March 7, 2016 - "Reaching Our Potential"

On her birthday at the lighthouse - district photo op

Bowling on Pday

Origami with Sister Curneal

Wow... I'm a little shocked that we made it through this week, but we did! I'm still alive! :) This week we were WAY busy and pretty stressed. I love being busy and working hard, but this week was a bit too much and we are just totally exhausted. But it was so worth the struggle because we've seen so many blessings and so much progress! We were able to have the baptism of the little 8 year-old girl Maggie! It was such a spiritual experience. The Spirit was so strong during the service and I know that it was an inspiring moment for her, her family, the members, and for us. It was so good! And now her mom is reactivated and Maggie is a member and they're headed off on the right road! :)

We also had two activities this week (one for each ward) and it was crazy getting ready for those and inviting everyone but they ended up being pretty good. One of them was a dessert night and I think I may have diabetes now..... but it was so good! Seriously. I LOVE Puerto Rican desserts! :)

We also had exchanges this week with the sister training leaders. I stayed here with Hermana Brown and I learned so much from her! I love how we can have these experiences to learn from missionaries who have more experience than I do. She taught me a lot about receiving personal revelation for our area and how, as a trainer, to help Hermana Curneal understand revelation and how to receive it. It was exactly what I needed! I know that the Lord is aware of us and knows exactly what we need and will send us His help so that we can learn what we need to learn to help us progress even more. It was perfect!

And yes! Transfers were yesterday! Hermana Curneal and I are staying here in Cabo Rojo! I'm really excited about it actually. I love this area so much and the people and my companion and everything - I never want to leave! So I'm super excited to have another transfer here to see even more blessings and miracles in these people's lives.

I realized that I haven't been answering very many of your questions lately so I'm going to take a second to answer some of them from the past couple of weeks....

First, my thoughts and experience with training! I have loved training! Really my job is super easy though because Hermana Curneal is basically already trained. She is such a good missionary and is so determined to be obedient and do everything she can to help these people. Of course, she's struggling a bit with the language, but it's totally normal and honestly, I've seen so much progress in her Spanish! It's incredible! Most of the time, I feel like I'm learning more from her than she's learning from me. This opportunity to be a trainer is really refining me and helping me progress even more as a missionary and as a disciple of Christ.

I think mom asked me this one about what President Boucher told me in my interview with him. One of them was that I needed to be more bold and straightforward. It was incredible because I could tell that something was holding me back and that something was stopping me from teaching super powerfully with the Spirit but I wasn't sure what it was. Then when he told me that, I knew immediately that that was it! And as I've worked to be more bold and straightforward I've felt a stronger spirit in our lessons and have been able to see a lot of blessings from it. I'm so grateful for the inspired counsel of our leaders and that they're worthy to receive this revelation to help us reach our full potential.

And to answer Dad's question... no S. and her husband aren't really progressing. It's been pretty hard with them because they always say that they're going to do things and come to church and all that, but then they never follow through. So we're working on that. But we have a 19 year old investigator now that we're working with that's been coming to church and our activities and is super interested so we're thinking she'll progress quickly and be baptized soon!

And CONGRATULATIONS mom on your job!!!! I'm so excited for you! You'll do great! :)

Something I found this week that I want to share with you guys is from General Conference in November. The talk is called "Blessed and Happy are Those who Keep the Commandments of God" by Elder Von G. Keetch. I love what he says - "True obedience, therefore, is giving ourselves entirely to Him and allowing Him to chart our course both in calm waters and in troubled ones, understanding that He can make more of us than we could ever make of ourselves." I love this so much! I know that when we are obedient to God and to His commandments, He will help us reach our potential and mold and refine us in ways that we never knew were possible. As we place our trust in Him we will begin to change and we will be begin to become who He needs us to be. I love my Father in Heaven and my Savior and I'm so grateful that they love us enough to allow us to grow and progress. I know that with Their help, we can and we will reach our potential!

I love you all so so very much and hope you have a marvelous week!!!! :) Love you!!!!!

--
~Hermana Allan