Happy End of January.

Hi people.

 

Let me tell you a short tale about Jessica.  Jessica has been an eternal investigator of the Church for over two years now.  She lives with her boyfriend who is a less active member of the Church.  I visited them for the first time with my companion and our ward mission leader last week and it was neat.  We got to know a little bit about her background and why she's been meeting with missionaries for so long.  She has some kind of terrible past with getting booted out of her Catholic Church and then she lived in darkness and hated God for a while.  It appeared to me as though she still suffers.  So a few days ago, we went to read a Book of Mormon chapter with Jessica to help her better understand the gospel.  We read 2 Nephi Chapter 31 which is basically a -booya, this is the doctrine of Christ/feel good chapter.  After reading with her we asked her what were some of the things she thought about as we all read.  She asked about the name of Jesus that was used in the chapter.  She was concerned because she thought that the Nephites shouldn't refer to Christ as "Jesus" because in the Old Testament he is called by many other names.  Right away, she asked if that was something that Joseph Smith thought up.  We told her that Joseph Smith only translated the words.  This is the exact record that Nephi kept so if that's what's written, that's what Nephi, being inspired by God, wrote.  After a tiny discussion, I asked her if she reads the Book of Mormon, thinking about the possibility that it could actually be true.  Not surprisingly, she said no.  THEN WHY ARE YOU READING IT?  She told us that she has been waiting for so long for God to inspire her.  I asked her if she had ever been inspired by God before.  She thought for a while and then told us a never-ending story about when she was in Rome, she heard that the Pope was close by and she felt so inspired that her heart was beating and she started running after toward the Pope-contained vehicle.  She said that she had never run like that before and she was running on rocks and didn't feel anything (until she got a bruise on her foot months later).  Without thinking, I blurted out: "Adrenaline."  My companion laughed, and she continued talking about how it felt like she was being carried by angels.  In the end, she never saw the Pope and she didn't even see the car he was in.  I was very blunt and I asked her: "So what did God inspire you to do?"  Her eyes got teary and she just described how this experience was like perfect faith.  After all those hours spent worshipping at Church, I'm not sure if Jessica has any idea of what the definition of faith or inspiration is.  Then she told us about how a sister missionary in our misison who taught her is very inspiring.  "Alright, so how did this sister inspire you?"  Jessica talked for a long time without getting anywhere and then she decided that the sister missionary's example of faith is very inspiring.  Awesome.  And what did she inspire you to do?  So anyhoo, we talked for a while about the doctrine inside the BoM chapter that we read.  There are so many eternal truths that she overlooked in that chapter because she was busy looking for the possible errors.  I don't think I've ever been more bold with anyone before.  I told her: "Stop waiting around for inspiration from God!  It's right here!  You are holding it in your hands!  Soooo many of my prayers have been answered by reading these pages."  Then we talked about prayer for a little while.  She told us that she hasn't been praying as much as she knows she should.  She told us about summer retreats that her and her fellow Catholic youth leaders used to go on.  They exhausted themselves in prayer so much that people were crying, sweating and talking in tongues.  "Neat, so how is your relationship with God?"  She bi passed the question and told us about how she likes to do the Jesus prayer.  Alright.  She told us that the Jesus prayer is when you just say the word Jesus over and over and over again.  "Cool.  Meditation.  But do you pray?"  We read 2 Nephi chapter 2 Nephi 32:8-9 about what prayer really is.  By the end of the lesson, she committed to praying like a human everyday before she reads the Book of Mormon with an open heart and an open mind.  We'll see.  I'm a big fan of dropping people when they waste time.  The ward members can always fellowship Jessica and her boyfriend but I don't have patience for more "adrenaline" stories with no purpose.  So sue me.  Even though I found Jessica and her stories incredibly annoying, I noticed that I wasn't frustrated during the lesson.  As a regular human, I would have died but that is the power of the name tag/calling: it makes me love people.  So that's swell.

 

On Sunday, me, my companion and a few other sisters sang for a youth fireside on missionary work to kick off the mission prep classes for the youngins.  President Watkins, our mission president spoke with his wife and  it was amazing.  I thought I had the bright idea of serving a mission but I know now that my whole life has pushed me and prepared me for these 18 months and these 18 months are preparing me for the next forever.  Life is good.  My companion is a rockstar and we're headed to the beach next pday.

 

Adios.

LOVE, SISTER KYLE