Charity :D

Sooooo this was the best week ever!!! :) 

Adrian finally accepted a baptismal date! Miracle time. We weren't even planning on teaching him that day but the other appointment we had fell through and for some reason we just both felt like we should go visit him. Idk if I mentioned this before but he lives in our same apartment building, so we just took the elevator up to the 9th floor and rang his doorbell. He came out, and we went downstairs to the lobby for the lesson since he was home alone. Hermana Maxfield and I talked before and decided this was the moment to try, yet again, and see if he was ready to accept a baptismal date. We asked him what baptism meant for him and he said it was a renovation, a restart. He talked about the life he had before he met the missionaries and how he needed to put it all behind him and start over. He told us about how when he met the missionaries in the elevator so many months ago, he was in the middle of a pretty big conflict with some people and was actually planning on doing some things he would've regretted. But since he started recieving the lessons, he changed his mindset. He's changed a lot. Even more than I realized. He said he no longer has bad thoughts. He no longer drinks. He has since given up coffee even though he doesn't completely understand the why behind it. He has been praying for support from his family and really wants at least one of them to join the church with him so he doesn't have to do this alone because he has every intention of enduring, and realizes that it will be hard once the missionaries leave. But he wants to. That's why he was putting off a baptismal date--he had been trying to talk to his family about it but just hadn't found quite the right opportunity yet since they live a couple hours away. After that the spirit changed the date we had already planned to extend to him which was november 28, and my companion asked him if he would be willing to be baptized January 1st of 2016. My gut reaction was like whatttttt?!?! haha because who knows if I'll still be in this sector by then. But then I let the spirit work in me and I realized it was kind of perfect. It would be a new year, new beginning, fresh start, clean slate. Plus then that would give his family time to hopefully learn and accept the gospel in their city, and give him more time to really get comfortable in this ward and make some good friends who can support him through this. 

That was the last lesson of the day and when we got home and I just threw myself on the ground and just laid their for a while with a GIANT smile on my face and Hermana Maxfield and I took turns saying "I can't believe it......." "finallyyyyyyy" haha. I was SO happy. I'm STILL on a cloud about it just writing this haha. Seeing that change in him was so sacred to us. The series of events of how he met the missionaries flashed through my head, the experience he had with them, with Hermana Vega and I, and then finally with Hermana Maxfield and I. I saw a replay of his progress and just sat there marveling at how far he's come. I felt the whisper of the Spirit teach me once again that God loves his children and truly does have a plan for each one of us. He puts things and people in our path for a reason and as we strive to be sensitive to the Spirit and follow his promptings, he will usually teach us why. That's true for all of us-- not just missionaries. Miracles can happen every day if we just look for them and ask God to let us be part of them. We'll find ourselves seeing people through His eyes, which makes us suddenly aware of the lense we've been wearing that was put on us by the world and all its unrealistic standards and false definitions of beauty, success, love, happiness, etc. We stop classifying people and begin loving them. Love being an action word. We start finding ways to communicate that love in ways that are more fool-proof than words like giving service, time, listening, understanding, ministering, sacrificing, and so much more. We can read about Christ and pattern the way we communicate love after His. And if for any reason we get scared or nervous to show that love, we can remember what it says in Moroni 7-- "charity never faileth" because it's true. 

My Savior. :) Loving him more and more everyday. And all of you. :) 

Have the best week ever. Fill it up with charity. :) 

xoxo

Hermana Cannon    

Pics from last week that I couldn't send haha:

1. Me opening the awesome halloween package y'all sent me :D I downed that bag of candy corn sooooooo fast 

 

2. Me and guitar reunited AT LAST. Happiest week of my liiiiiife