Week 81: A Divine Intervention

Hello!! Happy New Year! 

I'm finally out of my blackout year! (The year of your mission where you start as a missionary and end as a missionary) It's crazy to me that I'll be home in less than 6 months. 

We had some super awesome spiritual experiences this week. Mostly relating to our new friend, EJ. The day after Christmas, Elder Scott and I decided to go street contacting before dusk. When we got out of our truck, we were beginning to walk down the street and I had a spiritual prompting (not knowing it was a prompting at the time) to walk the opposite direction. Not even a minute later, we saw this guy talking on the phone and my companion was disappointed because he felt that we wouldn't be able to talk to him since he was busy. I felt another spiritual prompting to simply hold out a Jesus card and see if he would hang up the phone to talk to us. Well, he did just that and we ended up talking for an hour and a half. He also offered us weed and asked if we were Jehovah's Witness hahaha but he was just messing with us. He told us later on that he had just stepped outside to take that call so we could have easily missed him if the timing didn't work out like it did. He calls it a "Divine Intervention" and I couldn't agree more. We came to find out that his mom and sister got baptized about 12 years ago into the church but his sister also just recently passed away and his mom is inactive. He told us that he has struggled his whole life with knowing what to believe in and has been searching for guidance recently. We met with him again the next day and had another awesome lesson and then he showed up to church on Sunday! A full blown miracle right? But wait... it gets better...

Our friend Leroy also showed up to church soon after it started (we didn't think he was going to be able to make it). I went and sat with him while Elder Scott stayed with EJ.  Soon after, Elder Scott and EJ both bore their testimonies at the pulpit (every first Sunday of the month is called fast and testimony meeting where anyone can go up and share their testimony of Jesus Christ). Later I found out that EJ challenged Elder Scott to bear his testimony and said that he would go up if Elder Scott went first. Then a few minutes later, Leroy asked me if anyone from the congregation could go up there so I asked him if he wanted to go. He was unsure about it but I told him I would go with him and bear my testimony as well (especially because I told myself beforehand that I would bear my testimony). Sacrament meeting definitely went a little over time but it was seriously the coolest experience to see our friends bear their testimonies at the pulpit on their first day at our church. Definitely an experience I will remember for the rest of my life. These past few days EJ has been relentlessly thanking us for how much we've already changed his life and said that he's committed to coming to church every Sunday. Please pray that he will have the strength to keep pushing forward!

Oh and funny story... while EJ was bearing his testimony he gave us a shout out by using our first names hahaha. He had asked us what our first names were in our second lesson and now that's how he refers to us. Oops. The members were probably so confused about who he was talking about hahaha. Sometimes he calls me Harry Potter too cause of my glasses and even named his new dog Harry in honor of me. I honestly don't know whether to laugh or cry. 

We also got transfer news last night and I'll be staying here with Elder Scott but they're moving us to another district and I'll be the district leader. Leadership is definitely not my thing but I'm sure this assignment will help me grow!

This week I once again came to know that God is real. I know for a fact that God led us to EJ that day. You may call it a coincidence, but just like EJ, I call it a divine intervention. EJ was prepared to receive the message we shared with him and he has already seen a drastic improvement in his life. God is in the very details of our life and in everything we see. Alma 30:44 says, "...all things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator." If you simply just look around and you will see God in everything. And if you look even closer you will see how He is working in your life. GOD LIVES!! 

- Elder Christensen

Pics

☆ Marcel did NOT like my listing on Facebook Marketplace

☆ My boy EJ!

☆ I ate muscles for the first time and did not enjoy it