Another SUNNNY week in Limoges!

 

Well, that is kind of a lie. It has not been ANOTHER sunny week because it has literally rained every single day for the past transfer. But this week we have seen the SUN! It feels really strange. I left the apartment today without a coat. I forgot what that feels like. It is put me in a good attitude though. So, I love it!

 

This week has been a huge rollercoaster ride. Many ups and downs.

 

I would like to focus on the ups :)

 

First off, Co-- is doing awesome. It is looking good for his baptism on the 22nd. But.. I have learned a lesson and I am not going to convince myself it is happening until he is ACTUALLY underneath the water. But for now, things are looking great. His only stress right now is he is reading through the Isaiah chapters in 2 Nephi and was really stressed about how he doesn't understand, and pretty much all I had to say was...yeah, me either. Haha.

 

My biggest highlight of this week was an International Night that the Relief Society put together! It was just seriously one of those PERFECT moments. I just cannot even put into words how much I love these members. Especially these members here in Limoges. I realized this week that a lot of them have ACTUALLY started to call me by name, which has made me really happy. Because I am not just another one of those missionaries. They actually know who I am! They are just like my family now. I have such a huge place in my heart for every single one of them. And this Sunday as a mission we devoted our Sunday to doing our best to endear our members. And we definitely succeeded with that one. First off, I talked this Sunday. And pretty much told them how desperately missionary work will not go anywhere without their help. Gosh, I still got really nervous talking in French. But the last time I talked in Sacrament was my first transfer. So it was actually fun to be able to see my progress from there! And then we made all the members these amazing truffles that Soeur C has taught me how to make, and they were just all absolutely dying over them. And then we stuck a bunch of cute notes in all the hymn books telling them we loved them. Everyone was just smiling from ear to ear yesterday. It was one of the best Sundays! And we ended it with a miracle of a member coming up to us and asking if we would like to teach our ami and their house and eat dinner with them. Miracle! All in all...man I have grown a huge love for the members here.

 

Anyway, that was a rant. Back to International night. There have been a lot of moments on my mission where I take a moment, look around myself, and literally am just so happy with my life. There is no where else I would rather be. And I had another one at our activity this week. We had a lot of inactives and amis come, and it just turned out to be an incredible night. They had us missionaries present something on America. We gave them all a quiz about America. They pretty much got everything right except no one knew what the Super Bowl was. Haha. But then the BEST part of the night was our Relief Society President is Tahitian and apparently has a bunch of family here...and they ALL showed up and played awesome music for us and danced. It was so cool. And then they did a haka and it was literally the coolest thing ever. Sadly my camera died but I will forward you my companion's pictures:

 

This week we took a fake trip to Tahaiti...

We danced... :)

 

 

Anyway. It was definitely the highlight of my week.

 

Now, for the low part of my week. I don't like focusing on the bad things. So I am going to make this short. But Na-- is going through a huge trial right now, and she has completely isolated herself from the world. I tried to talk to her and she told me it is nothing against us, but that she does not ever want to talk to us again. And she has completely lost her faith. She told me that she no longer believes in God. And I tried to tell her how much Christ is there for her and she kept telling me it was not true.

 

Literally the absolute hardest moment I have had as of yet experienced on my mission.
But also, one of the moments I have grown the most.
I am so grateful for this experience with Na--. I have grown so much. I have gotten so much stronger. I have never prayed so sincerely as I did at that moment.
And my prayers were answered. I felt like I was literally carried through this week. There is no other way I could describe it.

 

I stumbled on a talk that completely answered my prayers and said these words:
"Life is hard, but life is simple. Get on the path and never, ever give up. You never give up. You just keep on going. You don’t quit, and you will make it."

 

I know that is true.
There are so many times that we literally just want to give up in life. We feel like we honestly cannot go any farther. But we cannot ever give up. Ever. We have to stick it through to the end.

 

Our Heavenly Father WANTS us to be happy. He wants it. And sometimes it is so hard to get there. But as long as we don't give up, we will be blessed beyond our imagination. I know that now. And I am so grateful that Heavenly Father has blessed me wih the amazing opportunity to learn this lesson.

 

I love you all so much. Thank you for all you do.
Don't give up. Just keep going.

I will see you soon;
Bisous!

Je vous aime!

Love,
Soeur Magleby