Elder Adams in Yakima: Week 65: In which we observe the eclipse, visit Stonehenge, and we meet people miraculously

Week number MIRACLE!

Hey, family and friends! It's been another fantastic week here in The Dalles, OR. Although we wanted to, we were unfortunately not able to make it into the zone of totality for the eclipse today. It's just outside of mission boundaries, sadly. However, we still saw about %98 of it, which was incredible! We saw it with the 4 other elders here at a nice member's house, who also gave us all donuts. It was great

After that, we went shopping, then joined again with the others to drive up to a really cool full-size replica of how Stonehenge used to look anciently, built in memory of the soldiers from Klickitat County (where the memorial is) who died in WW1.

I here include an excerpt of my letter to President Lewis. I think that's honestly all I'll have time for, since so much happened that I told him about. This is honestly the main interesting stuff that happened this week.

Most of the week, we just worked as normal, with very little visible success. A good highlight, however, was when we found and taught Alex on Monday, who is now a new investigator. However, he was out of town for our return appointment Friday, so he had to reschedule with us for next Friday. Well, he's still a great guy with some promise! The rest of the week passed with very little extraordinary.

Yesterday, however, we said a prayer as a companionship. In that prayer, we felt inspired to ask for help finding 2 new investigators, allowing us to reach the Standard of Excellence (we thought it was our goal, but our goal was actually a little higher). Because of church and other meetings, we only had about 3 1/2 hours to really devote to finding people. However, as soon as dinner ended, we decided to go try and find a man who lived in an apartment complex in town. These apartments have been thoroughly scoured by missionaries over and over, and almost everyone there knows us. Many of them avoid us, as well. As it turns out, that man didn't live there at all, so we just kept knocking on doors, hoping and praying to find someone. After all, we had felt we needed to knock doors there while planning, as well!

Not many doors later, a lady opened the door. Her name was Erica. After we introduced ourselves and our message, she mentioned she had a boyfriend there. We asked if we could come in (she had never actually talked with missionaries, though she had seen us around before), and she said yes! We got inside, and soon realized that a LOT of things had been happening in her life. Within the past week, her cousin's husband had had some sort of accident or illness and was now on the brink of death. To add to Erica's distress, her daughter's best friend (who is pregnant with another baby) had lost her first baby just a day earlier (Saturday) when her child was killed by a falling TV set. We quickly discovered that, in addition to all of this, the lady whose baby died was a former investigator of ours. We were shocked and sad for them.

Erica then asked if we could help her learn how to pray. She feels as if God doesn't hear her because she has made so many mistakes in her own life, and really desperately wants to be free of that guilt. She has been really feeling as if she needs to come closer to Christ in the past few days, and was just barely wondering about how to find that peace in an increasingly crazier world and freedom from the guilt of past mistakes and sins when we knocked on her door, sharing a message about finding peace and how to grow closer to Christ. She told us that she felt that God clearly sent us to help her find that, and we set up to talk to her again and give her a tour of the church in a few days.

To add to that, there's Claudia. Near the beginning of this week, Claudia called us asking about Daily Dose classes [English language classes]. We responded that, unfortunately, they are not happening right now, but that we're looking for new teachers. However, we asked her if she wanted to hear about the Restored Gospel, and she said she would be happy to! We set up an appointment, but it fell through because she had to go to a meeting at work. We rescheduled for a church tour (incidentally the same one) in a few days.

However, last night, we felt like we needed to go by and double-check we had the right address. When we knocked on a couple of doors unsuccessfully, until the last door where a lady opened, shaded by the door frame. We said "Hello" and heard an "Hola" in response. We had her. We introduced ourselves, and, after she told us her name, we mentioned we had talked on the phone earlier. After a matter of seconds, she began crying. We weren't quite sure what to do. She then told us that 15 days earlier, she had had a very jarring experience. A single mom, she had apparently gotten into a very, very, bad relationship, and after discovering her boyfriend's true nature, she sat down,drinking some alcohol, decided to end her life. She was saved in the nick of time by her ex-partner (not her then-current boyfriend), and was in the hospital for several days. While there, she felt like she needed to come closer to Christ. She really began wanting to change her life for the better and leave her old life behind. A week or so later, she saw our number on a box in one of the local Mexican stores and decided to call it for some kind of help.

As it turns out, a few minutes before we knocked on her door, she had been feeling really lonely and abandoned. Her kids had just decided to stay the night with their dad (the ex-partner who saved her life, but was also a terrible relationship), leaving her alone for the first time in a long while. She was about to call them and ask them to come back, and in that very moment of decision, she heard a knock on the door.

We were absolutely speechless. All we could do is testify about how she was a daughter of God and how He loved her and cared for her. She began crying again as she told us that it always seemed like God sent someone right when she needed it the most. She said she knew we were sent from God, and that He had sent us there even though it wasn't our appointment. We testified again, mourned with her, and helped her to say a prayer thanking God and asking Him for help. It was very, very, beautiful and sincere. We then left her with a card directing her to mormon.org/questions and another directing her to the Prince of Peace video. We invited her to look at them both that night after we left. The spirit was very strong.

That was yesterday. I feel both honored and humbled by those two experiences we had, nearly back-to-back. My testimony has yet again been bolstered that God indeed listens to His children, and that we are truly participating in a work far, far, greater than ourselves. It is my testimony that that is true. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

I am so glad I got to be here in The Dalles long enough to experience that!

Love,

Elder Adams

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Questions from Editor Mom:

Hi! I see that you got your glasses. Tell us your impressions of the solar eclipse! - It was amazing! We sadly couldn't get to the zone of totality. The members here tell us that Maupin is actually not quite there, and so the zone was outside of our mission. Plus, there are so many tourists here the traffic was really, really bad. However, we still got to see %98 of it! It was great, and we all got pictures through our glasses!

Did you get the package Dad sent? - You mean the one with the shoes? If so, then yes! Thank you so much, they look and fit great! I'm also super grateful for the insoles; tell Grandma for me. They're really comfortable.

What made this week special? - Well, Sunday. Sunday was basically a big miracle. I will probably mainly tell you about that in my weekly letter, instead of the day-by-day (although I may also get around to that as well).

Are you starting to feel like it's about time for a change? How do you feel about that? - Honestly, yeah. I've been here a while. I feel like it's probably time for me to go. On one hand, I'm super sad, because the members here are really awesome, and Elder Jensen is pretty great, too. I'm definitely going to miss a lot of people, including a bunch of our investigators. That said, I feel like I've been here long enough. I wouldn't mind some change, and am excited to see what the future holds! I pray that when I'm gone, our investigators will continue to do well.

Any interesting experiences out of the norm this week? - Sunday again. It was crazy. Crazy awesome, that is. Also, it was super sad for some other reasons, but more on that in the big email.

Are you surviving the heat? - Actually, we're doing much better! It's also gotten cooler; summer is definitely winding down. It's in the 70's/80's today, and is supposed to stay that way the rest of the week. Yay!

How are your eyes? Have you gotten a blessing for them? - Good and yes, I did. They are much, much better. God has been working miracles through Benadryl.

Love you!

Elder Adams