Apparently Cockroaches Fly...

Well, this week has been great. I’m not really positive why, but it’s been so good.

At District Meeting this week we made some goals and talked about where we want to be as a district by the end of this transfer. It was really good and we talked about a lot of concerns that we had. We really were struggling with being united, and it was mostly with being united between the Elders and the Sisters. So we talked about that, and about what we could do to be more united. A lot of it came down to obedience, actually, so now we’re all working on being more obedient/more exactly obedient. It’s been really good.

We have also started to do some zone activities. For example, we just got back from playing kickball (with a soccer ball) on some sand dunes just outside of Santa Maria. It was super fun! Hard, but so fun. And, oh… the feel of sand on bare feet… it was heavenly, until the sun came out and the sand got burning hot in about .2 seconds, haha.

It was so fun to just play in the sand, and we tried to see who could jump the furthest down the sand dune. It was so fun, and I feel like we became a lot closer as a zone in this past week and especially in this one activity than all the time we spent last transfer. I think this increase in unity and trust will help us help Sal, too.

Our district leader challenged us to pick a Christlike attribute to strive to develop and we would report on it, or something like that, next district meeting. So, this week I have been working on strengthening my hope. It’s been really good to study it, and I have really learned that hope comes from faith and trusting in the Lord and in His plan. It is about looking forward with faith and gratitude, and being optimistic in spite of challenges. I think the Lord was really encouraging people to have hope when He tells them to “be of good cheer”/“lift up your heads”. It is always paired with faith and charity, but I feel like hope kind of gets glossed over. But when we have hope, we are looking at things with an eternal perspective. We are focusing on the Savior, and remembering that God has a plan for us, and that all our challenges are part of His plan for us. He loves us, and our challenges are what we need to grow and to become our best selves. I have been praying for help having hope, especially because things are still really hard for my companion and it would be really easy for us both to go teaching without the Spirit, just feeling/acting exhausted and stressed. But with hope, you have to have patience. You trust in the Lord, and you don’t worry about how everything is going to work out… you just go forward, trusting that it WILL work out.

Oh yeah, and wow, it’s been crazy. We have really been working on using the BOM more and bringing peoples’ concerns back to the BOM (if the BOM is true, the Church is true, etc.), and there have been so many opportunities to teach people that this week. Or to re-emphasize the importance of going to the BOM to answer any questions, or to teach how the BOM is such a key to gaining a testimony of this church and to coming closer to Christ. I have just loved it. And we’ve started doing teaching more 50/50, where I teach or start discussions half the time, as if I weren’t in training. It’s been hard, but really fun. Especially because we kept having opportunities to teach the BOM. It has been so great. Wow, I just love the BOM, and it is just so important!

Well, that’s really what has been happening this week. Oh yeah, and we have started teaching an Adventist named Ravy.  He is great. He has a lot of questions and ideas about God, and it is really challenging to teach him because he asks so many questions and has these strong notions about who/what is God, but it is so interesting, too. We have just kept pointing him to the BOM, and have told him that that is his prova… his evidence. Everything depends on whether the BOM is really the word of God. But it has been interesting too, because I’ve been studying the Bible really well, and finding stories and seeing how the two support each other and help us understand God and the Doctrine of Christ more clearly together. I love it.

Oh, and Bia and Francisco are doing well. Our main challenge is to make sure they really understand how vital it is that they read the BOM every day… even if they only have time to read a few verses. Man, I just love them. They are so amazing, and Bia really wants to get a testimony… she hasn’t really put much time into reading the BOM, though, because when she isn’t at work, she is home, but her house is crazy busy with lots of little kids, so she is exhausted by the end of the day. I hope we can really teach her how important this is.

Well, we didn’t end up training as many members as I had hoped this week. And we only trained a few to help our investigators/less actives. Hopefully this week we will have more success with that. It’s been tricky though, because Sister Garcia is sick again… and super weak this time. I don’t think she has a parasite this time, but I guess we’ll probably get it checked out if she doesn’t get better soon. Haha, the house is very organized because of the time we’ve had to spend inside as she tries to recover. Apparently that’s what I do when I have excessive time on my hands and need a break from studying. Well, that’s about it. But please, keep Sister Garcia in your prayers, especially. She is really being faced with a lot of challenges right now.

Love you guys! I am doing great. Wow, it is amazing how much it helps to be focusing on having hope. I think it was President Packer that said hope is an anchor to the soul. That is so true. Hope is a small, strong trait that can keep us anchored to the rock of our salvation, Jesus Christ. Satan can’t toss us way off course and into reefs if we are anchored to Christ through hope. Man, it has been such a blessing to study it and to refine/strengthen/refocus my hope.

I just love being a missionary. I love being out here serving these people. I love learning so much about myself and about the Savior and about His plan for me. I love learning to trust in Him and to keep a smile on my face and in my heart because of His plan for me.

I love you all! Things can be so hard, but they are always opportunities to come closer to the Savior. That’s what I’ve really been learning/gaining a stronger testimony of. ALL these things work together for our good. It is just amazing.

Oh, one last story. I saw my first Caboverdian cockroach in our house this week. I’ve seen them before, but just on the outside wall of Dirce’s house when she was moving from it, and once in the street at night. And I learned that cockroaches fly, but they aren’t as hard to kill as I thought they were. They just fly, so you can’t dump them off the balcony unless they’re already dead. Also, just a word of advice… make sure you are holding onto the actual part of the dust pan when you through them off, and not just the plastic piece at the end, because if you try to chuck dead cockroaches off the dust pan a little too enthusiastically, the dust pan will go with the cockroach, haha. But it was broken anyway. :)

Love you all! Have a FANTASTIC week!

I can feel your prayers with me every day. 

Love,

 Sister Zimbelman