Arizona is hot!! It's been in the 90's all this past week. "Luckily", it's going to "cool down" and get into the 80's this next week. It's never been this hot so early before in Arizona. Lucky me. lol. I'm not looking forward to the summer at all. They call the 80's and 90's the spring time weather. Not a good sign. My companion gave me a poem about the Arizona heat which I will type up next week. It's pretty funny.
We had Diahann and Nate drop us because "they were comfortable with their church right now". It was a sad day because they canceled 15 minutes before and they hadn't given it a chance. They hadn't read the Book of Mormon or come to church. It's sad when people dismiss it before they're really read the fruits of the gospel and did everything possible to look into the church.
But! After they canceled, when had a lesson with Michael and his daughters were there, so we now have them as investigators! We lost two and then picked up two. The only thing is now we have all of our eggs in one basket- they're our only investigators right now. They haven't come to church yet because of various excuses. Michael's daughter is really sick right now and had been in the hospital. One thing after another keep on happening to Michael. If he'd only realize that the gospel can lessen the pain and help protect him from the storm than waiting until after these trials to make more of an effort. There's only so much we can do. Agency has a major part in the work. Which sometimes frustrates me.
The Easter Pageant is coming up this week and we can only go with an investigator. Since Michael doesn't seem like he'll be going to the Easter Pageant, I had been praying that we would have new investigators so partly we could go to the Easter Pageant since this is my only chance to go. We had a zone fast on Friday for our baptismal goal for this month. On the same day, we had our interviews with President and training from the zone leaders, the fleet coordinator, the housing coordinators, and Sister Howes. Sister Howes said someone in our Area Book who had been taught the gospel (former investigators) is ready to be baptized. She asked us to prayerfully go through those names and then go by them.
We went to a part member family we've been trying to contact since I got here with no success. They finally opened the door on Friday night and we set up an appointment to teach them. They had been taught and even had baptismal dates, but had backed out. We have an appointment with them tonight. Happy Day! That same day we stopped by a less-active family and they let us in also! We celebrated with them there son's birthday and shared a message. They came to church yesterday.
So Saturday night we prayerfully went through the names and then planned them in for yesterday, Sunday. Yesterday we went by them after church. Most of the people weren't home and those we did talk to said they were not interested. So we moved on. The last door we knocked on was a lady's name of Pauline. She opened the door and said "Sisters! I'm so glad you came by! We need to set up an appointment for this next week to meet!" We were just astonded. We set up an appointment and then invited her to the Easter Pageant and set up a day to go with them to the Easter Pageant! It was a miracle- direct answer to my prayer and fast!
My testimony has been strenthened this week of the power of fasting and prayer. Faith is a major element when fasting. I have been studying a lot about faith this past couple of weeks. The Brother of Jared is a great example of faith- he saw Christ because his faith was so great. God is a God of miracles and He cares about each one of us. He is aware of each of us and knows us personally. We watched Elder Holland's "Missionary Work and the Atonement', which really struck me. Christ has been through what I'm going through right now. As missionaries we need to be shoulder to shoulder with Christ. He knows and He cares what we care about. My testimony has been strengthened- I love this gospel and I love being a missionary.
Love,
Sister Lauren Collins