This week has been a very emotional one! Sister Wilson and I are dealing with a lot of difficult things with our investigators and it has been tough. More on that.
So last Tuesday we met the new mission president! What an awesome experience. I"ll forward you the email we got from him today with some notes from his talk. He teaches very differenty from Pres. Holzapfel but I love them
both.. I went up and introduced myself to them and reminded them that they had met Mom at their farewell.
I don't remember the day-by-day breakdown of the week, but the rest of Tuesday and Wednesday was hard to say the least. We visited a sister in our ward who is less-active and recently had back surgery and is in terrible pain. She can't stand for more than 15 minutes and she lives all alone in a run-down trailer home. She is so unbelievably lonely and is sinking farther into depression every day. We love her though, she is so sweet. We go and visit her often and do everything we can to lift her spirits and bring her closer to Jesus Christ. She can't make food for herself since she's in so much pain and will just open a can of corn or make a quick sandwich. So yesterday Sister Wilson and I brought her dinner, and we're going to help her cook meals twice a week. But anyway, it's just a hard situation. She's lonely, she's constantly in pain and does nothing but sit, watch TV, take her pain meds and sleep, and she is so poor. She's in need of so much help and I came out of our visit with her so so down. It hurts to see someone in so much pain and not be able to take it away.
Right after our visit, we got another call. Things went south with another investigator and it made us so sad. We love them so much.
Lastly, we visited a woman who is just as sweet as can be. She recently lost her husband and is struggling to raise her family in a dysfunctional home. We sure love her, and she really needs our help.
It's hard because these people have such real, difficult trials and it breaks my heart. I don't feel qualified to handle them, but somehow the Lord is strengthening me. I never knew how much it would help to have suffered through so much in my life. But I can relate to these people so much better because I have experienced so many trials, and that's a blessing. I talked to her about losing Grandpa and how we were so so close. I told her how hard it was, but that I found strength in the Savior and in this gospel. She knows this is what she needs to find joy, and her faith is incredible. She truly is a wonderful woman. She came to church with us for the first time yesterday and went to sacrament for the first time. She has a lot of anxiety so she was very nervous, but it was awesome to have her and her 10-year-old there. To see them take the sacrament for the very first time was... wow. Beautiful. It gave me chills. It was fast and testimony meeting, so Sister Wilson and I prayed that the people would be inspired to share things that were applicable to her, and wow, were they! So many recent converts got up and said that the gospel changed their lives, and that the gospel brought them peace through trials. She wants her daughters to have a strong foundation in God and so many of the youth got up and bore testimony of the gospel and Jesus Christ. She was so touched and said "I will be back next week. And I just got Sundays off, so I can come every week." She is amazing.
On a happier note, Mitch got baptized yesterday!! That was my first baptism, and it was sooo exciting. We had originally planned it for Sunday morning a 8am since Mitch does the door-to-door sales where he works all day every day but Sunday. The Bishop said it had to be in the morning, so Mitch could be confirmed during church that day. In the end we moved it to 5 so that his friends could be there, and it was great because it was exactly how Mitch wanted it. It's his day, after all, and we were glad he was so happy. He was glowing, truly. It was awesome to see someone you taught and helped finally enter the waters of baptism and receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. He was so happy. Such an awesome experience.
We had another family reunion this weekend, too. It was fun ahha, I love our ward. They're all so great. The (Smiths) are the family we ate with that had the farm and ducks a few weeks ago. Brother (Smith) brought us vegetables from his garden and a whole carton of eggs from his chickens!! I was soooo happy!! haha. so this morning I had cage-free, grain-fed eggs where I've actually seen the chickens and fed them myself and I know they are well taken care of. They run around his back yard all day and are happy as clams. So that was just really cool. me and my weird ways.
More and more people are finding out about Minor Details... I had so many people come up to me yesterday and say "So we heard you're famous!!" I'm like no.. no I'm not... We got to teach the Sunday School class for the 14/15-year-olds yesterday too, which was fun, and then we taught a short lesson in YW right after on ordinances and covenants. When I introduced myself, one of the leaders said "And she's the one in movies! which movie was it?" I told them Minor Details and two or three of the YW were like "No way! I love that movie. I knew you looked familiar." hah. So yeah... there's that...lol.
Well, that's a lot. Sorry for so much, but I have a lot to say. :)
Love you all so much! Hope to hear from you soon!
Sister Edwards
