Week 27 - La Cygne

Hi all. First of all, I hit my official 6-month mark this week!
Tuesday the 9th I had been a missionary for 6 months. So weird!

We had some really good and some really funny experiences this week. So we were in this little town called Prescott last week just walking around, meeting some people. Another lady we know from another town told us about her friend that lives in Prescott that we should go
visit. So we go knock on her door, and she says "Who are you! Are you Jehovah's Witness?" We tell her no and what church we are from. She says "Mormons? That's just as bad!" and starts closing the door. So we tell her that we know her friend, and then she changes her mind and lets us in. She was very...interesting. At one point she told us that she saw us coming up to her door and she contemplated getting a knife out of her kitchen and pretending to run after us with it. So we pretended like we thought that would be a funny joke and then taught
her about the Plan of Salvation. She actually seemed to enjoy it! But I don’t know if we’ll go back.

Last P-day we had our dinner cancel kind of last minute, so we ended up with a few unexpected extra hours in La Cygne after doing email. In most of the towns we go to that would be fine, but even though we live just outside of La Cygne, we hardly ever go there so we don't have
very many contacts there. And since it was dark, we couldn't just go tracting or something. We had one lady in mind to go visit, but when we drove past her house we noticed she had company. Immediately we were afraid to go talk to her, because she had actually not showed up for the appointment we had had a few days earlier and we didn't want to have an awkward "Why weren't you there" conversation in front of company. But of course, all these thoughts were fear of doing what we needed to do. One thing that I have found is that just because you are a missionary, it doesn't automatically make talking to people or doing things easy, it is still hard and awkward! Anyway, we decided to say a prayer to see if we really shouldn't talk to her or if it was just the adversary trying to make us scared. It was a really cool feeling. Sis. A said a prayer and immediately my fear went away. I was still not the most comfortable, but the scared feeling went away. The same thing happened to her. Nothing miraculous happened or anything, but we were able to talk to her and set a new appointment. I learned from that experience that Satan can't get in when you fight him with the Spirit.
That's why it is so important to invite him into our lives- otherwise it is really easy to confuse the feelings we get.

Also, we went back to the bustling metropolis of Amsterdam, MO (population 281) this week

and met some great people. Probably my favorite was this woman who just invited us in even though she wasn't interested because it was cold. She offered us some coffee or tea, and we asked for hot chocolate. She sat there and make us hot chocolate, gave us cookies, and told us about herself. She was super cute. She has a Jewish background, so we offered her the DVD about temples, which she accepted. And then when we left it was raining and she gave us a ride back to our car! Seriously, I wish everyone would be that nice to us. I have been amazed on my mission how many people are afraid of us or just downright rude to us just because we are from a church. And of course, there is a lot of misinformation about our church out there. I have often thought about what I would do if 2 random church girls knocked on my door, and honestly, before my mission I probably would have ignored them. But now there is no way! If I can I will invite them in and talk to them. There is no need to be rude to people. And of course, you can share the Gospel with them in the comfort of your own home! :)

One other awesome thing happened this week. So if you haven't been able to tell this transfer has been a little hard for me. It has been a struggle to go from being around so many sister, senior couples, and ward members to a little tiny branch with no other missionaries very nearby. I have felt a little bit isolated. But I have learned to rely on the Lord a lot more than I ever had. And we are having miracles! Last week we started teaching this kid who is only 17, but super spiritual. He came to church and everything. Then this week we taught both him and his brother together. It was awesome! We watched The Restoration and talked about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon and how the spirit testifies of truth. They really felt the spirit! Right then and there we just committed them for baptism. They both accepted- well they want to learn more first and pray about it- but I really feel they will recieve an answer and will be baptized. As my companion said, "turns out, when you ask people to get baptized they say yes!" Of course they won't always, but we have realized that duh, people know who you are and are really kind of expecting you to ask something like that. And if they feel the spirit, why not? There is no good in being shy- that is how you get eternal investigators who never progress.

Anyway, it was a good week! Transfers are this week and we find out tomorrow if we are staying or going. So we shall see!

I love you all.

-Sister Hafen