Living the Dream: Exchanges All Over the Place

I don't even know where to begin my sweet family. This week was crazy and I don't really know what's going on in our area because of our 3 exchanges this week.. but we saw so many miracles and felt much joy.

First, yesterday Hermano Timalach spoke in church! We helped him write his talk this week. He gave his talk spoke from the heart. It was beautiful and the spirit was so strong, he was teary-eyed and bore his pure and simple love for the gospel and how it has changed his life. It was perfect. Hermana Cardullo made pasta last night and the Timalachs were in love with it! Familia Perez (less active) has been going to church constantly for over a month now and we are helping them to prepare to enter the temple. :) I love this humble Lodi branch. My heart is here.

I was able to stay in Lodi with Hermana Dando and we had a great day! We had lots of teaching appointments. We really focused on being positive and excited to do the work every day and being urgent to do the work! There is nothing better we could be doing right now. :)

Hermana Cardullo and I both went down to Stockton with the American sign language sisters. President Lewis asked that the 4 of us stay in the area and just work in different parts of the city. So we just had a party. I was with Sister Abbott. She is an incredible missionary, Such a great teacher and teaches with such love, I really learned a lot from her. We had a really cool experience, we found this English lady named Ana because we were at an apartment complex and her door was open. We offered to help her and she invited us in, we cleaned her apartment with her, shared the Restoration and the Book of Mormon and she absolutely loved it. Sis. Abbott went back on Friday and they invited her to be baptized and she accepted, she called me so happy. It is such a blessing to be able to be doing these exchanges with so many great sisters in the mission. English work is SOO different though, I felt lost during the day but everything worked out. I also didn't understand any ASL but we had fun and a great day full of miracles and crazy experiences. We also met some crazy people...(it's Stockton but we will save those stories for later :)

I was also able to go to Tracy West and spend the day with Hermana Griffith! She is great missionary. We really focused on talking with everyone because she said it is hard to get 20 contacts a day. We had a great time really going out of our way and talking to everyone. Haha, I just love being a missionary.

President Martinez came to the branch again with the 6 of us missionaries and we studied about what the sons of Mosiah did to baptize so many people. We really tore apart Alma 31:34-35. I love that they truly PLEADED with the Lord to find the elect. Hermana Cardullo and I have some new ideas and great things we want to focus on and strengthen so we can be just like them. To be a good missionary you have to study and apply the things you learn from the scriptures! We also went over a bunch of fun new finding activities that we are really excited to try!

I know that the Lord is truly preparing hearts (Alma 16:16-17), just one more exchange this week and then things will settle down a bit and we can really focus on our area. I hope you all had a great week, keep up the faith. "Y según su fe, se realizó un gran cambiol en su corazón. He aquí, os digo que todo esto es verdad" (Alma 5:12). Les queremos mucho!"

Con Amor,

Hermana Thomas