toe rings & milagros

first off can i just tell ya that God is good??? like holy cow we've just been crazy blessed this week.

 

small plates:

-LOSING MY MIND BECAUSE WE HAD THE COOLEST LESSON EVER WITH OUR PAL JAVIER!!!! keep in mind he's the dude who found the Joseph Smith movie all by himself and watched the whole thing and just loves all we teach him, but before we head in to the lesson, we were planning on teaching the gospel of Jesus Christ (aka the fourth article of faith plus enduring to the end), and once we get in there and talking with him for a bit, hes just like "I understand our end goal is to end up with our Father in Heaven and right now our purpose of living on earth is to be learning and progressing, but aren't there some specific things that we need to do? like I just wish there were some specific steps I could be taking to prepare to meet God". Hermana Hampton and I just look at each other and I literally almost pee my pants and say "great news!!!! theres 5 steps and we were planning on talking about them today!!!" we taught everything and he was incredibly receptive and was repeating it all back to us to make sure he had it right, and then when we asked if hed be baptized and start taking the steps, his answer was a quick and short "of course I would". boom bada bing. we didnt get him on date because he works 1029374 hours every week and cant come to church ever but HEY he's gonna be baptized at some point!!!!! 

-intercambios!!!! I gotta have an exchange with la hermana plewe who is the bomb diggity. shes been out 17 months so her Spanish is bomb and so is her teaching so I learned a whole ton from her. we met a man at the gas station and ended up talking to him for an hour because he told us hes been looking for the truth for 17 years... we asked him if hes read from the Book of Mormom and sincerely prayed and he answered yes, but he still didnt feel anything, so the wise hermana plewe said something to really make him think. she asked him if he were to find out it was true, would he really be willing to act? if he discovered the truth was in buddhism, would he do everything he could to become Buddhist? and if he found it in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, would he be baptized? He pondered about that for a sec and then answered he'd never thought about it like that before. We gave him the address to the nearest church and I saw something change in him when we handed him that card because he started to really see the hope of finding truth. soooo long story short pray for Matthew and that he finds what hes been looking for for so long. 

-watched the Restoration movie in Spanish and just cried and cried. that movie gets me everytime, and it's even more spiritually uplifting when you start to understand it in another language. again, the gift of tongues is real.

-MIRACLE SUNDAY! buckle down cause this is a long one, but to start off, theres this little white book that we call the white bible. we live out of that thing because it has every single rule that a missionary needs to know (theres about a million haha). we have had a hard past couple of weeks with finding new people and havent actually had anyone new to teach this entire transfer, which has been incredibly hard, so we decided to really, truly, exactly, living by that little book because we need some miracles. theres one little tiny line in there that I've been ignoring the whole mission that says "tattoos, nose rings, other body piercings, or toe rings are not acceptable" and I was like pues duh we shouldn't have all these piercings and what not as missionaries but toe rings??? like nobody's even gonna see that anyways?? I've had a toe ring on for around a year and a half and like it doesnt come off because the skin has grown around it (sorry if this is TMI hahaha) and I've just been ignoring that statement because I'm the only one who sees it, but Saturday night, I decided if I was going to be 100% obedient, it had to go. so I cried a little bit and took it off, and what happened the next day???? we had 6 PEOPLE COME TO CHURCH. 6. OUR GOAL WAS 3. AND 3 OF THESE PEOPLE WERE DAN JONES'S OR PEOPLE WHO JUST RANDOMLY SHOWED UP. Selvin brought his niece and nephew, and then the other 3 men randomly showed up and I cannot even begin to tell you how golden they are. they're practically ready to be thrown in the font. they all loved learning about Christ coming to the Americas and felt so welcomed at the branch and they're coming next week with more buddies because "our congregation is small and we want to fill the room". God is good, exact obedience brings miracles. 

 

large plates:

-i made salmon for the first time in my life and it was delightful. 

-ha funny story. we tracted into this 21 year old dude who let us right in and asked us how we can be saved, so we started teaching and ended up teaching the first 3 lessons and all was going smooth until the end when he told us hes very active in his Christian church and how the bible says this and this and this about latter day prophets and other books of scripture blah blah blah (we get this a lot but jokes on you cause theres proof in the bible and book of mormon about each other). long story short we end up giving him a Book of Mormon and bearing testimony about it, and then heading out cause we dont wanna fight. we make it home, and I reach in my bag and realize i messed up so bad. 

back story: theres this copy of the Book of Mormon that I've been working on for 4 months that is crazy marked up with all of my thought written in the margins and I use it every day in tracting and teaching and I just love that thing to pieces. and yep, I accidentally gave that dude my personal copy. after many tears and much agony, I finally decided maybe it's good he has that copy cause all he has to do is open it and maybe see some highlights and realize how important it is to me and he'll read. we've even tried to go back to get it if he isn't reading it, but the spirit keeps saying no sooooo it's all in Gods hands for right now. maybe one day I'll go get her back and give him his own copy haha

-we're currently working as therapists for some lady in the English ward who is suicidal and had clung on to us as of late so pray for Jana and pray for us cause that makes me mighty stressed on top of everything else goin on

-played with littlest pet shops and American girl dolls with Selvin on his front porch. literally I love that man more than anyone else on this whole earth (besides my dog)(jk mom you know I love the family too) 

 

anywho sorry the email is 10 years long but it's just 2 good not to share yanno? life is awesome possum right now and I dont wanna be anywhere else. I love the mission and I love the people and I love all of you too :') 

 

con todo el amor en mi corazoncito,

hermana hess

 

fotos:

one day I'll get a good pic of Rainier

kitty in a sweater

baby hit 2 months!