Indianapolis~
Momma,
So first, will you send me a couple nice study journals? i want to be able to keep my notes and thoughts for a long time and i fear if i continue putting them in a regular note book the pages will start getting ripped and tore out. so a few nice ones would be good. i bought one today and it was kind of a lot of money for a missionary so if you could i would like that a lot.
There has been a lot that happened this week. First, on Tuesday i went one splits with elder ketch. he is a zone leader and he came to my area. he doesnt speak Spanish so it was me just flying solo for a day and a half. it actually went really good and i know without a doubt in my mind that i had gods help. we taught a woman called Hermana Marcos. she has been investigating for a little while and has been taught everything so i felt like we really needed to talk about babtism with her and find what her testimony was like. i asked her if she knew Joseph Smith was a prophet of God and she said yes. then i asked if she knew this church was true and she said yes. then i felt prompted to ask if she knew that this was the only true church on the earth and yes said YESSS!!!!! then i asked if she felt like she needed to be babtized. she said yes. haha then God rebuked me for not asking good enough questions and told me to ask another one. do you feel like you need to be babtized into this church? she said yes again. then we talked about why she wont be and she said that when she prays she feels like when she gets babtized she needs her husband to be there as well. if you dont remember this lady, her husband is a big guy in the catholic church and has been a big guy in the catholic church for over 20 years and wont meet with us so its kinda hard to get her to progress to the next step right now. but any ways, after she said that i told her how important faith is and when we take giant leaps of faith like this ( because for her, being babtized is a giant leap of faith) God will bless us so much and provide miricales to happen. then i told her that maybe God is waiting for her to show her faith before he can provide a way to have her husband realize how important this gospel is. anyways it was a really powerful lesson and the spirit was so strong. she cried a couple times in the lesson and then when she prayed at the end she cried the whole time. now i say that i felt Gods help a lot during the time i was on the split becuase the next day i could barely understand Spanish again. but i prayed for help while i was on the split and God helped me.
Something i have really been trying to work on this week is not being so worldly. if i am to truely be a representative of Christ i need to deny myself of all worldly things. i never realized how hard serving a mission in the states was untill now. its so incredibly hard to not listen to a song that is on or look at the tv or do anything like that. i felt like i kinda couldnt help but do those things right when i first got here but I've been working on it a lot and i memorized my favorite scripture and now when ever i hear a song i say the scrpture instead. its helping a lot and i feel like I'm becoming a more effective teeacher and missionary.
I have such a strong love for the scriptures now. i dont know what happend, but this week i just started reading the bible and book of mormon and d&c and i am so in love with them. every free moment i get i am reading and i am recieving so much revelation and my scriptures are just marked to heck now. i dont know what happened, i think i decided that if i was telling people that we believed in all these scriptures then i needed to really believe for myself. i have never really read the bible or anything else untill now and i just love it.
The worst part of being comp to the district leader is that we are always on splits. i had 2 splits this last week and I'm on one today and tomorrow so i wont really be in my area from last Friday till Wednesday and i feel like i miss so much thats going on.
One last thing before i go. yesterday was the happiest that i have ever been on my mission. Arturo had his babtism interview yesterday and after it was done he was walking down the hall with Elder Ketch and he ran up to me and gave me a hug and told me he passed and i just had so much joy that i had to really struggle to keep my tears in me. i am so happy for him. he has changed so much and his family has changed. he is the son of a non active member and she is re activating and now has such a strong desire to go through the temple and she is doing everything she can to go. this work it so amazing and everyday i am more and more grateful i am here. i know that this church is true and i love it. seeing it change the people that we are teaching is just so amazing. i love it and i love my family for helping me realize how important it really is. love you all.
Elder Hardman
No comments:
Post a Comment