Family and Friends,
Well, things here in S phoenix are picking up. being a real missionary is awesome! you get to meet real people, help them with their problems, and spread the gospel as much as possible. The highlight from last week was we taught this family. The mom is Bernadina, her live in boyfriend that should be her husband Danny, and their son Joseph. They had been meeting with the elders, but they are in our area so we are teaching them now. We walked in and started to get to know them and asking what they knew about the church and stuff. Then bernadina introduced us to her cousin, Antonio who is like 14 or 15. He asked us if he could ask us a question and tell us a story so we said "of course!" and so he tell us this story about how the other day his brother and sister saw a demon in their house and the demon was an "all black figure with red eyes" and then his brother got possessed and started crawling around and making evil noises. Needless to say, the family was creeped out and he wondered if we could do anything about it. We explained about the priesthood and how our elders could come over and bless the house and give his brother a blessing. So on that strange note, we went into our lesson. We talked a lot about the book of mormon and how we could pray about it. The spirit was soo strong and they were asking good questions and we got them thinking about the importance of the BOM and how important prayer is as well. At the end, we asked Joseph to pray and he prayed and his prayer was awesome. he asked if the book of mormon was true and thanked Heavenly Father for "the beautiful women who brought this message" haha it was great. The family told us that they learned so much and we answered their questions and they weren't confused on a lot anymore. We helped them recognize the spirit and related it back to antonio's demon story and said that we need to be living the gospel to have the spirit with us. it really was amazing. we have another appointment with them tonight and we are so stoked. after the lesson we called the elders to tell them to go bless the house. haha they were like "wow creepy, thanks sisters." haha but they went over there and they said there was definitely something in the house and as they were blessing the house, all these pots and pans were shaking! haha crazy. after the blessing they said it immediately felt better and the family recognized it. the elders said how important it is to live life with the gospel principles so things like that can't come into our lives. and then check this out--the elders committed them to baptism after a converstaion about the gospel and the 2 of the daughters said yes! the mom insisted she had already been baptized so the elders will continue to work with her. but the daughters and antonio came to church yesterday so we are all way stoked. out of really creepy, strange situations, miracles come to pass.
another highlight this week was the mission tour with Elder Duncan from the 70. mission tour pretty much means he comes and for 3 days he met all of the missionaries and it was pretty much a zone conference. but it was really incredible, he has lived a wonderful, sad, crazy life and we learned so much from him. we talked a lot about using our time effictively and teaching according to the spirit. we had the morning meeting, lunch, and then the afternoon meeting. the afternoon meeting started out very somber. he told us he received an email about the 3 missionaries who got hit by a car (drunk driving suspected) on their bikes in TX. 2 of them died, and one lived. he gave us all the details about it and then told us a personal story. when he and his first wife were married for almost a year, with a baby girl 5 months old, they got hit by a drunk driver and his wife died, leaving him in college, taking care of a baby. he said the Lord had prepared him for this in strange ways, and even though it was so hard for so many months, he learned so much and grew a lot. he re-married a few years later. but we started talking about those experiences and how agency plays such a big role in our lives, and we can try to preach the gospel to everyone, but they always have their agency to accept it or not. it was really an amazing meeting and a cool opportunity to meet a 70, who is partly in charge of the missionary department. he told me and elder kennedy (who was there at the meeting too!) that the re-assignments for missionaries go through them, and that it is a process of revelation. he said he also works a lot with choosing mission presidents which is also a great experience. needless to say, it was a spiritual day full of greatness. plus, i got to see elder kennedy and speak russian, which was soooooo good. it felt so nice to carry on a conversation.
this morning we went hiking on this mountain called South Mountain, and it was beautiful. it reminded me of home a little bit, it smelled like the desert and it was awesome. Me and hermana kigueta were in heaven. she loves hiking like i do. tonight, we are doing exchanges. i am going to an area called Goodyear. (named after the tires i think?) and i will be with a sister named Sister Zollinger. we are exhanging tonight, i will be there tomorrow, and i will be back tomorrow night. should be fun! also, this week on wednesday, we have a Sister's Meeting. knowing sister taylor (mission pres. wife) it should be full of good food and fun. we also get to go shopping through all these clothes that have been donated so we can "spruce up our wardrobes" haha i love it. that should be a blast as well. and next week, we are going with the Hermanas to the Mesa Temple! WAHOO!!! i am stoked. also, next P Day our district leader made an "executive decision" and for a district activity we are baking and watching church movies at the church haha, i'm so excited. good times in the Arizona Phoenix mission. I haven't seen any of my other elders besides elder kennedy, and its strange but i miss them!
we are still getting to know our area and trying to contact all of our investigators and referrals. we have more lessons scheduled this week, and it should be fun. the best part is definitely teaching and meeting people. there are plenty of wierdies in this area, but the work should pick up a lot soon. i love you all and i'm grateful to be a missionary. i'm grateful for all of your support and love that i receive. being a missionary isn't without trials or hard times or discouraging times (like when you bike around all day and no one will answer the door), but it is rewarding to have this opportunity to see people come to Christ and to change. i still think about Ukraine everyday, but i'm trying to focus on the work here and get all that i can out of it. I love you all!!!
Sister DeMille
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