Leben ist gut

Mission life continues to be awesome, although nothing in particular to report from the past week.

I had been in something of a slump for most of the week: I'd wake up every morning not wanting to be a missionary, but wishing I could be in Provo with Reginald and human friends too. Some of the people we'd run into say something about how they thought it was great that we got to do what we loved doing. I'd think about how that isn't true. There so much that we do that I will never love doing. I will never love knocking on doors to talk to strangers. I will never love making billions of phone calls. I will never love pouring out my soul to people who are so closed off. I will never love trying to teach people who claim to believe in Christ, yet aren't willing to take the smallest of steps to come closer to him.

And it's undeniable--that's a huge part of what we do, and although I will never love doing these things, I will never regret it either.

And there are some parts that I do love. I love the ward members, especially the ward missionaries. I love the people that sincerely do want to change, and are willing to. I love sharing my experiences with people who sincerely appreciate them. I love when people accept our invitations to come closer to Christ and begin to apply the Atonement in their lives. I love learning how the spirit works with me. I love learning how Heavenly Father works with me. I love witnessing the miracles in our lives everyday. And I love seeing direct and consistent answers to my prayers daily.

We got to go on exchanges with the Sister Training Leaders, and Sister Howard and I both learned a ton. We are excited about the changes we've made in our planning, studying, and goal setting, and they've already had a profound effect on the progress of our investigators.

And there's always the humor of the week. P's been out of town for a good chunk of the week. At one point in the week he called us to tell us he was at Bosley looking into hair transplants...but decided not to go for it 'cause it's too expensive. I wish we could take videos of the people we experience out here...some experience, whether they be humorous or spiritual, are so far beyond words or pictures.

But the work is good, and we're are blessed with a huge teaching pool and an awesome ward. Leben ist gut.

Sister Bowen