January 19, 2015

I've been bad at taking pictures this transfer but...

go seattle!

It's been a really busy week this week with the exchanges with other sisters. I got to go to Sullivan, MO from Wednesday to Thursday and Mountain Grove, MO from Friday to Saturday. It was a little stressful leaving my area for so long but I loved getting to help the other sisters with their areas. And I learned so much from them.

 

In Sullivan, we got to attend Young Women and talk to the 16-18 year olds about missionary life. They wrote down a bunch of questions they had ranging from silly ("Do you have a hot boyfriend?") to serious ("What was the most spiritual experience you've had?") We answered all of them and just talked about how fun and rewarding it is to be a missionary and encouraged them all to pray about serving a mission. 

 

In Mountain Grove, I got to meet an amazing family that is investigating the church right now. The mom just recently had a stroke and really struggles to communicate so her temper with her kids was REALLY short. Her kids are out of control and were running around the whole lesson. And her sister in law, who is a recovering drug addict that got all her kids taken away from her, was sitting in on the lesson. I was sitting in their smoky living room, taking in the whole situation and realized that before I came out on my mission, I probably wouldn't have loved this family the way that I do. The reason I loved them so much was because I could see just a tiny glimpse of the way that Christ sees them. I saw a mom who cared about her children SO much and was concerned about whether she was raising them right. And a woman who really desired to turn her life around and needed the power of the atonement to help her to change. I just had this moment of clarity where I remembered, this is why I came out here. I came out here to find these people that are searching for truth and good in their lives, not because they're perfect awesome people but because they need it. I remembered part of a talk I read that said something to the effect of, "Christ says blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness. He doesn't say 'blessed are those who are already righteous'. The reason we hunger and thirst is because we lack something. This family we were teaching, however imperfect they were, were thirsting after righteousness. We invited them to come to church on Sunday and they all agreed that they would.

 

Great things are happening in our area as well. Kaye is still reading the Book of Mormon every day and is getting ready to quit smoking this week. Richard and his wife fasted yesterday for help in committing to live the law of tithing. And we started teaching several new people. This week we are going to invite every single one of our investigators to pray about a date to be baptized. The work is moving forward so quickly here and I'm really excited to spend the last several weeks of my mission being a part of it.

 

I love being a missionary!

 

Sister Boll