Hello my beloved brethren and Sisters!
Happy Independence day. huh? haha it was a bit odd not celebrating the 4th oh
July. But some members made it fun! We got a text in the morning from
Brother Geerlings, our Bishopric 1st councilor saying happy 4th! We had
District Meeting on Friday so I gave all the sisters a little American
flag (all the Elders had one already). I tried not to be too over the
top (which you all know for me is hard to do when it comes to the 4th of
July!) because he have a Samoan sister and a sister from Heroshima
Japan. that being said we asked them if we could sing Hymn #340 to
close, and they were okay with it. So that was fun! We all went out and
got all you can eat pizza hut after! That was fun! That night for Dinner
we went to the Thompsons, we walked in the house I was holding my BIG American flag, Elder Orr was waving 2 mini moones around, Elder Evans
had the American flag party tape all around him and Elder Lewis followed
up the rear with the Star Spangled Banner Playing Out of my CD player!
haha. It was SO funny! They got a good laugh out of that! I was pretty
happy.It was fun. She said she forgot it was the fourth of July or she
would have made an America cake for us. haha. Gotta love good Ol'
Saints! We visited one of our Recent converts Zak, and his little
brother was down visiting for school holidays, Isaiah. They are so
funny! Zak is quite and calm and Isaiah is crazy and loud! It reminds me
of my and my brother SO much! They even comment and say that I look
like an older Isaiah. We were riding our bikes on the bike paths gain
later in the week. I HAD to stop and Take a picture because it was
BEAUTIFUL!!! so good!So I have had a pretty good week! real good week!
On to the Good stuff!
My core experience this week is a result of what my
experience was last week. As we have been really trying to get a stronger
spirit in our lessons it has made the biggest differance! Go-figure! We shared
a mormon message with a family and really let them talk and express their
thoughts afterwards. We used skills we had been developing through the spirit
to ask inspired questions. It guided the family to realize how important family
scripture study, prayer, and home evening is. Something we have been trying to
do since we got here. The father is a returned missionary the motehr was born
in the church, they are honorable members, but complacancy can hit and tempt
anyone. It was incredible to see them find their own commitment and then to
have Elder Evans boldly and directly ask them "Will you have family
scripture study and prayer every night?" They couldn't help but agree to
the invitation. Since the spirit was there Elder Orr promised a seemingly big
blessing, but it was prompted because the spirit told all of us that it was
true. After this lesson we were listening to some MoTab on the way home. So, we
had kept the spirit with us, strongly. When we arrived neither I nor my
companion wanted to get out of the car because we felt so good. As missionaries
the spirit is usually always around us. However, the strong moments are the
ones that leave an impression. I asked myself why would we ever NOT want to
feel this way? We need to share this! It gave me a renewed sense of purpose. I
am excited to go out and do some more finding!
Teaching as Jesus
taught... I have had a different experience as I have been giving district
trainings. The spirit flows best when all members of the participating group
are actively involved and sharing how they feel and what they know. It is similar
to the spirit of a testimony meeting. When every individual is striving to
learn from the spirit and help others do the same, revelation follows. It
something we have tried to adapt into our teaching of investigators and members
alike. It has really helped the spirit flow as you can tell from my previous
paragraph.
The zone conference we had recently was good. All of the
topics covered were things that I had planned to train on in a district meeting
that week but didn't get the time to. It was a real big "oh, wow!"
moment to me to see how the spirit of revelation works. I had been prompted to
create a lesson=plan, covered half of it, then zone conference covered what I
did not. The next week at district meeting I was able to follow up a bit and
help give more understanding as we all discussed it! Revelation and the Spirit
are Undeniable
Thank you all for your love! I love you!
LOVE,
Elder Ford
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