stretches of faith

Yes it's true my companion is Black.. or his name is Elder Black from Idaho. It's really crazy being with someone who's been in the mission longer than a month or two, I realized it's been over 6 months I’ve spent training and I loved it so much. It really was a time that I had to focus on being "perfect" in every aspect of missionary work so that the missionaries I trained could see the right way to do it all. It’s changed how I work and it's helped me be a better missionary.

This last week I went on exchanges with Elder Leyva. Right before we taught English at the church we had an appointment with a lady named Lalita who has been learning with the missionaries for a couple of weeks now. We started out by talking about the restoration and about getting answers from prayers. We asked her if she felt like she had gotten an answer which she said no. We asked about how she felt when she prayed and read in the Book of Mormon. I had a very strong impression come to me telling me that she needed to pray right now and get an answer. While the member was talking I whispered to Elder Leyva and he agreed. We taught about the feelings we will feel when God answers our prayers and then told her we were going to pray together right now and we wanted her to pray to know if the Book of Mormon was the word of God and at the end we were doing to just sit there for about 10 seconds and pay attention to our feelings. At this point the spirit was confirming that we were doing the right thing. We knelt down with everyone and she began to pray she said "God I want to be baptized and I want to follow this gospel, please help me find a way to do this and then she ended the prayer in the name of Christ. We all sat there and the spirit filled the room I knew Elder Leyva and I felt it. I asked Lalita how she felt and she said "i don't feel anything" I asked the members and they said they all felt it and had goose bumps everywhere. At this point my mind was going a million miles a minute because I knew we had just tried our faith and she didn't get an answer. I didn't know what to do next then Elder Leyva said "She didn't ask a question". I’ll admit doubt began to creep in, I knew I felt the spirit, I knew the members felt it but for some reason she didn't. I was very doubtful to pray again but I asked her to pray again and ask "Is the Book of Mormon true?” We prayed again and she asked; we all sat there in the silence and I noticed that Lalita was breathing really fast and that the spirit was there even stronger than before. I asked her “how do you feel?” she said “My heart is beating so fast and I feel great.” She then proceeded to feel the member’s hearts to see if they were beating as fast as hers which they were. We promised her that it was the spirit and that God was speaking with her. It was one of the biggest stretches of faith I’ve ever had. Praying to get answers with investigators takes a lot of faith and mine grew so much more. God knows us; he wants to help us, if we allow him into our lives he will let us know he's there.

Tell Brielle congrats on making the dance team!

I love you all,
Tyrel

Ps. there are senior couples here and they don't speak Thai. Grandma and Grandpa would love it as well!