10 June 2013

We moved this morning so now we are living in our ward. With one of my very favorite families! The Gerkensmeyers :D Except my companion is only going to live there one day.... :( just tonight. Then tomorrow is transfers... and she is going to Greenville California. it's just a branch but rumor has it that it is the most beautiful place in the mission. I am staying here. My new companion will be a sister who has been out for 6 months now. We are going to be the Sister Training Leaders for this area. Oh... and we're also training. It's going to be great... mostly. I am just SOO heartbroken to say goodbye to my companion. I keep randomly tearing up whenever I think about it. In sacrament the bishop had her come up to bear her testimony before she leaves and I cried through the whole thing. Afterwards we both had to leave to go blow our noses. rough.

I've loved my other two companions too and I will definitely always stay in touch with them. But Sister K. is going to be one of those forever friends from the mission.

 

So I am staying here in the Sierra Highlands ward. Oh... and we moved today. To the Gerkensmeyers home :) They actually live in our ward and they are one of my very favorite families. My new Sister Training Leader companion is Sis. B. who has been out for 6 months. And together we are training as well. Crazy crazy. So I am in a trio again. I guess trios are going to be quite common for the next 6 months or so with the rapid increase of sisters. Tomorrow we are getting 16 or 17 new sisters. Last transfer we got 13 and the transfer before we got 17. CRAZY. And next transfer is going to be just as high. President told me this morning that by next transfer we are going to be over the 250 compliment. And they just keep sending them. They have to though because missions just aren't opening fast enough. 

Our referral is still awesome as usual :) He is totally heartbroken that Sis. K. is leaving though. We all are :( Still working towards June 22nd baptism. Our new investigators are progressing slowly but they are progressing. illiteracy has been a major problem. So that has been hard. We have had probably 4 lessons with them so far. I know eventually we'll finish the Restoration. I hope!! Our other referral is also progressing really well :) She hasn't come to church yet though :( But she does read everything we give her and she is slowly figuring out that she really CAN question God. I recently realized that a lot of people are raised with the idea that it is never ok to question God. How sad is that? We'll see her again Friday because she will be out of town until then. The two new sisters are so lucky because they are coming into an area that is just getting well established. We even hit our standard of excellence for member present lessons!! It's been great here in Reno. 

The couple from the family home evening visit dropped us. We think she talked to her dad who is a preacher in California because last week they both seemed really interested. Especially Martin. But everyone has their agency and we can't force anything on them. We'll still try them again sometime though. 

We've also been working with a less active guy for quite some time. His dad recently died and he is living with his mom. He is very intellectual. He knows so much about history and religions. He studies a lot of theology and philosophy. Unfortunately, a lot of his studies are conflicting. He has some days where he wants to believe in God and others when he just thinks there is no purpose to life and nothing after life :s He really opened up this last week about some of his questions about the Book of Mormon. He has a lot of honest questions that I recognize I won't be able to answer. I don't know why but they seem to be holding him back from gaining a real testimony, even though they are not important things. Questions like "How could jews use the word 'infinite' 600 years before Christ, when the concept of infinite or eternal was not recorded until 200 AD?" (in 2 Nephi 9). Sometimes I just want to say, don't worry about it! They apparently did have a concept of it because they used it. And how can anyone claim that a person 2600 years ago couldn't comprehend eternity? Just because it was never recorded doesn't mean it wasn't understood, right? But we didn't say anything like that. He wasn't arguing and we weren't going to start. Plus I'd definitely lose a debate with him because A) I'm not as educated and B) the Spirit would be gone if I tried. That was an interesting lesson. He really does want to understand more and I think deep down he does have that desire to believe everything. 

Oh we also extended a baptism commitment this week. Well Sis. K. did :) but we both were teaching towards it. It was what we call a soft commitment. It's like: "if you came to know this is true, would you be baptized?" She said yes :) I know she'll come to know it's true too!

Lots of other good things happen. Everyday :) I've been better at writing all the good things down. Big or small. in my journal :) 

Love you lots and lots. Tell the family hi!

 

-Love me :)