Wow everything here is so busy! I am enjoying the warmth here so far, but I know that in just a week or two I will be dying! Funny enough we had a bit of rain yesterday and we checked the report during media, and the humidity was going to be a wopping 6%. WOW.
I forgot last week to tell you about the house that I am in, though I included it in my letter home. We are housed by a really sweet LDS woman and I am so grateful for her! Sister Brown and I live down in the basement where it is quite dark, but its comfortable enough. The decor is pretty darn interesting. We have this 4 foot laughing man lamp, and our couches are lime green old pleather with zebra pads on top. There is only one tiny itsy bitsy window as well so we are use to it being dark down there no matter the time of day. This has resulted in some great fun! This has happened a few times this week, but in fact this happened twice last night alone: We keep finding ourselves awake and making our beds and putting on our exercize clothes thinking it is 6 am. One of us looks at our clocks and realizes it is only 12:30 or 3:15 am (both of the times from last night) then has to spend 5 minutes convincing the other companion that it really is not time to wake up and that its okay to go back to sleep. Repeat. Haha so I guess I haven't been sleeping very deeply lately!
Also, our "70's Fabulous" bathroom is all the way across the basement, up the stairs, through the kitchen/ across the house and down a long narrow hallway. I'll just say that it is a very poor design for such a small-bladdered person. I do the potty dance every single night as I feel my way through the pitch darkness and up the stairs and across the house till I am praying to just make it to the bathroom when I get to the hallway! One night during my first week I even ran smack into the wall and hit my head hard. This woke up Sister Brown and it took a few minutes to convince her it wasn't a gunshot, but really just my head, before she would go back to bed. Nighttimes are strange down there in that basement!!! So disorienting, but pretty hilarious :) Thankfully it has been a few days since I have found myself walking into a closet instead of through our doorway when I get up at night. That one is always a surprise :)
This week I really got to experience the stress of a VC sister here in Mesa. As I have said before, we have 3 wards as well as a 6 hour VC shift every single day. It is SO tough and stressful during the time that we DO have in our areas! The elders are always inviting us to Zone sports or telling us how great it is to go to ward functions and how fun TTI-ing (teach, testify, invite -- when we just walk or bike the streets and teach anyone out there) ... but we can never do any of those things! Our small amount of time is all we get, and we have it booked up. In fact, I have already witnessed some contention as ward members are asking us to teach investigators in their home (which is great! The whole stake was challenged to have someone in their home with the missionaries by July 1st and they are REALLY jumping on this!) and we have VC shift that night -- they get pretty darn angry.
Its not fun to have to apoligize for just doing our duty -- for doing what we are called here to do. I feel the stress of our two areas (VC and Stake area) when they collide, and I want to just be able to do everything that people need of us. Also, sometimes Sister Brown and I find ourselves having to "prove" ourselves as the new young sister missionaries. Some Adult men in particular have trouble wrapping their heads around our adequacy, but that is neither here nor there. I am here serving the LORD! The only person we need to prove ourselves to is the Lord, though we desire the trust of members. Since we are a tracting-free mission as a whole, our members are so vital! Thankfully we have been blessed with some great families that are so willing to share the gospel with everyone and are very active in missionary work. Coming from the most densely LDS population in mesa ( our stake is just 2.5 by 2.5 miles and our area is probably less than a mile wide, even though we have 3 wards in there alone!) finding people that are open to hearing the Gospel is tough. Many have built up their defenses long ago, and so there are just a few people hidden in there that don't already have the Gospel that would even think about allowing the missionaries in their home. But WE WILL FIND THEM!!! This gospel is EVERYTHING to me and I know that it fills wholes in peoples lives that they don't even realize they have sometimes! My job is to be here representing Christ and to be unafraid to teach and testify from the first second. We allow others to exercise their agency by doing this, and if I am flat-out rejected, then so be it! My conscience will be clear.
The Visitors Center is awesome. I know I haven't talked about it too much, but really I do love it. It allows me to have a family and a "home" to go to each and every day! I love every single one of the sisters that I get to work with. Sister Brown and I work hard in the VC as well. Our purpose as missionaries is to "invite others to come unto Christ". This means Mormons and Nonmormons alike. EVERYONE can come even closer to Christ than they already are! It poses a challenge to follow the spirit as we talk to each person that walks through the door and as we listen for guidance on how they individually can have a converting experience. Conversion is a constant thing, and I always want to become more and more converted! Everyone that walks through the door is the same in that need for conversion, but the spirit is the ONLY guide for us to depend on so that we can know what their needs are from us. I find that I constantly have to have a prayer in my heart as I talk to people -- though honestly I have a LONG way to go till I get close to perfecting this!
Naturally, as missionaries we pray a lot. I mean a LOT!!!! Before we leave the house in the morning we have said at LEAST 5 prayers!!! Then we pray before we go into any house or lesson or meeting. We must say at least 20-25 prayers a day!! I have come to really love that aspect of this work though. Praying is a necessity for us if we want to have the Lord Guiding us everyday. We invite the spirit when we pray, and the Lord generally guides us through the spirit. I have already seen how different lessons go when we prepare with prayer and study for the individual, and then when we just are in a hurry and spit out a topic on the way that we want to touch on without getting to put it to prayer!!!
Unfortunately, they one of the sisters in the companionship that shares the house with us has been sick all week! She has been extremely ill throughout the whole 8 weeks she has been here, but this past week has been the worst! We have been praying and fasting for her as a mission and I hope they figure out what is wrong! Nice enough for Sister Brown and I, however, is the fact that her companion is a busy body and never wastes a second of the day. Their investigators are Mexican and so sweet so they keep bringing by mounds of food (for a girl that can't stomach anything more than pedialite and a smoothie) so she has been experimenting and each night we come home to a new snack to try :) (usually made from apples, because they have brought more than 50!!!)That has been nice, but I know that they both want to get out to the mission field again. Sister Schwartz is the one that was making us the food and actually she is from Atlanta! We both share a love for the south -- its food, beauty, and people! I will probably write more about her in later letters, but sadly I am out of time!!
I love you all sooooo much!!!!!!!
I can't wait to see you on skype next Sunday!
Sister Younce
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