well ALOOOOOOOOOHA family and friends!!!
This week was....
well....
It was a rollercoaster. And for those of y'all that know me well you know that I LOVE roller coasters, but sometimes riding them can be exhausting (if you don't believe me, go to 6 Flags on a slow day and ride Raging Bull 10 times. Then you'll understand) BUT it is also really fun. It's that whole principle of opposition thing that I was talking about earlier. To quote myself from 9/22:
So there has been a lot of opposition, BUT as Lehi points out, if we didn't have the bad we would not appreciate or even see the good. ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING has its opposite. I'm sure that all y'all smarties out there have already figured this out, and intellectually I knew it, but I have never seen so many examples of it until this week. We NEED opposition to be able to be happy, of this I am thoroughly convinced.
So yeah. This week has been a rollercoaster. But with every downhill comes an uphill, through every slow patch there's speed up ahead, and every line you have to wait in has a fun ride at the end. But before I wax too philosophical and bore all y'all, here are some experiences to help you ride the rollercoaster with me:
EXPERIENCE #1: Last Monday my ear was KILLING me and I knew from past experience that I had an ear infection, probably brought on by doing a lot of service in the allergy-infested outdoors. So we called the mission nurse and she recommended that I just go to urgent care and get an antibiotic prescribed. Well shoot. Ain't nobody got time for that! We literally had NO time until Wednesday, so that's when we went. We went to an urgent care in Edmond because I've spent 4 hours at urgent care in the city before so we decided to go somewhere that was a little more... classy. Luckily we got in and out in less than 30 minutes and they were even able to fill the prescription right away at the little family pharmacy that's attached to the urgent care. So we went around and started talking to the lady that was filling the prescription. After chatting for a minute, we asked if she was excited for Christmas (one of the ways we transition to "He is the Gift") and she said that she was, but she has a hard time teaching her children about God because they're really little so they don't really know the true meaning of Christmas. Well, just ASK THE MISSIONARIES they can help you! So we told her about He is the Gift, etc and before we could even ask if we could come by she asked if she could have our card so she could get ahold of us. Well ok! We set up an appointment for the next day. But upon examining the map we realized that she did not live in our area... so we had to give her to the Edmond 1st elders. But they had a lesson with her and set a baptismal date and then she came to church! So it wasn't a new investigator for us, but we're all on the same team, right?
EXPERIENCE #2: Friday was definitely the most awkward day of my life. I won't go into detail, but just trust me when I say that it was AWKWARD and a little discouraging. However, Saturday was amazing!(remember that whole opposition thing) We went to a baptism in Stillwater for Sis. McKenzie and then Tieasha (Comesha's daughter) had her baby shower and we were able to set some appointments with her family members. Then that night we were filling up the car and we get this phone call. He says that his name is Chris and that his dad just joined the church about 2 years ago and he's decided that he wants to be taught by missionaries and be baptized. WHO DOES THAT???? We were freaking out just a little bit and part of me thought that it'd be a scam, but it wasn't! The only problem was, though, that as we checked the address, we found out that he lives in the Edmond 1st elders area... So we passed him over once again. Kind of sad, but we know that we're being instruments in God's hands and that he will bless us with new people to teach as we continue to be worthy and diligent!
EXPERIENCE #3: Church on Sunday was JUST AMAZING. We wanted to present He is the Gift at church, and our bishop ended sacrament meeting a little early, and then we introduced the video and the initiative while the congregation was still sitting there. So everyone in the ward saw it and LOVED it. It also became the topic of conversation for the rest of church and many members commented on how much they liked it and that they are thinking of people that they can share the Gift with this Christmas. IT WAS SO GREAT!! and then the rest of church was fantastic. Bro. Cease gave an inspiring lesson in Gospel Principles about testimonies and everyone was moved to tears. And then in Relief Society Sis. Burke had the sisters share the impressions that they received as they watched He is the Gift and how they're going to act on them. It was simply amazing. I have never felt so inspired and renewed after church before. THIS CHURCH IS SO TRUE!!!!!
...but later on, while we were sitting in correlation we realized that our house key was missing. Like gone. We tried to retrace our steps as best we could on our way to Stillwater for another baptism (by calling people) but nobody could find it. By the time we got home it was 10pm and our options were either to call the mission president so he could bring us a spare key or to crash at another set of sister's house. We chose the latter, because I was not about to make Pres. W interrupt his sleep for our mistake. So we go to the Edmond 1st sister's apartment and sleep on their air mattress and recliner and then this morning we had to figure out what to do. I was a little down for the count because I had not brought any contact solution, and the only sister who wears contacts in that apartment has this weird solution that you can only use with a specific case or else it will burn your eyeballs out (weird, right?). Well I didn't find this out until the morning and my contacts had already been sitting in the solution all night. Long story short, I was blind from the time I woke up until we finally got back into our apartment. Not fun. We never did find the key, so we got into the apartment using the spare and then had the lock changed so whoever has it can no longer get in.
Do you see the rollercoaster effect? All in all it was a great week, though. We have had some great experiences sharing the Gift and I am so excited to being teaching the friends that I know our members will give to us. LIFE IS SO GOOD!!!!
Well y'all are awesome. I appreciate your prayers on my behalf. Please keep them coming, and especially pray for the members here because I know that they want to invite, they just sometimes lack the boldness to do so (as do we all).
I LOVE YOU!!!
~Hermana Holloway
PICTURES!
1. Sometimes district lunch gets a little out of hand.
2. Crazy fog on the way to Stilly
3. Our sleepover in Edmond
PS: You should look up "the Missionary Next Door" and listen to it (it's a talk) it's super funny and really amazing!
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