Sister Benson: 6/20/22

 Week 31: la semana de los milagros

This email might be kinda long 'cause this week was INSANE. Such a good week! I just have a million things i want to share with yall. 

First off..... yesterday was Fathers Day :)) So lets start with a little shout out to my wonderful dad. Throughout my mission when I have had gospel questions, I turn to my dad. Because for some reason he is not only a huge bank of temporal and practical knowledge, but he also has the scriptures memorized I'm pretty sure. Plus he understands Isaiah and i just dont even know how. And what I love is that I didnt realize that on my mission. I knew that before. I went into my mission knowing that my dad knew the gospel because he had made studying it a priority. I knew my dad knew the gospel because he always had a worthy temple recommend, and he used it often. I knew my dad knew the gospel because he always taught it to us. And that is such a huge example to me. My dad is cooler than your dad, what can I say. Happy Fathers day dad ❤️

Now I have to introduce my comp cause my mom will yell at me if I dont. :) My new companion here in Gainesville is Sister Doxey!! She's been out three months all in this area, she's from Nampa, Idaho, she loves ice cream aaaalmost as much as I do and she is so great :)) We get along super well. We're working hard and having tons of fun doing it!! 

Alright so going with the title, this week truly was a week of miracles!!! We went to try and find someone in an apartment complex, and their apartment was abandon. So Sister Doxey and I decided to walk around the complex! So while we're walking we see these two men sitting on their front porch smoking and we're like aight lets go talk to them. But before we even got close enough to say hi one of the guys was like HEY. ARE YOU MISSIONARIES. And we were like YES. And he just yells back WELL GET UP HERE AND PREACH TO ME. Ask and ye shall receive sir. So we went up and we taught him about the Book of Mormon and offered him one. He took it excitedly and his friend wanted one too. The first guy told us his name was Michelel (pronounced MEETCH-le. Not mick-el-el) and he gave us his number. We asked if we could come back and teach him more about where that book came from and he said yes. We asked when and he said today. So... we had an appointment but we came back right after and taught Michelel the restoration!! He had good questions and he was pretty excited about prophets. It was all together a good lesson!! Such a miracle that we found him BUT IT GETS BETTER. We asked him when we could come back. Guess what he said? Yall can come back tonight! Actually no we cant but we'll come back X day. So we came back! And we started teaching him the Plan of Salvation. The issue we were running into with this lesson was that Michelel was.... altered a bit in the mind due to... things he was doing if you catch my drift. So we taught the PoS but his questions were a little bit all over the place. (He was trying to convince us that Jesus and Satan were the same person BECAUSE "Jesus has 12 names and 12 disciples and 12 divided by 4 is 3 and 2+1 is 3 and 3 times 2 is 6 and 666 is the devils number so Satan and Jesus are the same." and we were like uhhhhh no) So Michelel was doing pretty good overall, he would be really focused and asking good questions then hed go off on a weird tangent, then realize he did and go oh sorry continue. So overall it was good. Then his neighbors came out. And one of them was like hey. are yall JW? Mormons? And we said yes to the latter. He just nods and walks away. We kept teaching Michelel but that guy kept looking over. Finally he got up and came over and asked us the once saved always saved question that we get a lot. Usually it leads to bible bashing. So we were careful 'cause he seemed like he might start spitting anti. But it became clear that he was actually just very worried about his soul. He kept saying that he wasn't living the way he's supposed to, and that even though he was baptized once he doesn't know if he's still saved. He told us his name was Jeremiah, which was the book my bible was open to, so he thought that was a sign. So Sister Doxey and I STARTED to explain, but then Michelel was like wait this will totally help, come sit. And so Jeremiah comes and sits and Michelel starts TEACHING HIM THE PLAN OF SALVATION with the PoS blocks that I have laid out on the floor. Our minds were blown. So we finished teaching them both and they were just so into it. It was awesome. Michelel had to leave so we kept talking to Jeremiah. We explained the Book of Mormon to him and gave him one, and he gave us his number. He said he probably would never respond and not to call him. (but he has answered our texts multiple times ;)) But he said he was truly touched. And i could feel that. Michelel and Jeremiah are both miracles. Michelel asked us to come back the next day. But later in the night he got... extremely mind altered and texted us a bunch of crazy stuff. So when we came in the morning, he had a joint in his hand. And Sister Doxey is a BEAST and she was like Michelel we dont want to teach you while youre h*gh. And he got really defensive and Sister Doxey just with the most love ever said we're not going to teach you while you're smoking. We'll come back okay? And he just said yes maam. So we left. And he didn't answer our texts the rest of the day. But in the morning, we told him we were gonna come by. And he said okay. So we came, and he was smoking just a regular cigarette. And as soon as he saw us, he put it out and said okay so what are you teaching me today! He was not high. He knew we were coming and he had not smoked anything all day. If that is not progress, I cannot tell you what is. We taught him the doctrine of Christ. (faith, repentance, baptism, gift of the Holy Ghost, endure to the end) It was an AMAZING lesson. The best one we've had. He ended up asking when he could be baptized. We told him there were some things he'd have to change before and he said he was willing to change. It was amazing. The Lord performs miracles. 

Something else I wanted to share from this week. In my patriarchal blessing it talks a lot about learning how to cook on my mission. So that is something Ive been trying to develop. But this week Sister Doxey and I went hard on it! And it had been so fun. As a missionary you are busy like all day. I came out being like I will never have time to learn how to do anything. So now Im going to explain how we've made this work so no one thinks we're slackers and that aW yOuR mIsSiOn Is So EaSy. We have an hour for lunch, and an hour for dinner. We can do whatever we want in that time. We often dont get the full time 'cause we're busy. In the Gainesville zone we are in charge of answering facebook ads and creating referrals. Which means that for an hour everyday we have to be 100% available to answer texts. (but we often dont get that many so we try to be productive during it) And last but not least we have to be home at 9 and unwinding for the night. So in these times, Sister Doxey and I have begun to practice. Someone told me this week that if you want a talent, pray for it and study. Because God wants you to learn!! So he will help you. So thats what ive been doing. And this week we made a bunch of stuff! We made bread! It didnt rise very much cause our yeast wasnt good, but it was still very yummy! We made pasta salad. We made SCRATCH chilli mac and cheese. And this is my favorite one. We met our neighbor. He is so nice! He moved from Iraq 6 years ago and had to go back to school cause they wouldnt accept his dentistry license. We asked his name and he said well... you can call me Shawn. My real name is too hard for people. And i was like no! We're gonna learn your real name. And he got so excited. Its Shawki. Shawki is so nice. So we were experimenting! And we found a recipe for a middle eastern bread called lavosh. So we made Shawki lavosh!! And honestly it was really good. It was like an unleven naan. it was good. And last night, Shawki brought us our plate back with an Iraqi coconut cake he made us!! Yall food is the way to peoples hearts, we're just growing relationships!! Anyways Ive been super excited that God is helping me grow my talents. Even though we have no time as missionaries, we've been provided time if we use it well. So Sister Doxey and I are eating GOOOOD and we would love recipes (that are quick easy and cheap) if anyone would like to share!!! I know that what is important to you, is important to God. Make time for God first and he will help you find time for things that are important to you. This may seem like a little dumb thing, but its been really exciting and testimony building for me :)) '

I love yall so much!!! have a great week!!!