Hello! It's good to write you all again. The weeks seem to keep getting shorter and shorter, which is a good thing but also a scary thing. I worry I won't take advantage of the time I have here as much as I should.
Some cool things from this week: Brother Rios, (the less active guy who fasted and as an answer we ran into him) Totally came to church yesterday with his whole family! How cool is that? I was so excited to see them all I could hardly hold it in! We plan to follow up with him to see how his experience was.
It was such a powerful fast and testimony meeting too! So many powerful people bearing their testimonies born. And our bishop bore his testimony as well. And that was cool. He had a really nasty surgery a few months ago and has been in brutal pain ever since, but his testimony as so powerful. He's an awesome man.
We also met a woman at a bus stop who told us "Yeah... I've met with you mormons before... But you lost me at John Smith's dishes" .... We were very confused for a bit, and had no idea how to respond to that... Then I realized where the mix up had happened: "Oh! The plates!" Haha, we got to clear up the misconception about that, and she also believed that it really was John Smith... Like from Pocohantos (spelling?). So that was a fun conversation.
And I've been thinking a lot about mom's. One of our investigator's was complaining about her Hashimoto's disease (again... spelling?) and how it totally wiped her out most days, and how he couldn't meet with us because of it. And everyone who knows what that was has taken it as a valid excuse saying things like "Oh yeah, that would give her lots of ups and downs." or "Oh really? I don't blame her at all, that's a really tough thing to go through!" And the whole time, I was getting confused, because my Mom suffers from the same disease, and it doesn't stop her at all!
Now maybe that's too much information to share, but the point I'm getting at is that the longer I'm out on my mission the more I realize what a blessing my mother has been to me. Literally nothing can stop her from doing 10x the tasks of an average human being, and working on like half of the sleep. What a woman! And if that was the only medical issue she was dealing with, that wouldn't be nearly as impressive as if she was dealing with all the physical and medical conditions she is dealing with! But nothing stops her!
And then I started thinking of all the amazing hard working women in my life that make everyone else in the world seem like a bunch of pansies! Both my grandmother's, my aunt's and adult cousin just to name a few. Elder Holland couldn't have picked a better topic for his talk because everything I am today I owe to my Mother and the other women in my life. Thank you so much for all you do.
Church is true, and families can be together forever. I know that to be true. With all my heart and soul. I know Joseph Smith was a true prophet of God. Not because of any physical proof, or intellectual research, but because of the burning in my heart I receive as I read the Book of Mormon and as I pray for a witness that it is true. I know that by small and simple things, great things to come to pass and the foundation of a lasting testimony comes through the small things like daily prayer, daily scripture study and weekly church attendance. And I know that we have a solemn responsibility to proclaim these things to the world. In the words of my wise mother: "I believe that is what eternity will feel like... We will long for those who we didn't help and we'll wish we could go back and work just a little harder, accept a little quicker and love a little more." Share the Gospel brothers and sisters. Share the good word with all you come in contact with.
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