This week started off great with us running a blood drive here in Hood river and then zone conference the next day! So the first of the week was crazy but awesome! Zone conferences are exactly what you need as a missionary sometimes, it is so inspiring and so awesome to get together and see the other missionaries and feel so hyped to do the work ! We had a really great class on Jesus Christ being the center of this work and the center of our lives and I can truly say life is so much better when you include him every step of the way! He loves us so much and helps us no matter what we are going through. I think we truly begin to recognize that when we lean on him and trust in him and his atonement!
We had lots of the same old same old this week haha lots and lots of hours of door knocking and lots of canceled lessons. But we did have some pretty awesome miracles ! There is one guy Isidro that we have been teaching English to and we usually start with a scripture and a prayer and for some reason I felt like we should use a doctrine and covenants one which we usually don't start new people off with because they've never heard of it. But we ended up using that scripture and he had tons of questions about where the book came from which led to Joseph Smith and the restoration and we ended up teaching an awesome lesson and never even got to English! He had so many questions that we got to help answer and really wanted to know the truth so hopefully we will be able to help him continue on this path of finding the truth! He is awesome!
One thing I've been thinking about lately is just having Christlike love. We had an awesome visit with one of the Spanish ladies in our ward this week and I literally could understand so that was a miracle!
But, she was talking a lot about how it is hard sometimes to feel a part of the ward family because she's one the few Spanish speakers in our ward and not many people try to reach out to be friends with her because her English is very limited and it makes her so sad. Then at church on Sunday a lot of people talked in their testimonies about how lonely it feels sometimes as a member of the church and especially the ones that have a language barrier or look different or come from different situations than we are and how sometimes they don't feel accepted or loved because of that. But they all talked about how a smile, or a wave, or a small act of kindness means the world to them because the language of Christlike love is universal. It truly made me think about how important that is! Loving God and loving our neighbor are the 2 great commandments and are often so overlooked! But it truly can make a big impact on people's lives and change the way they feel when they can tell we love them as Christ does. It is so easy to fall into the worldly ways of judgement, cliques and gossip but I invite you all to look outside yourself this week, become as Christ is! I love this reminder from my favorite primary song
“Love one another as Jesus loves you. Try to show kindness in all that you do. Be gentle and loving in deed and in thought, For these are the things Jesus taught."
I can truly promise that as we love our neighbors and show kindness in all that we do that we will truly make an impact on those around us and help their lights shine brighter! So, try it this week! Find ways to serve in small ways, try to be less judgmental, smile at strangers, text the person you've been thinking about, talk to someone new at church! I promise as you do that you will find true joy and become closer to our loving Savior, Jesus Christ!
I love you all so much and am so grateful for your Christlike love in my life!
<3, Hermana Hadlock
