THE VISION OF THE SOUTH

"Make no small plans: This is the vision I have for the South. I believe that one day the South will baptize more people into the church than all other English speaking missions in the world together....We will see the time when we will baptize hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands...In your day you will see a million members of the church in the South. There will be temples plural in the Southern States. What a great call you have to serve with these marvelous people." President Spencer W. Kimball

Monday, May 25, 2015

FROM PH: Don't Overstay your Welcome

Memorial Day edicate
Sent Date:  Monday, May 25, 2015
Author:  President Hansen

Dear Elders and Sisters,
I have really enjoyed visiting with you over the last few days. You are all great missionaries. I love spending time with you.

Please be thoughtful of members and investigators today and always as we go into their houses. Remember that they have things planned and so you must not impose on their time. With members stay only the amount of time that you have been invited for. If you invite yourselves to send letters, don't stay for more than an hour. If they haven't been clear ask them, "Do you mind if we stay for about an hour to write our letters?" With investigators be even more careful of their time. A half hour is a reasonable time to spend in their homes. When we spend longer they feel stressed and don't know how to get missionaries out without offending them, so they will start to make excuses when you ask to visit them next time.

Here are a few excerpts from letter the missionaries have sent this week:
------There was this lady that came to church for the first time and in broken English she said to us "I want to get baptized. You'll help me, yes?" I was so taken back. She wants to be baptized on June 6th! Her name is Eddy and she told us that all her life she has been searching for the truth and she has felt that she has found it.

------this car pulls over and a woman says, "Hey! Come here!! Do you remember me? Yall walked up to me and my neighbor when we were on her porch last week!" I recognized her and she went on to say "My name's Vonne. Here's my address. Come and see me. Do y'all have a brochure or something I can read in the meantime?" biking sisters We biked out and it was SUPER hot and humid. Like I thought I was going to just melt away. I prayed for just a little bit of cool rain. I put my head down and started biking harder. All of a sudden, I felt all these drops on my feet. I got excited! But when I raised my head, I realized that the drops I felt were the drops of sweat dripping off my head and arms on to my feet... I just laughed... :)

------She opened the door and said "oh I thought you were my neighbor, but come in anyways." She got us water and made us comfortable. She said that her daddy is a Baptist Preacher, and she has always been curious. She is married and they have 2 daughters. We taught her the Restoration of the Gospel and she was just soaking it up. She offered a kneeling prayer and asked for God to direct her. Then she stood up and with tears in her eyes she said "I prayed last night that God would point me in the right direction today." She went on to say "when I was praying I was thinking more like he would point towards those I could serve. But I can see that this is His answer to what I literally asked for." We set up a time so we could come back when her husband was home, he had majored in Christianity History. Kind of intimidating but we came back. We taught him the Restoration and talked about it. He then said it just makes sense that there would be a Book of Mormon and a need for Restoration.

------so Elder _____ put the address in and we started driving when we arrived at the address we had put in we realized that we typed the wrong address in. To be honest I was a little frustrated and in my head I was thinking, come on kid how hard is it to put the right address in. Well I turned around and started to get back on the main road, and right then I had a feeling that he were there for a reason. So I turned the car around and pulled off the side of the road, then I turned to Elder _____ and said we were sent here for a reason, lets find out what it is. We knock four doors and nothin... so we knock on the fifth door and this guy answers and immediately I knew that we had been sent here to talk to him....He also told us that he wants us to teach his buddies as well,

------At this families house they had people coming and going while we taught four people in the home and out of nowhere this lady comes up to me and asks me about what we were talking about. I summed up what we were talking about and I addressed all their concerns and questions as I read in 2 Nephi. It made sense to everybody. I was saying things that were exactly what they needed to hear. When I was done reading and explaining the lady Margaret was in tears. Her family laughed at her crying. She is catholic and said before that she is really catholic but when her family asked why she was crying she said with tears in her eyes "It’s true, It’s true, What they said is true."

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