Friday, July 11, 2014

Semana de Milagres

July 7, 2014

Helloooo family!  

I hope all is well with you and I hope your 4th of July was fantastic.  I celebrated by wearing red, white, and blue.  Our zone leaders called us in the morning and sang the national anthem.  It was a great day!

Well let me start off by saying I think one of the greatest lessons I have learned on my mission is PATIENCE.  I never thought I was an especially impatient person before my mission, but time and time again on my mission my patience has been tested. It’s been so hard at times, but I know patience is the key to truly accepting the will of God and being humble enough to serve during the difficulties.  At the beginning of my mission, I had to learn PATIENCE with accepting the will of God and serving where Heavenly Father wanted me to serve.  It was so hard, especially during the winter in Williamston, but I loved every minute of it and I have such a strong testimony now that the plan of God is perfect.  I had to learn PATIENCE with other people many times throughout my mission, especially when people rejected our message or when our investigators didn’t progress like we wanted them to.  I had to learn PATIENCE with myself when I arrived in Brazil and I wanted to be fluent right away and be the same missionary I was in Michigan.  It truly is such a Christlike attribute.  Every time my patience is tested, I think of a quote from Elder Holland that really has touched my heart:

´´Some  blessings  come  soon,  some  come  late,  and  some  don’t  come  until  heaven;  but  for  those  who  embrace  the  gospel  of  Jesus  Christ,  they  come.´´

Beautiful, right?  And this week was such a proof of this prophetic statement.  I can’t even begin to describe how wonderful our week was.  Wyctor, our new investigator, is so solid.  We taught him a few times this week and he will be baptized on the 19th.  He said he prayed about the Book of Mormon and he knows it is true.  At church he was asking us if he could be baptized sooner but he has to come to church three times first.  Heavenly Father really is preparing people, we just have to have the spiritual eyes to see.

Also, Celia, Leticia, Nickoly, and David are progressing well.  We picked a date for them as well for the 19th and they are so excited!  For a while, they weren’t progressing like I wanted them to.  It was frustrating at times.  However, we kept doing all we could do and trusting in the Lord to provide and it’s made all the difference.  We have been visiting every day and reading the Book of Mormon with them little by little from the beginning. Just imagine Sister Moscoso and I reading the Book of Mormon in Portuguese to a Brazilian family and trying to explain what is happening with our limited vocabulary. Most of the time is spent with us looking up words in our dictionaries, but despite this, the Spirit is always SO strong!  Also we gave them some old skirts we aren’t using and they wore them to church yesterday and they said this Sunday was better than the others and they felt the Spirit stronger.  Cool miracles like that have been happening and I feel so excited about the work here right now.

My time here has been filled with little challenges and setbacks with the language and with investigators . . . however, I can testify with PATIENCE, the blessings truly do come. Everything is coming together so nicely and I am so so grateful for the hand of the Lord in my life right now.  Thanks for all of the prayers and advice--every little bit helps!

Still can’t figure out how to send pictures, but I have some good ones ready and waiting!  
Love you all!!


Sister Dixon

No comments:

Post a Comment