May 2, 2016 - We once were lost, but now we are found.

Hey guys!

This week was pretty awesome!!!!! First off, I was blessed with the privilege to skype my family! Wahoo!!!! Highlight of my week! Your looking great family! Love every single one of you! (Sister-in-law included :D)

We got transfer calls! I am staying here in the great old Inlet View North Anchorage Ward! Sis. Rose is leaving me to do bigger and better things for the people in the North Pole! Sis. Christian will be coming from serving in Fairbanks to keep an eye on me :)

I can fit in Sis. Rose's suitcase!

So this week was super fun.. But a bit discouraging cuz many of our appointments get canceled or forgotten. It is a bit frustrating. But out of the lessons we did have, we put some on date to be baptized! Wahoo! So that is exciting. Now they need to continue to progress and continually meet with us.... Otherwise it's not going to be able to happen. I've noticed a trend. When putting people on date to be baptized they become more relaxed, less strict with meeting with us. As a missionary it's like "NO! WHAT ARE YOU DOING???" Because it is when they are on date that they need to meet with us the most! ESPECIALLY when they are on date. Because they haven't finished the lessons yet and because they have made a commitment to better their life and come closer to God, so it is a guarantee that Satan will be there trying so much harder to influence them. And it is sad cuz it
works. But us missionaries aren't fazed, we are as persistent as he is, you can just recognize us better then him so we are probably more annoying to the investigator, but that's ok, I like being
annoying 😆

So we got to ride bikes quite a few times this week. First of all, last week on pday our whole district went for a bike ride down the coastal trail. That was super exciting!

Out of Sis. Rose and I we only had one good mountain bike, then we had like this little hippy type bike with this horribly hard seat (I'm not sure what they are called) but we rock, paper, scissored it and I won, so she got that bike. It was super pretty! The elders left us behind cuz my bike started having some struggles (well combined with my lack of bodily strength, but I wasn't going to tell them that) so we got lost.

As we tried to catch up with them, we found our district leader, Elder Villeagas (he is from the Philippines). I thought we had finally caught up... But it turns out they had all passed him and left him behind too. This was kind of an awkward situation, cuz the elders aren't supposed to be left alone with the sisters, but he most definitely wasn't supposed to be by himself. I told him he is stuck with us. He road a little bit ahead of us but still in view.

We road down a long ways asking everyone if they had seen a bunch of boys on bikes. There was a point when no one had....So that was confusing. At that point we stopped cuz  it didn't sound like they were in front of us anymore.... But that didn't make any sense. Two minutes later our zls come riding around a corner super fast behind us.... That was the  weirdest thing ever! How did they get behind us?! Apparently they had all gone down off the trail to hang out at the beach. Five min later, when we didn't show up, they came looking for us. Apparently our telepathy is a bit rusty. Cuz I don't think any of us got the hint to leave the trail to find them.... But that was super fun!

Over the week Sis. Rose and I tried to ride bikes as much as possible. The mission goal is to talk to 10 new people a day and invite them to take the lessons. It is hard to do that in a car, so we biked. We were passing this bridge with two homeless men smoking on the stairs. Our goal was to not let anyone pass us without talking to them. So we pulled the bikes over and talked with them. They were super friendly! We asked if we could share a message with them. They said yes! So we actually ended up teaching them the whole restoration right there on the bridge. One of them had so many questions. When we talked about God is our loving Heavenly Father.... He got a little mad. Asking us if God loved him why would he let him suffer and be homeless? We told him that he let his own son suffer, he lets a lot of people suffer so that we may learn and grow. He didn't like that answer. But after a little bit more, he calmed down and apologized and said we could continue. So we did. And he listened. They both like actually listened! (There is a difference between really listening and pretending to listen). At the end we asked them if they wanted Books of Mormon. The one who got mad excitedly said yes, cuz we had answered a lot of his questions. Needless to say he was much more receptive. He said he wanted to learn more. But he was homeless so we gave him a card with our number on it and he said he would call........................ We are still waiting for that  call..................... But homeless people are the best! They are so much more receptive and polite when it comes down to it. They are just awesome! Scary at times, but awesome!!!

Anyways I love you all! Make good choices! The church is true! I love
it so much! And I love you all so much! Keep on keeping on!!! 🤗

#selfiewithamoose