Jan. 29, 2018 ~ I am like a Little Pencil.... God Is Love (Week 29)

Hola todos!
 

I am so grateful for all of you. Thank you for your love and support! Hopefully this post will give you a small update of the many things that I am grateful for here in the mission field :) I am constantly humbled by the mercy we are shown as servants of the Lord!  

1. We met a man on the street named Arturo, who confessed to have been searching for the true church for over 40 years. He expressed his confusion of how there could be so many churches, yet "one Lord, one faith, one baptism" , as mentioned in Eph 4:5. We were able to teach him about the Restoration of the Gospel, answer his questions, and get him to pray. It was amazing. He was crying from the time we sang the first line of our opening song (before we even said the prayer)... We will continue to work with him closely, and have hopes of helping him get over his stubbornness. (He's the sweetest and sassiest old man. I love him.)

And best of all? Before the lesson started, some girls peeked in the door to see who we were, and we invited them to join us. They also listened in on the lesson, came to our volleyball activity that night at the church (and one of the girls brought her mom), and gave us the information of their families so we could teach them all. THEY ARE ALL SUPER PREPARED! Qué bendición! It was so so cool! We are super excited to teach them all! 😀

2. Latino bebés... 😍😍😍😍😍 . Here is a pretty funny story. We were teaching the parents of the boy in the onesie with our ward mission leader, and the spirit was really strong. Out of nowhere this little boy came up to me and lifted up my dress for everyone to see. I embarrassingly screamed, and everyone laughed uncomfortably. The entire situation was so embarrassing but I now laugh every time I think about it. So funny. 

3. We have been receiving referrals like crazy! It's been amazing. While we were in certain area, contacting a referral from the Vietnamese speaking elders, we ran into a 14 year old girl who is seriously the sweetest person in the world. We talked a little bit about Jesus Christ (who she knew very little about because most viets are buddhist) and got a return appointment. We went back to see her a few days later, and her 2 sisters listened in on the lesson as well. We taught them who Jesus Christ is and how we can have faith in Him. We are working on handing them off to the Viet. speaking elders because their mom doesn't speak English. But she was very kind and gave us lots of hugs. The Vietnamese people are so kind and giving. I am grateful to be serving around so many different cultures and people! 

(Apparently, we didn't do a good enough job teaching about Jesus based on the fact that the girl is holding his picture upside down. Haha we will work on that next lesson. 😁)

4. God is love. (1John 4:8)

5. I ATE CHICKEN FOOT. We had to break each talon off to get to the meat, and literally breaking the bones in the foot you're about to eat is a little weird. But It was a really cool experience!  I wouldn't say it tasted good (because it tasted like chewy skin & there were a lot of bones), but it wasn't terrible!

This is the family that made it for us. They are from Guatemala.

6. We have our district meetings at the institute every Thursday. We found these hats there :). I love my district. Best missionaries in the whole mission. All of the missionaries work incredibly hard and are great examples to me! (My district consists of the 2 sets of Vietnamese speaking elders, 1 set of Spanish speaking elders, 2 sets of Spanish speaking sisters (including me) , and 1 set of English speaking elders. We see each other every day and spend a lot of time together. We are all good friends. :) 

7. Check out this chameleon! He kind of freaked me out at first. But he was cute. :) 

8. The chameleon belongs to the boy. He is the nephew of Sofia. She took us to meet her family last night, so I guess you could say things are getting pretty serious. ;) we were pretty nervous, because we were told that they didn't have the best feelings toward Mormons... We ate pupusas and shared a message about Jesus Christ, and it went really well! It was such a privilege to get to know them. 😊

I got to practice my sign language! Sofia's niece is hard of hearing, so we got to communicate with her a little bit. It was awesome. But I have forgotten most of the sign that I knew, which made me sad! 

10. The elders left this fake poop on our door step. #Classy. Sister Penrod and I then picked it up and hid it in my companions bed. #Classier .  

11. We have a basketball tournament today at the mission office! My companion and I have been practicing at the church in preparation. Haha I am super excited. (Update: We lost the Championship... a feeling I know too well! 😖)

12. I ❤ CA.

13. Celebration of the Chinese New Year or something... We thought we were getting shot. Haha (These are the papers left over from the firecrackers.)

14. We found a boy named Raymond. We have taught him a few times and he is preparing to be baptized! Please pray that he will be able to calm his nerves about coming to church. :) 

15. While tracting in a trailer park, we met 2 men who were working construction. We ended up teaching the 2 of them about eternal families on the first contact (that is our go-to message with Latinos because they all love their families very much. They're such good people.) They both broke down, told us their life stories, and could not be in a more perfect position to meet with us.  Unfortunately, they couldn't make it to church because they had to finish their work project. But we have high hopes for them! They're very good people! 

16. My companion is awesome. I am sad to have transfers next week, because she will probably be leaving me. We have a lot of fun together!! I really love her.

17. I had an experience a couple of weeks ago that I have since replayed at least 40 times in my head. It was a Sunday night and my companion and I were walking home from an appointment. It was dark, cold and raining. Most people weren't on the streets, and we happened to pass a woman waiting at a bus stop. She was very underdressed for the weather and was shivering as she waited. I said hello and asked how she was, to which she responded "good" (in Spanish). I pulled out a pair of cotton gloves that I had in my bag and handed them to her. She hesitated, then silently and slowly took the gloves out of my hands. Tears filled eyes and her lip started to quiver more than it had been from the cold. Without either of us thinking, we embraced, and the woman began to sob on my shoulder. The only words I could choke out through my own tears were "God loves you", over and over. Then, too quickly, the bus pulled up, she got on, and waved goodbye as it drove away. I don't think we exchanged more than 10 words between the two of us... nor spent more than 3 minutes together... nor did I even get the opportunity to learn her name... But that woman changed my life forever.

In that moment, I felt more love for a stranger than I have ever felt for anyone in my whole life. I know that I really was nothing more than an instrument in the hands of our Heavenly Father, who wanted one of His precious daughters to know how much He loves her. It humbled me to the core. I cried the whole way home that night and I have cried every time that I have thought about it since. (Yes, currently crying like a baby here in the library). I feel so humbled to be here and so humbled to have this opportunity. 

"A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you..." John 13:34

If anyone is questioning whether or not God loves them, I invite you to pray. Ask Him if He is really there and ask Him if He really loves you. I promise that you will receive an answer. ❤❤❤ 

I hope you all know how much I love you.
Thank you for everything. ❤❤

Xoxo,

Hermana Brooks