Stories from Ruth # 34

This is my favorite email from Ruth so far:

 

This week has also been full of miracles! Last pday we spent it with the Braintree elders and Jess Tofpik (a return missionary from Brazil in our ward) and went to Preto which is a lot like Tucanos.
The Lord loves to test our faith. Sister Strate and I felt promoted to talk to the dudes in the skate park. So we did. We walked into the middle of the skatepark and started talking to this guy with a skateboard and his friend actually came up and was listening. Then he told us that he beleived in God although most of his other friends did not. He was super chill. We did not end up meeting with him, but he was very interested and invested in the conversation.

Over a month ago there was this 17 year old boy the elders were teaching who came to church to church twice and then had to be referred to us, because he is in our area. A little before they referred him he disappeared. No one was able to get into contact with him. Then we received our smartphones and whatsapp! We were able to get into contact with him! He told us he had seen our messages but had not been able to reply because he did not have data which whatsapp does not require. We asked if we could meet him and go over the Book of Mormon with him which we did. He also came to church with us on Sunday and enjoyed it. He gets along really well with the youth and had a lot of fun. It was wonderful to see.    

On Friday we taught Denise and at the beginning of the lesson she we talked about Alma seven and she had read that and some more pages. She felt like it was pointing her to come unto Christ and a new beginning. She then told us how for a while she had not been studying the bible like she should and then we brought the Book of Mormon which was familiar and new like Alma 7:11. Denise began to tell us that she had had a dream a few days previous and she told us she said this was going to sound crazy since she had already been baptized but she felt like she needed to be baptized again. We told her that we were planning to invite her to be baptized that lesson and she was speechless. At the end of the lesson we invited her to be baptized and she said yes. We talked about prophets and she loved it. She said prophets and apostles were beautiful. She understood the authority. And she was told about priesthood blessings. Esther early on felt impressed to speak on Lehi's dream, so we did. We told her about Lehi's dream and she loved it, wrote it down, and her baptismal date, a scripture from d&c (be still and know that I am God), and Neal A Maxwell quote ("God does not send thunder when a still small voice is enough"). Also she asked Esther to send her conference notes about revelation. Esther taught her about the holy spirit and how we can the gift of the holy spirit with us all the time after we are baptized. Sister Strate and I taught about baptism and the relevance of the sacrament and how vital it is.

 

This week my spiritual thought is about the armies of Helaman:
Alma 53:20 "And they were all young men, and they were exceedingly valiant for courage, and also for strength and activity; but behold, this was not all—they were men who were true at all times in whatsoever thing they were entrusted.
21 Yea, they were men of truth and soberness, for they had been taught to keep the commandments of God and to walk uprightly before him."

If we want to live with God again we too need to be valaint, for those who are not valiant cannot dwell in the kingdom of heaven. In the bible it talks about how we need to be valiant in Christ's name if we want him to declare ours before the father. We need to seek to know him and become worthy enough to live with him and the father again if we are to declare his name. We must and can become that perfect and worthy to be taught directly by him and must be if we are to be like him, for we cannot be like and cannot declare the name of a person we do not know.