WICKED!!!! WICKED! This is the Musical of the Week. BoO yAH! Not because I have had it playing in my mind all week but because of a certain story that i will get to later on in my email.
FIRST off!!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY to GRANDMA, KY my dear, SETH-bud, I just adore you, Megan Mower, and Others... eek.
Well I hope you all had splendid days and that you are all living the dream because I SURE AMMMM!!!!! YAYAY!!!!
I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!!!!!! Each week just gets better and better. I think to myself, how am I so lucky? HOW DID I GET SO LUCKY! I adore German, already. My companion Sister Pickett is the best gem since sliced bread-no seriously guys. We work sooo well together!!!!!
I Love HER!
All right are you all ready for the story of a life time.... bucket up because this rocks!!!
So as you know we teach "investigators" in the MTC and yes, I love all of them. Mark is the name of a man we are teaching right now. When we met him he introduced himself and his two kids, but never mentioned his wife. We thought that was odd, but had no idea how to ask him in German so we thought we would get to that next time... haha. Well on our third lesson we had prepared something and when we got in there he was so excited and said, "I watched general conference! I read the Book of Mormon! I love everything! And then he proceeded to ask us different things about the book of Mormon. Well when he was asking all these questions I had a distinct impression to talk about baptism... I thought "Absolutely not! It is waaaayyyyy too soon." But again the feeling persisted and so I mentioned that the book of Mormon testifies of Christ and as we come to know him... yadadayadda ydada by his example he set we know we should get baptized... I said the word taufen (the German word for baptize)... very slowly and softly hoping he would not hear, he did. Bummer. But he was very interested and we asked him when he gains a testimony will he follow Christ's example and be baptized, without hesitation he said, Yes. I can do that. I was Astonished- and quite frankly did not believe it. Then as we left we got out of the room and Sister Pickett was like- NICE way to follow the spirit! I was excited as well, yes for mark to be baptized but also excited that I had actually followed a prompting and that the spirit was present in our lesson!!
Our next lesson we prepared for Mark was all about baptism and we had planned this beautiful spiritual lesson... ha. We go knock on the door, Mark comes and we ask him how he is, how the book of Mormon reading was. He said he stopped reading it- we were shocked and I explained to him the importance of the Book of Mormon and then had him read the last paragraph of the introduction, that says if you know the Book of Mormon is true then everything else is true. As he was reading it, it mentioned Joseph Smith and he looked up to us and said, "Who is Joseph Smith, what are prophets, what is this even saying..." literally my heart sank to the floor, here we were ready to talk about baptism and Mark has completely forgotten everything.
Okay Break from the story-you have to realize that up till now Sister Pickett and I have always had our lesson plans written out. We have phrases in German and basically create a script for ourselves. Thank goodness for theatre, I usually memorize mine, and then Sister Pickett memorizes/reads hers. That is how we have done it.
Back to the story….We had nothing for Mark. His questions were such a surprise and we had not even bothered to write any German down for those questions. After he says this-We both look at each other and are really horrified. Not only can we not speak German, but also our investigator has completely lost everything that we had taught him. This was our fourth time meeting with him! He had learned- the entire first lesson!!! I looked at Sister Pickett and she just looked at me-like what do we do. All the sudden I just opened my mouth and started talking and talking and talking. I told him if he remember watching general Conference-those were prophets-I asked him if he remembered our lesson on the Restoration, I clarified the book of Mormon and compared Moses to Nephi- I answered all his questions and asked if he better understood. I pleaded with him to continue to read the BOM-that through doing that everything else would make better sense. I told him to pray to know--Reminded him to pray to know--recommitted him, Sister Pickett asked him to come to church, and we testified of the truthfulness of the gospel, and then we left. I got outside and Sister Pickett just looked at me and was like, "wow, your German is good." WHAT THE MONGREL!!!! HAD I REALLY JUST SAID ALL THAT IN GERMAN!!!!
"Had that really just happened? Have I actually understood..." –
WICKED song-the wizard and I
Literally those were the exact words that went through my head!
GOD IS SO GREAT! He is so mighty, he is so powerful, and at the very second, he will put the words into your mouth that you need in the VERY moment! Guys, I spoke German. Best DAY EVER!!!! After the lesson my teacher (who plays the investigator Mark) came up to me and said, "Sister Nilson your German is so good. Wow. I was so surprised. YOU can speak GERMAN!!! Way to go!" BAHAHAHHAHAHHAHA!!!! Happiness FLOWED THROUGH EVERY PART OF MY BODY!!!! I was so happy!!! And although I have such a long way to go and am nowhere NEAR fluent, I do know the gospel and I can form simple sentences to testify of the truthfulness of the gospel. It was such a special moment for me.
Well we had another lesson with Mark and Sister Pickett thought that the Atonement would be a good lesson to plan and bring families into our plan because he has his two sweet daughters. I thought it was great so we prepared a lesson. When we got in we asked him about church and he said he loved it. He said he had met so many good people and he had a great time. We then asked him about the book of Mormon and he said he was still having a hard time-he said he had read it but was still unsure- Sister Pickett the little genius had prepared this brilliant comparison btw the Book of Mormon and the Bible (Mark LOVES the bible). She took him to different scriptures and showed him that both books testify of one another. Then he said he felt peace when reading both books! BRILLIANT! I jumped in and gave a whole little spiel on how the peace he feels is the Holy Ghost! Then the magic began- we asked him what he learned at church and he said, "they taught about the atonement of Christ" WHAT!!! BRILLIANCE! THAT WAS OUR Lesson WE HAD PLANNED! So we just went right off that. I started with telling him about how god sent us down in families and how central families were to Gods plan-then again I had a prompting, ask him if he has a wife- and the German works came into my head. I was like NO. You can’t just ask someone, "Hey do you have a wife" that is rude... so I didn't ask him. Then as Sister Pickett began talking about the atonement we had him read something and he talked about his family and said something about his FRAU-which is his wife in German. Well seeing as we don't understand German I looked at Sis. Pickett and said, did she die- She was like, "I think?" Again I had the prompting "Ask about his wife." I did not want to and it was Sister Pickett's turn anyways. Sister Pickett then went on to tell him through the atonement we can live with our families again and that he would be able to live with his wife and daughters again. I thought great. She did die we know what happened. Then as strong as ever the prompting came-"ASK HIM ABOUT HIS WIFE!" So I said this, Mark you talked about your wife, can we know the story about what happened?" And he just sat there. I was horrified.!!!! I was like NOOOO!!! I just lost him!!! Why did I do that! and then he said yea, he then proceeded to tell us that about his wife-and that they we divorced. Sister Pickett looked so embarrassed. We finished our lesson and went out. She was like oh my gosh! Why did I just assume that she had died? Why didn’t we ask for clarification earlier....I felt terrible. God had TOLD ME to ask earlier, and I had not listened. No nothing tragic happened. No one died, but because I did not listen to the Spirit the first time, My companion said something that I could have prevented. She got over it fast and it was completely fine-No BIG Deal AT All. Those things happen especially when trying to understand a different language-but if it was a lesson that I had to learn. It was a lesson that God needed to teach me. I am glad he taught it to me in the MTC with Mark instead of out in the Field.
We often ask ourselves if it is me or is it the Lord- Elder Bednar said-it does not matter. If you are obeying God’s commandment and are being a good girl and good boy God will use you how he wants. So don't worry about it.
Trust in the Lord- Be aware of the spirit and ALWAYS act on promptings you have.
I love this gospel and am so thankful for the experiences I have had this week! I adore my Mission!! I am so grateful that I have this opportunity! I love everything and miss you all. This letter is so scatter brained because I have NOOOO time! Sorry!! Love you!
I love being a missionary and Love the Lord!
Josie
AND WE FINALLY GOT PICTURES!!!!!!!!!!
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