Monday, December 15, 2014

IL EST LE DON (Week 48)

AWESOME week! I love Christmas time on the mission more than anything. It's absolutely magical. I have no clue where to start! Its been a super eventful week.

I think I mostly want to focus on little miracles that have been happening lately. God has answered countless of my prayers this week.

The view from where we were teaching Tatiana....
Here's just a simple experience we had yesterday that really touched me. We were walking down the street on our way to get a bus to go visit Sandra and I felt like I should stop this lady hunched over her cane slowly making her way. We started off by asking her some questions from our questionnaire:

"Do you celebrate Noel?"
"No I'm all alone and I don't like Christmas."
"Do you believe that there is a true meaning of Christmas?"
"No I don't believe in anything."
She was short and super closed off. Sr Staples and I kind of just exchanged looks and didn't really know what to say. The lady started going off a bit on how she has only ever had bad things happen to her and told us all about her family problems and how she didn't even have any friends. I felt really sad as I listened. As she finished I told her that we wanted to be her friends and invited her to come to our Christmas activity this Saturday. We gave her our number and then she bised us! (Which is not exactly normal for people to do during street contacts.) You should've seen her by the end. She was smiling and laughing with us when before she had her head down and she was angry about everything. As we parted I knew we had touched her life. It was so simple but so important to me!

That's what being a missionary is all about. Helping people feel the love Christ would show to them if he was there.

We love riding the bus!
Oh guess what!! We sang at church on Sunday! It was a super last-minute thing and we didn't really practice all that much but it turned out really well. We even had Vincent (return missionary from the this ward of about 4 days) join us and Elder Allen played the piano! While I was looking out in the audience I saw many people in tears. We had one lady who came up to us afterwards (who none of us had seen at church before - I assume she had been inactive for a long time) and told us that she was really touched by our song. We got asked to sing it again at the Christmas activity on Saturday! I'll have someone record it and I'll send it next week. :)

WE GOT HOT WATER!!!!!! After two and a half weeks of suffering the water is back!!!!!! I've never appreciated hot showers more in my whole life. Thanks for your prayers, they have been answered haha.

We've been praying recently to find service opportunities and to be able to touch the lives of those around us and God has blessed us immensely! Recently we have had many opportunities come up to help people! We're going to help someone move, we're going to help someone decorate their apartment foyer for Christmas (I'm excited for that one haha), and today we're going with Mama Gentil to deliver Christmas presents to children at the children's hospital. We've had a few other small services we've been able to do as well and its been keeping us happy and very busy!

The Cote D'Azur is so cool.
Ok can I just say how much I love this city???!!?? I love all of France but this place is incredible. Its gorgeous. Our ward is huge and super helpful. The people are super nice. I just love it! I'm so excited to spend Christmas here!

I need to give a shout-out to Frère Tantely. He is the best missionary every. He gives us referrals basically every week. This week we went and saw his mother in law and then the wife of a member in the ward who recently died. She is having a hard time with it but she has been coming to church and I think she is seriously thinking about baptism. She really loved her husband and she misses him a lot. Honestly I think she already acts exactly like any other member. I wouldn't have known the difference is someone hadn't told me! Pray for her. Her name is Christianne M.

Okay, I saved time to show you something cool! We have been sharing this a lot lately and it goes perfectly along with the "He Is the Gift" video!

There are so many things I love about this passage. (Luke 2). The video talks about doing 3 things: Discover, Embrace, and Share the gift. This passage shows how the Shepards did all three.

10 And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. (DISCOVER)
 11 For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.
 12 And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.
 13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying,
 14 Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.
 15 And it came to pass, as the angels were gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds said one to another, Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us. (EMBRACE)
 16 And they came with haste, and found Mary, and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger.
 17 And when they had seen it, they made known abroad the saying which was told them concerning this child. (SHARE)
 18 And all they that heard it wondered at those things which were told them by the shepherds.
 19 But Mary kept all these things, and pondered them in her heart.
 20 And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, as it was told unto them.

As members of the church we have already discovered the gift and we are so lucky! We need to truly embrace this gift that our loving Father in Heaven has given to us by using daily the Atonement of Jesus Christ and constantly working to become more like him. And of course we need to share the gift. Look everyone. We don't need to invite our friends to take the discussions (although that is always great) but we can share the love of God in small and simple ways which will create a spark in them and they will want to know more.

Please please please please share this video with everyone you can! It's completely normal to tell someone who you care about that you want to show them why this Christmas season is so important to you.

Find at least one friend to personally share it with!

Hey Everett family. I want to invite you to find someone to invite to our house for an FHE. I don't know who but if you pray God will help you know who it should be. And share the video with them!

I love you so much!

Joyeux Noel!!
Soeur Everett

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