The Spirit is Real

November 16, 2015

I love you all so much. It's been another great week, with plenty of miracles and plenty of struggles! Whenever I look back on the week though, the good always trumps the bad, and I realize just how blessed I am to be serving in St Louis :) I love this place!!

Sister Van Orman

Where to start? We had such a crazy busy and amazing week. We had two more exchanges with Frontenac and Lake St. Louis sisters. I was with sister Van Ormen and sister Gordon--two amazing sisters. And they both have beautiful red hair. :) With Sister Gordon we were able to find 2 new investigators together! Sister Van Ormen and I had fun teaching an amazing Plan of Salvation lesson and giving impromptu service to a member referral who (turns out) has met with missionaries before in Texas, and is ready to learn again! How cool. Our area really is exploding with miracles, that's what I learned this week :) 

Lake St. Louis Sisters

I learned a lot about the spirit this week. We had a great relief society lesson about missionary work, and there were so many converts that got to tell their stories. What stood out to me is that every one of them were let to investigate the church by FIRST feeling the spirit! It wasn't the doctrine, or the church structure, or even the Book of Mormon that first led them to be curious about the church, but it was the amazing FEELING that they got when they interacted with members and missionaries. There is a light we carry, and others can see it! It was neat, because as our investigator T. describes how she met us and started investigating, she says she "felt something different." That's it! No magic sparks or fireworks, just a gentle and compelling nudge from the spirit to take the next step. We as missionaries see our investigators from the beginning to the end, but they usually only see the next step. I admire the faith of our investigators!! They trust the spirit, and the spirit is real! This work is amazing.

More experiences with the spirit this week--on Wednesday we saw the C. family. The grandparents got baptized this year and we are teaching the grand-kids. Due to various circumstances, the C.'s haven't been to church in probably over 6 months. Last week we had a powerful lesson with them, where we were bold and both R. and M. committed to church. When Sunday rolled around however, of course the opposition came! They were all dressed and ready to go, literally on their way to church, when their car broke down. Holy cow. Sometimes the efforts of the adversary are so obvious, he clearly didn't want them at church. They were discouraged and had to take the car to the dealership, so they didn't come to church. This week we taught them again, and brought a brother from the ward to give them a blessing. We talked, and the spirit was SO strong. The blessing was incredible, and afterwards R. says, "I know one thing. We are going to come to church!!" That's commitment! I think they finally understood how much they needed church and needed the sacrament. On Sunday, M. came to church with two of her grandchildren!! It was amazing to see them partake of that sacrament and renew their covenants. AH! It was amazing.

We have also been having REALLY powerful lessons with our investigator G., and we have been teaching them in B. and J.'s home. Which is amazing. B.'s testimony is one of the strongest I have ever seen. It's so great to have them to help G.

We had 4 investigators at church! That was a highlight and a blessing. T. and L. told us they would like to get baptized before Christmas, and they LOVE coming to our church! The spirit is really working on them.

I love this work!! I'm so grateful to be here. Please keep K., G., and R. in your prayers, they are all going through a lot right now.

Frontenac Sisters!