August 26, 2013

SHANNON IS GETTING BAPTIZED SATURDAY (AUGUST 31)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! if you got annoyed from all the exclamation points...deal with it, cause that's how excited i am! :D i still think to myself sometimes, "is this real life?" it's amazing. she's been investigating the church on and off for 8 YEARS and she finally committed to being baptized! i'm so grateful i've been able to witness such a huge miracle. we had a lesson with her on tuesday, and we both felt impressed to just keep bringing the conversation back to baptism, keep hammering at it, keep pushing. We read mosiah 18:8-11 with her and helped her understand that she doesn't need to know everything beforehand (she just needs to believe - that's what the interview questions say! "do you believe...?" plus, 8 year old children do NOT know everything when they're baptized), she's not a hypocrite if she messes up afterwards, and she'll receive additional strength and power to overcome. it had come to a point with her that she couldn't really continue to progress without being baptized. haha so sister morrow extended the official invitation to her, "Shannon, will you follow the example of Jesus Christ by being baptized by someone holding the proper authority of God?" silence. shannon puts her head on her arms on the table and we hear, (resigned voice) "...when?" ha i bet our faces were hilarious at that point - disbelief, utter happiness. can you believe it?! and i testify that it was nothing that we really did - it really was the Spirit. we were just here at the right time, being ourselves, and the Lord worked through us to bless Shannon. she's taking this leap of faith, and i know she'll be so blessed.

so...that's the HUGE news. haha she and i are so alike - she said when she overcomes one hurdle, she wants to do 50 more, all at once! and she beats herself up for not doing all she knows she should...uh, we're twins. here's one reason i've been going through that and feeling all that - so i can help shannon!! i bore my testimony of the strengthening power of the Atonement, and that this gospel is a process.

another great smorrow moment: she had the BRILLIANT idea to buy flowers and give them to random people, along with our card, for finding! we did that 2 days in a row (ha we got a lot of daisies), in the walmart parking lot (and kinda got kicked out at the end...oh well) and at a park. it worked really well! we talked to a lot of awesome people and i liked thinking outside the box with finding. 

3 talks that really helped me and uplifted me this week: Elder Holland's "Lord, I Believe," Elder Andersen's "Repent...That I May Heal You," and Elder Scott's "The Path to Peace and Joy." i'd love to hear what you all think and get from those talks :) also, i'd love to be sent everyone's testimonies, so i can put them into copies of the Book of Mormon that we give out! feel free to just email them to me if that's easiest :)

this gospel is amazing. Jesus Christ WANTS to forgive us, and He makes all the difference. He is the only way to true happiness and peace. I love Him dearly.

And I love all of you!!

Hurrah for Israel!

Sister Hehl