Tuesday, September 2, 2014

A small world full of miracles

The latest news from Katelyn is that she is "doing more of the same".  You might not think that "doing more of the same" is big news, but in Katelyn's case, it is.  What I mean by doing more of the same is that every week Katelyn writes home and tells us all about the miracles that have been happening to her and her companion.  Katelyn's emails from the last few weeks have been "more of the same".  In other words, more miracles!  Without going into too much detail, this is what I mean.

Recently, Katelyn and her companion went to go visit with and older couple in their Ward but there was one problem.  They had forgotten to bring their appointment book and they weren't exactly sure what the apartment number was.  Katelyn thought that she knew what the correct number was so they knocked on the door of that apartment.  Then just before the person who lived there answered the door, Katelyn commented to her companion, "wouldn't it be funny if we got the wrong apartment".  Guess what?  A person who Katelyn had never seen before answered the door.  It was the wrong apartment.  Then the next thing that Katelyn knows, her companion starts talking with the apartment owner and it turned out to be a former investigator that they had lost track of.  Then suddenly the apartment door across the hall opens and it is the older couple that Katelyn and her companion had originally come to see.  So how is that for a miracle.  Katelyn and her companion were able to reconnect with a former investigator and set up a new appointment who just happened to live across the hall from members of their Ward.  It sounds to me like a miracle.  What do you think?

But the miracles don't stop there.  Katelyn and her companion were out street contacting one day.  Before they got out of their car to start tracting, Katelyn's companion said a prayer and asked Heavenly Father direct them to someone who would really be interested and be the one to ask them questions instead of the missionaries asking all of the questions.  Within about 10 minutes after leaving their car, they were walking through a neighborhood and stopped to look at an interesting sprinkler in the yard of a house.  Just then someone walked around from the back yard and Katelyn commented to the person that she liked the sprinkler.  Most of the time the person would have just said thanks and everybody would have moved on.  But this time the person walked over and started asking Katelyn and her companion who they were and what they were doing. So of course they started to explain to the home owner who they were and what they were doing there.  They shared some scriptures from the Book of Mormon and immediately the home owner was interested.  In fact they were so interested that they invited the Sister Missionaries back so that the missionaries could talk to some of the home owners family and friends.  Katelyn commented to us that usually it is hard to find someone that would even talk to them let alone start asking them questions and invite them back to teach them more.  Another miracle?  I'm thinking so.

 If you think that the miracles stopped there, you would be wrong.  Not too long after that Katelyn and her companion were going to talk to some other people that they had recently met.  When they got there, there was a little girl that they didn't know, sitting on the front porch.  The Sisters asked the little girl if her mother was home.  When the mother (who they also didn't know) walked out, it turned out that she was visiting family from a different city and was actually a member of the church.  As they all started to talk, some of the other family member came out and sat on the porch with them as the woman who was visiting started bearing her testimony to her other family members.  Katelyn and her companion spent about 45 minutes sitting on the porch talking, teaching and listening.  Then just before they were about to ask if they could come back another time to teach them more, the lady who was visiting beat them to the punch and set up an appointment for them to come back.  There you go.  More of the same, miracles upon miracles.

Transfer time again in Katelyn's mission and the big news is that Katelyn will be staying in River Valley.  But, she will be getting a new companion.  I commented to Katelyn in an email that she seems to be going through companions like crazy.  It seems that every transfer lately, Katelyn is either moving to an area with a new companion or a new companion is moving to her area.  Well, this time it is the latter.  Katelyn is coming up on her six month mark as a Sister Training Leader.  She has told us that sisters in her mission usually only serve as an STL for six months.  This probably means that Katelyn will be getting at least one more new companion before she is done with her mission.

In Katelyn's most recent email she talked about a family in their Ward named the Lows'.  Katelyn said that they are an incredible family that has been through a lot in the past year.  To start out with, about a year or so ago Sister Low found out that she was pregnant with triplets.  That was the good news.  Then shortly after the triplets were born, they found out that each of the babies had a rare form of cancer in one of each of their eyes.  This meant that they would need to go to Toronto for treatment that ranged from a specialized laser surgery to localized chemo-therapy.  That was obviously the bad news.  But rather than try to tell the whole story here, you can find out more about them in a news story that appeared in the Deseret News, Faith carries LDS couple as each of their identical triplets battles rare eye cancer | Deseret News  or on their blog at http://www.lows-lowdown.blogspot.com/ .  Now for the reason why I mention this besides the obvious.  An interesting little tie-in here is that recently Katelyn and her companion were visiting with the Lows' in their home.  Sister Low's parents were also there visiting and helping with the triplets.  As they all got talking, it turned out that Sister Low's sister is married to Katelyn's Mom's cousin.  How is that for a small world.  

Here are a few pictures that Katelyn sent home recently.


Building a new sidewalk and doing a little service.


Here is the finished product. 



Doing a little more service as parking attendants during Heritage Days. 



Enjoying a little treat at the mall.



Dressing up with the Young Women at one of their activities.



Katelyn and her companion are "out-standing" in their field. 



Ok, Katelyn may not be out standing in a field in this picture but she is definitely "leaps and bounds" above the rest.