May 21, 2018 in Ellsworth, Maine

Hello!

This week was fast! Everything is so fast now!

We had some exchanges this week and I went to Belfast. We had a really cool miracle while there! It was night time and we were getting eaten by black flies and mosquitoes, so we went to the store to get bug spray. The Elder I was with saw a member of the ward so we went and said hi! She was really nice and shared some of her story with me. She’s been a member her whole life, but went inactive as a teenager after some poor decisions that she thought were true freedom at the time. Over the years she has gone in and out of activity. Eventually one day she was thinking about when she’s felt the best, and she realized the place she’s felt the happiest was in the beautiful celestial room of the temple. She decided then to live worthy to enter the temple and has been active since. As she was telling us this story, another lady walked up the aisle. As she walked by us I said something , I don’t remember what. She stopped and we started talking. I realized she had some really cool earrings that my sister would love! I asked her about them and she said she made them! We continued to talk and we learned she was actually an inactive member of the church! She shared some of her story and the member we were originally talking with jumped in and talked too. They connected well and we discussed lots of things like dealing with loss, the Book of Mormon, and eventually divine design. I told her about the great talk given by Elder Rasband 

"By Divine Design"

which talked about how lots of things happen for a reason. I knew that us all meeting up in the store that day was by divine design. She agreed and shared that her young son has just begin to talk about God these last two weeks. Her husband isn’t interested at all, and she doesn't know if she’s ready to come back, but she was eager to set up an appointment to meet with the missionaries again!

A. is doing so well! She is excited for her baptism and we’re beginning to plan out all the details. She has great real intent and has truly read and asked God if the Book of Mormon is true!

P. missed church again which was really sad! We had some ideas, and he’s doing a charity softball tournament in a bit, so we're organizing a team to play for the ward! The members are really excited! :)

J. is good, we taught him Wednesday and sent him a video from some awesome members on Friday which he LOVED! He’s hoping to make it to church again this week.

We have started sending K. daily 3 minute video’s of us just teaching one principle at a time. She loves those as well, and once or twice we’ve been able to have members do them with us which was great!
:)

Have a great week!
Love,
Elder Branch