OCTOBER 16, 2017

IM NOT TIRED AT ALL….

Psyche!!... There seriously must be a gas leak or I must have mono or something because this week was exhausting. It’s like I'm a greenie again or something. I have hit a solid wall. but the work marches on!! So so do I! 

BUT ANYWAYS, HELLOOOOO!!!

Other than being extremely tired, this week was super awesome. We are working with a whole lot of super cool people right now and so our days have been so great. I think the Lord is just pushing us to our limits to see if we can handle it and its been fantastic. 

We had a super fun zone activity this past P-day at the beach for a few of the missionary’s birthday's. I just want to say again just how inspired it was that I am here in Florida. This place is always so pretty and sunny and happy and tropical and GREAT. It’s hard to ever be sad here. EVERYONE NEEDS TO VISIT. Although, on a similar note, we went to visit a less active this past week and her only excuse for not coming to church is that "it’s too hot".... yup, it’s just "too hot". Sister Dimond and I both walked out of that house completely confused but hey, I guess it is pretty hot. 

Right now, we are teaching this really cool 18 yr. old guy Robert and his girlfriend Taylor. He actually has been living in a member’s house for the last 4 years and has been going to seminary every morning and mutual every Tuesday night and honestly just knows everything already, but he wasn’t able to get baptized until he turned 18. He turned 18 a few months ago but just didn't feel like it was his time or that he had any desire yet until he finally felt in his heart that it was all true a few weeks ago. We have been teaching him everything and he is just the most solid kid. He has been through things that no 18-year-old should ever have to experience in their lives, but he has truly been strengthened for it. He is planning on getting baptized on the 28th, we are so excited for him! 

Lots of other hilarious stuff happened this week and I promise I’ll write it all down in my journal and talk about it later! 

I just want to end with a quote that my Dad actually sent me this past week from general conference that I really love a lot. It’s by Sister Oscarson and it says

"I have tremendous love for and faith in those of you who are in your teen and young adult years. I have seen and felt of your desires to serve and make a difference in the world. I believe that most members consider service to be at the heart of their covenants and discipleship. But I also think that sometimes it’s easy to miss some of the greatest opportunities to serve others because we are distracted or because we are looking for ambitious ways to change the world and we don’t see that some of the most significant needs we can meet are within our own families, among our friends, in our wards, and in our communities. We are touched when we see the suffering and great needs of those halfway around the world, but we may fail to see there is a person who needs our friendship sitting right next to us in class."

May we all try a little harder to open our eyes to serve those that are closest to us. For some reason it’s harder to do that I guess. It’s such a weird phenomenon. We love to fly half way across the world to serve complete strangers, but we don't find that same satisfaction in serving those that live under our same roof.  LET’S BE BETTER.

I love you all and pray for you every single day. Have a great week!