Week 68

Hope you are all well and happy 🙂 this week, oh I don’t even think I could pick a word to describe it haha except for maybe rollercoaster but I think I’ve used that way too many times already anyways… Hahaha but that’s just how it is! This week we had the awesome opportunity to see MOTAB!! It was amaaaaaazing!!!!! And they sung Battle Hymn of the republic and it was sooooo good! And also come thou fount and this African song and so much more and oh my goodness it was just so great!!!! We also locked out selves out of our apartment and broke in again (thanks to a handy old train card hahaha) got dropped (investigator doesn’t want to meet) and then picked up again (wants to meet again). We had a finding day and street display where it seemed hardly anyone wanted to listen, but those who did were so prepared. The very last person we spoke to was the one with real genuine interest. A lesson in enduring haha. We also were able to teach a new investigator how to pray and listen as he spoke with his Heavenly Father for the first time. At the beginning of church we had only one person there out of all the people we had invited and hoped that would come. And by the end we had almost all of them there. I love our gospel principles class- we spoke about who we are and we went around saying where we are all from. Me… Well born in South Africa, raised in the UK and now living in Australia, then there was America, England, Germany, Nigeria, Gambia, Romania, Albania, Nigeria again, half Mexico half American, Iran and Laos. It was so cool to have them all come! It’s like, I’m already so happy to be at church- I love it, and then every time someone comes that I also love it’s like my happiness just gets doubled and tripled and so on until I basically can’t just stop smiling. When I walked into the class and saw all these people that we are so privileged to know and to teach it just ah it just made my heart so happy. We met one of our investigators this week and had an experience that really touch me, this lady is such a huge example to me. She is a refugee from Iraq, they left because people we threatening to kill her and her family and threw them out of their house. She is so grateful to be here and not have to worry about her family. She describes them coming here on a boat, her daughter crying the baby of one of her other daughters crying, not knowing if they would all make it. She describes this fear so vividly. And now they are here she and her family are doing their best to fit into this culture. They are learning German- she can already also speak English. They are taking Maths and computer courses. She helps out in the office at the refugee home where they live, all 8 of them in a room the size of our lounge. Separated from the next room by a polystyrene wall. It’s hot, humid, and not the cleanest place. But they are so happy and so grateful. So so grateful. On top of that she has health problems and was even in hospital up until the day before we saw her. She also now has problems with other people in the home as she and her family were chosen to be the ones to do an interview for a news thing and now all the others are jealous. And after all this she tells us how she took the photo of Christ with her to the hospital to give her comfort. And how she reads the Book of Mormon and it helps her with her children and her life. And “it makes her heart quiet”. This lady is a hero. One of those “unsung heroes”. I am so grateful that we could be a part of her finding this peace, the kind of peace that only comes through the Saviour. The peace He promised His disciples when he said “my peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you, not as the world giveth give I unto you, let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid”. I am so grateful for his! I love Him, I love you! I hope and pray you all feel of this peace:) love youuuuuu!!!