Bystanders

Hola! 

This was a really interesting week. We went to the temple - which was AMAZING - attended a worldwide missionary training broadcast, heard the "dying testimonies" of some of our district members, helped set up for a pokemon birthday party, painted some elderly ladies' nails, and had some incredible lessons. Also, we may or may not have a baptism later this week. We don't know yet because our incredibly prepared investigator still needs an interview... The suspense!

Overall, it's been pretty great. The investigator in question, let's call him Ryan, met with us three times this past week and practically taught himself the rest of the commandments we needed to teach. Literally, we would show up planning to teach two commandments and we would start talking about the first one when he would add his perspective and tell us what he understands about it and go on a little tangent about the next commandment without knowing it. And then ask, "okay, so what's the second one?" We are just astounded by this man. After only 9 lessons with him, he is eager and willing to obey all of the commandments, change his life, and raise his son in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I count myself truly blessed to have been able to be one of the missionaries teaching him!

One of the things we emphasize as missionaries is that we are not the teachers. We are responsible for being worthy conduits of the Spirit. As we declare repentance and invite others to make changes in their lives and testify of our Redeemer, Jesus Christ, the Holy Ghost testifies of the truthfulness of our words and brings our message unto the hearts of those we teach. If we're doing it right, the Spirit is the teacher, and we missionaries are just bystanders with front-row seats to witness the awe-inspiring effects of the Atonement of Christ. That's how I feel it's been with Ryan. The Spirit guides both him and us every time we meet, and my companion and I are left in awe of the majesty of Christ's power. 

That's the bulk of the exciting news, I guess. This week is transfer calls, but my companion and I are pretty sure we won't change. Three of the missionaries we work closely with are going home this transfer, so that will be sad. I still don't know Spanish as well as I'd like to, so with any luck I'll stay in this language for a while yet. :) 

I hope you all have a great week!

Hermana Shower  

the view from our window at sunrise

more pantouffles (describes every companionship I've ever had)

we went looking for this one house that led us to this SUPER cashmoneys neighbourhood! 

Literally, every house was a castle, with towers and spires and columns and gates and triple garages and lion statues and arched double doors and high ceilings and spiral staircases. We didn't find the house we were looking for, but we did drive around for 20 minutes with our jaws hanging open. 

This is a poor picture, but yeah. That's how it was. 

And that's all the pictures I have this week.

These are a few of my favourite things :)

First of all, can I just tell you how COOL it is to be a missionary!? This morning, a woman in our ward was having a hard time. She's going through some trials and needed help from Heavenly Father but just couldn't seem to get any answers. She prayed. And a little while later, guess who showed up unexpectedly? The sister missionaries! We hadn't been expecting to actually get in and teach a lesson, so we weren't very prepared, but while she said the opening prayer I silently asked God what she needed, and the answer came to read Alma 7 together. We did, and it was exactly what she needed to hear. She told us she got her message. 

It is one of my favourite things about missionary work - seeing miracles happen and realizing that they only happened because we were following the Spirit and doing what we needed to be doing.

    Mi distrito! (there's also a senior couple but they were absent that day)

The reason we were out proselyting earlier is because today is not our P-day! Because we're going to the TEMPLE tomorrow!!! (Therefore our P-day is switched, though we still do emails today.) I haven't been to the temple since I was in the MTC 9 months ago! I am SO excited! What's just as exciting is what happens the day after that too. There's going to be a worldwide missionary training broadcast by a number of general authorities. This is the first time this has ever happened and I can't wait! 

So anyways, this week was pretty good. Our investigator with a baptismal date coming up soon is doing super well. He's started saying things like, "our church," "our prophet," etc. I feel like a proud mom. He's even worked it out so that he can bring his 4-year-old son to church every week. A lot of the lessons we have with him are at the end of the day and always make our lives better. 

Funny story of the week: I got a nosebleed in the middle of sacrament meeting yesterday, which wouldn't have been the end of the world, but we were sitting on the stand because I was playing the organ.... So we had to walk out in the middle of the last talk with blood running down my arm for all to see and someone who was visiting our ward had to fill in for the closing hymn. Awkotaco. But! All is well. :)

Hermana Shaver

         A card I made for our investigator's daughter           A picture of me and my trainer from day 1

(she was SUPER excited. She LOVES frozen.)                   She sent it to me. :)

                 Pantoufles (slippers) I made for our district leader. He said he was okay with pink, so.....

Los milagros

This week was a little bit crazy!! Not in a bad way - it's just that a LOT happened, and I feel like last Monday was an eternity ago. Sooooo I obviously can't write about everything, but I'll mention a few things.

We went on exchanges at the beginning of last week. My companion went to the sister training leaders' area and I stayed behind. My temporary companion learned Spanish in high school....but doesn't really know the language at all. So! That was fun. We had a couple of INCREDIBLE lessons together. In one of them, the woman we were teaching explained that she had no intention of ever changing religions (she was pretty adamant) and told us about how she developed faith in Christ, etc. That was the beginning of the lesson. We were able to explain to her why it's important to search for truth and how to do it, and the whole time she was agreeing and going, "oh.. okay... yeah... oh, I guess I didn't have real intent when I prayed last time...... yes...." and the Spirit worked its miracles and by the end of the lesson she had determined to honestly investigate this church and accepted a tentative baptismal date. The Holy Ghost is AMAZING. Not to mention all the help we were given to understand her and speak her language!

(I just took a selfie right now :P) I dyed it darker. I'm trying to be Latina, 

but I'm worried that going darker would wash me out.... so yeah!

This week we also had a couple of interesting dinner appointments, made a blanket fort in our apartment, dyed the hair of one of the other sisters in our apartment (she's Tahitian, so she has a LOT of hair), ate arepas, made and delivered birthday cards, sang old Quebecois songs with elderly people, and had TWO investigators at church. Woo!

the fort I made for our weekly planning session

And then last night was like the icing on the craziness cake. After dinner, our only plan was a lesson with a less-active in our ward. She wasn't home, so instead we decided to deliver more of the birthday cards we had made. We did that, expecting a quiet night without any real lessons, and instead taught an active woman we didn't know very well along with her inactive son and nonmember brother,and taught the less-active 14-year-old son of a family we work with and his nonmember friend in French. (My French is suffering after almost 4 transfers of neglect....I don't speak anything anymore.) The best part of that last lesson was that we taught the Restoration, and the parent who was present wasn't being very nice and kept interrupting - but he fell asleep when we got to the part about Joseph Smith and his vision. Tender mercy. Basically, it was a week FULL of miracles!

I know that God lives because I see miracles every day. I know He's working very hard in each of our lives. As one of my previous companions told me, He's probably doing a million things for each of us right now, and we're aware of about 3 of them. I love you all, and I hope you have a great week!

Hermana Ducha (Shaver)

ps: This transfer is 7 weeks, but yes, we ARE more than halfway! Two missionaries in my district and one in my apartment are going home! So weird. 

pps:  I am officially unofficially the ward organist now. 

ppps: Guess who I got a letter from!!!!!!!!!!!!!! SISTER FINKEN!!!!!!!! It was a super cute christmas card! :D