Week numero 6!

 

K so I've been in the field for almost 6 weeks (in Houston that is). Time just flies when you're having fun!  Haha, but If I'm being completely honest a mission is not fun all of the time.  Sometimes you are really frustrated, or sad, or even occasionally irritated.  But, while it may not be fun all of the time, it is rewarding 100% of time.  With that being said, this last week started out pretty rocky.  We are supposed to do nightly planning every night as soon as we come in for the day.  In the beginning of the week we had fasted that we would be able to find new investigators, because we thought the ones we had were not super awesome (I definitely repented for those thoughts).  As the week went on we were having little success.  We were not meeting any of the goals we were setting for ourselves, and the result was that we were kind of put out.  That resulted in us not putting any effort or thought in to our nightly planning and therefore we were setting really pathetic goals.  On Wednesday our mission president gave a specialized training for the missionaries in our zone.  So the night before that we prayed that he would talk about something that would help in our missionary work, and that we would be able to receive inspiration on how to improve.  The topic President Pingree ended up teaching on was how to plan effectively and set inspired goals.  Haha, I seriously love the Lord, He is just too good.  President taught us how to include God in our planning.  Basically, we should not be setting goals that we can achieve without God.  Isn't that an interesting concept?  I love it!  Why the heck would God help us achieve our goals if we set ones that we can do on our own.  To demonstrate this, he shared a couple of scriptures.  The first one is found in Gen 18:9-14.  This is the account of Abraham and Sarah.  Basically 3 Holy men come to visit Abraham and they tell Abraham that his wife Sarah is going to have a child.  Sarah is eavesdropping, as women do, and when she hears this she laughs to herself because she "knows" that this is impossible.  Abraham and Sarah had been trying to have kids for years and the scriptures say, "Now Abraham and Sarah were old and well stricken with age; and it ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women".  Translation: Sarah was too old to have kids.  After Sarah laughs though, they ask Abraham  why she's laughing, and then he asks an important question, "Is anything too hard for the Lord?"   When he related this story I felt super dumb.  Of course nothing is too hard for the Lord.  

The next Bible account he shares is found in Judges chapters 6 and 7.  This account addresses the difference between Man's ways and God's ways (Isaiah 55:8-9).  So the setting is the children of Israel were wicked, so the Lord delivered them into bondage to the Midianites to humble them.  As always, after a while of being in bondage, the children of Israel decided that life was way easier when they were obedient and allowed God to help them, so they began to pray unto the Lord to deliver them.  After a bit, the Lord answered the prayers of Gideon, who was their leader, and sent an angel to tell him to gather his people and "go in thy might and thou shalt save Israel from the hand of the Midianites".   This was after He reminded them that He had delivered the children of Israel from bondage to the Egyptians and therefore He could definitely do it again.  When Gideon heard this though, he doubted.  He asked the Lord how he was supposed to save Israel. "my family is poor... and I am the least in my father's house."  Gideon did not believe that he was good enough, rich enough, or strong enough to do as the Lord had instructed.  He felt inadequate.  But the Lord promised, "Surely I will be with thee."  Fast forward a few verses, and Gideon has acquired 32,000 people to fight the Midianites. When the Lord sees this He says to Gideon, "your army is too big.  If you fight the Midianites with this army and you win, the people of Israel will boast in their own strength and forget that it was by my hand that they were delivered".  So He told Gideon to tell the army that whoever was afraid was allowed to go home.  22,000 peaced out.  Now Gideon has an army of 10,000, mind you the Midianites were "without number", meaning A LOT.  When the Lord sees the new number He tells Gideon that there are still too many people and instructs him to take his army to a river and whoever "lappeth the water with his tounge like a dog lappeth" will be your army, and everyone else who bows down to drink you need to send home.  So Gideon does this and 300 men lap at the water like a dog and the rest bow down.  So Gideon sends them home.  Looking at the state of affairs,  things are looking pretty grim.  Gideon now only has 300 men left, and they drink water like dogs.  Not exactly the cream of the crop.  But Gideon puts his trust in the Lord and does as he is commanded.  The Lord then tells the army to gather trumpets, pots, pans, pitchers and lights and to encircle the outside of the Midianite camp while they are asleep.  They are then instructed to bang the pots and pans and break the pitchers and wave the lights and yell "The sword of the Lord, and Gideon."   When they do this the Midianites are so confused and discombobulated that they think there are tons of people surrounding them and they start fighting and end up killing each other therefore freeing the Iraelites from bondage.... logically that should not have worked.  300 men with musical instruments and cooking utensils should not have been able to defeat an army without number.  But in this account we are reminded that God's ways are not man's ways and with God all things are possible.

 

So after the training my comps and I head home and we decide to re-plan and reset our goals for the day.  Instead of looking at our numbers and the probabilities and thinking about what they should logically be, we said a prayer and asked Heavenly Father what our numbers should be.  The numbers that came to mind were way higher than we thought were possible for that day, but we decided to put our faith in the Lord and see what happened.  We not only met our goals, but exceeded.  We acquired 3 new investigators, and while they are not going to be easy to teach, I know with the help of the Lord all things are possible.

 

The last thing I learned this week, is that there is no place for feelings of inadequacy.   Looking from the outside in  things might look pretty grim.  Our investigators are pains in the butt, it's super hot one second, and then torrentially raining another (like right now), we'reimpatient and prideful and imperfect in every way. From the outside in we probably look like a lost cause. Luckily our Savior does not look from the outside in. Instead he looks at the intents of our hearts. He knows our imperfections and recognizes our weaknesses. As we fail and fall again and again, which inevitably will happen, he will continually pick us back up, dust us off and help us become better. I know our Savior loves each and every one of us even if we sometimes forget to love him. He is patiently waiting to bless us, all we have to do is ask. I know this is the one and only true church and gospel here on the earth and that our savior lived and died for us. I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ Amen.

 

-Sister Williams

 

P.S.

 

Transfers are next Wednesday and I will not know if I will be staying in this area until the day before. So please keep that in mind when you send letters, just so they don't get sent to an address that I no longer live at and are lost for eternity in the black hole that is the mail system. Love ya!