Walking a Little Taller

Hello again!  This has been a long, and crazy week.  Working with Sister Song is great!  She is so open and fearless and sweet and talks to everyone. She is a big strength to me and we complement each other well--she is surely strong where I am weak.  I'm so blessed she was sent here!  I am trying learn some Chinese from here, I hear it a lot more often these days :)


Okay so first of all our area DOUBLED in size today. They took out a pair of Elders from KK :( so we sisters are taking over their area, which I am very unfamiliar with, and also which is very far away!  It's a little overwhelming but we are inheriting a couple of solid investigators from them, which is always great for us. So it's gonna be a new adventure trying to learn the new area.  It's so. so. big.  Ahhh!  But I'm excited too, I feel like good things are gonna happen.  It's pretty exciting as well.  We're gonna be busier.


It's been brought to my attention by Sister Song that I look down all the time--when I pause to think during lessons, and also I look at the floor when I walk to make sure I don't step on anything weird. I've been working to change that this last week, it's made much bigger of a difference than I expected. I feel different. I feel stronger. Looking up, walking a little taller (although I already feel so awkwardly tall here), looking people more directly in the eye... it's changing the way I think. You should try it.

Do you wanna hear about my favorite lesson we had this week?  There's this girl who is living with an active member family (solid. member. referral.) and she has come to church twice. Her name is Dana. She is 19 years old and very mature, we met her on Sunday and scheduled an appointment with her. We traveled over an hour on a very hot sweaty bus to get to the spa she works at--run by the same member family--so we taught her in the back of a spa. A very tranquil environment, dark purple walls and purple drapes throughout the room. Quite an exciting venue. Dana is really sweet and seemed a little shy, but as we taught her she opened up more and felt comfortable asking questions. We learned she's read the Book of Mormon up to around 2 Nephi 4, just on her own, without even knowing what the Book of Mormon was. She said she felt that it contained a lot of things that were relevant to her life, but she didn't know what the Book of Mormon really was or where it came from or what it meant. We taught her how to pray, shared the Restoration and her face lit up as she learned why there were so many churches, for she said "There are so many different churches, but I could never find one that could open my heart.  Now I know why, and now I finally feel  like I've found one."  The Spirit was strong, she accepted the invitation to pray about the Book of Mormon. I then told her that one way we get closer to God is by obeying His commandments, and one commandment is baptism. She said she'd never been baptized in any other church, so I invited her to be baptized in a few weeks.  She happily accepted, I might even use the word thrilled. We picked a date, and she expressed concern not knowing how to prepare. We told her it was just going to be through meeting with us so we could teach her, and doing things like praying and reading and going to church. We assured her we'd be there with her every step of the way. She then gave her first verbal prayer, and it was so heartfelt. It was so cool. It was one of those times where I felt like, this is why I'm here, this is what it's about. I felt edified, and know Dana did too.


We've met a lot of people this week... and we keep meeting more.  We keep going forward. We're focusing on getting referrals from members, and so far it's looking like a really good thing. Referrals really are the way to go.


I was reading a talk by Elder Holland today "The Ministry of Angels". I was really touched and was reminded that the Lord really does extend heavenly help to us regularly.  Heaven IS near, not far away.  We can be reminded of that by remembering that everything good in our lives come from God directly, and by praying often and sincerely.  President Monson said, "Prayer is the passport to Spiritual power."


Stay strong! Remember to pray!


Sister Gopinath