Thomas, the best last name ever.
Hi everyone!
Happy Late Father's Day to all the
amazing dad's in the world. We are so blessed to have you and you are
inspiring and changing people everyday through your hard work!
It
has been a special week. So many special experiences that I feel so
grateful that I get to have. And now, today, starts the first day of my
last six weeks as a missionary. In the mission, we go by six week
periods of time that we call transfers. And for each of those six week
periods we have a little planner where we plan out everything we do
during our days. And today I start my last planner. How crazy is that?
There
were some things that happened this last week that I want to share, it
was with one of our investigators Godlyn and her six year old daughter
Murna. They came to church the week before and really loved, but they
were going on vacation this last weekend so they couldn't come, but
Godlyn wanted to have us over to have a lesson. To give more background,
Murna is a sort of rambunctious child, (kind of like me as a child,
mom, I'm sure you can picture it) very easily distracted and hard to
settle down. We've had several lessons with them, but Murna hadn't been
too involved, so when we arrived last Wednesday, Godlyn started by
telling us that she wanted Murna to be more involved that lesson. So we
started sharing more about Faith in Jesus Christ with them, and we
opened with them in the Book of Mormon to where a prophet compared
having faith to planting a little seed and nurturing it and letting it
grow. We talked about this idea with Murna, and she really loved it. She
started telling us ways we could help our faith grow, she told about
how she now understood what faith meant, and also, she repeatedly told
us what faith did, she kept saying "faith makes you happier! If you want
to be happy you have to have faith!" We were so happy, Godlyn included.
We almost didn't recognize this little girl who was telling us all
these amazing things. But that phrase "faith makes you happier" kept
ringing in my ears even after we had left the appointment.
Later
that night we had another special experience with one our members named
Sandra, a recent convert of only one year, and we talked to her about
Sundays, and why it's important and about how we can come each Sunday
to re-sign our agreement with God to try harder the next week. She
loved it, and we laugh and ponder the scriptures together and it was a
tender time. And then as we were driving home, after the day was almost
done, I was looking around me, on roads that I had driven for the past 5
months, and I just started crying!! I kind of took me by surprise, but I
was smacked with the idea that this wouldn't be my life for very much
longer. That I wouldn't be able to have experiences like that (in the
same context, with the same people, in the same way we do as a
missionary) everyday. And it hit me, that I would be leaving this place
that I come to love with my whole heart, way sooner than let myself
expect.
And that's a sad thing. I've seen so much growth and
so much happiness, in myself, but more importantly in others in this
past hear and (almost) a half that I'm left marveling. Being a
missionary is such an incredible blessing, is such an incredible
privilege, that I'm left just feeling eternally grateful to God that I
have even been given the experiences I've had to grow.
A few months ago a very wise man told me, "this is not your mission; this is the Lord's mission for you."
And how true I have discovered that to be. Everything that has
happened, all the smiles given and tears shed have been a gift from my
Father in Heaven, as He has given me experiences to change the hearts of
others as well as mine. And I'm just left feeling.. happy.
Nicole, Malcom, and Sister Bolander, my favorite people!!
I hope you all have a happy week. We deserve one.
love,
Sister Thomas
Tandoori chicken from a local indian restaurant (!!!)
it was only a 5
minute walk from our house, it was just discovered this week. SCORE
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