It has been ANOTHER fast week. A week is not very long. I have already lived through over 1000 of
them. I don't know why that always surprises
me.
Monday at family home evening for the YSA group in the Hmong
branch Natasha and Krystle brought two of their friends! Natasha and Krystle returned to activity
earlier this year and they are on fire with missionary work! They are sharing the joy that is back in
their lives with all of their loved ones.
Xyla and Marissa (their friends) both want to start taking the
lessons! Marissa is already talking to
Krystle about baptism. God is gathering
together everyone who will listen!
We visited with Jason, a returning less-active in the McKee
ward, and shared a brief message with him about the Book of Mormon. His girlfriend has been reading quite a bit
lately. She wants us to come and teach
her the restored gospel! We will be
going over there tonight for another lesson with them. She wants to get baptized too! They are planning on getting married
soon. This is great for their family!
As a mission we are
seeing many miracles right now as we emphasize faith--faith that God is
preparing people to hear the message of the restoration and to accept it. A story that Elder Anderson shared in a
recent mission president seminar is a good example of the kinds of things that
have been happening. Elder Anderson is
quoting the story of another man:
“Years ago as a missionary in Philadelphia I (this was told
by a Stake Presidency member) was transferred to an area that hadn’t had any
baptisms for many months. The mission president instructed us to ‘break the
curse’ and find and baptize someone. So my companion and I set a goal of trying
to find and baptize just one person in one month. We worked hard, exercised our
faith, fasted, and prayed and within a week had found a few good families to
teach—one was exceptional and was progressing well. . . . With one week to go before
the end of the month we went to their house to have a family home evening with
them, only to find a note on the door that read, ‘Elders, please do not ever
come back!’ That didn’t stop us, and we knocked on their door many different
times on many different days, but no one ever answered the door. Our other
investigators weren’t progressing very fast and so we continued to talk to
everyone to try to find someone. Sunday was the last day of the month, and by
Saturday it wasn’t looking good and my faith was struggling. “Saturday night we
had gone to bed when the phone rang about 11:00. The person calling said that
he had just transferred to the naval base in south Philly and that he had been
taking the discussions and was going to be baptized on Sunday and he was
wondering if he could still be baptized. That experience changed my life
forever.” Miracles do change lives. I have experienced these miracles myself,
and I have witnessed them hundreds of times in the lives of obedient
missionaries, their spirits burning with faith in Christ. Let us always protect
this precious flame of faith. “For eaglets, the thrill of soaring begins with
the fear of falling.”
That story is motivating!
Just last week some of the elders farther north in Atwater experienced
the same kind of thing. They had been
working hard, but had been dropped by all the people they had been
teaching. The second to last Sunday of
the month their bishop pulled them into his office where a mother and daughter
were waiting. The bishop introduced the
missionaries to them. They were making
an effort to come back to church. The
daughter wanted to be baptized the very next Sunday, her ninth birthday. The baptism happened. Faith brings miracles.
Keep your faith burning bright this week! Expect miracles! Our Heavenly Father has always been a god of
miracles!
With love,
Elder Cummings
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