The Work Goes On

Sister Funk's Birthday!

Hey y'all!

It has been a great week.  Full of miracles, as all weeks are. :)  Especially because it ended with General Conference, which was absolutely amazing.  Funny though... Sister Funk and I were WAY more exhausted after sitting on the couch for most of two days than we are when we bike around in the heat... oh well.  We were definitely spiritually fed. :)  More on that later.

We had a lot going on this week.  From Interviews and Specialized Training to split night with the ward missionaries to celebrating a birthday to "regular missionary stuff" we were two busy sisters.  The specialized training was awesome, all about setting goals and planning with faith, and was followed by our Zone Meeting where we had the most spiritual goal setting sessions I have ever had.  In the past we've done everything from setting goals as a companionship or district and then adding those up to make our zone goals for the month to having big long discussions during the meeting as to what we can and can't accomplish when you look at the numbers.  But this month we threw out the numbers and focused on the names.  We talked about all the investigators in the zone that have the potential of being baptized in the next two months, and offered advice and counsel to each other.  Of course at the end we counted them all up because God "numbereth his people" (Alma 26:37) but we walked away from that meeting confident that we could, and that we WOULD accomplish the goals we had set.  The meeting was so spiritual, and by the end of it each of us had a list of all the investigators in the zone with the intention of having a zone fast and praying for each of them BY NAME.  So Sister Funk and I fasted and prayed yesterday, and it was amazing, because I DEFINITELY have a testimony that fasting and praying WORKS!  So we're expecting miracles to happen in the zone.  It will be great. :)

We finally had a split night with the ward missionaries this past week!  Except none of the sisters showed up, so we couldn't actually go on splits... :/  But we sent them out to do missionary work, which was good. ;)  We were planning on getting some families started on their family mission plans but after calling and texting nearly all the active families in the ward and finding that everyone had something going on... we sent most of the ward missionaries out to find less actives instead.  We did get one family started on their mission plan, which is better than none.  But we might have to switch split night to Sundays so we can catch more people at home.  But we did see miracles - the ward members were able to get in with some people that we've never been able to meet, and Sister Funk and I ran into a less active that we've been trying to catch for a couple of months now!  There are DEFINITELY miracles that come when missionaries and members work together. :)

We celebrated Sister Funk's 20th birthday by weekly planning... yay!  ;)  We did other things too, don't worry. :)  I decorated, and Mama Grover made cupcakes (thanks for the supplies mom!) and Alice took us out to lunch. :)  And we taught an 8-year-old (Chloe, she's the daughter of a returning less active and wants to be baptized but her mom wants them both to listen to the discussions again before that) and when she found out that it was sister Funk's birthday she ran upstairs and made her "birthday bucks" and put some chocolate covered macadamia nuts with candles somehow stuck in them (I think she creatively used toothpicks) on a plate and sung "happy birthday" to her.  It was sweet. :)  All in all, I think she had a great birthday. :)

Back to General Conference - AMAZING!  We watched the Saturday sessions with Melody and Chris and Andrew (Chris's 10-year-old son who we're going to start teaching this week! :D  I promise - this is a MIRACLE - we've been waiting for Melody and Chris to decide that he's ready to start learning, and it finally happened, and when Melody texted us last Monday saying she wanted us to start teaching him I nearly started crying out of pure joy on the way home from the grocery store.  It was great.)  They loved it, and Chris went to the Priesthood session with their home teacher and loved that too.  And we watched the Sunday morning session with Alice and the Grovers and let them get to know each other for a while before teaching the Word of Wisdom between sessions.  Alice is willing to give up coffee - she told us she could take it or leave it and when we told her that the Lord has asked her to leave it she said, "good.  It will save me a lot of money!"  Haha oh how we love her. :)  She couldn't stay for the afternoon session, but at least she was able to watch some of it.  We pushed up her baptismal date to October 24th because we feel (and have prayed about it) that she'll be ready by then, and why would we wait to give Satan more time to get in the way?  No way we're going to let that happen - she's golden. :)

So yep.  That's what happened this week. :)  Miracles miracles miracles.  I can't make it through my nightly prayers anymore without crying... I am SO grateful for everything that the Lord has blessed me with... I can't even accurately describe my feelings.  Basically it's the Atonement.  With Christ we can change.  Others can change.  We can help others to change.  Change to become more like our Heavenly Father and our Savior.  It is a beautiful truth of the gospel.  And I LOVE it.  I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY! :)  And I love all y'all too. :)  Have a great week!

Sister Ririe

Alma 5:12-14