Week 15

Dear Family,
 
I love you all so much! You are seriously the best. I'm saying this now in case I don't get time to tell you later in emails to all of you personally.
 
This week has been so great. Sister Allen almost got eaten by a dog yesterday. Not that those are related.
 
Also, we weren't hit by a car on Tuesday! It was the biggest miracle. The light turned green and Sister Allen started to go, but she just put her foot on the break, without even thinking about it. At that moment, a little silver car came flying by and hit the van next to us. It luckily only took of the bumper, but if Sister Allen had gone, she would have been hit so directly. After we pulled over and gave them our witness information, we decided to pray and say thank you. Neither of us realized what a big deal it was until we prayed, and then we realized angels were totally looking out for us. You know your family is praying for you when....
 
We also had a potential investigator come to church yesterday. Her name is Shannon and she brought her two kids. It was one of those testimony meetings where every member of Relief Society gets up and cries. Shannon was kind of horrified, and kept asking why everyone was so sad. Luckily her son's football coach got up and shared his testimony and addressed Dmitri (who is autistic) and told him the testimony was for him. It was perfect. They all went to primary together and enjoyed that though! :) She said she'll come back next week and we told her church isn't normally that sad. She hasn't had any discussions and doesn't even know about the Book of Mormon yet, so she had a ton of questions all through Sacrament Meeting. It was scary to try and answer all of them, but I was so excited they came.
 
We also had a Navite man named Sheldon come to church who legally can't be in the building because his foster daughters are there, but he has so much real intent. He told us about his culture and how in his culture, everyone has gifts. He said his was to know the Creator is there. He told us about a dream he had had about a river and people trying to discourage people and blind them from choosing the right course; I don't remember the whole thing, but it was just like Lehi's dream in the Book of Mormon! Really it was amazing. So we had him read 1 Nephi 8. He talked about how in his culture, when they pray to the Creator, they have their ancestors talk to him--kind of like Jesus is our Mediator with the Father. He said when he was in his treatment center (he got out a couple of months ago--he's a recovering drug addict/alcoholic) he just wanted to talk to God directly, so he did. We talked about Alma 22 and how the king says he would give away all his sins to know God. It was an awesome lesson. He won't be coming back to our church, but the Elders will teach him at home and we'll try to get him to the building 40 minutes away.
 
I'm really coming to know the purpose of baptism and receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost better on my mission. All of these covenants that we make give us full access to the Atonement of Jesus Christ so He can fully heal us. That is why it is so important that everyone make these covenants through the proper authority. When we do so, we can truely be washed away of all our sins when we are baptized and the guilt and shame that come from sin can be healed and leave us completely. Then we can be cleansed with the gift of the Holy Ghost, which can really be there in every instant. Because of the Atonement, the Holy Ghost can comfort us when we are down and heal our hearts when things go wrong that we cannot control. Our first counsellor last Sunday described a man and asked everyone to think if they would want to invite this person to church. He said he swears every other word, he drinks, his morals aren't great, he's had a couple of minor run-ins with the law, gets in frequent fights, and he smokes. Then he said, that was me. Before he was a member, our bishop had to kick him off of his (the bishop's) property when our first councelor was sent to be his electrician because he kept swearing so much. Everyone was in shock. Our first councelor seems perfect. He's just this happy, young dad who is so happy and strikes you kind of as real-life teddy bear. He has a sweet wife and his kids are just awesome.
 
Love you all!
 
Sister Thomson