What a week! Sister Clement and I had a great week! We've really enjoyed working together during this time of year. There really is a Christmas spirit that is just so strong this time of year! We decided to really seize that and do all we could with it.
Before I say anything else, I just have to say that this week didn't go at all the way we'd planned. We set our goals as numbers that we really expected we could achieve this week, and then through the week there were a couple of times that it seemed there would be no way to achieve them! BUT. The best part of that was counting them up yesterday and realizing how blessed we truly were, regardless of the bumps along the way.
Our Christmas was an adventure! I woke up feeling pretty sick, and as soon as Sister Clement started feeling sick as well, we decided it was likely food poisoning from the Christmas party we'd been to the night before. We had ups and downs all day, but were still able to talk to people, have a really positive first lesson with a man named J, sing Christmas songs to some people, and be the subjects of familie Van Gijsel's Christmas hospitality. We are very grateful for it all, even though we did have a pretty rough day as far as things go physically.
We had plenty of miracles this week, not the least of which was feeling better after a few days of being sick and being able to do missionary work without that extra obstacle, but I wanted to share about one of our baptismal dates, R. R is from Angola - he was a referral from a man in our branch. R speaks decent Dutch, but Portuguese is his mother language, and what a blessing it is that we have 3 different couples in our branch who speak Portuguese so that he can hear the basis of the gospel is his own tongue! Last week we invited Rafael to be baptized in January. The date ended up being a little bit foggy, as two were talked about, so we clarified it in a lesson yesterday. He will be baptized on the 25th of January! The special thing about this is R's great faith! When we asked him which date of the two he'd like to strive for (the 11th or the 25th), the first thing that he said was that he knew that through God, he could reach even the first one, though he struggles with addictions and does not know a ton about the gospel yet. That was so neat to hear! He did end up choosing the 25th, because he says he would like to be able to learn things more in depth before he takes the step of baptism. We're excited to talk to him about the gospel of Jesus Christ next time, and really get more into why baptism is so important!
I loved studying hope this week, especially because I sure felt hopeless a few times. The biggest reason that I decided it's important to have hope in the future because of Jesus Christ's atonement is that if I have that hope in Him, my will and his will will align! And if that happens, why should I ever worry about the future - it's secure.
Well... There's always so much more I wanna say but I am OUT of time.
Love you all SO MUCH. ECHT WAAR.
Zuster Anjewierden
1 - Sister Clement and I in Brugge (also Elder Hansen being a punk)
2 - BRUGGE is so beautiful
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