Week 41 - Recognize Your Strengths

Sister Jenkins & Walker

The Lord has truly blessed us with beautiful weather. We have been biking all over the place and had several members at church come up to as and tell us they’ve seen us biking. It’s been an amazing week! We’ve seen a lot of miracles from biking. It makes a difference when you’re on your bikes in crazy helmets and dresses, with a big smile on your face trying to hold your skirt down in the wind, people definitely notice you. When we can’t bike to certain areas we’ve been trying to get members out with us so that we get to know them better. We’ve actually seen a lot of miracles with the members we’ve been taking out. One member we didn’t know very well who went out with us, told us about a former investigator that is related to her, who she thought probably would like to take lessons again. While she was out with us we had to go pick up her son’s non-member, Brazillian fiancé, who was super interested in the gospel and she came to church today. That was awesome! We’re seeing so many awesome miracles with the members this week and it’s been really cool to see how much of an impact they have on missionary work. You members out there are really making a difference. Smiling at someone, sharing something brief about the gospel is doing missionary work. Keep doing what you’re doing. It’s amazing. I love the members here.

My shoes!
Tape isn't working anymore 😁

Sister Jenkins and I had the unique opportunity of attending another church, Life Church, this week. Little did I know that I would get to go to another church on my mission but it was a really cool and interesting experience. The reason we did this was for something that we are allowed to do, called a church swap. Our investigator, Sharon, came to our church, then we went to her church. It was nothing that we’re used to and it was a completely different way to feel the Spirit. As I looked at the people in the room, I noticed one thing that was similar to what I saw in our church, every single person in that room is trying to come closer to Christ. There is absolutely no room to judge those people. I could very easily have judged them when they raised their hands up and praised the Lord, but that is their way of coming closer to Christ in what they know. So it was different for us to see, but was honestly a learning experience that every single person, especially being in the Bible Belt right now, who’s core belief is in their Savior Jesus Christ, want to come closer to Christ and to one day be with Him again. This is so amazing, and I absolutely love it. That is honestly their ultimate goal and as missionaries, our purpose is to invite them to come closer to Christ. So, they have a foundation in Christ but why not add to that foundation and grow with it? That is our purpose – to apply the teachings of Christ and add upon that to make it even stronger. So I think it was a pretty cool experience going to Life Church. When Sharon came to our Sacrament Meeting, she said it was a real cool experience to see a different side of church. She liked the family aspect and other things that she absolutely loved about it. It was real cool for both of us to feel the Spirit and to see ourselves come closer to Jesus Christ. I am so grateful for the plan of salvation and knowing that every single person on this earth chose Jesus Christ when they came to earth. Some don’t realize that yet, that’s why we’re out here teaching about it, so hopefully they will understand that they are sons and daughters of God. I know for a fact that there is Jesus Christ and that He lives. It’s just incredible to see the growth that the people we teach make and the growth that I’ve been making and that my companion’s been making. It is an amazing experience to see how Christ truly affects us if we turn to Him.

We had the craziest miracle happen, and it just shows that things happen by divine design. Things are laid out perfectly and it all happens because God is real and He has a plan for us. It was so cool, we had just gotten done with a lesson with two sweet girls we were teaching and reading with them the story of Ammon & King Lamoni in the Book of Mormon (Alma 17-18). In the story Ammon goes to a people he’s heard about who aren’t the nicest, who usually kill the Nephites. (Ammon’s a Nephite, Lamoni’s a Lamanite). He goes anyway because he has a lot of faith in the Lord. That is A LOT of faith knowing that you could die but willing to do it any way. He went to teach the gospel to the Lamanites because the Lord asked him to. He is tied up by the Lamanites and brought before King Lamoni. All Ammon wants is to serve this king and that’s what he tells him, so the king begins to respect him and makes him a servent. King Lamoni sees the good deeds that Ammon does and thinks of him to be the great spirit which is God. Ammon explains that he is actually a servant of God. We talked to the girls how sometimes we have to serve.  Being kind, loving and serving is teaching the gospel, and that softened king Lamoni’s heart so that he would be able to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ. It didn’t happen in an instant,  it took a little bit of time. After this lesson our next appointment canceled that we were really looking forward to.  Sis. Jenkins suggested that we just walk our bikes and I agreed after saying “No, let’s just ride our bikes.” (I have a lot of respect for Sis. Jenkins because she just goes for it, has no fear and is awesome.  She’s really been pushing me and I appreciate her). We were walking down this one street and she noticed a lady talking on the phone and doing a bunch of yard work. She said, “Let’s go see if we can help her.” Sometimes when we go offer service it’s like, “girls in skirts?  Oh, I’m OK. You girls just keep riding your bikes.”  But she was really appreciative and said yeh, that would be really great. We got her flower bed weeded and things raked up off her lawn and it was the coolest miracle because we just applied scripture story about service and had the opportunity to apply it. We were there for 2 hours and helped her and talked to her about her life and what she was going through. Slowly she opened up to us about some things she’s been experiencing and how she’s been able to come closer to God. We were able to testify about the plan of salvation which is always amazing . . . I absolutely love to testify about the plan of happiness. She kept asking us what we believed about this and that. She told us about experiences she’s had with her ancestors on the other side of the veil. It was one of the coolest 2 hours of my life. After we left from that experience, our jaws just dropped and acknowledged that that was a miracle from heaven. . . we were supposed to meet her. Her name is Donya and in those 2 hours we became close and she said she wanted to have us over for dinner. By the way, she loves music, and so we are going to jam together. She plays guitar and sings. No coincidence, right?  So we are going over to have dinner with her and her family and sing and teach. We had been getting a little discouraged this week because we’ve been having to drop people who weren’t ready right now, so that was a tender mercy from the Lord.  We are so grateful we met that sweet lady Donya.

I have an experience this week that goes along with the Challenge I have for you this week. We talked a lot about confidence this week and our Mission President surprised us and showed up to District Council, where all the missionaries in our District meet and talk about how we can improve as missionaries and get counsel from each other. We were talking about confidence and in walks Pres. Mansell. He had some good insight about confidence and he put me on the spot and it really tested me and tried my faith a little bit. He asked me what my strengths were. I realized that I have not been focusing on my strengths lately, I’ve only been seeing my weaknesses. It took me a while to pinpoint a lot of my strengths. Yes, it was a little embarrassing in front of my whole district but it was cool to see how much we need to recognize our talents and our strengths and the things the Lord has given us. They’re for us to use to help other people. We talked a lot about what God has given you is supposed to affect / influence other people for great things. So the talents the Lord has given you, use them to serve, use them to teach, use them to do good in the world. This week I’ve been really focusing and applying that counsel I got from my Mission President to my missionary work, to have confidence in the things that I’ve been blessed with, and to not forget those things that I could do better in. So your CHALLENGE this week is to recognize your strengths. There is not a limit as to how many strengths you can put down on a piece of paper.  I would just like you to write down as many strengths as you can and then put it somewhere where you can see it and study it, and really ponder about why God gave you those strengths. Everyone is going to have different strengths. They’re not all going to be the same, because everyone is different and God made everyone unique and special. He loves each one of us and those strengths are going to take you into eternity. You have to learn from them. The lord gives you talents not to set in the corner and collect dust, but He wants you to use them for good. I have truly had a strong testimony of the need for confidence this week, and it has tried my faith and it has tried me in so many different ways. I’m excited and thrilled to be strengthened in that. I hope you all have a great week and let me know how this strength challenge goes.

Love,

Sister Walker