at some of the things that we talked about. They are very prepared, and we are so excited to teach them! Their daughter even asked for her own Book of Mormon 🙂

Basically, our work is getting better and better. More members are getting excited about sharing the gospel and more people are inviting their friends. Also, a random family who moved from Bridgeport showed up at church this week, and the husband and son are not baptized 🙂 One of the members kept encouraging them to come, and now they are committed and really excited. The son is even going to a big youth activity this weekend. Waterbury is doing well. We love it.

Lessons learned this week: