Oh man, these are getting harder and harder to write. What happened this week? Oh, ya know... missionary work.
I could really just end it right there. Ah, but then Mom would be upset. Can't have that.
Last Tuesday we went over to Sally's house. She is someone we met by the lake the week before last. She invited us to work on this service project with her. It's a Holocaust memorial for the children that were killed. We were painting rocks with their name and age and they are going to be put in pillars for the memorial. We only painted about 15 altoghether, but it was still super fun. We got to know Sally and she showed us around her super nice house. She loves flamingos, so there's flamingo decorations EVERYWHERE. Her sink drain is literally a flamingo. She also has a retro juke box that was playing some awesome music while we painted. We painted the rocks and we learned that she is pretty interested in family history, which is awesome. We got her in contact with our ward's family history consultant, so hopefully she can learn how to do some.
This past week has been a lot of street contacting. We haven't been able to meet with Linda again yet, but we are in contact with her. Funny thing is happening: she doesn't quite understand the language so her husband is reading some of it and explaining it to her. Her husband! This guy is not interested in meeting with us (yet) and yet he's reading the Book of Mormon with his wife. It's awesome!! Hopefully he starts to see that it truly does testify of Christ and that it can strengthen our faith in Him.
As we were walking around a neighborhood one day we came across a lady named Ellecia (or Elle for short). She agreed to hear our message and we were able to share the restoration with her the next day. It was really cool. At the end of our discussion she said that she wants her Mother to hear it. I hope that means she felt the spirit testifying that it's true.
Yesterday evening we came across 3 people who said we can come by again sometime. 2 of them were a couple and they were suuuuuper nice. We talked for a while until the mosquitoes got too bad. Boy, that's another thing. The mosquitoes out here are vicious. They're HUGE too. It's crazy. We get about 5 bites a day, so I'm always itchy somewhere (usually my knuckles, I don't understand what's so great about my knuckles).
On Sunday Elder Simpson and I made about 12 slices of french toast to break our fast and it was maybe not the greatest idea. It was soooo good, but we were on the edge of falling asleep while we walked. Our stomachs were so full of sugar and bread, we were struggling to stay awake after that. It was a good Sunday though.
I was studying truth the other day and I came across a scripture that really made me think. 1 Nephi 15:8 "And I said unto them: Have ye inquired of the Lord?"
It made me wonder how often we actually inquire of the Lord. I study the scriptures everyday, but how often am I inquiring of the Lord? I realized that I need to make Him a bigger part of my study. Even if I already think I understand something, I should inquire of the Lord to know if maybe I can understand further or learn something I hadn't originally thought of. The biggest thing I learned from this verse, and the whole story of this chapter, is that we can't expect to understand the mysteries of God if we aren't asking Him to bless us with understanding. They're called mysteries for a reason.
I invite all of you to inquire of the Lord. If you don't know what to ask about, ask Him to help you find something to ask about. He wants us to learn, that's the purpose of this life. So let Him teach you.
I hope you all had a good Labor Day, enjoy this next week.
-Elder Peterson
