Holding birthday packages

June 24, 2013

Hi everyone!  

First of all, Thanks SO MUCH for the birthday packages!  I had the best day and I just felt so loved.  But I will get to that later. I am so glad to hear everyone is doing well!  I'll give a little description of my week.

We had such an amazing week again!  Monday and Tuesday were filled with finding and teaching.   I discovered I have a love for bus finding!  Talking to people on bus rides is the best.  Plus it's suspenseful because you never know when they are going to get off so you have to time the invitation to learn perfectly.  I love it!  I am still working on mastering the timing though.  The worst is when I don't get to ask for someone's number and we have to leave.  It's a fun challenge though.

We had district meeting on Wednesday and we got to go to Chipotle for lunch again.  We taught the rest of the day on Wednesday which I just love!  We saw so many miracles that day.  We taught 2 new investigators--one from India and one from Saudi Arabia.  So cool.  The one from India is named Ashwini.  He is a referral from one of our Chinese members named Lyons (Lyons is hilarious and is one of the best missionaries ever!) but we taught him and he came to church yesterday so we have high hopes for him.  Then we taught Thamer from Saudi Arabia.  That lesson was interesting because he is VERY hard to understand.  He was a miracle though.  He got our number from one of his friends who was a former investigator and randomly texted us that he wanted to meet.  That NEVER happens so we are excited.  We are meeting with him again this week so hopefully that goes well.  Bruce meets with us almost every day and on Wednesday he prayed the Miami Heat would win their next game hahaha it was so funny.  But they won!  And Bruce told us he has a strong testimony of the power of prayer.  Heavenly Father was definitely helping us out with that one.  On Wednesday night I went on exchanges!  Sister Christiansen and I went to Williamston with Sister Nuttall.  

Being on exchanges was an awesome experience because Williamston is a family ward.  It was interesting to see the different dynamics.  We started out the day doing service for a lady in the ward.  We pulled all of her weeds and I loved it!  We don't get too many opportunities to serve in our ward because the students are all super busy and they don't really have front lawns or anything we can help out with.  So the times we do get to serve are just amazing!  We had a picnic at the park with another member who was hilarious.  She is very old and said some very interesting things about the Church and men (she is divorced and very bitter!) so we enjoyed ourselves.  We got to go door knocking later in Williamston.  That was very different to knock on family doors!  Some people were very nice and open but some people were very set in their ways and not very polite.  It was still fun though and hopefully they will get return appointments.  There was one guy that really gave us an interesting experience.  He came out on his porch and we started talking but then he stopped us and lit a cigarette and then pointed to a tattoo on his hand.  He said "See this mark on my hand?  It means you’re not welcome here.  Bye now.  Don't get hit by a car or anything."  And then went back inside.  It was creepy but we were all dying laughing.  One thing that bugged me was how people kept saying they are comfortable where they are in their own church.  I decided I HATE that word!  I think the only time we can experience true joy is if we are striving and growing.  If we are comfortable and complacent, we are not learning or becoming better.  For the rest of the day, whenever we would feel uncomfortable or awkward or frustrated, we would look at each other and say "YES!  We are growing!"  I am glad I learned this because it's definitely something I want to strive for the rest of my life.

On Friday we had a sister training meeting.  It was with all of the sisters in our zone and it was awesome!  I seriously learned so much and it just made me so stoked to be a missionary in this time and in this place.  Later on we taught Bruce and went to Book of Mormon study.  All of the members sang an early Happy Birthday to me and it made me so happy.  Like the most joyful I have ever been.  I love these people so much and I was just so touched by their love.  

My birthday was awesome!  I got your packages on Friday but I waited to open them until Saturday morning.  Thank you for everything!  I love it all and I already wore the shoes.  And my companions say thanks for the Starbursts!  Sister Probert made a scavenger hunt for me while I was in Williamston and she gave me some cute gifts.  One of them is a whiteboard for me to write on because I am doing an English fast tomorrow.  Wish me luck!  And Sister Christiansen wrote a hilarious comic for me.  I loved it all.  Later, Greg and Erin (some members) came by and gave me a chocolate croissant.  We worked the rest of the day and then went out to a pizza place for dinner.  Overall, it was an awesome day and I just felt so loved.  Oh and the best part of the day was our lesson with Bruce!  We committed him to get baptized on June 29th for sure!  He told us on Friday he was considering waiting because he had a crazy schedule but on my birthday he told us he got it all worked out!  So he is getting baptized this Saturday and we are all so excited for him.  I can't believe it though.  I mean we met him on June 6th, my first day, and he has just progressed so much!  He is the definition of being prepared by the Lord.  It's going to be an amazing experience.  

Sunday was good too!  We had some investigators at church and we got to teach Gospel Principles about the sacrament.  I am so grateful for the sacrament!   The broadcast too was UNREAL.  It was cool too because there were some missionaries I know in the choir.  We were sitting there with all of the missionaries in the district and President and Sister Hess were with us and you could just feel the energy from how excited everyone was.  All of us were just sooo pumped up after and we kept saying how lucky we are to be missionaries right now!  I feel so blessed!

I hope you all have a great week!

Sister Dixon