Week #71: When You Believe – November 14, 2017 – November 20, 2017 (Miri)

 

The Miracle Poster

This week started slow, but ended up being AMAZING! On our wall, we have a miracle poster, where we write miracles. It has some Christmas lights around it and at the top says, "There can be miracles..." This whole week was definitely miracle wall worthy. We started the week off right by watching 17 Miracles. I was bawling by the end, (mission tears you know). Jk, but it was a real tear-jerker. The first few days were really slow. On Wednesday, time picked up and we were biking across town (over 20 km to get to town) back and forth and back and forth. One of the amazing  miracles was I bought some stuff for my companion's birthday. I had it in a bag, but accidentally left it on a bench in the mall. We had left, biked a good 15 minutes, and remembered I had left it. We then returned and I found it on the bench, untouched. It was a miracle! We then left the mall and contacted a man from China. Let me tell you, Malaysian Chinese and China Chinese are wayyyy different. I'll never be able to communicate! It at least showed the man was very nice and patient :) He ended up leaving the next day. 

 

Enjoying the rain in Miri.

Another miracle was planning what to do on Thursday, when one of our members pulled up in their car. They brought a lot of delicious Chinese food (including dumplings) that her nonmember friend wanted to give to us. The nonmember friend heard our member's story of who we are and wanted to share her food immediately. The member then took us to their sister's home (a place no missionary has been allowed to enter until now) and we had a delicious lunch. We were able to teach our member's niece and nephew. Miracles!

When Saturday rolled around, the miracles and blessings were just pouring! We started  Saturday with a plan to meet six people with only two real set appointments. We weren't sure if the people would be home. As we started we found ourselves getting calls from other people for us to meet them. We were biking from one end of Miri to another. We were very excited and more than willing to do so. The lessons were certainly Spirit-filled, we were well fed, and we reached many of our goals that day. God really planned our day! Miracles.

On Sunday, the real miracles happened. At the beginning of the day, we were studying before going to church. My companion all of a sudden had a strong craving for a cookie. I started making cookies, when she made herself a microwave chocolate mudcake (it's very delicious by the way.) She satisfied her sweet tooth, and we left the giant cookie I made at home. After church, we had plans to contact all day. We are advised to do so since most families are home this day. We've been following this advice this transfer. Today, we were walking around a neighborhood. We found a home where a Muslim man lives. Because of Malaysian laws, we aren't allowed to teach Muslims. The man was very nice, and pointed us to a ton of houses we CAN contact. We had some great conversations, some were nice, some not so much, and in the end, none of the people wanted to learn. After a while, we came to a crossroads. We took a left turn. We were then called by a previous contact. During the call, we saw one of our English Class students. He ended up leading us to their home and mother. We set up an appointment to meet them and share more about the Gospel. It was a double hitter and a miracle. Afterwards, we left the neighborhood to meet our investigator. We had already had a lot of rejection, were a bit down, but prayed and left for our lesson. In the end, the investigator canceled, but we went to their work to say "Hi!" On our way, we found a girl who had just finished work. We taught her the first lesson, set up a return appointment, and gained a new investigator. It was a true miracle and tender mercy! God answers prayers. When we came home, we found out the other sisters had a miracle too. There are four other sisters who live with us. Two of them came home because they were feeling sick. Another two came home because they had a flat tire. They all had a hard time coming home. Two of them had a sudden craving for cookies and remembering the power of prayer, they prayed for cookies. They came home to find the giant cookie I made. The tender mercies of the Lord are everywhere. He truly makes a way and means so He answers all prayers, even though we may not understand everything at the time.   

Nighttime in Miri.

Church was amazing, as always. We taught a lesson about reaching out in love to less actives and recent converts. I continue to be amazed by the members of Miri. As I mentioned before, these are the pioneeers of Malaysia. The members seemed a little down because they see how hard it is to be a pioneer in the modern days. They told it how it is. It's hard. I admit that. I really respect and admire these members. We told them how much we love, appreciate, respect, and even look up to them because they ARE modern day pioneers. We realized they don't hear enough from the missionaries how great they actually are. We tried to remedy that and we could tell it really hit home for them as we told them of what they're doing right. I've definitely learned a lot over my mission of the power of positive words. Words are powerful. If you don't believe so, read, "The Ricciardi Letter" and "The Power of Your Words". These are amazing. As Sister Linda K. Burton said, "When was the last time you intentionally spoke kind words to each other?" I invite you today to speak kind words