Farmington Week Ten

Hello, friends!! Week 10 was incredible.

Monday. Highlights were probably bowling and the lesson we had with Jennifer (a returning member). We read 2 Nephi 4 with her and that's one of my favorite chapters EVER. It was a great discussion!! When I read it this time my favorite part was verse 26. Earlier in the chapter Nephi talks about how his heart sorrows because of the mistakes he has made, but then in verse 26 and he says: "if I have seen so great things, if the Lord in his condescension unto the children of men hath visited men in so much mercy, why should my heart weep and my soul linger in the valley of sorrow?" To me, he's essentially saying that because he knows about Jesus Christ and His mercy and grace and the atonement He performed for each of us, there is no reason that he needs to be weighed down by his sins. He can let go of those because Christ made a way. I love that.

Tuesday. Sister Darlington was gone for a leadership meeting so I spent the day with Sister Linford, who is serving in Cortez, CO and just got to the mission about 2 months ago. It was fun getting to know her! That afternoon we got our regular companions back and I had about an hour with Sister Darlington before she had to leave to go on an exchange with some of the other Farmington sisters, so I was paired up with Sister Butler for Tuesday night to Wednesday night. We had a great lesson with our returning member, Roman, reading Alma 5:1-27. That is a powerful section!! And we got to close the lesson by bearing testimony of the power of Christ's atonement and how He really can purify us if we let Him.

Wednesday. Sister Butler and I did a lot of service! We went to the food bank and walked dogs for the animal shelter (where we ran into Sister Corpus and Sister Cattani!). We had the cutest little pack of dogs!! We also had a really great lesson with a returning member family, the Beyales. We watched the 20 minute Restoration video and talked about why the gospel being restored to the earth by Jesus Christ through Joseph Smith matters to us in our lives and what blessings we have because of it. Sister Beyale said it's very reassuring and comforting to her to know that since the gospel was restored by Jesus Christ himself, it's perfect and all the pieces are put together correctly. She's native and she was telling us about some of the traditions and ceremonies that her people do and how you can tell that they must have had the truth at some point because of the similarities, but it just got lost. For example, in one of the medicine man ceremonies he passes around a cup of water and everyone drinks from it, like how Christ instituted the sacrament in the New Testament and in the Book of Mormon. I just thought that was really neat to think about. Everyone has those little pieces of the truth, but in the restored gospel is where you find all the truth.

Thursday. We had a lesson tonight with another returning member family, the Begays. We talked about how God answers prayers in different ways and used the story of the brother of Jared (Ether 2-3 in the Book of Mormon) to teach some of the different ways. Sometimes God answers our questions directly and quickly (like when the brother of Jared asked how they will have air in the barges) and sometimes Heavenly Father wants is to study it out and find a solution on our own and then go back to Him with our thoughts (like when he asks how they will have light and comes up with the idea to have God touch the stones he prepared). It was a good lesson for them and for me!

Friday. We met the most amazing soon-to-be-returning member! Her name is Sydney and she's just barely 20, and she is so great! She asked us if we could come back sometime to study the scriptures with her and to have dinner!! That was SUPER exciting!

Saturday. I got to spend all day with Sister Butler and Sister Bingham (one of the newest sisters in the mission!). We stayed in my area and had some great lessons (and my favorite lady, Jane, gave me the greatest floral bag EVER). The biggest miracle of the day was that we went to contact a referral that randomly popped up in our phone (we had no idea where it came from) and she was AMAZING!! Her name is Shannon and she was taught 2 times by missionaries in Aztec before she moved to La Plata. She told us that she has already prayed like Joseph Smith to ask if what the elders taught her was true and she knows that it is! And we asked her if she wanted to come to church with us the next day and she said she was already planning on it!! That leads us to...

Sunday. Shannon and TC (her husband) came to church!! And as soon as they walked in to the chapel members were going up and introducing themselves. And after sacrament meeting it was the same. Bishop Bentley headed right towards them after the closing prayer and introduced himself and then a ward missionary couple came over and walked them to gospel principles (Sunday school) and a good handful of other active members (like our relief society president, Sister Crum, and her husband) took it upon themselves (we didn't even ask!) to go to gospel principles and add to our discussion there because they saw we had people with us. We had a great class and as soon as it was done Sister Crum turned to Shannon and told her she could take her to the next block and TC stayed behind with our ward mission leader for elders quorum. 2nd Ward did so good. SO GOOD. Shannon and TC felt really welcomed and I feel very optimistic about them!! Just the way everyone jumped in to action with fellowshipping the two of them was honestly one of the biggest miracles I've seen since I've been in this ward. The members have come a long way in their missionary work!! The ward is transforming :) Yesterday we also got to help Divonna and Rashaan set up their baby girl, Myla's birthday party. It was so cute!! And we got to meet a lot of their family members and it was lots of fun!

I have felt so blessed to be here this last week! Heavenly Father is sending so many miracles and I can't wait to see what he has in store for us this week!

From Farmington with love,
Sister Bohman