Hola hola! This week was kind of one of the best ever.
For one thing I turned 20. That's so weird to write down. I don't feel qualified to not be a teenager anymore. I thought my birthday would be a pretty regular day of missionary work but we happened to have a relief society activity on the day of my birthday, so the president invited us and they all sang to me and had me blow out a match.
Thanks for all the birthday wishes you guys sent my way and sorry that I can't respond personally! I love you guys!
And on my birthday Dara, Chrismayla, and Kaëf passed their bautismal interviews! I was honestly scared they wouldn't because it's been so difficult to gauge if they're understanding or not since they don't speak Spanish. We kept asking their aunt (our translator) if they understood, and she would say yes and we'd hope she was right. I decided to just trust God, and the interview would be the defining moment. Another missionary who speaks Kreyòl called them to do the interviews, and at the end he told us they were all ready and that he was quite impressed at their understanding of the gospel. He asked how we did it, and the truth is that we didn't. We don't speak kreyòl, but when we speak Spirit that doesn't matter because the Spirit speaks all the languages.
They got baptized on Saturday in between sessions! It was awesome. I was filled with straight joy watching these children of God follow His commandments. The Elders we ward share with baptized them in kreyòl so they'd understand, and that was really cool. Especially after hearing them practice and butcher the prayer beforehand. Then in the moment, they said them perfectly without a single mistake. The gift of tongues is so real.
Also CONFERENCE!!! Holy cow it was so amazing!!! I'll try to restrain myself here and not write a novel about how powerful it is to listen to the words of the prophet and apostles.
When was the last time you thought about how cool it is that God has given us a prophet? Not just back in the day, TODAY. I've known the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is the true church for a long time, but I feel like just recently I've started to figure out WHY. It's because it's built on revelation. There are a lot of good churches, but there is only one that is founded on continually being directed by God instead of just going off of what He said in the Bible. God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He is a God of miracles and He is a God of love. And He speaks to us every single day. Personal revelation is not only amazing, it's necessary. The prophet told us that it will not be possible to survive without personal revelation. And churchwide revelation is also something completely necessary for us to know how to find and stay on the covenant path despite the obstacles Satan constantly throws at us.
We taught a lesson this last week about the prophet and the lady we were teaching told us that she believes in the word of God but that He doesn't speak to us anymore. She said it with such certainty and it just made me sad. God does speak to us today. We bore testimony and invited her to watch conference and pray to know whether or not President Nelson is a prophet of God. I don't think she did and that just tears my heart up.
I hope all of you guys did. And that you take the next six month to study the words of the living prophets every day alongside your study of the past prophets. We have so many sources to receive the word of God and revelation and using them truly brings the power of Jesus Christ into our lives.
It's normally really hard for me to pick a favorite talk, but this year Elder Dale G. Renlund's stood out to me clearly. It was about personal revelation. We can receive it as we search the scriptures, seek revelation on our runway (in other words, that is within our stewardship), and trust in the revelation we and church leaders have already received.
Hermana Cazier
pics. My comp found some balloons in her room and put them up for my birthday... they're just off by a little bit :)
also I recorded my testimony in kreyol since I've gotten some good practice sharing it in recent weeks and it seemed fitting with our kreyol baptisms. It's not that great and probably only two people on this email list will understand it, but there you go :) I hope it works (I couldn't figure out how to put that on here, so...sorry.)
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