Lots o' laughs

Muli bwanji!

This Monday there is a general authority visiting the mission so we have a big meeting with all the missionaries in Zambia. Its going to take all day so we are emailing today instead of then. I'm really excited for it! Kevin S. Hamilton is coming! You can look him up in the conference Ensign. I'll tell you all about it next week Monday.

The week was pretty great. We did lots of tracting again. It makes the time go pretty slowly but it also makes for some funny stories. You meet the most interesting people! For example: While street contacting, a really tall skinny guy came and talked to us. He was wearing a purple shirt, purple pants, purple shoes, and a huge leopard print cowboy hat! It was hilarious. We gave him a pamphlet and introduced the church and invited him to come. Then he walked away and we kept talking to other people. About 30 seconds later we saw him sprinting back down the street yelling ''SISTERS! SISTERS! WAIT!'' (which freaked us out a bit) He got back to us and in an out of breath voice he said '' I forgot to give you my phone number!''

Here are a few other funny stories from the week:

One day for lunch we went to a hamburger place to eat. While we were waiting for the check Sister Vea's earring fell out and rolled under my bench. (We were sitting in a booth) I tried to get it by just reaching down but it was too far under. So I had to crawl under the table to get it. As I was doing that, the waiter came back, just in time to see me crawl back out. He gave me the weirdest look and it took him a good 4 or 5 seconds to compose himself. I tried to explain but he just kind of shook his head and chuckled as he walked away. Sister Vea just laughed. And then after turning bright red, I laughed too.

On our way to our area every day we pass by a HUGE church. So the people know us pretty well there. They see us all the time. One day when we passed, one of the preachers from the church stopped us and invited us to come in and take a tour of the church. We weren't in a hurry so we agreed. That place was nuts! They had a pipe organ and everything! It was pretty awesome! On our way out he started asking questions about us and the church. We aren't allowed to proselyte at other churches but we are allowed to answer questions. When he found out which church we were from he got very excited. ''I know that church! You have a big choir in America! Have you ever heard of it? I have a couple of their CDs. I'll make a copy of them so you can hear them!'' We tried to tell him that it was not necessary but he was too excited. The next day when we passed by he called us over again and gave us 2 CDs of Mormon Tabernacle Choir music! It was so funny!

Its things like that that help us get through the long days of tracting and contacting. We have been having a lot of success though! We still haven't found a ton of people but the people we have met have been great. If all goes as planned we should have 4 or 5 people coming to church tomorrow! Hopefully they all show up.

The big miracles of the week have all been small things. And all of them have been because we followed quiet promptings of the Spirit. Lots of times we were prompted to go check on someone who is rarely home, and we found them there. Lots of times we were prompted to go talk to people sitting or standing near where we were walking and they turned out to be really interested in learning more. Lots of times we were prompted to call people who rarely answer their phones and they answered. It was all pretty amazing.

On one instance Sister Vea was able to teach me a valuable lesson about faith. We were prompted to go and check on a guy that we had met a few weeks earlier. We didn't have his address and his phone wasn't working, but he had told us where he works. We didn't know exactly where it was but we had an idea so we decided to try and find it. I (unfortunately) was a bit skeptical. I didn't think we were going to be able to find the place. But much to my surprise we found it! But when we got there it was not what we were expecting. He told us he worked for MTN which is a phone company like Sprint or T Mobile. So we expected it to be a little phone store. Nope. It was the headquarters. We get to the place and it is this huge 4 story office building. There are probably hundreds of workers there. As soon as we saw it I thought there was no way we would ever find him. We only had his first name, we didn't know which department he worked in, nothing. I wanted to leave. But Sister Vea said that if the Lord prompted us to come here, he would help us find him. I was still skeptical but I went along. Before we even got inside, guess who walked out of a side door right near where we were walking... yup, it was the exact man we were looking for. I'm sad to admit how skeptical I was but I was really grateful that I have a companion who wasn't. And I am thankful that The Lord was able to take that opportunity to teach me a valuable lesson. And I definitely learned my lesson.

Well I hope you all have a good week and I'll talk to you next week!

 

Lots of love, Sister Gehring

Hedge sculpting is a popular thing in Zambia. But usually they just make geometric shapes. I guess someone was feeling creative here.