Week 18

Dear Family,
 
Naomi is getting baptized! :) We had an awesome lesson with her on Tuesday and the Spirit was really strong. I invited her to kneel and pray at the end of the lesson and ask if the church was true and anything else she wanted to ask. She prayed and asked that and also if the Book of Mormon was true and if He wanted her to be baptized. We were just in her bedroom with our friend Celest (who recently decided to serve a mission :)), but it really felt like the celestial room. She said she felt really warm and a lot of peace, but she wasn't sure about the answer just yet. Sister Allen invited her to be baptized on February 28th (not even remembering that was my birthday :)) and she agreed. Best way to spend my 20th ever. Naomi is 18 if I didn't mention this before, and Christian, but she's had a lot of questions. She broke up with her boyfriend last week (which we were soo happy to hear) and is the perfect example of being teachable and humble. Celest's best friend of 18 years ended their friendship the day we had our first lesson with Naomi and they are becoming really good friends.
 
Also, Sister Allen and I got high on Friday.... But we taught a really awesome native woman named Delores who is a survivor of a Residential school (one in Mission called St. Mary's which was supposed to be one of the worst.) She said she's been sexually abused since the time she was six and almost drank herself to death multiple times. But she has a firm belief in God and Jesus Christ (even after the school she went to!) and has quit the alcohol and drugs. She needs this gospel so much, and I am so happy we found her. We just need to teach her in a different house......
 
Sorry this letter is shorter! I can give you a short recap of the rest of the week:
(1) We taught a lesson with a woman named Shqipe who brought her friend Steve. Steve was trying to sell us on a quick, get rich (scam) he talked Shqipe into, while we were trying to teach the first discussion...
(2) We talked to like 100 people on Saturday because we walked all day. All day.
(3) A member gave us a popcorn machine that can make kettle corn. Guess what we've been eating all week?
(4) We found the cutest Greek Orthodox couple from Syria and Eygpt. They've been married for two years. When I asked how they met, Antoine said, I asked my family to find me a good wife, and they did! She just smiled really wide. They had an arranged marriage and are the happiest couple ever.
(5) We've had almost a whole week of sunshine. It feels like summer....
 
Love you all!
Sister Thomson
 
PS. I read this quote by Elder Holland this morning and am absolutely in love with it. I am really learning about the worth of one soul.
"Anyone who does any kind of missionary work will have occasion to ask, Why is this so hard? Why doesn’t it go better? Why can’t our success be more rapid? Why aren’t there more people joining the Church? It is the truth. We believe in angels. We trust in miracles. Why don’t people just flock to the font? Why isn’t the only risk in missionary work that of pneumonia from being soaking wet all day and all night in the baptismal font?

"You will have occasion to ask those questions. I have thought about this a great deal. I offer this as my personal feeling. I am convinced that missionary work is not easy because salvation is not a cheap experience. Salvation never was easy. We are The Church of Jesus Christ, this is the truth, and He is our Great Eternal Head. How could we believe it would be easy for us when it was never, ever easy for Him? It seems to me that missionaries and mission leaders have to spend at least a few moments in Gethsemane. Missionaries and mission leaders have to take at least a step or two toward the summit of Calvary. [...]

"The Atonement will carry the missionaries perhaps even more importantly than it will carry the investigators. When you struggle, when you are rejected, when you are spit upon and cast out and made a hiss and a byword, you are standing with the best life this world has ever known, the only pure and perfect life ever lived. You have reason to stand tall and be grateful that the Living Son of the Living God knows all about your sorrows and afflictions. The only way to salvation is through Gethsemane and on to Calvary. The only way to eternity is through Him—the Way, the Truth, and the Life."