It's ok to have fears and even questions... but we must handle those questions with faith and hold to the faith that we have.

Well i realize that my email writing abilities have not been that great lately... i guess i just get caught up in the Playing part of P-day

This week we went on exchange with the STL's in the zone. I went to their area and worked with sister Kunz. we were tracting and we talked to a young man (Jake) and he said that he had met the sisters before, but sister kunz didn't recognize him so she thought it was the other sisters in their area that had contacted him... we talked to him for a bit, but I could tell that he was not interested... so we invited him to check out the website and left it at that... we finish tracting then we go and contact some of their potential investigators... the first one isn't home, so we try another one across town in another neighborhood... his name is Marshall and the sisters met him and his brother as they were leaving their house and he told them to come back another time. So we knock on his door and the dad answers and invites us in and Sis. Kunz asks for Marshall, and he goes off to find him. Sister Kunz turns to me and says how weird would it be if this was jakes house... I think it was us that tracted into Jake.... I think Marshall is his brother" the dad came back and, turns out that Marshall was busy... but as we are talking to the dad... his other son walks by the doorway... and you will never believe it, but it was Jake, the young man we had just met like an hour earlier... he kinda paused and looked at us funny and then walked off quickly.... man, I felt like a total creeper! "oh, don't mind us, we are just mormon missionaries who are seemingly stalking you..." Ha Ha. We had a great laugh about that one after we walked out the door... 

Then the next funny experience, Sister Snyder and I were at the church this week it was just her and I there practicing our song for the ward Christmas party, and all the sudden we hear someone banging on the doors... so we walk into the hall to see what was going on and there was a man out side.... so we walked to the doors and asked if we could help him. he wanted to know if he could have the metal pipes that were behind our dumpster, he wanted to take them to the recycling to get money for them. I of course couldn't say yes or no but I told him that I would call the building maintenance guy and ask... so while we waited for the building guy to call us back this man talked with us... I asked him if he had ever heard of Mormons before he said no. I asked him if he had ever read the book of Mormon and he just stared at me... so I asked again and he shook his head as if to break a stare and said " Dang girl, you have beautiful eyes!" then looking away and under his breath he repeats himself "beautiful brown eyes"..... "uh... thanks" I said slowly... I wasn't sure how to continue our conversation... so I just asked him about his belief in God... and he quickly went off on that...phew.... He talked about how he was baptized like five times... so I just asked him if he would be baptized again this time by someone holding the proper priesthood authority of god... he said no, but that's ok... then he went on to ask about our food pantry and if we gave food to people... yatta yatta yatta... then he said, again with the same uncomfortable and creepy stare as before "Is there a place I can sign up for a wife... the bachelor life is kinda lonely." I was just praying that the building guy would call just then... but no such luck! Finally he got tired of waiting and he said he wuod check back later... and he walked off. I was so relieved.

Only on a mission would I have these kind of experiences... ha ha... but now I have something to look back on and laugh!

anyway, this week has been alright, we are still trying to build up our teaching pool. I had a pretty neat experience with prayer this week. We were trying to think of where we should tract and so we said a prayer and asked the Lord where He needed us. then we looked at our map and as I looked over it my eyes kept coming back to a certain neighbor hood, so I said "well, this must be it, lets go" so we went... we tracted the neighborhood and  found only one person that invited us back! But this one person seems to really be searching. we had a first lesson with her and we are scheduled to go back for a second this week. How cool is that ! I love prayer! the lord really has his hand in every aspect of this work. 

anyway this lady is Spanish and I thought that she would want to have the Spanish elders come and teach her... so I offered that and she told us that she wanted to better her English so she wanted us to come and help her better it by teaching her. She is really awesome and she seems to understand what we teach her! im really excited to continue teaching her!

Welll family, I hope yall are still reading along with me. We now have finished Helaman and are into 3rd nephi.... something that I really loved in the first chapter of 3rd nephi, was verse 7 and 8 Talks about the believers how the sorrowed for fear that the signs might not come that were told by the prophets. but then in 8 it says "...they did watch steadfastly for that day and that night and that day" that had been prophesied of.... I love this because even though there was fear and maybe some doubt... they still held true to their faith... they still believed. Like us, sometimes things happen to test our faith, and even though we may have doubts we must re-evaluate our faith and take it back to the basics... do we believe in god? yes... do we believe that Jesus Christ is his Son and our savior? yes...  then if we believe these things, then we work up from there... and we hold to the faith we have. It's ok to have fears and even questions... but we must handle those questions with faith and hold to the faith that we have.

Well family I hope that yall are having a good week!

Love Sister Dannika Nielsen