miracles 123‏ Mon 6/28/10

Dear family,

Sister Dewyea wasn't feeling well for most this last week. It wasn't bad enough to not go out, just bad enough to make the work extra difficult. She didn't complain, but everything was just harder, for both of us. Despite that, we saw a LOT of miracles this week. I will tell you three.

#1 - The office called us on Friday and told us that our investigator Huang jm was trying to get ahold of us but doesn't have our new phone number. They told us she was calling to cancel her baptismal interview for Saturday. We made a conscious choice not to call her but to let her sleep on it and maybe visit her the following day. On Saturday we originally had two baptismal interviews planned. The aforesaid Huang jm tried to cancel on Friday, and the other, a child called Liu dx, called and canceled Saturday morning. On Saturday we were at the church, had just gotten fanged by our lessons and Sister Huang called us and reaffirmed that she was canceling her interview. Sister Dewyea and I both felt very dejected and went to the bathroom before getting ready to go do our backup plan. When we walked out just a couple minutes later, there was Huang jm in the parking lot with the second ward elders! Before I knew what in the world was happening, Huang jm was handing me a bag of squid and telling me to put them in the fridge for her and was in a baptismal interview with Elder Mauii.

A big thank you to Elder Christensen! They were riding their bikes and a lady about ran his companion off the road trying to talk to him, but Elder Rostead is new and didn't understand her. Once Elder Christensen understood she was trying to tell them she wasn't coming to her interview, he gave her our phone number and convinced her to come to the church immediately. While she called us to cancel, he called the Zone leaders and told them to call us and get us to the church really quick. He was intending to stall her until the District leader could get there. It was certainly NOT coincidence that all three companioships happened to be in the right place at the right time. We were so blessed!

2- Our new member's son wants to get baptised but canceled his interview the morning of because he is afraid he wants to drink tea. We went to see him and talked to him about it and agreed next week to do his interview. Then after church (I was in the other ward that day), Elder Mauii tells me to congratulate him because he passed his interview. What?! Apparently our ward correlator called and told his dad he had to come to church and do his interview, and so they did it right after church. We didn't even know they were going to interview him. Our ward correlator is so great.

So pretty much we have people passing baptismal interviews right and left and we literally have nothing to do with it. The past couple movecalls I am just more and more sure that the success I have here doesn't have to do with my own merits - God's grace literally steps in and gives us miracles every day.

Okay, one more little miracle story:
The ward asked us to go find a "Less active recent convert." I had visited Sister Lai a couple times before and despite having been baptised less than a year ago, was less than welcoming and refused to come to church. She moved and didn't leave a forwarding address or phone number. I asked her neighbors where she went and this is what I knew - On the juguang lu going towards Taizhong, (I didn't know where it was or even the characters for it the street), after the overpass, somewhere on the right hand side. She was moving in with her husbands family, but we didn't even know his name.

So that was all I knew. With a prayer in my heart, I looked at the map, found a street that had the second character for Guang in it and rode until we found an overpass. As we were going down the other side of the bridge, something got in Sister Dewyea's eye. I was wondering where in the world we should start looking for this new member - there were a LOT of neighborhoods and we didn't know how far after the bridge her house would be - just somewhere on the right. I walked back up the hill to where Sister Dewyea was trying to get something out of her eye. As she took a minute to let it fall out, I pulled out the phone and started to call referrals. I noticed a street below and wondered if was the street we were looking for. We decided to start asking people there. The third person we asked directed us to a house, and... we found her address. It was crazy. We found her in less than a half an hour, even with travel time and we had NO IDEA what we were looking for, or even her husbands name. It's a good thing Sister Dewyea got something in her eye or I never would have thought of going to the street that was next to the bridge, not past it. What a blessing!

Other than that, things have been good! My companion got "dear Johned" last week and that was a bit dramatic. It downpoured yesterday and there was about ten inches of water in the streets downtown. Sister Dewyea started to ride through the deepest part (maybe 14 inches or so deep) and I had a panic attack and made us go around to where it was at least a little more shallow. We aren't supposed to be in water so it freaked me out. Sister Dewyea teased me and said I was afraid of crocodiles. I'm pretty sure there are NOT crocodiles in Taiwan.

Other than that things have been pretty normal.

I love you all so much! Have a great week! Happy Fourth of July, I'll be thinking of you all having fun at the cabin :) Be safe!

FML
Sister Johnson