HELLO

I've learned so much this week. Ether 12:27 has a whole new meaning to me.

27 And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them.

Heavenly Father knows how to humble a person, that's for sure. Being on my mission I have definitely found a lot of my weaknesses, it's frustrating at first, but over time as we rely on Heavenly Father he will help us to strengthen those weaknesses. Of course it's a long process. We have to work hard at it. We are in training to learn how to be Godly and Christlike. So we can't resist the exercise and routine and discipline that it takes to achieve that plan.

All of our progressing investigators have been M.I.A. on us. But we have been working hard at getting a ton of new investigators who we hope will be solid. *crossing fingers* We have truly been led by the Spirit this week as we have done inspired tracting. We go onto a street and pick three houses we want to knock on, ask for referrals from all of them and see what happens. It's so great to see that every referral we have gotten from someone random, they have been interested in learning and we have had full on lessons with them, invited them to read the Book of Mormon, assigned them a chapter, and set up a return appointment. Now that I've seen the blessings from asking for referrals for everyone, I never want to do this work without it (: no wonder our leaders has asked us to ask for referrals!

Our A.C. has been out all week so we have all the windows wide open so we can get some "cool" air inside. Unfortunately though it's been extremely hot and rainy which means it's been humid. And since it's been raining we need to close the windows sooo...it's been a struggle. Yesterday we came home at 9pm and it was 90 degrees inside. Lol we survived though.

I went on exchange with Sister Holden this week to fort Yargo. All of our plans fell through so we ended up tracting for 6 hours straight, but it was wonderful! We met so many fabulous people. One door we knocked on and a man told us to come in. Unfortunately we couldn't because there wasn't another women in the house but we stood outside and talked to him while he was sitting on his couch inside (he had just had surgery so he couldn't get up). We had a short lesson on the restoration with John, gave him a Book of Mormon and set up a return appointment, and asked to say a prayer. He said it was fine with him, but because it wasn't his house, we would have to ask his friend. We didn't realize until that moment that there was another man in the room on his phone. So we asked him "Could we say a prayer?" "What??" "Can we say a prayer??" "What?!" And then John joins in "PRAY!" "Clay?" "PRAYYYY!!" "Stay??"  " PRRRAAAAYYYYY!!!" ....this was going on for like five minutes as all of us were trying to play charades with this guy to tell him we were going to pray. Finally he got it! And we said a prayer (: haha

There's this man named Brother Stephens who was our team up for a lesson one night. Brother Stephens is a convert of about 5 years. He's probably the most baptist Mormon I have ever met, but he has such a strong testimony of this gospel. Our set appointment that we were bringing him to wasn't there, so we go visit a potential investigators house. Nobody is answering the door so as we are about to leave a van pulls into the driveway. Brother Stephens opens up his arms and yells "WE'VE BEEN WAITING FOR YOU!" Only thing is, we had no idea who these people are. We secretly try to tell Brother Stephens that they aren't the people we are looking for. He turns around and said "it's okay. I'm in sales." Then turns back around and yells it out again! We were a little mortified because these people had the weirdest look on their faces and we knew they felt awkward and a little scared. Haha but as Brother Stephens kept going ... "We have this beautiful message for you today that will change your whole life." He tells his conversion story, we teach a little bit about the Book of Mormon and we get two new investigators. They're solid. But boy oh boy. Brother Stephens.. Lol!

Anyways. Love y'all (: and I hope you have the greatest week!

Love, Sister Merritt