faith…everything depends on it

Guess what...I got to pick a piece of cotton! that's a souvenir I will
treasure for a long time. We were going down a dirt road between
cotton fields to visit a less active member and stopped for a couple
seconds to grab a piece. God's creations are simply amazing.
We are still working hard finding and teaching. We had the wonderful
opportunity to have Sis. Chai and Allen visit us this week. Every few
transfers we'll be having sister exchanges to learn and grow and feel
support. I highly enjoyed it. Sister Chai was in my MTC district :) .
I loved talking with her and seeing how much we had each grown.
While they were here I discovered several things in myself that I need
to improve. Probably the most important lesson I learned is this:
everything depends on faith. If I don't have faith in my
investigators, they won't progress. They can feel if we care about
them, if we expect them to succeed or not, because it shows in our
body language and actions towards them. They can feel if we have
enough faith in our message that we know it is true. They can tell if
we have faith in what we say by our confidence. You can't fake the
Spirit. I found myself this transfer expecting investigators to not be
home, not have read, or to drop us the next time, because we haven't
seen much different. But if, even though I was sort of hoping, I
doubt, then I can't have faith and we won't see miracles. If nothing
else is learned on my mission, faith is the biggest, most important
thing for me to learn and develop. Everything else stems from that one
principle. Because I tried to have faith that day, we met some amazing
people.
The Equation for Success/Growth/Progress/etc:
Faith+Diligence+Patience=Fruit  (Alma 32)
That applies to building faith, gaining a testimony, raising a family,
missionary work...everything. D&C 123:17
The Lord is truly good. I am so grateful for the Atonement and for the
fulness of the gospel on the earth today. It's true! Christ lives! And
this is His same church back on the earth again! I love the gospel,
and I love being a missionary!
Keep on keeping on :)
Have a wonderful week ya'll!
Love,
Sister Cottam