Flood the Font

Hello! 

We have had many faith building experiences this week. So our zone has set a pretty high goal for baptismal invites this transfer. 1000 baptismal invites for the transfer as a zone with the initiative #FloodTheFont. We have done the math and it shows that every companionship needs to have at least 11 baptismal invites per week. It doesn't seem too bad, since inviting others to be baptized helps us to fulfill our purpose as missionaries, but at the same time, I know it will stretch us and it will be challenging. As I was reading and studying preach my gospel this week, some passages stood out to me on page 146. "Goals reflect the desires of our hearts and our vision of what we can accomplish. Goal setting and planning are acts of faith."  

As we set this goal, the desire of our hearts is help baptize converts. But of course, we can't do it alone. I have been trying my best to strengthen my faith this week and to put my total and complete trust in Him. Knowing that if I do, I will be an effective instrument in His hands to help people receive the restored gospel in their lives. On page 61 of PMG it states that if we have faith in Jesus Christ, we know he will fulfill his promises. He promises us that if we work hard and have faith, we can perform miracles. We needed a miracle!! 

We woke up Sunday morning with this list of things to accomplish: 

Get an investigator to church 

Find 3 new investigators

1 LIMP

4 baptismal invites

Prepare and Teach the relief society lesson (we found out about that morning)

Bake cookies

Contact 2 referrals (with cookies)

Attend Ward Council and correlation

All without eating! We had a zone fast to give us the faith and strength to accomplish our goal. 

That morning all of our set lessons with the potential investigators who were to become new investigators cancelled and we just had a bunch of finding to do. But we knew the Lords promise was true, and He was going to help us accomplish our goals. We worked SUPER hard all day long and prayed more than we ever had. Here are the results:

Our 9 year old investigator came to church by himself

The relief society lesson went GREAT! We had a wonderful discussion going. 

We decided to stop in on some former investigators whose whole family was home. They invited us right in. We had a great lesson with them and by the end, one of our potentials (who had cancelled that day) showed up and asked to be taught a lesson. Invited 2 of them to be baptized. They said yes! 

Baked and delivered the cookies to the referral our bishop gave us. They invited us right in and we had a great lesson with them. 

On our way home (8:45pm) we decided to stop by another one of the potentials home who had called and cancelled that morning. She and her family had invited us in we had a powerful lesson on the restoration with them. Resulting in two baptismal invites and two yeses! 

We were able to accomplish everything we needed to do that day! Heavenly Father is so good to us! And we know that his promises are true! We are able to perform miracles!! "There is a power to make things happen that need to happen. Faith is power!" 

Other than that our week has been full of interesting things. 

For example. We met a 64 year old black man named Melvin about 9 weeks ago. We have been teaching him off and on every couple of weeks or so, but he doesn't seem to want to keep commitments so we had dropped him. Saturday night we decide to call him with the intent to invite him to church. As the conversation went on, he asked if I would like to meet him for lunch at Olive Garden that week. Who says no to Olive Garden?! So of course i say yes! He then proceeds to say.. "oh that will be great. Me and you and a nice dinner at Olive Garden." Realizing that he wasn't asking me AND my companion out to lunch, but just ME i said., "Oh! Melvin, my companion has to come too!" Resulting in "Well she has to pay for herself!" As me and my companion are trying not to laugh uncontrollably he then has the nerve to ask if I am infatuated with him. But because I'm not the brightest crayon in the box I think he is asking if I'm intoxicated. To which I reply.. "NO!" ...a little insensitive. but still. Overall, it was just an awkward conversation and we will NOT be going to Olive Garden with Melvin.  #NowWeBothHaveToPayForOurselves

But I hope everyone's week is going well with lots of fun memories of your own! I look forward to hearing from you soon! 

Love, Sister Merritt 

Some of my favorite Sisters ❤️