Man this week was crazy! Sounds like you guys had a pretty crazy awesome week though! I hope you warned Destin for me, next year is going to be nuts. Also, I got the package from you guys filled with presents as well as the one with the massive Christmas tree and ornaments! I took down a list of things to say to some people who wrote on the back of them but I'll have to answer them next week because I forgot to bring it. But WOW. I don't know if I've ever felt loved by so many people at once. I didn't realize how many people actually read the blog too. So to anyone who wrote to me on those things THANK YOU. I love all of you.
Anyway, so some pretty exciting stuff happened this week. Sunday we had District Conference and President Roggia announced the creation of the Kenema District (Districts are like the same thing as Stakes but not as big of a deal, in case you didn't know.) So it's exciting to see places I've served in growing so much and seeing the joy it brings to people there. We also had Zone Conference which was super sweet and all about the gifts of the spirit. My companion and I gave an instruction as part of it about why do we need the Holy Ghost. I felt it went pretty well. One thing I've definitely learned and understood a lot more since I've been here is what the purpose of the Holy Ghost is and what it really means to receive it as a gift. One thing we talked about during the conference was helping people to recognize answers to their prayers. We always invite people to pray and ask God about the message we share with them, but if people don't know how the answer will come, it really won't do too much for them. We learned a lot of different things and practiced them. The day after we had a pretty sweet experience with one of our investigators. This one guy we're teaching (the guy with the Conroe shirt on actually) has been struggling to progress and just doesn't seem like he fully understands the message we're sharing with him. One thing we've been encouraging him to do is to read from the Book of Mormon and to pray and ponder about it. As we went to see him we asked him how the reading was going. He said he had read a little bit but didn't see anything really to it. We asked him if he prayed about it and he said yes. We then asked him if he had seen any changes in his life since he had begun doing so. He kind of sat back for a moment and thought about it and then he looked at us and said yes. We asked what he felt was different. He said that since reading his desire to gain knowledge and to read God's word has increased and every day he feels like doing that, whereas before he never really had that desire. We then asked him where he thought that feeling came from. He sat there for a while and he said to us quietly, "From God." We read Moroni 10:3-5 with him and he seemed to really understand it. We had also brought a member with us who had been a member for about 3 months and he started to testify about how he used to be like our investigator but he read and prayed about knew the church was true. We didn't even ask him to say anything but he just started talking to him and their interaction was just so sweet! The investigator started asking him about his past life and the spirit was just super strong in the lesson. It was definitely a super great experience. It's cool though because its that simple. You can get an answer from God who you know will never lie to you. It's just left with him now to act and continue to search. We'll see how things go with him. Anyway, we have to go to Kenema this evening so I've got to go! I love all of you and will talk to you next week!
Love,
Elder Stewart
P.S. Jordyn Ingram- Happy (late) Birthday!
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Our cultural picture. All the missionaries are representing different nations. From left to right to down left to right we have: Kenya, Liberia, Qatar, Sierra Leone, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Liberia, England, America, Samoa (American), and Nigeria. Pretty crazy that so many people all over the world can come together as one!
Coke loves everyone.
You see the writing on his shirt? "Conroe Medical Center." On the back there is a map showing a place known as Conroe just north of Houston. Ever heard of it? Haha, it was pretty crazy because the day before I got a letter from Clayton! Don't get your noonas all stressed buddy, I already wrote you back and its on its way.
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