This is Emily, the "pre missionary" in Italy, Summer of 2008
Transfer week! Okay, well this transfer has been a little anticlimactic so far. I was pretty sure I wasn't being transferred, thought at the same time I was prepared for whatever. President likes to throw in some surprises and mix things up it seems. But S. Fatkin and I predicted, and were right about transfers for our entire district. We are both staying, and Sister Dutson, who has only two transfers left, is coming down here with us. I don't know lots about her, but I hear she's easy going and she has a geology degree. My kind of girl! Apparently I don't know how to be a missionary any way other than being in a threesome. We have a new sister coming in, a Korean, and she is being trained by the sister who was just brand new this last transfer. Yeah! And our little S. Ochoa is going home. It is really weird, she is my trainer! We are going to really miss her. She really is amazing; we're just trying to convince her to move from Vancouver to Utah so she's there when we're off the mission. I guess not all RMs can go to Utah. None of us in this new trio are fluent in Spanish. I think I am the one who speaks the best, and that's not saying much. So I think learning curve will really increase this transfer! I'm excited about that.
This last week was really good. I don't have my planner in front of me, so I don't remember a lot about what happened. We did have a good lesson with Yesenia/Abel/Eva. They're really fun. We seem to go from laughing really hard with them to all of a sudden being serious and having a really powerful spirit there. We talked to them about faith and repentance and tried to set a baptismal date with them. They're ready. But they don't believe it. So we're having them pray about it. But I think they're afraid to pray about the date, because they know they’ll get an answer that they need to do it.
We also had a great lesson with Araceli and Cibelly and they came to church again this week. Hopefully they keep it up. Though I do think we need to let them go for a little while. They know some church members and maybe they need a little shove along the path in order for Araceli to make a decision about how she's going to be baptized. We had a temple tour this Saturday and they came and I could tell Araceli was really thinking and listening hard the whole time. I think she gets it. It's like baptism is only a matter of time, except that she hasn't been willing to do what it takes in order to force her "husband" to make a decision about marrying her.
We continue to knock a lot of doors in our area. There are plenty of places to do it. Of course it's nobody's favorite thing to do, but sometimes I feel like it's real missionary work. I'm starting to actually think it's pretty fun. It needs to be done in order to really find those people who are ready. We're trying to work with members and get referrals from them, but until that starts really happening, we're going to keep on knocking as much as possible.
I don't know what else to say. I can't believe it's just about February. Where did November go? Being a missionary is crazy. I love it! I love all the e-mails I've been getting and love hearing all of the family news! I know you're all praying for me and thank you for that. I know it helps! This is going to be the transfer for baptisms here, so keep praying! Thank you all for everything everyone! Love you all!
No comments:
Post a Comment