God Speaks Every Language

 Buenos días everyone! Just want to remind each of you and love and miss you! Thanks for your support as I serve my mission!

This week, as usual, we saw lots of miracles! Two of our friends, Jesus and Luis accepted a baptismal date! The Spirit was really strong in their lesson and I'm so grateful to get to be a part of this work! Pray for these two as they continue to progress toward their goal!

I just want to say that a huge blessing of being set apart as a missionary and teaching lessons to each of our friends is I feel like I get to know and see them in a way I never would in other circumstances. I get to feel the Spirit in the same room with these individuals and help them as they share personal life stories and demonstrate so much faith as they choose to seek out religion! And I truly feel like God has helped me feel such a deep love for each person we teach. I know that the love I feel for them is just the tiniest portion of what God feels for them. And I have a firm testimony that relationships grow to be SO much deeper when individuals feel the Holy Ghost together. That's why family prayers, church services, and sharing personal spiritual experiences with loved-ones is vital! If you're looking to strengthen a relationship in your life, the best advice I can give is find a way to feel the Spirit together!

I had two awesome exchanges this week. The first was with Sister Evans! She is one of the sweetest people ever and she's so chill about everything! We spent a lot of time knocking doors and talking to people, and we saw so many miracles. One thing that was fun about the neighborhood that we were in is that there were quite a few people who only spoke Spanish. When we started talking to them in English and they said they didn't speak, it felt so good to be able to switch over to Spanish and show them that we could still communicate! It's such a good feeling to be able to get to know someone who comes from a completely different culture and language. Learning the languages on my mission has really helped open me to a different perspective on people, and I'm so grateful for that.

I had an exchange with Sister Colletti on Saturday, and it was so fun! She is such a good example to me of a missionary who truly wants to grow and see progress every day! It was fun to be on exchanges again because we did exchanges back when I was in Paso Robles too. We had a day full of miracles and good lessons! For dinner, one of the members took us to a buffet so that was fun. And then we taught English class that night!

SPIRITUAL THOUGHT:

Today I want to share my testimony that Heavenly Father hears and answers ALL of our prayers!

When I started off my mission and I could barely understand Spanish myself, I literally could not wrap my mind around the idea that God could understand what I was saying when I prayed to Him in this new language. I felt the same way as I've been learning Mixteco. Mixteco is so foreign to me that I honestly felt like it had to be fake the first few times I tried speaking to people in it haha. It's a shocking feeling to start recognizing that people are really communicating to each other in another language, when I initally only heard sounds without meaning.

Something I am coming to understand is that God DOES understand me! He understands me perfectly when I pray to Him in English or in any other language. I have felt love and answers come from prayers I've given in English, Spanish, or Mixteco. It really doesn't matter how we're saying something. Our Heavenly Father always does and always will understand us.

I wanted to share this because I know it doesn't just have to do with the language we're speaking! I know that there have been times I've gone to my Heavenly Father in prayer and felt like I didn't know how to express what I was feeling. I've wondered how He could possibly understand. But He doesn't just understand the things we're saying, he understands what we're feeling!

God wants us to pray to Him because He knows it will help US! He already knows us perfectly, and He's just so proud of us for putting in our effort to communicate with Him!

I know we can feel God's love in any language! My invitation for you all is to listen to a church-related song in a different language this week! The Spirit speaks in all tongues.

I love you all!

-Hermana DeMordaunt