A Week Of Miracles And JOY

It's a beautiful day in the neighbourhood! 

How are you all doing?

This week was interesting. 

It started off super scary.... sister trost and I on monday were just chilling eating our lidl breakfast... and then I hear a gasp followed by the most horrifying sentence "siostra... I got my plan" after a back and forth of me accusing her that she was lying... I finally believed her... because I checked my email.... and there it was...MY PLAN. so that was a horrible way to start the week. Sister trost and I went into crisis a few different times this week because of our upcoming departure. There are some things we are excited for but it is so strange. 

Followed by this we had exchanges on tuesday. I was with a sister who is still in training. Her name is sister radford and she is SO cool! We got on the tram later in the day to go contact , not even being on the tram for ten seconds... as I was buying our tickets for us this girl was already talking to this lady. It was so cool to see. I was expecting to have to hype her up to do it.... but nah. I have never seen someone in training do that before. By the end of our time on the tram I left her by herself to talk to this girl while I went and found someone else to talk to. We had a lot of fun. I am so grateful I could be her companion for the day. 

Last week I was on exchanges with sister Mace who goes home in a week... this week with a sister who is in her second transfer in country... sister trost and I go home in two transfers (which is how long we have been together... so that makes us both want to barf) anyways... scary stuff. the reason it is such a big topic right now is because we have eighteen sisters in the mission and in the next twelve weeks we lose nine.... so crazy times here in Poland. 

Anyways ENOUGH about that stuff. 

Wednesday was really cool! Sister trost and I went and volunteered at a highschool and taught them about canada and the united states. the first class we taught was really scary. But the teachers were so adorable. literally the sweetest ladies I have ever met. But the second class was so so cute! but the end... the end of the class was crazy... this girl walked up to us and said "so I want to get baptised..." sister trost and I were in shock but managed to get her instagram.... it was NUTS. In our presentation we only shared that we are missionaries and are here to help people come closer to christ... we showed a quick picture of the Book of Mormon... but that was literally it. SO that was insane. 

It was so cute as we were walking out of the school we were talking about what an insane experience that was and then we heard a few little voices yelling for us. We turned around and these three little 16 year old girls were running after us. They wanted our instagram... so now we have a cute little fan base on instagram that is hyping us up. That school was a miraculous experience. 

 We had all saints day! It was so cool to be in Warsaw again. I love warsaw. It is quite tender to see all the candles and the people mourning and praying for their loved ones. It is a very special experience. It was cool we had one of our branch members helping us contact people and then one of our spanish members pulled up because he said he felt prompted to!! at first we were panicking a little because we werent sure what job we were gonna give him... because he speaks spanish and english... but THEN he walked up to our other branch member and just started speaking nearly fluent Polish... Needless to say he was amazing and we did not have to worry about anything. 

Got to translate for a lady into Spanish yesterday... the amount of times I have done that on my mission is a lot more than I thought I would need to... being that it actually was never a thought for me... google translate clutches up. I should really just learn Spanish... I can pray and that is about it. I really need to step up my game. 

It was quite tender though because the lady I was translating for is the wife of a man in our branch. He came to Poland last year and has been trying to get his family here. I saw him for the first time yesterday since being back in warsaw. He gave me a giant hug and we talked... our conversations consister of some polish, some spanish, some english.... but ummm it's fun... but out of the few things he can say in english he looked at me and pointed to his family sitting down and said with the biggest smile ever "they are here, complete". I just wanted to sob. It was so sweet. He is so happy now. 

 

We had dinner with the elders last night to break our fast. It was really good and just so fun to spend time together... even though we do... literally every single day ... in the office....  25/8.  

Sorry this email is super long. I'll get on with my spiritual thought now! 

This week I studied the story of David and Goliath alongside the first three chapters of Nephi.

It was so cool to see the parallels of these stories. Although asked to do very different things... the principal remains the same..

Having confidence in the Lord so that we can act in faith no matter what. 

This made quite the impact on me and something I am excited to be better at applying in my life. 

No matter the giants in our life God provides a way to not only conquer them but to have confidence in whom He is. That makes all the difference! He provides a way for His plans to prevail. 

One thing I have started to pray for is to have Him replace any fear that I feel with confidence in Him. I have found a lot of joy in that and it has already started to make a difference in my life. 

God is so good and has a marvelous plan for each of us. 

This week you should go read philipians 17 and the first three chapters of the Book of Mormon. I would love to hear what you learn!!

Anyways... so sorry for the long email! I hope you all have the best week. I always love hearing from you all! Thank you for your emails.

Hermana Andrea  ( what carlos's wife calls me)