This week was so awesome! One of the best experiences we had was
last Monday. We had a family home evening with our relief society
president and a part member/recent convert family. We didn't think the
husband was going to come because he has kind of been avoiding us (he is
the one that isn't a member), but he did come! We taught a little
message about the Holy Ghost, and then we went with the family to
deliver cookies to an active member, a less-active, and a friend of the
recent convert who wasn't a member. The person that wasn't
a member invited us in and the RSP responded with, "We can't come in
right now, but these two girls can come back and visit you!" And then
the recent convert's daughter (6) said, "Yeah! They teach about Jesus!"
So we are excited to hopefully be able to teach them. :) Also, yesterday
in church, the active member that we had delivered cookies to got up in
Relief Society and said, "I just want to tell everyone that I was
having a rough day the other day and then Hna Leites and the
missionaries came over and sang to me and it just made my whole day!" It
was such an awesome thing. We are going to try and do it again tonight
with another member!
Tuesday we had another MLC. We normally have one every second Tuesday.
This time we basically just talked about what we are going to apply
from what Elder Hamula taught us. I honestly can't remember much from it
- all of these meetings lately are just running together in my head
right now!
After that we went and helped the
youth with a song they have to perform with the stake. Man...youth. Glad
I never was one. (Matilda anyone?) But on the bright-side! We got to go
to a place called "Frutti Hielo" and they sale a bunch of crazy Mexican
snacks. I will send you a picture of what we got - TOSTILOCOS! They are
chips with Valentina (salsa stuff), Jicama, Cucumber, Pinapple,
Peanuts, a few other things, and these little candied chili things. One
fellow missionary said it was like eating out of a trashcan, but I was a
fan. We are definitely going there when we come to visit.
Wednesday
we got to go crash DLC (District Leadership Council) because the Zone
Leaders invited us! This was to plan for Zone Meeting. That was fun. I
felt like I was crashing bro's night or something. They taught us a lot
about how we can make exchanges better. Which is good because we have
three this week. We also got to work on family history this day, and I
added a story about Grandpa Ricks so you'll have to go read it!
We also had a cool experience Wednesday
night. We were on our way to try and meet a former investigator, and on
the way there we ran into this lady that was super excited to see us!
We found out that she had run into other missionaries a lot. As we
talked to her, a car pulled up and yelled, "Oh! They have a Book of
Mormon!" We found out that the neighbor was a member! She used to go to
the Spanish ward, but they switched over to the English ward. We ended
up going and talking to them afterwards, and it turns out that she had
already given a BOM to the lady we ran into in the first place! This
member (Hna Hernandez) is who we are going to have an FHE with tonight
and go visit all her neighbors. What an awesome missionary!
Thursday
we had zone meeting which is a bring-back of MLC which like I said
before was a bring-back of Elder Hamula. Haha now you can see why they
are all running together in my head!
Then on Friday and Saturday
we got to help with this service that the California Dental Association
was sponsoring. A bunch of dentists and orthodontists came together at
the Ventura fair grounds and they set up hundreds of dental chairs where
they offered free services. And they offered like EVERYTHING. They were
making dentures, taking out wisdom teeth, normal teeth extractions -
crazy! Between the two days they did it they had the goal of giving 2000
people that were low-income free dental care. And Hna Hemingway and I
had the best job ever! We got to be the interpreters! Do you know how
cool I felt being like, "Oh it's okay Doc, I can tell you what they
said." However I must say, I never did figure out how to say root-canal
or dentures in spanish. Some of it ended up being charades - welcome to
my whole mission. hahaha But it was awesome! It is always such a
humbling experience to help people like that, and to see so many other
people come together to offer so much incredible service.
Anyways,
I love you all! I know that this is the Lord's work. I am so
grateful to be a part of it and to see his hand guiding everything. I
have grown a testimony of prayer, and I know that Heavenly Father is
always listening. If we offer specific prayers, he will offer specific
answers! He really is our father, and we are literally his children. If
you haven't talked to him in a while, repent and begin now.
Have a wonderful week!
<3 Hermana Trystan Ricks
 |
| And these, my dear friends, are Tostilocos. |
 |
| CDA service! |
 |
| This is the little girl that said, "They teach about Jesus!" |
No comments:
Post a Comment