Love Letters & Broken Glass Doors

 Hola everyone!! Hope you've had a great week!

Transfers are this week!! Hermana Silva is leaving which makes me so sad!! My new comp is named Hermana Van Brocklin and she was actually Hermana Silva's first trainee, so now her two trainees are comps haha!

I forgot to share this last week, but I shared my testimony in fast and testimony meeting in the Spanish/Mixteco branch. I've mentioned this before but there are generally two people at the pulpit at a time because someone speaks in Spanish and someone translates each sentence into Mixteco. So I shared a sentence in Spanish, and Alex, one of the members, stood next to me and translated everything into Mixteco. It was a little confusing to try to say everything in Spanish and hear his translations right after haha, but it was a cool experience! Maybe sometime soon I'll share my testimony in Mixteco at church, but switching off between translations with the two languages felt a little extra tough to try my first time.

We've been working with a few awesome families lately, but pray for them because we need to help get them motivated to come to church on Sundays!

On Monday, all the missionaries got to the church for district council and 3 different glass doors were completely shattered. There was a big hole in the glass door that led to the YSA ward building and a vase was shattered inside, but other than that I don't think anything else inside was damaged. The main church building had shattered doors, but only the first layer of glass was broken so it doesn't look like the person who did it was trying to get in, just do damage which is sad.

Also funny kinda weird story! One of the newer members in our ward knew that Hermana Silva was probably about to leave because of transfers, and he gave her a letter. When she opened it, it basically confessed his love for her and he sprayed his cologne all over it haha. It was funny but at the same time pretty disappointing because it feels like he might have been more focused on his crush on Hermana Silva than the spirit he felt at church. When she opened it before transfers she said this was her sign that she needed to leave to a new area hahaha, so I guess it's good she's out if the Santa Maria ward for that reason.

Hermana Silva and I were doing calls at the church one night and the English ward was having a Christmas party. One of the members walked into the room we were in and invited us to go grab some food and it literally made my whole week haha. The food was sooo good and it was such a nice party. I think it's just because of the difference in size and circumstances with the English wards vs Spanish wards, but I've realized one of the perks for all the English-speaking missionaries is how much and how well they get fed by the members.

I'm definitely not complaining about getting fed this week though, because we had some awesome member dinners thanks to everyone wanting to say goodbye before transfers! We got taken to a buffet by a new member and friend of the Elders who's planning to be baptized and it was super fun!

SPIRITUAL THOUGHT:

This week I want to share something my Mission President shared with me a few weeks ago. I was updating him on some of my thoughts and feelings about how missionary work has been for me. I told him that sometimes I feel like I'm not contributing as much as I could be because it feels like my companion's Spanish is so much better than mine and she explains things so well anyway. I felt like my contributions to the lessons weren't always making a huge dent in the overall discussion.

He followed up right away with a question. "Who was a better teacher, Alma or Amulek?"

 (Context: Alma and Amulek were both prophets in the Book of Mormon who preached to the people. They taught together, and Alma has a lot more teachings written in the Book of Mormon than Amulek.)

I wasn't really sure how to respond, but I told him I figured they both were. He went on by explaining that I was right, that both were valuable and powerful prophets of God. It didn't matter which one spoke more. They were both necessary and changed countless lives. And now their teachings live on through the scriptures, so they continue to change lives today!

I felt the Spirit speak to me. The Lord needs my missionary efforts just as much as he needs my companion's. Just as much as He needs any other missionary's efforts.

He needs the contributions of every member of the church. Every voice is important to Him. And no matter how insignificant or small our contributions might feel, He'll take what we have and change lives with it.

My invitations for you all this week is to reach out to someone and serve! Trust that whatever you have to offer is enough, and Heavenly Father recognizes your efforts!

I love you all!

Hermana DeMordaunt

*Pictures haven't been working hopefully I can send some next week!