December 4, 2017 -- What a Cherry Cobbler Can Do!
Friends, Family, Loved Ones <3,
Happy December! This week has been an answer to many prayers. I wish I could write whole novels about this week, but right now I don't have the time for that. Maybe one day. ;)
My entire mission, in fact, my entire life, I have struggled to feel like the Lord needs me for any specific reason. Since coming into the mission field, I have often felt like it wouldn't really matter if I was the missionary serving in this area or if someone else was here, because it is God who is doing all the work anyway. It wouldn't matter if I had never served a mission at all, because there would still have been missionaries in this area, and missionary work still would have been done.
This week, I realized how wrong I was.
A few weeks ago our recent convert, Sister Sadler, was telling us that one of her friends in her tailor park, Candice, was about to have a birthday. Sister Sadler wanted to make Candice a cherry cobbler, because that is her favorite dessert, but she didn't have any experience making those, and she wasn't sure how she was going to be able to pay for it with her situation right now. I offered to make one to bring to her, and so I did. I haven't had much time to bake anything in the past few months, and I have really been missing it. So I scheduled out some time in the evening, made the cobbler, and we took it over to Sister Sadler's and gave it to Candice on her birthday. We didn't stay to talk for very long because we had appointments to get to, and because we had talked to Candice a few times in the past and she wasn't very interested in learning anything more about our message.
This past week we were in the area so we stopped to say hello to Candice, and she invited us inside. She told us that she had been really touched that we would make a cobbler for her when we didn't even know her, and that she didn't know very many people like that. She wanted us to come back and teach her and her step-daughters about the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. Since that conversation on Tuesday, we have had three lessons with her and her girls and Candice asked US how she could be baptized by someone holding the priesthood authority of God, and how she could know what truth is.
Another experience (that is different but relates in the end, I promise!) happened on Friday, when a young adult in our ward, Jo Jo Sanchez, came out and spent the entire day with us doing missionary work. Jo Jo has been contemplating going on a mission, and so we showed her basically what a regular day as a missionary actually looks like. On that day, we had three AMAZING lessons that were all very different. One was with a new investigator named Esosa, who is a really sweet 18-year-old who goes to UWF. She told us that she is searching for truth in her life and that she has had a difficult relationship with her family involving religion. Both Sister Adams and I cannot relate to that, but Jo Jo could, and was able to bear amazing testimony. Then we went to see Candice and her girls the Plan of Salvation. We were talking about how our families can be together forever, and the girls wanted to know if they could be together forever with their mom, dad, and step-mother. Sister Adams and I did not know the answer, but Jo Jo did. Then we went to go see Sister Long and her granddaughters, and Jo Jo was able to share personal experiences with them about how sports and athletics have blessed her life and helped her come to know the Savior more. Those are things that Jo Jo and both granddaughters were interested in, but Sister Adams and I knew nothing about.
These two experiences teach me two very powerful things:
1-We have no idea what the Lord is preparing us for.
Each one of us is an accumulation of a hundred different things, from the trials that we have overcome to the hobbies we have, we are each of us as unique and different as our fingerprints. I know without a shadow of a doubt that Jo Jo was supposed to be with us that day. All three of those lessons would not have gone nearly as well without her. Esosa came to church on Sunday, Candice and her girls are considering baptism, and Sister Long and her Granddaughters have been fellowshipped in a way that Sister Adams and I could not have done on our own. Jo Jo was the perfect instrument in the Lord's hands in the Fox Run area of Pensacola Florida on December 1st, 2017, because of all the preparations He has been making in her life up until this point. Because of who she is, the Lord was able to work much good in His vineyard.
2-God needs us for who we are, not who we think we should be.
Could another missionary have made Candice a Cherry Cobbler? Yes. It isn't even that hard! But it wasn't just any old missionary, it was me. I have been being prepared my entire life exactly like Jo Jo has. The Lord made sure that he had a servant here in Fox Run at exactly the right time who could give Candice exactly what she needed. She did not need any rousing testimony of the Restoration or the Book of Mormon, she needed a Cherry Cobbler. And I can make that happen. The person that I have accumulated to be is the exact person that God needs here right now, because that is how the Lord is getting his work done. He is the one who does it all, by orchestrating it all perfectly so that we are here to help exactly when we will be the most effective at it.
My Grandfather was a dentist. After he retired, he decided to start using his tools to make canes. The tiny drills were perfect for making intricate designs and making the designs in his head appear on the wood. I am sure if the drill had a brain, it never would have thought that it would be operating on a cane instead of a tooth! Yet it did, because it was in the hands of a master craftsman, someone with more vision and insight than we could ever comprehended. We look at ourselves and think we are here to fix teeth- he looks at us and says that we are here to carve canes. (Or bake Cherry Cobblers!)
God needs us to do His work ladies and gentlemen. He needs US. I didn't have just any old mom- I have mine. I didn't have just any old dad- I had mine. I am not just any old missionary- I am me. And that is all the Lord needs me to be.
Have a great week everyone! God really loves you, I promise. You are important to Him, I promise! HE NEEDS YOU! I promise ;)
Happy December! This week has been an answer to many prayers. I wish I could write whole novels about this week, but right now I don't have the time for that. Maybe one day. ;)
My entire mission, in fact, my entire life, I have struggled to feel like the Lord needs me for any specific reason. Since coming into the mission field, I have often felt like it wouldn't really matter if I was the missionary serving in this area or if someone else was here, because it is God who is doing all the work anyway. It wouldn't matter if I had never served a mission at all, because there would still have been missionaries in this area, and missionary work still would have been done.
This week, I realized how wrong I was.
A few weeks ago our recent convert, Sister Sadler, was telling us that one of her friends in her tailor park, Candice, was about to have a birthday. Sister Sadler wanted to make Candice a cherry cobbler, because that is her favorite dessert, but she didn't have any experience making those, and she wasn't sure how she was going to be able to pay for it with her situation right now. I offered to make one to bring to her, and so I did. I haven't had much time to bake anything in the past few months, and I have really been missing it. So I scheduled out some time in the evening, made the cobbler, and we took it over to Sister Sadler's and gave it to Candice on her birthday. We didn't stay to talk for very long because we had appointments to get to, and because we had talked to Candice a few times in the past and she wasn't very interested in learning anything more about our message.
This past week we were in the area so we stopped to say hello to Candice, and she invited us inside. She told us that she had been really touched that we would make a cobbler for her when we didn't even know her, and that she didn't know very many people like that. She wanted us to come back and teach her and her step-daughters about the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. Since that conversation on Tuesday, we have had three lessons with her and her girls and Candice asked US how she could be baptized by someone holding the priesthood authority of God, and how she could know what truth is.
Another experience (that is different but relates in the end, I promise!) happened on Friday, when a young adult in our ward, Jo Jo Sanchez, came out and spent the entire day with us doing missionary work. Jo Jo has been contemplating going on a mission, and so we showed her basically what a regular day as a missionary actually looks like. On that day, we had three AMAZING lessons that were all very different. One was with a new investigator named Esosa, who is a really sweet 18-year-old who goes to UWF. She told us that she is searching for truth in her life and that she has had a difficult relationship with her family involving religion. Both Sister Adams and I cannot relate to that, but Jo Jo could, and was able to bear amazing testimony. Then we went to see Candice and her girls the Plan of Salvation. We were talking about how our families can be together forever, and the girls wanted to know if they could be together forever with their mom, dad, and step-mother. Sister Adams and I did not know the answer, but Jo Jo did. Then we went to go see Sister Long and her granddaughters, and Jo Jo was able to share personal experiences with them about how sports and athletics have blessed her life and helped her come to know the Savior more. Those are things that Jo Jo and both granddaughters were interested in, but Sister Adams and I knew nothing about.
These two experiences teach me two very powerful things:
1-We have no idea what the Lord is preparing us for.
Each one of us is an accumulation of a hundred different things, from the trials that we have overcome to the hobbies we have, we are each of us as unique and different as our fingerprints. I know without a shadow of a doubt that Jo Jo was supposed to be with us that day. All three of those lessons would not have gone nearly as well without her. Esosa came to church on Sunday, Candice and her girls are considering baptism, and Sister Long and her Granddaughters have been fellowshipped in a way that Sister Adams and I could not have done on our own. Jo Jo was the perfect instrument in the Lord's hands in the Fox Run area of Pensacola Florida on December 1st, 2017, because of all the preparations He has been making in her life up until this point. Because of who she is, the Lord was able to work much good in His vineyard.
2-God needs us for who we are, not who we think we should be.
Could another missionary have made Candice a Cherry Cobbler? Yes. It isn't even that hard! But it wasn't just any old missionary, it was me. I have been being prepared my entire life exactly like Jo Jo has. The Lord made sure that he had a servant here in Fox Run at exactly the right time who could give Candice exactly what she needed. She did not need any rousing testimony of the Restoration or the Book of Mormon, she needed a Cherry Cobbler. And I can make that happen. The person that I have accumulated to be is the exact person that God needs here right now, because that is how the Lord is getting his work done. He is the one who does it all, by orchestrating it all perfectly so that we are here to help exactly when we will be the most effective at it.
My Grandfather was a dentist. After he retired, he decided to start using his tools to make canes. The tiny drills were perfect for making intricate designs and making the designs in his head appear on the wood. I am sure if the drill had a brain, it never would have thought that it would be operating on a cane instead of a tooth! Yet it did, because it was in the hands of a master craftsman, someone with more vision and insight than we could ever comprehended. We look at ourselves and think we are here to fix teeth- he looks at us and says that we are here to carve canes. (Or bake Cherry Cobblers!)
God needs us to do His work ladies and gentlemen. He needs US. I didn't have just any old mom- I have mine. I didn't have just any old dad- I had mine. I am not just any old missionary- I am me. And that is all the Lord needs me to be.
Have a great week everyone! God really loves you, I promise. You are important to Him, I promise! HE NEEDS YOU! I promise ;)
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