Man Crush Monday

Spanish district band at dinner with the Lopez family

I have a crush. His name is Paul. You may have heard of him if you're into reading the New Testament.

But for real though. I. LOVE. PAUL. Recently I have been reading a lot our of the Book of Acts in the New Testament and if you haven't read it, I'm going to invite all of you to read it ASAP. Especially if you are a missionary. Paul is one of, if not THE, best missionaries ever. He taught with power and boldness and has changed the way I do missionary work. He is the ultimate example of fearing no man, only God. Literally almost every city he visited wanted to kill him. He was beaten, persecuted and imprisoned yet never stopped, never took a break. He was truly converted to Christ and wanted everyone to know about Him so they too could be saved. The funny thing is before his conversion he wanted to kill the Christians and was on his way to do it when Christ appeared to him and was like "Stop this nonsense" and then Paul was blinded and so Christ appeared to one of His disciples and was like "Go visit this guy" and the disciple was like "um...isn't he the one that is trying to kill us?? so lets think about this..." but then he went and healed Paul and the first thing Paul did was go preach about Christ #converted 

I. LOVE. PAUL. Poor Sister Shaffer is probably tired of hearing me talk about him all the time but he is awesome and I'm obsessed so #Can'tStopWon'tStop

But in other news it was a great week (every week here is great tbh). Our zone has set a goal for 18 baptisms this month and with the training we received at Zone Conference this week we can totally reach it! Our whole zone is pumped and working hard to reach it and let me tell you the miracles are real! #18Bap'$

On our end of things..Letty and Diana are on date! Letty wants to get baptized so bad so we are really working hard with her so they can be baptized on the 22nd! Please keep them in your prayers! The only thing in her way is getting married to Rodolfo. Not even that...it's just getting the marriage license! Let me tell you if anyone in the Gilbert area needs to get married I can hook you up. I know a lot about it now. 

Gloria is still doing awesome! She got us frostys the other day and as we were eating them we talked about her baptism. She has big plans let me tell you. She knows who she wants to baptize her, who she wants doing the music and all that. She decided I probably shouldn't sing which is a good decision all around but she asked me to make invitations for her to give out....SHE IS THE CUTEST! Also she was at church the other day and it was fast Sunday and she came up to us and was like "I started my fast yesterday". WE DIDN'T EVEN REMIND HER! Gloria is so so special to me. I love this woman with all my heart and am so so grateful for this time I have to be with her.

Cool experience happened this week. Hermana Shaffer and I were visiting a potential when we passed by some landscaping guys. I had this feeling to go talk to them but 1) they are usually from Phoenix and 2) probably not interested. So I drove right by them. After stopping by the potential, we drove by them again and the thought kept coming to my mind... "Go talk to them". I, of course, ignored it and kept driving. After about 5 minutes of driving away from them I just couldn't shake the feeling we had to go talk to these men so I flipped a U-turn and drove like mad back. Sis. Shaffer was a little confused and scared. Anyways Pancho, Miguel and two others were all on their lunch break and although they were indeed from Phoenix we were able to share a message with them and give out 4 copies of el Libro de Mormon!!!! We also have a loose return appt for the next time they are in the area on their lunch break so #blessings. It was so cute to see as we were walking away them all flipping through it and talking about it.

But in all seriousness I love being a missionary. It is hard work but so rewarding. We have two amazing recent converts who have almost been baptized a year so we get to work with them on going to the temple. Seeing their excitement makes me so grateful for being a part of this and eternally grateful for Heavenly Father sending me here to Gilbert. I will never be able to thank Him enough.

To the Moon and Back

Hermana Showalter