Semana 80 - You Don't Know What You Have 'Til You Lose It

Hey mom!

You would probably be very proud (and surprised) that I have definately grown a better appreciation for things that I have. These past 2 weeks I found that the frase "you don't know what you have 'til you lose it," rings very true when I battled constant flat tires and finally this past tuesday I was on exchanges in Rome and the missionary who came down to C-town broke the axel on my back tire. Since then we've walked miles upon miles everyday and at one point my feet were just two giant blisters. E. Newman is getting the REAL missionary experience haha. It also makes sense that this past week was the hottest it's been this summer...and getting hotter. It's ok though, cuz the branch generously offered to help us fix the bike so we'll be up and running soon!

Because of the bike situation we were a lot slower at working this week. We couldn't reach a lot of our appointments on time so that was really frustrating but things happen for a reason. One reason I believe is because of a lady named Barbara. We met her while she was sitting on the porch enjoying the shade. We said hello and she asked why we were walking in heat like this and shouldn't we be home somewhere haha. Long story short, we talked to her about the plan of salvation and if she would be interested in learning more and Barbara agreed. The spanish work has been keeping us busy so we handed her over to the sisters. Fast forward to Sunday and Barbara was there with the sisters! Sister Johnson told me later that Barbara had an awsome experience! That made me happy!

For us, we had no investigators to church but we had a few more LAs there so that was great! We're actually helping one of them, Gisele, set up the baptism for her 8 yr. old daughter, Synthia. We have to do it before they leave for Mexico July 14th.

The new president has not come yet, that's on the 1st of July. A big bit of information that I forgot to tell you: President Harding will be delayed in coming. He had surgery (a tumor removed the size of a football) so there is another guy filling in 'til he gets better--Elder Snow of the Seventy...formerly from the Seventy. So, I'm sad that Pres. Harding won't be here for a while, but it's also exciting to have Pres. Snow here for a bit.

I just wanted to share something I read this week. It was the talk by Elder Donald L. Hallstrom titled, "Converted to His Gospel through His Church." He said some very powerful statements like, "It is possible to be active in the Chruch and less active in the gospel." He also quoted a scripture that I liked--Mosiah 5:13:

"For how knoweth a man the master whom he has not served, and who is a stranger unto him, and is far from the thoughts and intents of his heart?"

He then invites us to "couple prayer with constant study and humble pondering to continually build unshakable faith in Jesus Christ." As we do this, E. Hallstrom points out that "a sustained knowledge of and love for the 3 members of the Godhead are indispensible" and can help us build our foundation on the gospel. There is much more than that in the talk but I really enjoyed what he said there. We won't be sufficiently strong if we are not built on the gospel.

Well, it's been a long week and I can't remember everything that happened, but I'll let you know if i remember anything awsome!

Love you guys!

--E. Heimuli