I'm sorry! I didn't take a lot of pictures this week!
I should have! And you'll see why. Or read why. You get
the idea.
So, this week has been AMAZING. Both Sister Robinson
and I have been studying about obedience this week. And as we've been
striving to be more obedient, we have been very blessed in several ways.
We officially picked up the Halls as a new investigator this
week! Their names are Heather and Joshua. Sadly, Joshua doesn't
count as an investigator because he's 8, but they're both are like "let's
get baptized now!". So, we're going to go teach them every Tuesday
and Thursday and get them baptized soon. They're both super sweet kids.
Heather is 9, super involved in Girl Scouts, and when we asked her why
she wanted to get baptized, she just simply replied "A lot of my family
is, so why shouldn't I?" I love it! It's not even a thought to
NOT get baptized! I can't wait to work with them a little more. The
mom, Brittany, is nice too, and wants to be active in the church again.
But it doesn't sound like the dad is really interested at the moment.
I'm not quite sure if he's a member or not, but with the rest of his family
wanting to go to church, he's bound to become interested at some point, yeah?
But sadly, Mary is not progressing.... she started smoking
again, and she fell down her stairs, so she's had a hard time getting out of
bed, which means it's been hard to get to church. When we went to go
visit with her, she just asked us to pray with her, and she wanted me to say
the prayer. As I said the prayer, I was filled so strongly with the
Spirit. By the end of it, I think all three of us were almost in tears. And
as we left, we knew that we gave Mary what she needed to hear in that moment.
Then Sister Alder, who was going to give Mary a ride to church, told us
of the conversation she had with Mary before she came to church. Sister
Alder had stopped by before church to see how Mary was doing, and through out
the conversation, she kept saying "I should have gotten up to go to
church. I've been wanting to meet new people and friends so bad."
While she couldn't make it to church this week, she's not going to let
her smoking hold her back anymore. And she said that she was really going
to commit to quitting smoking again. I have complete faith in her-- she's
been desiring to change her life for good for so long; I know that she will be
able to do so.
And Destinee-- her baptism date is being moved up!
When she realized that she had softball clinics on the fifteenth, she
knew that the date had to be moved. She started looking at later dates,
but between softball and lacross and school, nothing was going to be open.
SO! We're going to have her baptism THIS SATURDAY! HOLY SNOT!
SO EXCITING!!!! I just love her desire to be baptized. The ward has
been so good about fellowshipping her and making sure she's involved in YW, and
I think that has really helped.
Also, we got to feed baby lambs this week.
..... I bet you're wishing for photos, but.........
I forgot to bring my camera with me that day. Bummer.
There's a lady in the South Slope ward, Sister Bennett, and
she has a little farm full of goats, sheep, and Chihuahuas. (No, seriously, she
has 15+ Chihuahuas. She breeds them, so there's at least 15 of them at a
time.) When we ate dinner at her house the other night, there was a
couple from Jerome, ID that came and bought 6 of the baby lambs for a petting
zoo, so dinner ran a little long. Poor Sister Bennett hadn't even had a
chance to sit down and eat dinner and it was time to feed some of the lambs she
keeps in the house! (She keeps some of them in the house to nurse them
back to health.) So, we offered to feed the lambs while she ate. It
was super fun! We told her that she could call for our help anytime, so
maybe at some point you'll have pictures of us feeding baby lambs or goats
(coming soon!).
And.... my shoes.
...... yup. A puppy got them. It wasn't one of
Sister Bennett's though. There's this family, called the Earls, and they
have this puppy named Jake. And I was stupid enough to take off my shoes
last night when we were there to send progress records to our ward mission
leaders.
...... need I say more? Jake now will have some new
chew toys. Soon. Very soon. It was sweet-- Sister Earl felt
so bad and was like "We owe you new shoes!"
.... but, strangely enough, it doesn't matter. I don't
care that Jake chewed up the one shoe-- even though they were expensive.
It's just like, "Eh, I have other shoes to wear. I'll just
make sure he doesn't chew those ones up too." It's so interesting--
things that would have mattered before, like a chewed up pair of 100 dollar
shoes-- they don't matter anymore. And it's because I'm doing His work.
I understand that it's not going to interfere with what I'm trying to do
out here. I understand that those shoes aren't my entire life and that it
represents who-knows-what. All they are is a pair of shoes.
By the ways, do you know how weird it is to say that your
brother chewed up your shoes? Just saying.
Anyways, I love y'all, and I just want to let you know that
I'm doing well. I still love it out here, and I'm working as hard as
ever.
Hope you guys are doing well too!
Love,
Sister Empey
No comments:
Post a Comment