The spring is here

17 March 2014

Transfer 3, week 2

The spring is here. The sun's shining every day and there's flowers everywhere on the trees and we don't need to wear coats! It's amazing, amazing amazing! Missionary work is so much nicer when the weather's like this. Nicer but NOT any easier.

Our mission president came up with this idea of a questionnaire that will make our contacting more effective. There's four questions like "do you think there are serious problems in the world" and "do you think it would be good to have God's help" and then people respond and often it sparks a really good conversation. People are still often really rude but at least we can buy two minutes with them and give them the chance to feel the Spirit.

We had two great rendez-vous with the Sri lankan family. First time we taught them The plan of Salvation and the next time the restoration. We also gave them a soft baptismal invite and they're thinking about it. They are still so awesome. They have amazing questions, like babtising babies and reciting prayers etc, natural questions for Catholics to have and they're always really happy with our responses. The mom really likes the Book of Mormon, she's already in Mosiah and loooves king Benjamin. This is such a special and loving family and I'm 100 % sure Heavenly Father loves them SO MUCH. I just wish i stay in Clermont long enough to see them get baptized.

We had a mangez-vous with soeur Gribissi, the less-active who's now pretty much activated. We gave a lesson on forgiveness and used Christ as an example. He went through so much but still was willing to forgive everyone and even asked the Father to forgive (Luke 23:34).

Saturday was a sad day. We got dropped by two people who we thought we could help progress. But apparently not. Luckily soeur Burton made us rolls. That were the most delicious rolls I've ever eaten.

Yesterday evening we went to pass by a potential. She is sooo nice to us and very spiritual. We talked to her and prayed with her and she asked us to call her later in the coming week to set up a rendez-vous. She's got two little dogs and the other is named Uppsala! Haha, so random! She thought it's a town in Norway though but anyways, such a cool name for a french dog! And the best thing she told us was that there's mafia in Clermont!!! My day was made.

And just for everyone's information, my new favourite flower is MAGNOLIA. Everyone here has magnolia trees here and they are so so so beautiful this time of the year.

- Soeur H

First McDonald's lunch outside

Picture post transfer 2, week 6

We stopped to see an old, beautiful casle

Staying inside makes you go crazy

Transfer 2, week 5



This past week was looooong. Soeur Green got sick at the end of last week and whatever she had didn't go away until the end of this week. So we spent a lot of time inside. Too much time. Staying inside makes you go crazy.

We had a few good experiences with members though. We had mangez-vous with two families in the ward and had so much fun with them. The members here are so great, their testimonies are so strong and the way they live the gospel is a great example to me.

We got a few new amis this week! Who knows if anything will come out of them, the other is an old portuguese woman who's a practicing catholic, we're quite sure she  hasn't realized that we're not catholic... And the other is an african man, who's met with missionaries before and Temoin Jehovas visit him every now and then. Hopefully spirit will touch their hearts when we teach them.

And we had two amis at church both week ago and yesterday. AWESOOOOME. They're African and we've been teaching their friend who told them about church and they decited to come and see what it's like. We taught the other man this week and haha, that was interesting! He's a protestant preacher, he showed us this sketchy looking certificate he had, and started preaching to us about faith in the middle of our lesson. The funny thing is that he's not trying to fight us or our believes but apparently just wants to show off his knowledge about religion. He's really cool though, he loves being at church, after every talk in the sacrament meeting he comments on how great the talk was and he absolutely LOVES singing hyms! Totally off key but whatever.

Saturday was the best day of the week. We accidentally contacted this man who's door we had knocked on a few weeks earlier and who had been really rude to us. this time he was totally different! He apologized for not being nice to us and we talked to him about all kinds of things and at the end of our little 15 min conversation we were the best of friends with him! He's still not interested in the gospel but at least he has a good impression of mormon missionaries now! Later that evening we had a less-active miracle, we visited a lady we had never met before. She was so happy to see us and pretty much told us her whole life story and then gave us Coca-Cola and chocolate! She still has testimony of the church but feels unworthy to come back. She just needs friends who'll help her come back and the ward of Clermont is perfect for that.

À la fin, here's my fave scripture of the week:

MOSIAH 5:15

 15 Therefore, I would that ye should be steadfast and immovable, always abounding in good works, that Christ, the Lord God Omnipotent, may seal you his, that you may be brought to heaven, that ye may have everlasting salvation and eternal life, through the wisdom, and power, and justice, and mercy of him who created all things, in heaven and in earth, who is God above all. Amen.

- Soeur H

Heavenly father is being too good for us

10 February 2014

Transfer 2, week 3

Heavenly father is being too good for us. We had some crazy crazy crazy miracles this week.

On wednesday we went to pa by a potential ami who lives quite close to us. We got to his building but didn't find his name on any of the doors so we knocked on a few door and asked the neighbours if they know which apartment was his. The last door we knocked before finding the right one was opened by a young girl, probably about our age. I got this thought that I should ask her if she wants to learn more about the Church of Jesus Christ but I didn't... She told us she didn't know where the man we were looking for lived and we left. But after that the whole time we were talking to our potential I had this feeling we should go back to that girl. We were leaving the building when I finally stopped soeur Green and said that we need to go back. We went back and knocked on her door and Soeur Green made me do all the talking because it was my idea... The girl opened the door and I explained to her quickly who we are and that we share a special message about Jesus Christ and His church and asked if she wants to learn more. She said she was a little busy at the moment but we ended up fixing a rendez-vous with her for next week! That was such a cool experience!!! I just felt like a full missionary who's being guided by the Spirit. I must be doing something right.

Thursday was a day full of tombez-vous. It felt like every time we take a member to teach with us the people we're supposed to meet don't come. It's embarrasing.

We were also supposed to meet this african lady who was a referral from the office. She lives an hour away from Clermont so we were going to see her at her cousin's house. We get to the building and realized we don't know the cousin's name! S we just looked at the mailboxes and picked the most African name we could find and knocked on their door. We didn't find our african lady but we did find ans african family of 7 who want us to come back and teach them next week!

Saturday night was the craziest. Once again, all our fixed rendez-vous were cancelled. We decited to go visit some less actives but they weren't home. We ran out of back-up plans. It was cold and rainy and windy. We still had to more hours before we could go inside and the thought of just going door to door or contacting on the street didn't really make me happy at all. Only thing that kept me going was thinking that this is Lord's work not mine, I'm not here to be comfortable, I'm here to work. things could be worse... But still feeling pretty miserable. We contacted this oldish lady and started talking to her about all kinds of things, she told us she hasn't found faith in her life but she really likes gospel churches because of the music. We told we have pretty songs at our church and told her we could sing her some and she was like yeah, why don't you come over to my house right now, drink some hot chocolate and you can sing to me! We couldn't say no. So we went and ended up staying for an hour (or two...) and she even made us dinner! As we were leaving she told us that we had brought this light to her soul and she would want us to come back and teach her more about our message. That was such an awesome night, walking home we didn't care about the bad weather anymore, we were just so happy!! I felt like I was fullfilling my purpose as a missionary. We gave a long prayer of thanks to Heavenly Father that night.

Book of Mormon Jacob 6:12

12 O be wise; what can I say more?

Á la prochaine, Soeur H

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