BONJOUR!!!
So I realize that somewhere out there in the world.... people have real lives. They get up in the morning, worry about normal things like what to wear, what they are going to do that day, who they need to call, or sometimes they have days where they do absolutely no worrying whatsoever....BUT here in my little corner of Paris we have a very different way of living. We get up and worry about normal things too (trust me...deciding what to wear out of our very repatitive selection is trés difficult) but on top of all those things we are constantly worrying about the welfare of people's souls (ok maybe that was stated a little strongly) but seriously.... I felt like this week, well this whole month, has just been one giant build up to Anne Sophie's baptism! Although I realize my lack of hand-eye coordination has deprived me of participating in many 'championship games'...this week felt like what I imagine to be the build up to a big game.
This week Anne Sophie ditched us for the first time for a lesson...although it was for something a simple as sleeping in we had every possibilty running through our heads of what could have happened to her. We also had what I thought was a spiritual moment in which we watched the Joseph Smith movie. Soeur Pearce and I bawled our eyes out... literally I could not speak afterwards. (The best was an elder poked his head in and when he saw the two of us he said 'ya...things were getting a little emotional there...' haha) Anyways we looked over at Anne Sophie and asked her what she thought, and her typical french manner she just said "oui ça va"... right well I guess we all feel the spirit in different ways. And she did...she showed her enthuisiasm in other ways...like the day she walked in with her computer and had made her own program for her baptism. Including asking all the people who were going to be involved with the program herself...and picking out all the songs, etc. Or the day she told us how after church she felt like she needed to tell each of her roommates that she loves them and gave them big hugs (and if you know the french they are not exactly 'huggy' people) and then proceeded to give us big hugs. Or how every time we saw her she told us that her baptism just wasn't coming fast enough. She was plenty excited. And thank to our amazing ward the baptismal planning went smoothly. Before we even made any calls they relief society had already assigned people to bring food and just everything was taking care of. When I told Soeur Pearce how surprised I was that planning a baptism really wasnt that stressful she warned me that Paris is the only ward that functions this well and that I was getting quite spoiled for my first baptism. Which is fine because its Anne Sophie and she totally deserves the best!
The day of the baptism went great...everyone was on time, the font filled up, Anne Sophie felt great. And the baptism went great! Anne Sophie seemed a little stressed about the possiblity of having to be dunked more than once...so when she came out of the water in typical Anne Sophie fashion she just looked at us and said "ça va?" haha It was perfect. And just to prove how truly perfect she is, when one of the other missionaries congratulated her she just sad "well Im only half a member right now, tomorrow I become a full member" aka when she recieves the Holy Ghost. Overall the night was perfect...it was the next morning that stressed us out! When church started Anne Sophie wasnt there... but she has a tendancy to be late so we thought we would give her the benefit of the doubt. After relief society when she wasn't there and still wasn't answering her phone we started to panic. Then when she still wasn't there after sunday school we definately started to panic. We finally got a hold of her as Sacrament meeting was starting and she said she was 4 metro stops away. She arrived right after the sacrament and basically ran to the front as they announced that they were now going to confirm her. PHEW! So she is now a full member of the church...even though it was a close call. So baptism number one = success!!!
And just to make this weekend that much better our roommates, the sisters for the other Paris ward had a baptism on Sunday as well! Phelaman is african.. and in typical african manner showed up an hour late for her own baptism. Definately caused some stress for the missionaries. And when her family showed up three hours late they were shocked that the baptism had already taken place. BUT her family told the sisters they are interested in taking the discussions so everything worked out great!!! This weekend truly was great...now we just need to find new investigators!!!!
The rest of the week was great and full of typical missionary adventures. The Chinese twins that were baptized a couple weeks ago came conacting with our district this week and they were awsome! They ran up to every asian person they saw with big smiles on their faces. Honestly...I thought they just happened to know everyone walking by because they would run up to someone...with open arms like they were going to hug them, start chatting, and then wave the missionaries over. It was hilarious!!! They were an inspiration for me of how excited I should be to share the gospel. I also had the chance to see my MTC companion this week. She and her companion were in Paris for the day (long story) but it was so good to see her and see how she has accepted and is loving missionary life! I also had my first taste of Mexican food in France as I had my first 'burrito fête' with our ward mission leader...aka we made burritos and ate them while discussing our amis. It was much better than I expected! The elders even made homemade tortillas.
Last night we had a meeting with a new member to our ward (she moved her from the states) and she said something that kind of reflects which I think of as my theme for the week. This week has kind of been wierd because even as we are excited that Anne Sophie to get baptized...its kind of scary to think of having no amis(investigators) with baptisimal dates. I kind of had a minor freak out (dont worry mom it was more of just me expressing the many worries to the other missionaries in my apartment). I just started to think of how truly I felt like I had done nothing for Anne Sophie. She was so prepared and ready for the gospel; and by the time Soeur Pearce and I arrived she was well on her way to baptism we just had to be here to guide her. I started to feel a little useless and like maybe Im not the best missionary I could be. The other sisters did a great job a reassuring me that really thats all missionary work is...being the tools to help the people the Lord has prepared. All we can do is do our best to be there and be prepared to be used by the Lord. Nothing we do is truly fruits of our own efforts...usually someone has been prepared for the gospel by members they know (Anne Sophie), or by generations of other missionaries (Lou) or just life's circumstances. We usually just happen to be in the right places at the right time and guide them towards baptism. And in many ways we will never see the fruits of our efforts now...the people we meet and teach only once will end up not truly converting until another missionary comes along in who knows how long. Well this member said "I've come to realize that most of life is just grabbing onto the iron rod in the midst of darkness" I liked that because at I think as missionaries we get so focused on one step in the Gospel...baptism. Which is such a little step. An important and essential step! But just one step in the long scheme of things. If someone is baptized and then gives up and is not determined to persevre to the end then the baptism has failed. I don't know if I'm even making any sense...but I had a little moment of personal revelation of how important perserving is and that it can seem very difficult at times....but is so worth it....and in many ways the most important step in the gospel. And if we are willing to grab on the rod even when we have no idea where it is leading us in this life, we know where it is leading us in the next life and truly that is whole point of baptism, missionary work, and life!
Alright, well now you've all experienced about 30 seconds in my brain... hopefully you at least can feel the spirit of what I was trying to say haha. I love you all and Im so happy to report that we had a baptism week. I love this work and I don't care what anyone says...the work is going great in France! Love ya, miss ya!!
Soeur Smith
So I realize that somewhere out there in the world.... people have real lives. They get up in the morning, worry about normal things like what to wear, what they are going to do that day, who they need to call, or sometimes they have days where they do absolutely no worrying whatsoever....BUT here in my little corner of Paris we have a very different way of living. We get up and worry about normal things too (trust me...deciding what to wear out of our very repatitive selection is trés difficult) but on top of all those things we are constantly worrying about the welfare of people's souls (ok maybe that was stated a little strongly) but seriously.... I felt like this week, well this whole month, has just been one giant build up to Anne Sophie's baptism! Although I realize my lack of hand-eye coordination has deprived me of participating in many 'championship games'...this week felt like what I imagine to be the build up to a big game.
This week Anne Sophie ditched us for the first time for a lesson...although it was for something a simple as sleeping in we had every possibilty running through our heads of what could have happened to her. We also had what I thought was a spiritual moment in which we watched the Joseph Smith movie. Soeur Pearce and I bawled our eyes out... literally I could not speak afterwards. (The best was an elder poked his head in and when he saw the two of us he said 'ya...things were getting a little emotional there...' haha) Anyways we looked over at Anne Sophie and asked her what she thought, and her typical french manner she just said "oui ça va"... right well I guess we all feel the spirit in different ways. And she did...she showed her enthuisiasm in other ways...like the day she walked in with her computer and had made her own program for her baptism. Including asking all the people who were going to be involved with the program herself...and picking out all the songs, etc. Or the day she told us how after church she felt like she needed to tell each of her roommates that she loves them and gave them big hugs (and if you know the french they are not exactly 'huggy' people) and then proceeded to give us big hugs. Or how every time we saw her she told us that her baptism just wasn't coming fast enough. She was plenty excited. And thank to our amazing ward the baptismal planning went smoothly. Before we even made any calls they relief society had already assigned people to bring food and just everything was taking care of. When I told Soeur Pearce how surprised I was that planning a baptism really wasnt that stressful she warned me that Paris is the only ward that functions this well and that I was getting quite spoiled for my first baptism. Which is fine because its Anne Sophie and she totally deserves the best!
The day of the baptism went great...everyone was on time, the font filled up, Anne Sophie felt great. And the baptism went great! Anne Sophie seemed a little stressed about the possiblity of having to be dunked more than once...so when she came out of the water in typical Anne Sophie fashion she just looked at us and said "ça va?" haha It was perfect. And just to prove how truly perfect she is, when one of the other missionaries congratulated her she just sad "well Im only half a member right now, tomorrow I become a full member" aka when she recieves the Holy Ghost. Overall the night was perfect...it was the next morning that stressed us out! When church started Anne Sophie wasnt there... but she has a tendancy to be late so we thought we would give her the benefit of the doubt. After relief society when she wasn't there and still wasn't answering her phone we started to panic. Then when she still wasn't there after sunday school we definately started to panic. We finally got a hold of her as Sacrament meeting was starting and she said she was 4 metro stops away. She arrived right after the sacrament and basically ran to the front as they announced that they were now going to confirm her. PHEW! So she is now a full member of the church...even though it was a close call. So baptism number one = success!!!
And just to make this weekend that much better our roommates, the sisters for the other Paris ward had a baptism on Sunday as well! Phelaman is african.. and in typical african manner showed up an hour late for her own baptism. Definately caused some stress for the missionaries. And when her family showed up three hours late they were shocked that the baptism had already taken place. BUT her family told the sisters they are interested in taking the discussions so everything worked out great!!! This weekend truly was great...now we just need to find new investigators!!!!
The rest of the week was great and full of typical missionary adventures. The Chinese twins that were baptized a couple weeks ago came conacting with our district this week and they were awsome! They ran up to every asian person they saw with big smiles on their faces. Honestly...I thought they just happened to know everyone walking by because they would run up to someone...with open arms like they were going to hug them, start chatting, and then wave the missionaries over. It was hilarious!!! They were an inspiration for me of how excited I should be to share the gospel. I also had the chance to see my MTC companion this week. She and her companion were in Paris for the day (long story) but it was so good to see her and see how she has accepted and is loving missionary life! I also had my first taste of Mexican food in France as I had my first 'burrito fête' with our ward mission leader...aka we made burritos and ate them while discussing our amis. It was much better than I expected! The elders even made homemade tortillas.
Last night we had a meeting with a new member to our ward (she moved her from the states) and she said something that kind of reflects which I think of as my theme for the week. This week has kind of been wierd because even as we are excited that Anne Sophie to get baptized...its kind of scary to think of having no amis(investigators) with baptisimal dates. I kind of had a minor freak out (dont worry mom it was more of just me expressing the many worries to the other missionaries in my apartment). I just started to think of how truly I felt like I had done nothing for Anne Sophie. She was so prepared and ready for the gospel; and by the time Soeur Pearce and I arrived she was well on her way to baptism we just had to be here to guide her. I started to feel a little useless and like maybe Im not the best missionary I could be. The other sisters did a great job a reassuring me that really thats all missionary work is...being the tools to help the people the Lord has prepared. All we can do is do our best to be there and be prepared to be used by the Lord. Nothing we do is truly fruits of our own efforts...usually someone has been prepared for the gospel by members they know (Anne Sophie), or by generations of other missionaries (Lou) or just life's circumstances. We usually just happen to be in the right places at the right time and guide them towards baptism. And in many ways we will never see the fruits of our efforts now...the people we meet and teach only once will end up not truly converting until another missionary comes along in who knows how long. Well this member said "I've come to realize that most of life is just grabbing onto the iron rod in the midst of darkness" I liked that because at I think as missionaries we get so focused on one step in the Gospel...baptism. Which is such a little step. An important and essential step! But just one step in the long scheme of things. If someone is baptized and then gives up and is not determined to persevre to the end then the baptism has failed. I don't know if I'm even making any sense...but I had a little moment of personal revelation of how important perserving is and that it can seem very difficult at times....but is so worth it....and in many ways the most important step in the gospel. And if we are willing to grab on the rod even when we have no idea where it is leading us in this life, we know where it is leading us in the next life and truly that is whole point of baptism, missionary work, and life!
Alright, well now you've all experienced about 30 seconds in my brain... hopefully you at least can feel the spirit of what I was trying to say haha. I love you all and Im so happy to report that we had a baptism week. I love this work and I don't care what anyone says...the work is going great in France! Love ya, miss ya!!
Soeur Smith
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