hey. check out this week.
-Wednesday: got a call in the morning from a member who lives in the sisters area. he's been less active for 3 years, didnt ever want missionaries over. someone in his family needed a blessing so he called us. told us to come over at 7pm even though he wouldnt be there, so we did. his wife answered and they actually had 3 kids. we spoke with his wife, she told us it was her mom that needed the blessing. she wasnt feeling too well.. so we gave a blessing, which was awesome. after, we just talked for about 10 minutes or so to the wife and she told us the reason for being less active but they want to start coming back. she said the missionaries could come by whenever, and they would like that. turns out the oldest child is turning 8 years old in October and needs to be baptized. the sisters are going to start going to their home and inviting them back to church and stuff so im excited for that!
Afterwards, we didnt know what to do.. i felt like we should see an investigator that lives across town for some reason, so we biked over there. they lived in the ghetto, and we've been warned about being shot in that area but whatever. when we got there, E was outside on the porch like usual but she didnt seem happy at all. i asked whats wrong but she just said she was fine. i told her "you cant lie to us, i know something is wrong. what happened?" and she started crying and told us the problem. in short: her mom got really upset, started yelling at her, fell down and started having a seizure. the son, M, picked her up and E called 911 but the mom told her not to and kept yelling at her. she left, but mom chased after her and told her to come back so she did.. then mom just got in the car and left, and E had been outside ever since. she had been gone for hours. once she got done explaining everything, we had no idea what to say. this family has been seriously struggling, and is super dysfunctional. what could we say?.. i prayed in my heart for the Lords help, and it came. The first thing i did was make a phone call to her mom. she didnt answer, but i just left a voicemail. i cant really remember what i said, but i hope that it made some sort of difference. then we shared a message to E and M about family, responsibilities, love, and the Savior. I told them how the Lord guided us to their home and that it was no accident that we came when we did. this was maybe the 2nd time we had both of their attention fully. They listened, and it touched them. The spirit was so key to that whole circumstance!
That night, i called the sisters to inform them about the less active we gave the blessing to. i asked them about some things and then they told me something SO COOL! so they have an investigator thats really progressing and stuff. they had a good lesson with her and she said "you know im so much happier now that im starting to go to church and read and pray. sometimes i dont understand what i read but i just pray about it and it makes more sense. but it all really started when those 2 guys came over and gave me a blessing. I felt the spirit so strongly then.. and i knew everything would be alright" That was the blessing that elder W and i went to go do!!!! Elder W didnt know what was going on (English missionary) but he felt the spirit there as well. It was so awesome to see the Lord used us to help out like that!
-Thursday: we had zone conference and elder T from the 70 came and talked with us. it was super cool, and he's a great speaker! Learned a lot :) right after conference we went on exchanges with the zone leaders and i stayed in the area. All the plans fell through but we just street contacted and talked with everyone we could find. we got 1 super positive lady, who we had to like chase down. we were biking away from an intersection and Elder W was like "hey i saw a lady jogging down the road, should we turn around and go talk to her?" i said sure and we did, but she was past the intersection already so we chased after her and stopped and talked to her. it was reaaalllyy awkward at first hahah but as we shared a brief lesson about the restoration she was very interested. I remember talking about the book of mormon and Joseph Smith, and the spirit was sooo strong! it was ridiculous!! when i stopped speaking we all 3 just kinda stood there in silence on the sidewalk and Elder W said "did you feel that spirit as he testified of the book of Mormon?" and she nodded her head, smiled and said "it feels great, very peaceful and... i dont really know how to describe it." it was so awesome, and she said she would read the book of Mormon! So excited to teach her :)
Saturday- around 7:30pm we were back over in E neighborhood. their family wasnt home, so we biked around for a while. i got tired and stopped, turned to my companion and said "Elder you got that greenie fire, so im following you now" and he was like "okay well... there is one street we havent tried yet so i guess we can go over there?" i was skeptical but agreed so we went. there was 1 family outside, a man with his wife and a baby. Elder M stopped and said "hola!" and that was it.. silence. hahah so i started talking with him and he was pretty cool. we taught him about the book of Mormon and our message and he seemed to like it. he said hes catholic but not very "catholic" if that makes sense. he told us we could come by whenever we want and he would listen! so we are excited to go back and teach him more.
Then we left, and it was late so we were headed home on the bikes. we saw 2 kids so we spoke with them. they were teens but were interested. we taught a brief lesson 1, gave them both a book of mormon, and got their info. they were way positive and wanted to know if we had a prophet today! We gave one of them over to the English elders but the other was Hispanic and such so he's ours haha.
THEN, about 50 yards after, we ran into another man who was in a hurry. i stopped and said "hey you have a moment?" he said "no i gotta go over here, then back to the hospital." i asked him what was wrong and he said his "girl" was in the hospital. so i asked if she would want a blessing and he said "uh i guess. yeah." so he gave us her room number and we went to go see her haha. by this time it was like 9:20pm or so. We got there and spoke with the lady, her name was brandy. OH MY.. she had quite the story fellas!! got into drugs, husband left her, had no money, went into jail 2 days after surgery, found out she has cancer and hepatitis.. it was so sad.. but we gave her a blessing and she spirit was super strong. we assured her the Lord loves her and is perfectly aware of all of her problems. She just wanted someone to come visit her because she literally has no one. We gave her to the English elders but hopefully they can help her!
Soooooo... i guess you could say we had a pretty good week?! our numbers were horrible, almost all 0's hahahah but it was such an awesome week! I love doing this so much.. I know that Christ lives, and that the worth of every soul is great in His eyes. I love you all. Have a wonderful week! :)
-Elder Jacob James
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