Bonjour

Hi everybody!

I hope you all had a great week and fabulous Father's Day! We are truly so blessed to have such an amazing Dad. He is such an amazing example of the Savior, hard work, service and so many more things. I hope that we can always respect and love dad for all he does for us and so many others.

We had Father's Day dinner at an American's home??  What?  Haha!  One of our members is married into an American family so they invited us over for dinner. It was a nice little piece of home :)

Well on to this week! We had a lesson with Mariana. She is the one that found my wallet.  It was a nice lesson; she is super nice and interested in the Book of Mormon.  We aren't very sure how far things will go with her because she wasn't super interested in coming to our church but we will see.

Diana! We were at an apartment complex trying to contact a referral. The referral didn't answer the door so we were looking at our paper to make sure we knocked the right door.  Then Diana came up and asked if we needed help finding someone.  She wasn't the referral we were looking for but she is awesome! We had a lesson with her on Wednesday and she is such a sincere person. Her husband left her and her three kids a few years ago and is now part of a drug cartel in Mexico.  The father is having a quite big influence on the children and sending them some not so good things.  She explained how she is really looking for something that can help the lives of her children.  We talked about the Book of Mormon and she was so excited to read it.  We asked her if she would be baptized when she comes to know these things are true and she said, "well of course".   We have another lesson with her on Wednesday.

Our lesson went really well with Nazario and Socorro this week!  She has been down with bronchitis this week so we only got to see them once.  We read Mosiah 2 with them.  Nazario and Oscar are reading the Book of Mormon every day together :)   We explained to Socorro how some times the Lord answers our prayers after we have acted on a righteous decision.  We attempted to set a date with her but she said she just really wants to focus on praying about taking the step of baptism for right now.  But, Nazario called us the next night and told us that they were talking about baptism together!  Nazario has told us in the past that whenever he brings up baptism she changes the subject. Socorro was asking Nazario questions about baptism.  One baby step closer :)

We are on the search for new investigators. A few weeks ago we had about 25 potentials.  After teaching all of them a time or two we have narrowed it down to the people that are actually going to progress.  It narrowed it down….quite a bit.  So now we are on the search again. My testimony really has been strengthened of the importance of talking to everyone.  About 2 months ago if my companion said lets go talk to that person I would be hesitant.  But now that I have really seen the importance I love talking everyone, no matter if they reject us or not.

We have stopped doing service at the old folks place because no one was every showing up.  I guess old people really don't love genealogy that much..haha. We have started to do service at food bank.  I think that's what you call it? People can come in 1x a month to get a food box and we help people get food and organize the food.  I think it will be a lot better way to interact with people!

One of the mornings for companion study Hermana Bunderson and I sang, “I know that my Redeemer lives”.  It made me think back to how my friends sang that song at my farewell.  I sat there thinking about how my testimony has grown of Jesus Christ.  I have been working on memorizing the Living Christ. He truly is the "the light, the life, and the hope of the world."  I know that He suffered for each of us individually.  Not just for our sins, but also for our trials and pains.  As we try every day to become more like the Savior, we really can become so much closer to Him.  As I was thinking this I thought that I never want to come home.  Haha.  I know that when the time comes it will be the right timing but it is truly a blessing that I get to be a representative of Jesus Christ every day.  It's such a blessing to get to testify of His life every day.  I know that My Redeemer lives.  I love you all!  Have a great week!

Love,

Hermana Gifford