Well Hello my dear family and friends. :)
Well, this week. WOW. This week.
so, we started off with a really good Zone meeting about
prayer and faith, and how we can use it to find people. It was one of the
most amazing Zone meetings I've been to yet! It is really helping Sister
Longhurst and I re-evaluate our area and see how we can improve the work that's
being done here and come up with ideas of how to find people in such a vast
area. So yeah. We're excited to see how this will help us. :)
On Wednesday, we were going to try some homes on a street
called Ila Lane, and noticed a do Not contact there. So, we called up
Bishop McIntyre (whose name I have a terrible time remembering), and asked what
he knew about it. he told us that he didn't know, so of course we were
going to go contact it and see why. (Let's face it-- you can't escape the
Church. Once we meet you, you'll always be on somebody's list, and there
will always be somebody brave enough to go contact you.) Well, we knock
on the door, and the wife, Jodie McAbee, answers it and lets us in! We
talk for a while, and she explains that while she's not a member, her husband
is, and had been talking about starting to come back to church with his son
Andrew! We were like "AWESOME! Can we come back to visit y'all
sometime?" And she said yes! So, we set up an appointment to
visit on Friday evening. The rest of the story will continue in a little
bit.
And Thursday was exciting-- Sister Longhurst hit her halfway
point, so she got to go to the temple! Isn't that super exciting?!
:D SO EXCITING!!! :D So I got to spend my day with the
Sister Training Leaders, Sister Lyman and Sister Dijkwell. It was super
fun! I have never had so much fun being in a trio. :) We were super
busy all afternoon and evening, and 9:00 PM came before I knew what
happened. And Sister Longhurst had an amazing time at the temple.
Eek! I can't wait until I get to go back! :D
Friday was a day of food. We started off the morning
by meeting Rosie, a less-active member who wants to go to the temple, but her
work schedule prohibits her from getting to church on Sundays. Well, we
saw her last week, and I had a really strong prompting to invite her to take
the time to walk the temple grounds and to feel the Spirit there. She
flatly turned it down, saying that she didn't have time and that it was too far
away. Needless to say, it was a little crushing to hear after feeling so
strongly to ask her to go. Well, we met up with her this Friday at this
place called "The Orchard House" for breakfast, and to read out of
the temple magazine like we usually do, and guess what?!?! SHE WENT AND
WALKED AROUND THE TEMPLE GROUNDS!!!!! Holy cow, this was HUGE progress
for her! According to Sister Longhurst, she has never kept a commitment,
so to follow through with a commitment that she didn't even promise to keep is
BIG. We asked her what it was like to walk the grounds, and she told us
about the peace she felt, and how she noticed how many people were coming in
and out. We answered that one day, that will be her. One day, she
will be one of the people walking in and out of the temple. It was a very
sweet and tender moment. After that, we went home to study, then went off
to lunch with Sister Lamar, who is a convert of 10 years, but is just coming
out of almost 9 years of inactivity. And she just adopted a brand-new
little baby, Nora (long story, don't ask). As we were there, we tried to
answer a question of hers about the Godhead (she was really confused with that
when we had dinner with her last week), but we don't really know if we were
able to answer it or not. But at least we tried! But we're going to
start going through Preach My Gospel with her, so maybe that will help her with
all of her questions... hopefully. And then that night, we had dinner
with a less-active lady, Jewel Black. it was good, but it was fast--
because we had to go visit the McAbees on Ila Street!
Talk about one of the most awkward visits I've ever
had. So, we go over, and Brother McAbee was like "yeah, I'm kind of
thinking of coming back, but the rest of the family except Andrew are Jehovah's
Witness and not interested and there's really nothing you can do to help
us." And we were like ".... oh." AND THEN, he's like
"Oh, excuse me, I gotta go out and help my wife out real fast."
HIS WIFE WASN'T EVEN IN THE HOUSE!!! O_O Missionary mode
totally kicked in and we were like "AH!!!! We're breaking rules
here!!!" But it ended up being okay-- she came into the house, we
shared a scripture, and got out.
... yeah. We aren't sure where to go now with
that. We'll find something to do though.
And on a last note, guess what?! WE GOT A NEW
INVESTIGATOR YESTERDAY!!!! :D Sarah Sheeter is 9, and the granddaughter
of an active couple. So her grandparents asked her mom if she could take
the lessons, and her mom said yes! So we went over Sunday, taught her the
first lesson, and set a baptism date for her! We aren't sure if she'll be
able to make it, because of doctors appointments and stuff, but we're really excited.
:) Her mom agreed to let Sarah take the lessons, because she said that it
wouldn't be fair to Sarah if she couldn't return to Heavenly Father because she
died of her heart condition and hadn't been saved yet. When her mom was
telling us that, it was a very tender moment. You can see how much the
mom, Mandy, loves Sarah. And Sarah is super sweet and totally prepared to
have the Gospel.
Well, that's it for this week! I love y'all, and keep
the faith!
Love,
Sister Empey
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