Hey Family!
It’s been another sunny/rainy week here in Atlanta Georgia
filled with many adventures!
It’s been a pretty interesting week though, many ups and
downs, but I guess that’s the roller coaster of missionary work no matter where
you are. The ups though made all the downs worth it of course.
We started out the week with last Monday, for P-day after
emailing we went to downtown Stone Mountain to walk around. Sister Perry had
always wanted to do that and so we did! It has a cute little main street with
little shops and cafes but basically everything was either shut down or just
closed that day. So we didn’t really do anything besides walk up one side and
then walk back down the other side of the street. It was a beautiful day
though so it was nice to be outside. We did have a cool experience walking
back to our car! We had parked in a parking lot near the city hall and there
were a lot of cop cars in the same parking lot as us and one was pulling out
right and we walked to our car. We waved at it as they drove past us and then
were about to get in our car when we watched the police car stop and sit and
then back up to us. We weren’t exactly sure what to expect, but the lady rolled
down her window and asked us if we had an extra copy of the Book of Mormon! I
wish everyone stopped us to ask us that question! Turns out she had visited
Temple Square a number of years ago and had taken a tour with some sisters and
got a Book of Mormon. She didn’t know where it was but was really wanting to
read it. So that was cool, she didn’t want to stay in touch of course, but
that’s okay! She has the book and as long as she reads it I know she’ll find
missionaries again. So we figured if we drove all the way to down to Stone
Mountain to give someone a Book of Mormon then it was all worth it.
The rest of the week consisted of setting appointments with
investigators and members to come with us, and then the investigator canceling
the day of as we are on our way to their home with the member. So that has been
a tiny bit frustrating, but in the end things always worked out. It was truly
incredible. One particular instance that I was truly grateful for was on
Friday, we were on exchanges with our Sister Training Leaders. I stayed in the
area and Sister Perry went to the other area. I will admit I was a tiny bit
nervous because I didn’t know the area as well (on Thursday the APs assigned me
as the designated driver). Well it started out great, we (Sister Burckle and I)
did some service for a member of our ward, their daughter was getting married
this weekend so we cleaned and prepped many potatoes for cooking. We went
finding and found a lot of solid families. Had a powerful lesson with a lady we
are teaching, we read the Book of Mormon with her and then talked about Women’s
Conference. The chaos of the day started towards the late afternoon. We were on
our way to meet a member for lunch, she took us to a Jamaican restaurant
-delicious! Anyways, we got lost going to that, used up a lot of miles and
ended up being pretty late. We then had to drive to the church to meet another
member who was going to a lesson with us, while we were on our way Sister
Burckle called the investigators who we were going to see to let them know that
we were going to be a little late and make sure it was still good for us to
come over. Well, turns out neither of them were going to be home so they wanted
to reschedule. I’ll admit, at this point I was getting a little stressed. The
member we were going out with is one of the sweetest older ladies in our wards
and I didn’t want to let her down. When we got to the church we let the sister
know what had happened, we apologized and told her that the appointments had
fallen through. She kind of sighed and then said ‘okay, what’s plan B’. :) So we called some
potentials and other investigators and found one who was on the way out the
door but said we could stop by for a little prayer. I truly have a testimony
that no matter how much we plan and try to organize, the Lord’s plans are
always so much better than our own! We ended up having a lesson on prayer, not
sure how that even came up but our investigator opened up and let us know that
he had actually never said a prayer before. The Sister who came with us opened
up and bore powerful testimony about how prayer had worked in her life and
invited him to say a prayer of gratitude just to start out with. It was just awesome,
she was just loving and bold. It’s funny, every time I stress about something
like this the Lord always fixes it and sometimes I just feel that He’s just
trying to tell me to relax because He has everything under control-well I know
that’s what He’s trying to tell me.
After the lesson the Sister took us back to our car at the
church and we shared with her 3 Nephi 5:13 telling her that we thought it was
the perfect description of her and who she was. I don’t think I will ever forget
her response “All I know is that I am a daughter of God and I love Him. I just
keep trying to do what He wants me to do.” She really is the best, I love
serving in a ward with these wonderful sisters who have such strong testimonies
and are truly converted to the gospel!
But ya, that was just one experience but things like that
happened basically everyday all week long. It was crazy! Gratefully the members
that we take out with us are patient and are just along for the ride :)
For some fun things that happened, we walked for a day! Oh
my goodness, we calculated it to be a little more than 7 miles by the time we
got home. So, I have never spent a day walking so I don’t know if that’s a lot
but it sure seemed like it! We were blessed though because the day that we
walked the weather was super nice, the sun was shining and there was a nice
cool breeze. Sister Perry did get sunburned and I have a nice shoe tan line
now-oh the joys of missionary service! Luckily walking for that day worked
perfectly because we were able to have enough miles to last us the rest of the
week and we basically aren’t driving anywhere today so we will have enough for
tomorrow! I hope my next companion is good about always thinking about miles
because I have not been able to adapt that mindset yet. Probably by the time I
get ready to leave the area I’ll have it all programmed into my little head.
Hopefully.
So the work is moving forward in our fun little Twin Oaks
ward! We were able to attend the broadcast for the Women’s Conference this last
weekend. That was really good! It was fun to be with a stake and to see
everyone. I did meet briefly Katrina’s husband’s sister? Haha, I really didn’t
think I was going to meet anyone out here who had connections to our
family-once again I was wrong! Anyways, the broadcast makes me super excited
for conference, especially because I am able to watch all of the sessions! Yay,
that doesn’t happen on Temple Square. The time difference is still a little
weird to me, we didn’t get home for the broadcast until about 10pm because it
starts so much later here. All is well, just made me think about the time
differences in all the other countries. Wonder what conference is like there.
Well for those who saw the broadcast, did anyone have a
favorite talk? Or insight? The thought that came to me was because we are in
the week leading up to Easter, made me think about how the first person Christ
visited after His resurrection what Mary and for Conference, the first group of
people who get to hear and learn for our church leaders are the women. Just a
cool connection that I made.
Well Happy Easter Everyone! I hope someone has an Easter egg
hunt for me and dyes some eggs for me as well :)
Love you all!
XOXOXOX
-Sister Fluckiger
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