Email 60 - "Hello from the hottest place on the planet! ´Good thing we have an ocean breeze :)‏" - Great Moments with Fellow Missionaries, and Lots of Awesome Photos

"My buddy Hna P :)"

Editor:  It looks like Elder Bybee captured Hermana Irigoyen and Hermana Grover in the act of teaching a lesson in a park.  It appears this nice gentleman just needs a nametag, and he could be a missionary himself! :)

"I´ve been cooking a lot. I love it. :) I made chicken wraps, asian salad, shrimp pasta... mmm."

"And we splurged and went to a Japanese restaurant!"

 "Here´s the good ole Canarian flag :)"

"Chillin´ at the Larsens´ :D"

"More from the Larsens :) We got to hear their love story, haha, and Elder Larsen started 'telling lies.' It was adorable." 

 "More from Zone Conference. First time the whole zone´s been together since May!"

Helloooooooo

So this week had a little bit of absolutely everything in it, and it started out with (as you probably guessed based on last week´s photos) The best Pday ever. We spent almost all Pday in that beautiful park, getting fried by the sun and playing a huge game of Ultimate. Woot!

And then, after Pday ended, the Hermanas had a devotional with the Larsens, and we got to spend the night at their house :) Saying it was marvelous doesn´t cut it, haha. 

Zone Conference the next day was incredible, too. Anyone preparing to serve a mission should plan on learning a LOT from those meetings, and should definitely attend every one with a list of questions, because they´ll find answers to all of them.

As for our investigators this week... that´s been a little frustrating. We´re not really seeing anyone progressing at all, and it kinda got to a point where I felt like I just wasn´t helping anybody by being out here. BUT Nephi promised that those with faith will see the tender mercies of the Lord, so I put that to the test and decided to ask for really specific blessings in my prayers.

(Elder Shumway, as he was bearing his testimony at the end of the mission, said, "there have been times during my mission when I have felt like I could just ask for whatever I wanted, and I´ve seen miracles." Pretty cool, right?)

And although I´ve always thought I´ve always had faith, I realized this week that the complete confidence and trust that comes from real faith was still kind of absent...and then I started seeing the specific things I was asking for. It was reeeally cool.

For example, I prayed one morning for an easy contact. I still struggle to stop people on the streets (I can talk to ém all day long... but only after my companion has stopped them first, haha), so I basically asked for the Lord to drop a contacting opportunity in my lap. As I was praying, the face of a guy we used to see everyday on a bench, but had never talked to and hadn´t seen in a couple of weeks, came to mind. I said, "alright, if I see that guy, I promise I´ll stop him."  That afternoon, we ran into him on the street. 

Then, I prayed to see if Heavenly Father could change my desires and help me want to contact. The next morning, I honestly didn´t make the connection, but I saw something weird happening in myself. I felt like I not only should contact people, but I could and I wanted to. I didn´t make the connection until that night as I was closing the day with a prayer, and I realized that it´s exactly what I´d asked for that morning. It was crazy.  There were a lot more examples, too. Heavenly Father answers prayers, folks!

Okay, I´ll tell you about one more. I was praying to see evidence that I´d really actually helped someone this week. And as we sat down to start a lesson with María Jose, I threw out the phrase, "as we were thinking about what to share with you earlier this week..." she stopped me and said, "you think about me before coming to visit me?"

We explained how we pray for those we visit and try to receive spiritual guidance on what to teach, and she said, "oh well that makes sense. I was wondering how you always teach exactly what I need to hear. Your visits really help me a lot." Woohooo!!!

During the Zone Conference, President Jackson quoted a lot from President Eyring´s talk, "Rise to Your Call," and this is the part that caught my attention:

"If I think only of my own performance, my sadness deepens. But when I remember that the Lord promised that His power would go with me, I begin to look for evidence of what He has done in the lives of the people I am to serve. I pray to see with spiritual eyes the effects of His power."

That´s what I´ve been trying to do this week.

Hna Irigoyen and I are working on helping people progress or having the courage to leave them if they aren´t moving forward. This hasn´t been a particularly easy time of my mission, but I´m learning SO much! Transfers are this week, and I wouldn´t be surprised if I´m called out to serve in another area, but I´m really grateful for the transfers I´ve had here in Las Palmas. It´s definitely changed who I am :)

Thanks for your prayers, folks!! I´ve been really feeling them this week. When I got the last-minute call to head out to the islands, I was fortunate enough to receive a priesthood blessing from President Jackson. I told Mom about this in a letter, but he said that now, more than ever, I would need the prayers of my family and I would notice the power I was recieving from them. That was definitely an inspired blessing!

I love you guys!!! Have a great week!

-Hna Grover