It has been another awesome week! Missionary life now is just so... normal. Haha it is just my life! Does that make sense? Like it isn't strange anymore, it is just what I do every day. And it is great!
Lately, I have really come to know that this is the Lord's work. He is in charge. His powerful eye is watching over everything we do. A few weeks ago, we made a pretty typical contact. We met a man named J. out in his garage cleaning a fan. We started to talk to him, and he talked to us for probably 15 minutes about how religions divided people and how religious people can be hypocrites. He wasn't exactly unpleasant about it, but we finally left inviting him to church. He didn't give us his information to have the Elders come by. Much to our surprise, we saw him with a member at church on Sunday(she had picked him up). Continuing our shock, he was at our dinner appointment with that same member (Sister Perez) that night! We taught him the Restoration. This week, we taught him again and then passed him off to the Elders. He is getting baptized in October and came to church again on Sunday. Surprised? Yes, we were too!! Apparently after we left his house that first day, he was impressed that we hadn't judged him. He went in and said to his uncle, "I think I want to be a Mormon." His uncle then told him about a friend of his who was Mormon, Sister Perez. Sister Perez was on it! She offered to take him to church and invited him to dinner. Jermaine is someone really special. He is so ready for a new start to his life. In our second lesson, he brought out all the nitty and gritty of Church history that he had found online - polygamy, Official Declaration 2, the Black Hawk war, etc. We were able to answer his questions and testify, and he is as solid as ever! He is unfazed by all this anti information he found! We are just so amazed that this seemingly normal contact with this person who was seemingly unaffected has ended up changing his life forever. The Lord works.
We had another contact this week with an atheist. Surprisingly, it was one of the most spiritual and powerful contacts I have ever had. (A contact is just when you talk to someone, introduce who you are, and invite them to act) He was a real searcher of truth. It was so powerful to testify to him of the Book of Mormon, and he was rather open to it. It is just so fascinating that he was more open to truth than a lot of "Christians" we know. I always wish to be someone who looks for truth and goodness, no matter where it comes from.
I still love speaking Spanish, a lot. Haha it is just something I love to do. I want to keep it up forever. I feel so blessed always to be a Spanish-speaking missionary.
Our families are doing so-so; we would really like to meet with them more! However, miracles keep occurring and we keep talking to/finding a lot of new people! The English Elders have 4 investigators right now with a baptismal date that were our contacts. I am so glad that we are all on the same team and part of this great, giant work with 80,000 other awesome Sisters and Elders. It is great to be a little, different part of so many stories. Someone said something in a meeting once that has stuck with me. These people are not just part of "our mission stories." When it gets down to it, when Jim tells the story of his conversion, he won't say, "Sister Smith and Sister Johnson were working hard but with little success. Then they fasted and prayed and worked extra hard and found me by a miracle!" It will be, "I was at a point in my life when I didn't have anything left. I prayed for God to give me a sign. And then I found two missionaries at the park who brought a message that He cared." We are part of their story. What a beautiful work.
I have loved working with members this week. They can be such an effective finding tool.
I love the Book of Mormon. I have just had such a passion for it lately!! I know with all of my heart that it is true. It brings me such a purpose and I am very grateful for those inspired prophets.
Haha sorry I am kind of boring today, we just had a game day as a district and we played volleyball, dodgeball, and monopoly. I am exhausted!!
Mom, I loved your package!!!!!!!! Haha the new BYU shirt is now my favorite shirt. :) The pez was awesome. The mints were awesome. We have been enjoying it, and now I have all the stuff to pull out when BYU plays UCF in October!!!! President Berry asked if we could go to it. Apparently the answer was no, haha which is a bummer. But I have already been using it to talk to UCF students! Fun stuff. GO COUGS!
Well, I love you all so much. Thanks for always being there for me. Glad to hear that school is going well. HAVE THE BEST WEEK EVER!
Love, Sister Allred
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