Let it Snow!

We had our first proper snow of the year during the last couple days! It was cold, but exciting. It's been a very warm winter here so far, so the snow was sort of fun. Hopefully it stays fun.

We had zone training this week! And it was great, as always. One of the big things that I learned from this one (and from this week) is that the Lord knows perfectly what we need to learn and how we will grow. He knows what we can handle, even when we think that it is too much, or more than we can bear. An interesting conversation that came up this week is what exactly is the will of God and what comes as a result of the choices of us or others that God allows? It's a difficult question to answer--it's very hard to tell someone that their pain was the will of God at that time. I can't pretend to know the answers to everything. But what I am grateful that I can testify about is that God knows best what we need, even when it means that we must suffer. He will not take away those experiences because He wants to give us every chance to become like Him. And we cannot ever do that if we don't have trials, if we don't have challenges. His Only Begotten Son suffered more than any of us can imagine. Why did God allow that suffering? Because He loves us and because He loves Jesus Christ.

I’ve thought a lot about following promptings lately too. As I am obedient to the promptings of the Spirit, not only am I blessed with peace of conscience, but I am blessed to see miracles, such as the miracle a few days ago. I had the idea that we needed to go out to a little dorpje (hamlet) pretty far away to visit a potential. In order to make it a little more worth our time we were going to also combine it with a trip to a dorpje that is close to it to visit an inactive that no one knows. So we headed out and couldn't find the potential. No one we talked to in the area was interested. We went to the inactive and he said that he's not a member and never has been (still don't know what's going on there). No one in that area was interested from the first few doors. I was feeling somewhat discouraged at that point and like we'd just wasted a bunch of time. So we prayed to know if we should just head back or keep finding there. Afterwards, we each picked a few doors and tried them--nothing. We started biking away, but then I felt like we should try just this one more house. We went back, and a man answered. He wasn't super positive, but he gladly accepted a Book of Mormon and said that we could come back in a few months once he'd read it. He was open enough for our message that I felt that it had been worth the time and effort to give that Book of Mormon. I don't know what will happen with him, or if anything will. But I do know that the Lord is the one in control of this work and He rewards our obedience.

Our investigator is still doing great. He was sick last week, that's why he wasn't at church. But he's stopping smoking for good and he's excited for his baptism in a few weeks!