ELDER VAWDREY RETURNS HOME FROM HIS MISSION IN:

Friday, May 18, 2012

The blessings are flowing!

Familia y Amigos!!

How are you all? I hope you had a great mother's Day!! It was a blast to talk to and see my family on Skype yesterday and to find out that everything is great and that the family is continually striving to increase their testimonies. I just want to say thanks again to my mom. I'm so grateful for you and your great example. Everything that I have and am is because of you. And I hope you had a great rest of the day! Love ya.

Virtual family hug

As for a quick report on this past week, Elder Pese and I feel like we learned a ton. We changed the areas a little bit between the 3 companionships here in Omaha, so we are in the process of finding out which members are in whose area. So as for this week, we pretty much had to just do missionary work by our own efforts. And I realized that missionary work is very difficult if we just try and do finding ourselves. I'm so grateful to be serving in a ward right now and to be serving in another area where the members are so willing to help us out.

But this week, Elder Pese and I knocked a lot of doors and just felt like we were teaching basically the same thing at each house. We thought it would be good to always talk about the Restoration but after each lesson we just felt like the lesson didn't go well. We decided to change things up a little bit.. and so we tried to ask more inspired questions to the people we contacted and wow it made such a difference. I feel like I am starting to understand better the voice of the Spirit and that it truly is the Spirit that guides this work and helps it move forward. Without the Spirit, your teaching will go no where. so anyway, long story short, Elder Pese and I felt like we had some really solid visits this last week and we felt uplifted after several of them. I think that is how I can realize if the Spirit directed the lesson or not.

But things are going good here. Another really exciting thing that I just heard about today was back from when I was serving in my first area...Sioux City, Iowa. When I was serving with Elder Thayne and Elder Jones, there was a night when we just had no one to go see and we had been knocking a lot of doors. We didn't know what to do and so we decided to say a prayer in the car to find out if there was someone the Lord wanted us to see? Well, after the prayer we shared whatever came to our mind. Elder Thayne and Jones didn't have anyone in mind...having been just new to the area. But there was one name that came to my mind, that I had never taught a lesson to before but we contacted her once at the door. But I said her name, M, and we went and saw her and we were only able to set up an appointment. But, I just heard from Elder Jones today saying that M just got baptized and her son as well!! I am SO pumped!!! YEAH!!! I feel so grateful for the many blessings that the Lord constantly gives us and helps us to know that what we are doing is the right thing to do. Missionary Work is so great. It has it's long days, but moments like this are priceless and make all the long days worth it. I'm so grateful for a loving Heavenly Father who knows our needs, our thoughts, our worries, and our interests and is always right there to help us out. We just need to show faith and he will be there. Really quick I heard an analogy the other day that I really like.

This life is like us on a row boat. You need a paddle on each side of the boat in order to go straight and fast. Our sunday school teacher related it to the importance of our personal agency and trust in God. If all we ever do is just trust in ourselves and say we can do it on our own...our boat is just going to go around in a circle. Likewise if all we ever do is rely on God to show us everything that we should do, we also just go in a circle. So moral of the story, we need to trust in the Lord as we exercise our agency. whoot. love it!!

Anyway, have a great week everyone. I love you all so much. Thanks so much for your love, support, testimonies, and examples. You're actions speak louder than your words. Thanks :)

Love,
Elder Vawdrey

P.S. here are some pictures from the last few weeks. Enjoy :) haha    Elder Pese in the dryer, my bad sunburn, us on Mormon Street, burgers at King Kong, and some of the cutest kids ever !!

Elder Lobster

Let see...permanent press?

King Kong burger...appropriately named!

Mormon Street!

Some of the cutest kids ever!

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