The Fiery Darts

This week started out perfectly. Elder Limón, a missionary who served out here a year or so ago, came down to visit and went out with us to try and find some of the people he had taught. During that day we tried to talk to everyone we could, we even followed someone into what we thought could've been someone's basement (luckily it was just the laundry room), and we ended knocking on one lady's door he had taught. While we waited at the door, she pulled up and got home, it was too perfect of timing. We ended up coming back later in the week, learned a lot about the huge trials she's had to work through, and helped her to feel better. She even came to church! She's got two cute little kids and she's just the sweetest lady. Her name is Marisol and we really want to help her and her family to find true happiness. The best day of the week was Wednesday.  We'd worked really hard for a while, and we just hadn't seen the results we were expecting from all we were putting in, so that morning during one of our prayers we specifically asked for miracles because of the work we'd put in. Later that afternoon we just started knocking. In just an hour or so, we'd talked to and set appointments with about three people, which is really pretty good and seemed like a miracle. We had intended to do more, but I felt prompted to go visit some of the families nearby. Again, more miracles: We met a mom with 4 boys who'd been in a fairly recent divorce who told us that she'd really been wanting to come back to church. She said it was the only day and time it would've worked and that we were lucky to have caught her, so we really look forward to meeting with her. Even more after that: we tried to stop by one of the ward missionaries who we'd never been able to contact, and when we pulled up he was outside! He was an awesome guy. His wife had passed away a year before from cancer and it pushed him back into church. Anyways, a whole bunch of little things all worked together to make an awesome night full of miracles that really encouraged us and got us even more excited for the work.

Zone Conference

We also had zone conference this week as well which was great as always. The primary lesson we received was on cleaning ourselves up spiritually and physically so that we can be more effective as missionaries. We got some good ideas to improve our work. Sometimes I think I struggle to realize that even as a missionary I make mistakes and am not always who I want to be, and that really got to me a couple of days. After all the good days, things just kind of came crashing down a bit. I was having some self-doubt and frustration coupled with some days that weren't super successful as well and I'm good at blaming myself for those struggles. Luckily, Elder Berry has had similar experiences, so we were able to stop and just think over the situation for a while so I could get some frustration out and get back to being myself. If there's one solid takeaway from this week, it's been that Satan will work really hard to tear you down the closer you grow towards Christ, and we've got to keep doing the simple things in order to keep his temptations and the self-condemnation at bay. The last few days have been really improving, so no worries! That's about all for me this week, and if you're looking for an interesting study, I'm currently studying the law of sacrifice in the books of Moses to try and understand repentance even more. It's fairly in depth, but it has led me to a lot of good insight so far. See you next week!

Elder Shepherd

Lenexa & Olathe Zones Service Project today at Deanna Rose Children’s Farmstead. The missionaries prepared the Farmstead for the season opening by raking leaves, putting down mulch, caring for farm animals, and cleaning buildings. #JustServe