Another amazing week

Yay! It was another wonderful week serving the Lord:) Elder Gay came to our mission! We have been so blessed to have guidance from so many general authorities lately. By far at the end of the zone conference, during a question and answer session, was one of the most spiritual experiences I have ever had. He gave us such divine advice on how to be the best missionaries as well as the best people we can! He talked a lot about forgiving ourselves. The atonement covers everything, and if we don't let go of our past transgressions we aren't truly repenting. That is defiantly something I need to apply more in my life. I don't even know how to categorize all the miracles this week so I am just going to break it up into paragraphs:

Sammi committed to baptism!!!! She is just so amazing. The Gospel is changing her. Her light is growing the more she comes to know who she is and who her Savior is. She told us in our last lesson that something that made her life this much better had to be true. She is great at keeping committments and is just so ready to act on truth.

While finding we met James! I started out just talking with him about prayer... which led to teaching the restoration. During the first vision he asked if this was LDS. I said it was and he said "We have been attending that church. I am in charge of the scouts." A little confused I probed and asked if he had been baptized? He said that he hadn't join that church but said he wanted to. Then he asked for a form to fill out hahaha. We talked more about baptism and he said that was for sure something he wanted! Holy Miracle! Him and his whole family have been attending for awhile and so that baptism is basically falling into our laps. I am very grateful for the blessings we recieve from just opening our mouths!

The miracles for that day of finding don't end there. While walking back to the care, we walked up to a man named Derek. We began talking and he told us his experience with God and Christ in his life. He told us how much he was struggling. I felt the Spirit burn inside of me as I testified that we were sent from God and had what he needed. Sister McCrae taught the most powerful first vision I have ever witnessed and cried. (She never cries!) He told us that he couldn't believe that he was talking to two angels on the sidewalk. We had a lesson with him yesterday and he told us in more detail about the situation. His wife had just left him and he walked the long way to calm down. And then two angels walked up and told him that God loved him and was there. He is very excited to read the Book of Mormon and find the peace in life he needs. Our happiness is determined less on our circumstances and more on our focus. When our focus is Christ, joy and fullfilment will fill our lives.

Same apartment complex the night before we met Eddie. We walked up to him just before he made it in his house. He told us he wasn't religious, but that it was funny we were here because he desperatly wanted to be. He told us of his desire to find God. He was native and believed in somewhat of a power, but didn't know what it was. I felt like Ammon teaching him! It was so cool. Super excited to teach him too!

Night before that we went to follow up with a potential named Bran. Yes like the cereal haha. His wife wasn't home but we had a 40 minute lesson on his porch! Except it was freezing and afterwards I couldn't fell my legs the slightest bit. Lucky us we have a car.

SO MANY PEOPLE NEED THE GOSPEL!!!! And not only need but want it. True joy only comes through living the gospel of Jesus Christ!

To end the week Sister McCrae and I went hiking up to the falls in Eatonville again. It was so spectacular! You could walk behind the water in caves:) We got pretty wet... and its winter... so cold, but soooo worth it!

Your Sister in Christ,

Sister Northrup