(I told her it was illegal to have 2)
This week was a bit of a blur. I do want to say, however, that I am very grateful for your letter you sent me with the tiny package. I needed to hear it. I'm sure you felt prompted by the spirit to write those words and for that I'm grateful. Lately I've been feeling like no matter what I do, I'm failing in some way. It's been a serious struggle lately to get members with us - and even when we do, no one will answer the door. By the end of the weeks, I feel as if we've worked quite hard, but our numbers do not show it. On top of that, yesterday at ward council we were humiliated in front of the entire branch presidency. We discussed the people we had seen this past week and the branch president called us out about a couple that had come to church 2 weeks in a row and we hadn't visited them yet. We didn't recognize their names at first and it took us a moment and he was all like, "oh that's bad, they don't even remember their names!" A few seconds later we realized who he was talking about, and actually had plans to go see them that night. There were a few other hurtful comments he used and we just felt very belittled. It was the cherry on top for me after feeling so beaten down throughout the week...well, actually it wasn't the cherry on top. The cherry was when our district leader, elder Dahneke, acted like he knew who presidente was talking about in the meeting and kept looking at us like, "don't you know who they are? Huh? Huh?" And then very light heartedly says later, "I don't know who he was talking about." The whole situation was extra frustrating because over the past few weeks, we've had new investigators at church and our focus needs to be on them and getting to know the branch (which is not small in numbers, mind you!). It's not our fault if we don't get the chance to talk to every person in the chapel. We try, we really do, but sometimes the members need to go up to us and introduce us to their friends or the people they want us to meet. We were only introduced to this couple last week by the Retis family, at which point we got their information and they told us that that week wasn't a good time to visit. So it wasn't fair. especially because he never even took the time to introduce us to them before. We barely just met them and they told us and we have to remember so many names! And they told US not to come by that week. When elder Dahneke called us last night for our weekly phone call with the district leader, we told him that our feelings were hurt that morning and he apologized.
I've been having a hard time lately feeling like I'm hitting a wall. I never want to be the reason Desert Bloom doesn't trust missionaries anymore and I don't know what I'm doing to cause that, but I feel like I'm failing in some way.
This morning I included in my prayer to let me know if there really is something I'm doing wrong or if Satan's just trying to get me to think there is. Of course I can always work harder, but if there's something I'm doing WRONG I would like to know. This morning during personal study I felt a little more peaceful and came across the scripture Doctrine and Covenants 6:36 that says, "look unto me in every thought. doubt not, fear not." I felt as if maybe Heavenly Father was trying to communicate with me in some way, and then your letter! Have I been looking to Him in every thought? I slip up at times, I'll admit. But have I been STRIVING to work hard and follow His will? Yes. There's always things that I can improve on, I can always push myself more, but I'm not being disobedient or shifting my focus. I don't want to throw out my name tag and go home. So then how much have I been worrying about numbers to measure our success? Looking back over our numbers when I was with sister Webb, it makes me DOUBT myself even more and FEAR that the success we were getting with numbers was only due to her efforts, (even though we were both fully invested in the work) and my efforts without her aren't enough.
Yes, it's true that MPLs are important, our mission is big on 10 a week. And there have been many times this past transfer that we've had members, but no one ends up being home, so we don't end up getting the numbers. During my personal study this morning, though, a thought popped into my head. Maybe it's not so much what I'm doing wrong, as much as there's something I personally need to learn from it. A test of my faith, talvez? I tend to worry too much about what others think of me and despite how hard I know we work and my companion knows how hard we work, I often times allow what outside people see (like numbers) to define who I am or rather, what kind of missionary I am. I need to develop more integrity in that sense. I know who I am, I know my intentions. Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ know my heart. So in my thoughts am I looking unto Him or am I looking unto the opinions of others and what they possibly think of me?
Then I read a little bit in Alma about the struggles those missionaries went through. We're going to face moments at times where we're on the very edge of losing hope. We wear the name of Jesus Christ on our chests! With that comes our responsibility to respond well to trials and persecution. Maybe absolutely no one will answer the door for two days in a row. Maybe we have a bad experience at ward council about something that's out of our control. If we're on that very edge, it's our choice to either go apostate and lose all hope or take it as a blessed opportunity to become more Christ-like - build our characters and our faith. So I'm grateful and I'm stronger than I was last week.
We had a really cool lesson with the Ventura family last night. remember them? We taught the Restoration with the whole family. At the end each one offered a kneeling prayer. The mom and dad were both crying at the end and the dad said, "me gusta. Me siento mucha paz."
Juliana is doing really well, we set her for baptism for the 8th of feb. and testified that she can be ready by that date, even if she doesn't know everything yet. She realizes it's a special thing and feels good with everything, but she doesn't understand the necessity of the restored priesthood authority. That's party our fault, so we're going to teach her the restoration again and re-set her. Our last lesson with her was really powerful, though, and she cried when we showed her a picture of the savior and told her to try to imagine the love He has for her. She asked us to sign that picture of Christ and give it to her oldest son, Noe, so he can look at it and remember the Savior when he feels lonely and Juliana has to work. It's funny, she always tells her kids, "shhh, we're with papa Jesus right now" or "Papa Jesus loves you". She knows that the father and son are two different personages, though. I admire what a good example she is to her children. When she says Papa Jesus, they know exactly who's she's talking about.
Well, I love you all very much! Stay good! <3
No comments:
Post a Comment