Hi family! So Bishop Williams called? He's so nice. He always speaks very highly of the sister missionaries. When we called to tell him about transfers we had him guess. Without saying anything we got him thinking that we were both leaving. He was relieved to hear that we were both staying. I am SO happy to be staying here! My companion and I are both so excited. We can just keep working uninterrupted.
THANK YOU all for the birthday package! That was perfect! I loved everything. I'm sending a picture with me in the shirt and birthday headband. And wow, chocolate fishy crackers? Can life get better? I submit that it CANNOT! Mom, I love the Diabetes poem. That was a very touching letter to many people i'm sure. And ask my companion, I was very excited about the star wars stamps. :-) I'm so glad that you're feeling better.
Did everyone over there like conference? I loved it here. I heard a lot of things that reminded me of you. Like Elder Holland's talk. He talked about how his parents sacrificed so much to help their children have the best life they could. That is what you mom and dad have always done for us.
Hi everybody! Well it's that time of year where the weather can't seem to make up its mind. It's been really hot the past week but the last few days it has started raining and today it's slightly chilly.
It's transfers again this week but this time I get to stay here with the same companion. I am SO excited! We have a lot of investigators that are SO close to being baptized and we were worried what would happen if we left. And I absolutely love working with this sister. One reason is that she does work. She is a missionary inside out. It's easy to focus on the work with her. We can share our feelings without fear of offending each other. We can trust each other. We can learn from each other. We teach well together. We both love the people we teach. We both love being missionaries. That's the main one I think.
I hope everyone got a chance to watch General Conference. It was great to hear a living prophet of God and other chosen servants speak to our needs. We had a family we are teaching come and watch it. When the prophet spoke they were really excited and attentive. During the talk Jose the father started crying. After the talk was over he had to excuse himself for a little bit outside. I know the words of the prophet touched his heart. He knows it's true. That's one family that is really close to being baptized. I love how the prophet spoke on gratitude. My favorite parts were when he said "refuse to remain in the realm of negative thought" and "to live with gratitude ever in our hearts is to touch heaven." I really believe that. Gratitude brings humility which is what ultimately invites revelation. I also loved how he powerfully testified of the Savior and his mission. That really is central to what we believe. I also liked an example in the talk by Per G. Malm. He told of a mother who decided not to be angry with her son after he broke some of the eggs that he carried home from the store. She said "It will not make the eggs whole again." What's in the past is in the past. We can only make the best of what we have and look forward with faith. Being angry at what has happened will not make broken eggs whole again. Instead I think the heat of contention will only encourage them to rot faster making everyone involved in the situation unhappy. Contrary to popular belief we CAN decide how we react to things no matter the circumstance. No one can MAKE us feel a certain way. It may be hard but hey, you can afford to be stubborn. "Refuse to remain in the realm of negative thought." Rather run for your life!
Anyway, this has been a great week. I love applying the training we received over the last two weeks. The mission president really focused on teaching people not lessons and how the most important part of teaching is just listening. Then we are able to hear the still small voice of the Spirit and know what the people need to hear. We had a good experience with that last night. We taught an investigator Bobby who has been very stubborn, opinionated and negative. Yet he said he likes or visits. He seemed to want to argue whatever we had to say. So this time we mostly just listened and he started to open up more. I could feel how much Heavenly Father loves him. We really wanted him to offer a kneeling prayer at the end of the lesson and amazingly he got down on his knees without much argument. We found out he has a really strong belief in God and has been humbled by his circumstances. We have a lot more hope for his progress now. Never judge someone without really listening with love first.
We have a young couple that we are teaching, Josie and Paul. They have five kids all under the age of 5. They are PREPARED to hear the gospel! Their questions are sincere and they have a desire to know. It's great.
We had a miracle last week. We visited an inactive sister. Her nonmember sister was there. After a few minutes of discussion she #1 asked us for a Book of Mormon #2 asked us to give her some background so she knows what she's reading and #3 said she'd like to meet and discuss more so she could learn about what we believe. We were thinking, did she visit the MTC or something? We're seeing her again today.
Remember everyone, whenever you set a righteous goal, there WILL be obstacles. I see that every single day. If you study and pray sincerely and feel something is right, go for it no matter the things that go wrong. Many times if things keep going wrong it means you're on the right path. Just keep looking to God for guidance instead of the world.
Thank you for everyone that wrote me last week! I really appreciate it and I will write back as soon as I can. Everybody have a wonderful week!
Hermana Evans
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