This
week was GREAT! I can't believe how fast the time is flying by! I feel
like I just wrote yesterday but yet it is another whole week gone by. I
feel like it is all going by like a dream! And this up coming week is
sure to fly by quickly too, I have an exchange this week with SISTER
HUNT! woo-hoo! So that should be fun. We also will find out TRANSFO, and
I will know where I will be for my LAST transfer. Scary. Although I
think I will stay here in Brovary. And then next week is transfers and I
will start my last transfer. I just can't believe how the days are
passing like minutes. Not fair. This wednesday is my 17 month mark as a
missionary, which is so crazy to me! Can you believe that I have been
doing missionary work for the past 17 months!!! Wow!
cards
also, we had a ping pong tourney this week.
I was so bad at ping pong,
but then I CREAMED in cards :)
This
week, we went to the Clarks to do some service, and while there, we
shared a spiritual thought that has seemed to be a theme for my week. We
started our spiritual thought by playing a game of telephone, you know,
where you say a sentence in someones ear and pass it on and on around
the whole circle. I must admit that I thought that it would be more
scrambled at the end then it actually was, they did a really good job,
especially for a part Ukrainian/part American family and a bunch of
missionaries But it wasn't exactly what I had said at the beginning. And
we talked about how it was hard to hear the whisper in your ear when
others were talking.
playing telephone
Then we compared the whisper in our ears with the
Holy Ghost and talked about how it is hard to hear the still small
whisperings of the Holy Ghost. And we shared a scripture from 1st Kings,
"And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the
mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the Lord; but the Lord
was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the Lord was
not in the earthquake: And after the earthquake a fire; but the Lord was
not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice" (1st Kings
19:11-12). We shared how in our lives, the whisperings of the Spirit
won't be loud and big, but will be a still small voice. We also shared a
quote from Preach My Gospel, which said, "The Spirit is always
available to guide and direct you. However, the Spirit speaks quietly,
through your feelings as well as your mind. One great challenge for you
and those you work with is the recognize the quite, subtle prompting of
the Holy Ghost". The Spiritual Thought went really well as Brother and
Sister Clark both shared some experiences where the Lord has spoken to
them through the Holy Ghost.
So
if I had to pick a theme for this week, it would be the importance and
blessings that come from recognizing and understanding how the Spirit
works in our life. As a missionary, I can only do work if I work with
the Spirit. Joseph Smith taught that "No man can preach the gospel
without the Holy Ghost". And that's true. Doing missionary work would
never work without the Spirit. Preach My Gospel also promises that we
will "succeed in [our] work as [we] learn to receive and follow personal
revelation". That is something that I have really learned a lot this
last week. For a couple months now, there has been a problem that I have
been trying to figure out. Nothing bad, just something that I have been
thinking about a lot. As I have prayed to know what to do and what
choice I should make, I have been unable to receive a clear answer. This
last week, as I was studying, I decided that instead of praying for an
answer on the specific question, I would instead pray to better learn
how God speaks to me through the Holy Ghost. As a result of that prayer,
I feel like I have learned so much more about how the Spirit speaks to
me. He has guided me so much in my work this week and I have seen
miracles come from following those promptings that He sends. I feel like
Heavenly Father in more ways than one, has dumped revelation down on
me! I can share a few experiences from this week that illustrate how the
together with the Spirit, miracles can happen!
So
this week, we were waiting for a bus to go stop by a member. As we
waited for our bus (the 9), the 404 came, which would take us close to
the member's house, but require more walking. As the 404 came, I felt a
prompting to take it instead. So we got on the bus and were riding it,
then got off to walk the rest of the ways to that member's house. As we
were walking, we saw another member, a old grandma that is sometimes
grumpy. I've never been able to meet with her, so when we saw her on the
street in the distance, we ran to go say hello. She told us how happy
she was to see us, and even though we only talked to her for like 5
minutes and didn't do much, we were able to brighten her day. I know
that the Spirit prompted us to take that bus for that reason, to see her
and strengthen our relationship with her!
A pigeon pooped on my head this week... opa!
bird poop
Another example
was when we decided what members to visit. We felt to visit a lady and
give her a Thank you card. So we left it on her door with some banana
bread. That was all that we did. Yesterday at church, she came up and
told her how much that card and the bread had strengthened her and
helped her. When she was sick, she read the card, when she got home
late, she was able to spend time with her husband (who is not a member)
drinking tea and eating banana bread and it was relaxing and happy. So
that was cool. Another day, we felt to stop by a member and sing a hymn
for her. We went by and sang 'i am a child of god' for her. She cried
and cried and talked about how she so strongly needed that at that very
minute. It was so special to be an answer to a prayer. I know that the
Spirit prompted us to know how to best help these ladies in our ward!
Another example was on a lesson with Sergey, our new
investigator. He is one of the first people that I have taught on my
mission that doesn't know whether or not God lives. It has been really
interesting teaching him and helping him. It has been so cool to see him
experience the Spirit for the first times. He doesn't really know how
to describe how he is feeling and he doesn't always recognize it, but I
can see that the Spirit is touching his heart. In our Gospel Principles
class yesterday, we ended our lesson with a Mormon Message about a blind
kid that is a piano prodigy, after our lessons about talents and how
God gives us talents because He loves us and so that we can help other
people. The Spirit was so strong after that lesson, and I went up to
Sergey and asked how he was doing and what he thought of church and he
went off about how everything was, "so cool". He was almost literally
filled with light and he was so happy. I realized that he was feeling
the Spirit and being filled with the light of Christ. It is miraculous
to see someone change as a result of hearing about the gospel!
But at one point this week, we
had a lesson with him. At first, the lesson wasn't going very well, not
bad just not the super spiritual lesson that we wanted. Partway
through, he received an important phone call and had to leave to answer
it. Sister Larcabal and I took that moment to say a prayer, pleading for
the Spirit to guide us. When he came back and we taught again, it was
as though we were teaching a completely different lesson. The Spirit was
SO strong and it was SO cool! It was so fun to follow the Spirit,
especially when it leads a different way than what you expect!
One
last example was when Sister Larcabal and I had a few minutes to be on
the street talking to people. We said a prayer before we left to be
guided by the Holy Ghost, then went out and on our way. As we walked
down the street, I saw a lady selling watermelons on the other side of
the road, and I felt like we needed to go talk to her. At first I
justified that thought and decided that we would talk to her on the way
back, when we were on the other side of the street. But then the spirit
said, "go now", so we did. It was seriously the MOST AWKWARD
conversation ever! The lady asked if we wanted a watermelon and I told
her that we didn't have money and she was like, "my watermelons aren't
free, girl." and so I asked her about her watermelons and she just
didn't want to talk. So we left and walked back down the street. It
wasn't quite the conversation that I had in mind after that big
prompting. So then we were heading back to the church, when we say this
lady up in the distance. We head over to her and start talking and end
up inviting her to english. She is so interested that she shows up THAT
VERY NIGHT, loves english and is into the spiritual thought! Isn't the
way of the Lord so interesting? He knew that if we kept going on the
path that we had started on, we would've never ran into that lady, so he
gave me a prompting to turn us around, thus putting her right in our
(new) path. So cool! :)
So
I learned so much about personal revelation this week! there really is
no limit on the personal revelation that you can receive to guide your
life! And although I didn't immediately receive an answer to my
problem, I learned more about how God speaks to me individually, which
prepared me for the quiet moment when he answered the question that I
had for a long time. Because I had learned how to recognize revelation
better, when that answer came, I couldn't deny it, and I knew that it
was His answer to me. Personal Revelation is SO COOL! :)
I love being a missionary and I love being guided by the Spirit! The church is SO TRUE! :)
Keep on being fantastic :)
I LOVE YOU ALL!
love,
Sister Kati Ford
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