Service ...with a Smile!

prep day grocery shopping

service project with children from Chernobyl

In Which Sister Gish Has a Run In With Classic British Teeth, Service, and A Lot of Photos.

This week we made plans to visit a lovely young lady we met at church on Sunday.  We got her name, her phone number, and her address and scheduled a time.  We called twice the next week to confirm.  Let's call her Sarah.

We arrived at the visit to a very blank stare from a very different lady.  She told us to hold on, her mum is a member of our church.  We thought maybe the young lady we wanted to visit just lived with her mum and some sisters.  

Finally we were invited into the back room to meet someone- whom we'll call Allie - no, we'll call her Sister White.  Sister White was NOT the person we scheduled this meeting with.  Sister White looks exactly like I picture Miss Haversham from Great Expectations to look... 500 years old, 90% deaf (even worse than you Papa Jim) and impossible to understand because she has approximately 6 teeth... 5 on the bottom and 1 very large protruding worn out thing on the top.

  
You'd think if you only had one tooth you'd take pretty dang good care of it right? 

Wrong.

 

And the ENTIRE time we spoke I couldn't help but stare at Sister White's tooth and wonder,

"WHO. is. this. woman."

 

She knew us, she knew the missionaries, and after asking one question (yelling one question) - "is Sarah your daughter" I knew everything about her expect who the flip she was.

 

We also did a lot of service this week.  Which will be explained entirely in pictures.  

 

 

 

(Not entirely.  Sister N started a water fight but you can't really tell so I have to tell you that part because the picture looks dumb otherwise.)  

  

 

And then I stepped in rank dog foul.

 

On the spiritual side:

A couple of amazing things happened this week that I want to share. 

Sister Nemec and I planned to go to St. Asaph to contact some less actives, but we both started talking to people on the bus and ending up riding all the way to Denbigh (our furthest away area and a good half hour ride).
 

You know you're in Denbigh when....

Hashtagsomuchsheep

 

 Once there, we decided to stay for times sake and stop in on an amazing potential investigator. We met with her briefly and she was so excited about reading the Book of Mormon. She wants to meet but her husband doesn't much approve so we're trying to set up a meeting at the chapel rather than her home. 

 After talking to her we realized there was a less active that lived very close by and so we trekked towards that house. The lady was quite friendly and told us she was glad we were serving missions, that she really admired us and felt a lot of people in that neighborhood needed God. She was quite adamant about not returning back to church but welcomed us to come visit any time. 

 As we started to walk away though, she rushed out after us and said, "I had to tell you: I've been feeling quite poorly today and I know God sent you to visit me." We hugged and said a prayer. It was a beautiful moment.

 
I learned (and I suspect I will re-learn this essentially every day of this mission) a little bit about how the Lord works. If I or Sister Nemec hadn't started to talk to people on the bus, we may have never ended up in Denbigh and missed the opportunity to serve the Lord. The Lord blesses us when we do His work and talk to people; inviting them to come to Christ. That moment was all I really want ever: to just fade a way and be a tool in His hands

 

p.s...it does take effort, i.e. blisters from walking... not mine, Sister N's.