Hello! I have yet to hear anyone say "Howdy!" so that
is a stereotype if I ever heard one. Man.. well this week has been super
interesting. I will put it in segments because there is too much to say!
Everyone has those down days...
Well... we all have those down days and this week we had a few
"lets wallow in self-pity" kind of days....being a missionary is so
hard but you have to stay positive! Remember Kimber? We found her thanks to a
miracle! Well... we were both so excited to teach her and we prayed for her
every day and had the restoration all planned out to teach her. I was so
excited because it was going to be my first real lesson. Annnnd.... surprise.
She isn't there. We just smiled and shrugged our shoulders and then walked over
to our referal Eva's house, she lives just a few doors down from Kimber. We
have stopped at Evas house probably 8 times and she has never been there. BUT
this time someone answered and we were so excited when we saw the light turn
on. A man comes to the door, we ask for Eva and he says, "uhhh.. she
doesn't live here." It wasn't too fun to be lied to. So we get in the car
and decided to just sit and wallow in self-pity for a minute. Sister Folsom and
I just kept saying, "GAH! Where does the lord want us to go!? Where are
the tens of thousands!"... we called our district leader to vent and he
and his companion just had the exact same thing happen to them...so we talked
and decided that we needed to just get out there and get back to work! The
support we give each others as missionaries is pretty amazing! It is so cool
that we all have the same purpose!
Everything Happens for a Reason
The other day we stopped to get gas and the gas pump wouldn't
work. We tried pulling it out, putting it back in, swiping the card again,
switched gas pumps, and repeated the frustrating cycle... still no avail. So we
look at each other and I say, "Well... maybe we are supposed to go talk to
the guy inside!" Sister Folsom said, "I was thinking the exact same
thing!" So we went inside and talked to him, he told us how to get the gas
to work and then we gave him a Mormon.org card, who knows if he was interested
but while we were in there we were a voice behind us say, "Stay away from
the beer Sisters!" and it was a member from the Woodlands ward. So we
talked to him for a bit and he told us about his mission in Japan, then we
talked to two firefighters who were waiting in line to buy Gatorade. Who
knows why we were supposed to go back into the gas station but we ended up
talking to 4 different people about the gospel just because our gas pump wasn't
pushed far enough into the car! Maybe we planted a seed somewhere along the
way!
Love for Strangers
Man, everyday we meet someone with a heartbreaking story. So many
people are going through divorces, are on disability, got kicked out of their
house, lost their job, are fighting for custody, have a loved one in the
hospital, or are recovering from an addiction... and with Christ's name on our chest
it is our duty to use our time to help these people come and find the gospel,
or if they are not quite prepared to hear it, which is often the case, it is
our duty to just love them as the savior would. It is our duty as
missionaries. We are on the Lords time, not our own.
We went with a member in our ward and visited a less active
member who is struggling. She just about broke my heart she has 7 kids
with different fathers and right now she is fighting for custody for
her 7 year old son. She is currently in the middle of a divorce, and she is
being sued by her ex-husband. She is just lost. She told us that
she knows that god will help her and he knows what is best, but she
is just about ready to give up. We shared with her D&C 121 and told
her that her afflictions will be but a small moment. I felt so much love for
this woman and for her children. When we knocked on her door she was in the
middle of reading her scriptures and she has so much faith but she just needs
to hold on a little bit longer!
Elder Golden is Golden
Every so often a general authority visits each mission and we
had Elder Golden from the Seventy come and it was so good! He is such an
amazing man and the spirit was so strong. There was a fireside on Thursday
night for Recent Converts and investigators, and Elder Golden spoke! It was
amazing. We brought a member from our ward who has been struggling and before
anyone had even started speaking she was crying. Once the musical number
started Rachel just started sobbing. She felt the spirit so strong and it was
amazing, she just kept apologizing and we said, "it's okay! don't
apologize!" I told her that I am a crier too and that made her feel
better!
Friday we met with Elder Golden and he kinda gave us a pep talk,
man it was so deep! But he really inspired Sister F and I to be better! So
friday night we went tracting at the trailer park and it was awesome!
Trailer Park Tycoon
We had a few doors slapped in our faces, lots of tattooed
shirtless men, one jealous girlfriend who didn't want two pretty
christian girls hitting on her man, one very drunk atheist who wanted us
to walk his dog with him (yikes, we said no), a million mosquitoes and lots of
yappppy yappy dogs. But we met with a few awesome people who invited us back! We
are excited about it! Trailer parks are DA BOMB. All the rich people are so
content and so its so nice to tract trailer parks because they are so humble
and most of them are going through pretty tough stuff right now. We talked with
these women with like 2 teeth left in their mouth, we asked them to pray
and they grabbed our hands and we all stood in a circle. I like got way nervous
and didn't know what to say in my prayer because they were like
all humming and had cigarettes in their mouth. Sister Folsom said that
happens all the time and its only a matter of time before someone in the middle
of your prayer people will shout "Hallelujah!" or "AMEN! Praise
the lord!" If you start the prayer you are the "leader" and so
if you ask someone to pray and then say, "sure you can lead!" then
you pray and they pray after you and its like a chain effect of prayer. I think
its so funny! But we pray on people's porches all the time and its like totally
normal its bizarre!
Toilet Troubles
Well... we woke up the other morning to see that our water pump
broke... COOL. Sister G called and told us that they were going to drive over
to the Nursery to shower and that we could come with them, I groaned and
said, "ummm I think we are okay, we showered yesterday. Thanks though!" Apparently Sister
F and I were still half asleep and we didn't really understand the gravity
of the situation. NO WATER=SHOWER, TEXAS HEAT= DAILY SHOWER OR ELSE
DEATHLY STENCH. NO WATER= NO TOILET... good thing we had really
spicy food the night before and we drink like a million bottles of water a day
so we dont melt when we step outside. The combo of spicy food and no toilet is
really really awesome. When we realized the gravity of the situation we jumped
out of bed and freaked out.... we texted every single missionary in our zone
and asked them if they knew how to flush a toilet with no working water pipes.
We would have just pulled on the chain and let the cord go but the Geisekes
have like way powerful toilets like the kind that make you jump when you flush
them... and they were like way high tech so that plug thing wasn't even
there!... we were screwed. I almost just went in the pasture. We were laughing
SO hard at the situation. All the elders just texted us back laughing their
butts off giving us any knowledge they had of the plumbing world... it was so
so funny. We ended up going to the Hermana's apartment and using their bathroom
and shower. Oh it was so bad. So now if we want to go to the bathroom we have
to either go outside, or drive 5 miles to the nearest gas station. It is pretty
bad. Sister G rented a room at La Quinta hotel so they could shower and it was
so bizarre being in a hotel room! I felt like we were on vacation.
Brother Geiseke was so mad. I went in to wish him happy Fathers Day and he just looked at me from behind his tiny reading glasses and gave me a
look JUST like dad would in that situation. It was pretty bad. I guess they
aren't sure if the well pump is broken....? If it is then they will need to
replace it and they will have to like rip the roof off of the shack where the
well is and get a huge crane to come and lift the pump 200 feet in the air so
they can get the huge pipe our of the ground... BUT it could also be that the
well is empty... YIKES. In that case, they will have to dig a whole new
well and that is going to take a lot of money and like 2-3 weeks. We will find
out what is wrong later today... but gosh. it has been a rough few days with no
water. PRAY FOR RAIN. The poor Geiseke's garden is so beautiful and it will be so
so sad if it dies!
Anyway.. this week has been so random but there have been lots
of good things! I wish I could tell you all of our stories but there are way
way too many!
LOVE LOVE LOVE YOU!
-Sister King
Morning routine with Koda and Chloe
Our bug infestation, we had to put tape up around the windows!
If I had to live in a trailer this would be it, gotta love the cats and christmas lights!
Geiseke's house
The view from our porch
