Cinco de Mayo (Cinco de Michael!) is a good day when an apostle of the Lord comes to town. I'll talk about that more later but SHOOT it was SO COOL.
It was a solid week! We didn't have an exchange this week (which means that we'll be doing three this week...not sure who the heck planned that. OH WAIT. We did.) so it was weird to have a full work week in our own area, so we took advantage of it and just went full steam ahead. We had mission leadership council and a bunch of other meetings but it's still been a good work week. It's been a bit frustrating these past couple of weeks; every single person we have seen only has about five minutes of time and is running out the door. We do our best to teach the message of the restoration, and it's definitely possible and the Spirit is always there, but both of us were really missing the chances to sit down for 30 or 40 minutes and have a full-out LESSON. We did some major praying at the end of last week, that this week we would be given opportunities to share the first vision and HELLOOOOOO God answers prayers! A few days ago we went and visited our investigator, Priscilla. Whenever we go over she is usually running around chasing her insane children (i have never seen so much energy in a 2 year old in my LIFE) who are yelling and screaming....not exactly the easiest place to feel the Spirit. But, to our surprise and deLIGHT, when we came over she demanded that all of her kids go outside and play and "leave mommy alone for thirty minutes". We got to sit and have one of the most powerful lessons I've experienced on my mission! She had the EYES-they were completely riveted on us as we testified of the first vision and you could just tell that she was feeling the same things we were. I had a grateful heart as she accepted the invitation to be baptized with this huge smile on her face. I love the message of the Restoration, I love reciting the first vision, I love it when my companion says the things that never come to my mind but need to be said. Man, life is good.
I know I mention the Gonzalez family every email but I can't get over how miraculous they are to me. They were in Murietta (hour north of SD) all weekend and told us that they probably weren't going to be able to come to church. So we were bummed, but right before sacrament meeting starts we get a text from them that said "we're almost there!"! They drove straight from Murietta to the church building to come for the last hour. Oh man....so much joy! We loved sitting next to Cassandra and Arturo (8 and 9) and hearing that they wanted to go to the primary activity this week, we loved sitting next to Shayla when she said "I want to go to girls camp!", and we loved looking over and seeing Mayra singing along to the hymns that she sang 20 years ago with her family when she was little. She looked so peaceful and happy sitting there, with her daughter on her lap singing "I Know That My Redeemer Lives" (good song...) and Hermana Barnes and I just looked at each other smiling the whole time.
We aren't a tracting mission so all of our investigators either come from referrals or street contacts, but this week we had a day where we didn't have a whole lot of appointments planned so Hermana Barnes and I went and did some smart-tracting, which basically means we walked around a trailer park and knocked on all the doors that either had Christmas lights still up, a bunch of flowerpots, or a mop outside their door (all of which mean "SPANISH-SPEAKERS LIVE HERE".). Its cool how Heavenly Father blesses you with miracles by going out and sweating. We added a woman named Maria (the first door we knocked on!) and she told us that she was praying for help right before we knocked on the door. I love it when you follow the Spirit without even realizing it. We're stoked to keep teaching her and her family!
SO. Elder Ballard was here. Hermana Barnes played piano and I led the music so it was cool to sit on the stand and look at all of the missionaries. I don't know all of their names but I love them all. I can't even imagine how President and Sister Clayton must feel. The mission president from the Alabama mission and his wife were here, along with our area seventy so basically it was a slap-in-the-face-with-the-spirit meeting and all of us were in Heaven. They all took turns bearing their testimony. The president from Alabama was very intense, and talked a lot about how we are successful when we are baptizing-very much a "fire and brimstone" kind of guy. We were a little scared. It was and interesting comparison after he spoke, when both of the Claytons went up and simply told us how much they loved us. They focused on how we measure success here in the San Diego mission-by obedience. By feeling the Spirit and following its promptings. By giving ourselves over to the will of the Lord. I look at the Claytons and how much love we all felt from and FOR them, and I just kept thinking "They are mine. We needed them.". It was comforting when they told us that we will be theirs for the eternities (they're leaving in a month....). It's true. They're ours.
Elder Ballard brought it all home. I wish I could relate everything that he said but it was just cool to hear him say things that were meant specifically for our mission. We were all very proud missionaries when he said "I am so proud of my daughter and son-in-law". I think the coolest thing was seeing him a lot lighter than he is at general conference. He was crackin' jokes all over the place! We talked a lot about determining success and following the spirit. He ended his talk by talking about happiness- "If you are not happy here, doing the Lords work in the California San Diego mission, you have a few things to figure out. This is joy.". I testify to that.
Another fun quote from him- "You're gonna be doing it in the Spirit world, for heaven's sake, so you might as well get good at teaching here in the field!"
I love you all! I'll expand more when I TALK TO YOU THIS SUNDAY!
Hermana Hess
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