We did a lot of service this week. We did 17 hours! Which sounds like more than it actually is. Individually we each did 8.5 hours of service but we report how many hours were done together. On Tuesday we went over to the Dawson's house. Brother Dawson was our ward mission leader and he was an AWESOME ward mission leader but he got a job in Kansas City, Kansas so they're moving. He left this past Saturday and his family will follow him at the end of the school year. We helped S.Dawson Tuesday to clean up around the house and reorganize some stuff (based on what an interior designer in the ward told them to do) so it will be ready for pictures and showing this week. The Dawson family reminded me a LOT of the Foster Family if you need to picture what they're like in your head.
Last Sunday (I'm not sure if I wrote about her last week) we also finally got hold of our 9 year old less active. She was staying with her member uncle's family in Utah this past summer and they had her take the missionary lessons and she decided to be baptized. Apparently the ward got her records and have been trying to get a hold of her but hadn't been able to up to this point. She's adorable. When we met her we could see the light in her eyes and she was so happy to see us. We asked if she still had her book of Mormon and she said it got left in Utah so we gave her a new one. She was so excited and she wanted to read with us. We met her parents as well that evening and we got his approval to come back again sometime this past week to visit with Cheyenne some more. We went back on Tuesday with John Teate and his daughter Savannah. They both got baptized last August and Savannah is Cheyenne's age. John really hit it off with her parents and Savannah and Cheyenne absolutely loved eachother.
We had to leave for another lesson but they said John was welcome to stay and we had an appointment to see her father this past Saturday for a "bible study." Whenever someone invites us to do a bible study with them we mostly expect them to just want to bible bash with us. But apparently John was able to say something to him that opened him up a little. So when we went back on Saturday he just sat down with us and said "what do you got for me?" He kept getting interrupted during our lesson so we didn't get to teach him very well but his wife and father sat down with us and the lesson went really well with them and they asked if we could come back the next day without our prompting. We said of course. Sadly, when we went yesterday Cheyenne's parents weren't feeling well but they had told her to tell us that we could definitely sit down and share a message with Cheyenne. So we're really excited for her. We're hoping to introduce her to her primary teacher this week and get her to both activity days and church. We're also hoping to get her parents to commit to church as well. It's looking possible.
Wednesday, I had the new missionary lesson sign-off at the mission office in Sugar Land. Sister McCleery had been telling me horror stories of her lesson sign-off when she did training. They had to solo teach all of the lessons to P.Hall. Instead, this one was more a training on all the things you need to do to make sure your lesson is the best lesson it can be. There were A LOT of things. He assured us that we obviously didn't have to have them all down but that we should be working to improve a couple of the things each week. And we also need to be making sure to actually write down the lesson plan for every lesson that we teach. That night we visited with a less active family that we're trying to get to the Temple. We got them started on their family history. It was really awesome to see how quickly they took to it. It was especially exciting to me because I've recently taken up Family History and seen what a wonderful thing it is. We talk all the time about how the gospel blesses families and I think we forget that families bless us. To understand that identity we have because of our families and to feel this love for distant relatives that you don't even know is to come to a better understanding of your identity being part of Heavenly Father's family and to understand how much more Heavenly Father loves us as his very own children.
To have those family names to take to the temple also reminds members that their ultimate goal should be the temple and frequent temple visits.
The churches family history site is also just super awesome. The fact that it's the largest database of people and that it's free to ANYONE makes family history super easy and fun.
Thursday was another day full of service. We watered one person's plants, then we helped someone else wash their horses, then we helped two women start their family history and then we helped Sister Dawson with her house again. I got to participate in a good old-fashioned Texas round-up. Which sounds more awesome than it is but I was told you only need 5% of the truth when you tell a tale in Texas. What happened is when the 3 horses were put back in the pasture after they were washed the other gate wasn't closed. So we had to chase them all around the neighborhood and lead them off one by one. It was ridiculous, especially since Sister McCleery and I had already changed out of our service clothes back into our dresses.
Sister McCleery and I listened to this speech this week https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/hugh-b-brown_profile-prophet/ I highly recommend it. But one of our favorite parts was one of the very last things that Hugh B Brown said
"Although these evidences and many others that could be cited may have the effect of giving one an intellectual conviction, only by the whisperings of the Holy Spirit can one come to know the things of God. By those whisperings I say I know that Joseph Smith is a prophet of God."
Many times the people we teach want miracles and proof. But even if we did miracles before their eyes and showed them the very plates that the Book of Mormon was translated from, it would not leave them with the same spiritual certainty as the quiet whispering assurance of the Holy Ghost that they receive in answer their sincere questions that they asked in prayer.--
Sister Gillespie
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