This week was a week full of tender mercies. There was also a lot that didn't quite work out for us, but we're moving forward and getting better!
Update on Veronica: So... I chickened out. Basically, we took her to dinner and tried to bring up church and the gospel, but the timing never felt quite right. This week for sure I am going to ask her if she wants to learn more. I felt the prompting definitely last week after watching a little bit of conference, and after finishing conference yesterday, that prompting came again even stronger. I know it's what I need to do but I'm pretty scared... but it will be ok!
We had a few crazy meetings this week. We had a meeting with this one family that is kinda messed up. We visit the grandmother, and she is super sweet. She is only in her 60s or something, but her health is really bad, so she stays at home most of the time and she doesn't even really stand up. She has 8 children, and they are all over the place. When we went over, one of her grown up daughters was passed out on the bed we were sitting on with a hangover, and her grandkids were running around everywhere. The daughter who was passed out on the couch has four little children, and they all smoke, despite the fact that they are no older than 6. It feels sad. We talked with her about Easter, and as we talked, I could feel the atmosphere in the room begin to change. Her circumstances didn't change. The daughter was still asleep, her grandkids still had sunken cheeks, but she felt happier. She felt the spirit, and she felt God's love for her and her family, despite the poor choices her kids made.
I did mention that we had a lot of tender mercies this week. There are these cookies that missionaries here really like called kontiks. They are found in lots of places in Russia, but for some reason, we haven't been able to find them in Vladivostok... until this week. We were in a tiny town about an hour outside of Vlad. It is hard to get meetings there, and a lot of missionaries don't like going there because it seems like even when we do have plans they always fall through. However, despite the disappointment, we went and we tried our best, and God blessed us when we walked in the store and found kontiks. The crazy thing was, they were only in one check out line in the store, and the lady had to manually type in the price because the scanner wasn't working on them. I think that they were heaven sent.
Life is sometimes hard. Actually, I think a lot of the time it's hard. Things happen. But that doesn't mean that God doesn't love us. He gives us trials so we can grow. He gives us agency so we can learn right from wrong. And He gives us tender mercies so that when we are about to give up, we have the strength to keep going. I know that this gospel is true. I am so grateful for the opportunity I had to watch conference this week, and for the words that we can hear from modern day prophets. I know that President Nelson is a prophet of God. I am just so grateful for all of God's little tender mercies in my life. He really does love us!
I hope you all have a wonderful week!
Sister Jones
