You know how sometimes the strangest things happen to you as a missionary and it doesn't even phase you that it is strange? Like the fact that we are sitting at a wedding eating fried chicken and clapping to gospel music or a guy walks literally ten feet away from you carrying an ax or seeing two little boys pooping in a public park? Yeah it was one of those weeks.... (almost as good as the kilt flashing man) and then to top it all off we had some random person on the bus give us hard boiled freshly dyed Easter eggs with bunny faces on them. Little did she know her address would become the start of a miracle story.
We go to visit Easter Egg lady and her name is not on the klingle. Well.... at least we can have egg salad sandwiches right? But it gets better than that. We decide there has to be some reason Heavenly Father led us here. He seriously sent us to a straight up jackpot. We knocked on the door and start testifying and then two cute little girls run out (and at that moment I was so grateful to have a personable, kind, friendly companion because without her this may be a way shorter story). and we make some comment about her Easter decoration and botta boom botta bang. we are in. Like am I literally walking into a house of a German stranger right now? of a family? Shared the Easter film and watched her appreciation for Christ rise as the Spirit entered her home.
Then we door the next door and a man answers and we testify and invites us in. Without us even asking! Like how is this happening? and we explain how we can't come in unless we have another girl... blah blah blah. and so we teach him a 2 minute version of the Restoration right there on his porch. And then invite him to church and he says how he has ran into missionaries like his whole life and this must be a sign and shows up to church 20 minutes early all spiffed up with his Bible in one hand and little 6 year old daughter's hand in the other.
And so on and so forth until we door the entire building and every. single. person. Let us in their house to hear a message about the gospel of happiness and that God has a plan for them and that we have prophets on the earth today and that you can live with your family forever and that you can have more joy than you ever imagined etc. Every door. EVERY DOOR. WE GOT INTO EVERY DOOR OF AN ENTIRE BUILDING. I don't know if I can express to you how crazy that is. And how grateful I am the there are prepared people here.
One of the coolest parts was that with both of these situations and many of the other people we work with this is not the first time they have had contact with us. With the German family a lady in our ward kids go to the same kindergarten and she had noticed something was different about her and the ward member had talked about the way she raised her kids and how the gospel helped her and this lady noticed that same joy with us. With this other man he had met missionaries time and time again on the bus, on the street, now on his doorstep and it took that long before he finally came around.God is preparing people. Maybe just in a different time frame then we think of. So keep doing your thing and being you. Shining your light and maybe someday some wee little missionary will be eternally grateful for the seeds you planted. Really and truly grateful.
still on the hunt for egg lady but I don't mind this in between time one bit.
xoxoxox
yours truly
s. heywood
ps: okay also. I seriously am having the hardest time focusing right now because MY BEST FRIEND IS MARRIED. HOLY COW. I can't stop freaking out. I love you and miss you terribly kate. But I am so happy right now. Eeep. Trev you better treat her like a queen. cause she is perfect.
we went to this really cool radio tower thing. where you can look our into 5 different cities at one time. it was sah-weet.
There I also proceeded to delete alllll my pictures. but alles klar. Tech genius Elder Bennett got them back for me. hero.
let's just say we are very forgiving people.
