Single and ready to...share the gospel

 

Family, I love each of you a lot. I'm really sorry that I don't have individual notes this week, but honestly, I'm just really lazy this week. I'll write the best dang individual notes next week. I promise. :) 

Quotes of the week: 

1.) "I like all veggies.. Except for corn; that gives me the runs." -Carl (recent convert) So, I've talked about Carl before. He's my fav. I love him so much. Usually he doesn't show up to church. but this week HE TOTALLY DID. He had someone pick him up and everything. I woulda hugged him but he's pretty disgusting and hugging a male is basically breaking the law of chastity as a sister missionary. Anyways, I gave him a firm handshake with tears in my eyes, and asked him how he was. He said "I'm doing good. We're having 'Chicken Divine' tonight at my house so I'm pretty excited about that." Then because he's Carl. he somehow started talking about how corn gives him diarrhea. As most of you know, I'm pretty comfortable talking about bowel movements. We all poop, there's nothing to be embarrassed about. BUT when the bowel movement someone is talking about is not solid, I get pretty awkward. I don't know why, it just makes me feel weird inside. SO, when he said this quote I got super red, Sister Grant started laughing really hard, and we walked away from him. Oh and guess what? We were SURROUNDED by people. SO many people heard him say this quote to us. Oh Carl; we can't take you anywhere, buddy. I still love him.  

2.) "Is your wife going to be singing with him?" -Sister DiVeto We had an appointment with this old guy named Roger this week. We found him contacting and started crying because his wife had just died. We were like "We share a message that teaches you how you can be with your wife forever.", he was like "Wow, please come.", and we were like "Aight." (things might have gone a little different then that, but it's pretty accurate) We brought a member, Sister DiVeto, with us to the appointment because he lives alone and lessons with members present are the best, When we got in the house he was like "Do you want to hear my wife singing?" We told him that we would love it and he came out with a CD. He put it in and guess what song started playing....GOD BLESS THE USA. Tender mercy from the Lord. Anyway, his wife began singing the Lee Greenwood classic and she totally sounded like a man. Not feminine at all. I knew it was his wife, Sister Grant knew it was his wife, Sister DiVeto did not know it was his wife and thought it was a man singing. When she asked this question, I wanted to die. I wanted to die so hard. Roger took the question like a champ though. All he said was "Oh, no, this is her singing. She just sounds like a man."  He was so casual about it. He then closed his eyes and just cried through the whole song. He loved her manly voice so much. I still wanted to die a little so I didn't even really enjoy the song. Gosh dang it, Sister DiVeto. 

3.) "I was only going to join your religion so I could get married." -Joshua  Here's a really, really crazy story. SO, we were SUPPOSED to have a baptism this past weekend. We were teaching this 25 year old named Joshua and he was doing awesome. Reading, praying, living the Word of Wisdom, all that jazz. We were pretty excited. Wednesday night he didn't show up to his interview. We called 10,000 times and no answer. We eventually ended up going to his work on Saturday to try and figure out what was up. He was delivering something, so we gave one of his co-workers a note to give him. 30 minutes we got a text from good ole Joshua telling us that he was only learning about the church so that he could get married to a Mormon. He had asked me a couple times before all this went down  if I wanted to go bowling, feed some fish, stuff like that (I didn't go btw haha)... I thought he was just lonely and had no friends...nope...HE WAS TRYING TO MARRY SISTER MISSIONARIES. SICK NASTY. After crying for a little while and calling our zone leaders, Sister Grant and I came to the conclusion that Joshua is a weenie and that we weren't going to be sad about it. Now, we're tracting all the day long for someone who wants the gospel, not marriage. Youngstown, man....it's a crazy place. Crazy, crazy place.  

4.)"Bill, lets think of things the sisters can do for us. If they do service for us, they won't have to tract for 6 hours." -Sister Betts Here's a fun fact for ya: No one wants to talk to missionaries on America's birthday. I guess that's not a fun fact, but it is a fact. The only appointment we had yesterday was a 4th of July BBQ at the Betts. They asked us what our plans for the rest of the day were. By this time it was about 2 in the afternoon, and we had tracting/contacting down until 8. Sister Betts felt bad for us, so she tried to think of something we could do for service. All she could think of was for us to pick the raspberries in their garden. That took a total of 20 minutes and Sister Grant and I ate basically ate everything we picked (so basically we just took an extra 20 minute lunch and called it service).  BUT because of sweet Sister Betts, we only had to tract/contact for 5 hours and 40 minutes. Not gonna lie, Sister Grant and I wanted to die a little, but it was still an alright day. We came out of the experience better people and really sunburned. 

5.) "Our destiny is not determined by the number of times we stumble but by the number of times we rise up, dust ourselves off, and move forward." -President Uchtdorf  This week has been a toughy. Before I came out on my mission, I imagined missions being this spiritual adventure full of happiness. I'm not saying it isn't a spiritual adventure full of happiness (because it totally is) but it's not happiness all the time. There's disappointments. There's actually a lot of disappointments. I often wonder why I like my life so much. I haven't quite figured it out yet, but I sure love being on a mission. I really do. I even love the days where we just go finding for 5 hours and 40 minutes. I thank Heavenly Father every night for this opportunity. SO, even though it was a hard week, Sister Grant and I are going to keep moving forward. Miracles don't happen when you give up. 

I love all of you a lot. Have the best week. 

Love, 

Sister Reddish