Transfer 9 Week 4

Holy crow, y'all. What an amazing week. I hope I can remember everything.

Last Monday we taught Calvin the Word of Wisdom. It was cool--we did an object lesson that involved a blind fold, a hulk ice pack, and a gun that shoots little plastic balls. It was awesome. Calvin is progressing so great and I'm so thankful for him!! His baptism date was, however, pushed back to May. Some of our hurdles couldn't be jumped by Easter, but baptism is well worth whatever wait. Tuesday was cool, we had district meeting and then went out to a Chinese buffet as a zone. 2 of the Elders serving in the Tongan ward and an Elder who is Japanese all decided to eat an octopus. Gross...so of course I did it too. I was missionary number 5 out of 13 to eat it. Our whole zone ate one, minus one Elder who is a bit of a stiff, but it was hilaroius. My comp was the 2nd to last because she was determined not to eat it, but then she did and made the other zone leader look like a wuss, so he ate it too--after it was in his mouth 2 other times. Gross. It was awesome, though. Zone unity 100%!!

Wednesday we got a text message referral for a Book of Mormon request. It was via Mormon.org, and since we had time, we went immediately after getting the request. We drove up there and this lady answered the door, saying that it was probably her husband who had requested it. I asked if we could come back and share a message about the Book of Mormon and she agreed, so we set up a plan to see her Friday evening.

Oh, ps. It snowed this week. What the heck?!

Anyway, so we're going to fast forward to Friday. We went on exchanges, meaning Sister Dixon went to Fallon and Sister Warnock came to Reno with me. We had a lot of plans. One of our lessons didn't show up, but that was okay because we just got to every thing else a little early. We did service ,ate some good food, blah blah blah, fast forward to about 6:30. We had to then go on splits because we had two appointments for Friday at 7:00--one with the referral and one with a Less-active family. Sister Warnock went with the Dalen family to the LA family and I went with the Dyers to the referral. And holy holy holy holy. We found out like on Thursday that he was a member who was a "do not contact" for a while, so we were a little nervous to say in the LEAST when we got up to his house (which is a mansion, also intimidating). We go in and took a tour of all his trophies (stuffed lions, leopards, bears, zebras, etc etc etc from EVERYWHERE. Literally--China, Russia, Africa, Canada, Alaska...). It was like a museum. Then we proceded to have an AMAZING discussion--and Elizabeth, the wife, isn't a member. Mike, the husband, wants to be sealed in the temple. They both want the lessons so bad, and we talked about the Book of Mormon, invited them to church, and set up a follow up appointment.

FAST FORWARD TO SUNDAY aka the BEST DAY EVER!!!! So not only did Mike (age 72) and Elizabeth (age 68) show up at church on Sunday looking FABULOUS in their Sunday best, but Calvin was there AND was fasting (because it was fast and testimony meeting). I joked with Calvin about him sharing his testimony (because I'm my father's daughter) and he laughed and was like, "yeah, maybe when it gets stronger." Testimony meeting was amazing--people bearing testimony of the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith, God being our loving Heavenly Father--aka a missionary's DREAM!!!! And with 5 minutes left Calvin leaned over to me and asked me if he was allowed to go up there. I smiled and said yes and told him just to remember to close "in the name of Jesus Christ, amen." As soon as the lady that was up there said "amen" Calvin was out of his seat and up to the stand, bearing his testimony about the church. I COULDN'T STOP THE TEARS FROM COMING OR THE SMILE ON MY FACE!!!! The day ended amazing, and everything was amazing.

Now I have no time to explain other amazing and precious miracles that I witnessed, but I am so in love with this work. I wish it could never end. And thank goodness, it doesn't.

I love you guys so much!!!

love, love love
Sister Mack

ps--the pictures are from us hiking this morning with Sister Elsmore and her amazing daughter, Riley, who has downsyndrome. It was fun because Riley got tired and so I carried her on my back. It was a lot of fun.

Y'all should look her up on youtube--type in Riley Elsmore talent show and watch her dance. She does her own choreography and everything. AMAZING!!!