Week 17

This week was amazing! There were 3-4 Christmas parties this week, so we did A LOT of driving. We also went to MLC, which is a Missionary Leadership Council. It was awesome to counsel together with President Cusick and other missionary leaders about how to help the mission improve.

Mission Leadership Council on Friday:

We had a busy week, and a lot happened. I'll try to recount it as quickly as possible.  I don't understand how time can fly so quickly.

On Monday, we did our daily stuff, and the time flew. At the end, we had no time to write letters! It was crazy. We went to an apartment complex in Holiday. We had prayed about it and felt prompted to go there. We knocked on 2 doors in that complex, and at both of them we taught the Restoration. One of them was an amazing family! They invited us inside when we knocked, and we went in and shared a message. The woman's name was J, and her husband G is a paraplegic. He is paralyzed. He and J were both so interested! I felt so much love for both of them. It was honestly kind of strange to have so much love for people I'd just met, but it's true. I love them so much. They are such an amazing family and they have such strong faith. We then went and taught A, an 8 year old who's going to get baptized this saturday. His grandma is W, who was baptized last month! They are going through a really difficult time right now, and any prayers would be much appreciated.

Tuesday we had district meting, and then we followed the spirit and went to a new city in our area. It's called Oldsmar, and we contacted some headquarter referrals AND set a date with a teenager. His name is Q and he is super cool. We then went to a lesson with a less-active, who's name is N. She is 16 years old, and we found her while tracting a couple of weeks ago. How crazy is that?! She had moved here from Connecticut and she didn't know there was an LDS church here. She's such a cute girl.

On Wednesday we had a youth come out with us. Her name is C, and she is awesome!! She helped us teach so many lessons. A had his baptismal interview, and he was so concerned about it. But he did fine. We then went to go contact a referral. This was an amazing miracle. So we parked the car and were walking down the street to go to this headquarter referral's house. We saw a lady on the street with her daughter, and we stopped and talked with her. She was very interested in our message, so we set a return appointment, got her address and phone number, and continued down the street. We pulled out the referral again to see what the address was, and it was the same address as the one the lady gave us. The amazing thing was that she had a different name! But it was the same address. What an amazing miracle.

On Thursday we went to Tarpon Springs to find some part member families. We went to this one, and he wasn't interested in coming back to church. In fact, he told us that he had asked the church not to contact him. But we asked him if he knew of anyone that could use a prayer. He said no at first, but we asked him again a little later and he said "Yeah, my sister. She lives down the street from me." So we went to go see her, and she needed a prayer. We prayed with her and taught her the gospel. She was so prepared to receive us, and I know we helped her feel the spirit. We set a return appointment with her. I am so excited to go see her again! After we finished in Tarpon Springs, we drove back to our apartment complex for dinner. There was an apartment christmas party, so we stayed there for a little bit to find some investigators. It didn't work out, but we then went to the Relief Society Christmas Party, where they served us dinner and we got to spend time with the sisters! That was a productive time as well. 

Friday was a good day. We had MLC, then we went and did missionary work! Like every day:) 

Saturday We taught 7 lessons in one day. I feel like it was really productive and we worked hard. We also had the ward Christmas Party, in which we set up appointments with members and got referrals.

Sunday we were at the church for 9 1/2 hours. We got there at 10:30 for missionary correlation and we didn't leave until 8pm that night. There was a Christmas choir concert at the church at 6, and we taught lessons there, and it was a great day. The Christmas choir concert reminded me of ones I used to go to for school. It brought back so many memories! 

It was an amazing week. I love missionary work!

Love, 

Sister Minson

My name-tag in the sand.

Decorating for Christmas

Leadership Council a few weeks ago at the beach. That was a fun day!