called to serve AZ a MESAnary: Temple Trip Tuesday

It’s not a pun, but it’s a nice alliteration.

Anyways, the week always seems long when pday is on a Tuesday, but this week will seem shorter, so I guess it all balances out.

This past week, it was mostly just like any other week. I was kinda sick on Wednesday, so that wasn’t fun, and then my comp wasn’t feeling good the rest of the week. It’s just that time of year, and we have gone to so many people's homes this past week where they have been sick, and it’s not just the, “I’m sick” excuse people use to get us to go away.

We did have a lesson with a part member family about why we go to church and stuff, and we brought a member with us. We asked the member to share the blessings of going to church and how it helps him. Well, he starts talking about how hard Church really is when you have young children and talked about how it’s the hardest 3 hours of his week and what not. He even said that, “church is harder than hell.” We were getting a little nervous, but he eventually tied everything back together and said that despite the difficulties, he sees how it makes his week better and how he has learned to cherish seeing all his girls dressed up in the backseat of their car and everything. I think it helped the family to have someone give them some real talk though.

We also got a referral for a member who has been inactive for awhile who requested a copy of The Book of Mormon from online. We didn’t even have her records in our ward. We were able to contact this referral within 20 minutes of her requesting The Book of Mormon, and she let us right in. Apparently, her 6 year old has been a little curious since they went to church a little bit ago with the grandparents, so the mom decided that if her daughter wants to go, they will go. And they came to church on Sunday! Interestingly enough, our ward mission leader knows them a little bit and had been feeling like they needed to invite her to things. And last night, there is a group FHE put on for the missionaries to bring people to once a month now by one of the high councilors, and she came with our ward mission leader’s family. So that is exciting.

I also learned that the mission president looks at how much money is on all the missionaries mission cards, and if you start accumulating too much money, you get a phone call from him. This may or may not have happened to me this week... But the reason I have more money than usual on my card is because I haven’t had to buy too much with members giving us stuff and then a member payed for our groceries last week. So we just have great members, and it is a blessing.

It was a little sad to hear about President Monson’s passing, but it has been a great time to reflect on those things he exemplified and those things he has taught us. It gave me the opportunity to think about what he taught me and some of the things he has said. Two of my favorite quotes from him are, “may we ever choose the harder right than the easier wrong,” and “never let a problem to be solved become more important than a person to be loved.”

Anyways, love y’all!

Sister Smith