Week #10

HI!!!!!!!!

It’s been a long time since I emailed ya'll so I thought I'd send ya'll an update on life...jk. Last time I emailed was Wednesday and nothing that exciting has really happened since then. LOL!

Stephen was confirmed a member of the church and was given the gift of the Holy Ghost at church!! It was such a cool experience to be share with him. He was so happy and the Spirit was so strong. He is going to be given the Aaronic Priesthood next week!! We are planning a temple trip for him as a ward next month! I've never seen anybody more enveloped in the gospel. He has such beautiful insight and his testimony is so strong. I just feel like a proud mom every time he shares his testimony. (':

We extended a baptism challenge to Belinda, again, and she didn't accept, again. She doesn't feel like she has received confirmation from God yet, so she is still waiting. Pray for her!! Hopefully she will find her answer soon!!

We knocked a lot of doors this week and honestly, I really hate knocking doors because I'm so awkward in general.  So can you just imagine me on someone's door step trying to tell them about the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith in less than five minutes!! It's terrible. I'm terrible. My companion usually just steps in and takes over for me and I let her because I'm the worst companion in the world, but this week she said she was going to LET me do it all by myself, and I didn't believe it, so we got to this door step and she didn't say ONE WORD. I had to do the whole thing by myself!!! Yikes!! It was terrible!! The guy took a copy of The Book of Mormon, probably because he felt bad for me!! And then when he closed the door my companion said, "Well Sister, at least we got that out of the way, and now you won't be that awful ever again!" We both laughed so hard. It was awkward. I was awkward. I got messed up in the door contact and I said, “Lehi’s family was leaving Babylon instead Jerusalem.” It was GR8. But I (kind of) got over my door knocking fear (hopefully)!  Now, I'm not afraid to speak up a Lil’ bit! Baby steps!!

I do want to share a brief testimony/story about the Holy Ghost. My entire life I have struggled to find how the Holy Ghost talks to me. It's always been hard for me to figure out what is coming from my own brain and what is coming from God through the Holy Ghost. I have been working every day to be better at it as a missionary. I want to be able to recognize a prompting when I have one. So this week when we were knocking doors, we knocked on the door of this woman who wasn't interested, but when we were leaving her house she told us NOT go to her next door neighbor’s house. She said it "wouldn't be a good idea." How creepy (: Right as she said that, I had this feeling that we needed to go next door, creepy or not. I tried to ignore the feeling because I thought I was going NUTS and well, because it was a creepy thing for the woman to say. We walked past the house and I told my companion that we needed to go to that house. She looked at me like I was a crazy person!! I don't blame her!! We went and knocked on the door and the woman who answered looked at our name tags and said "You know, a month ago I would have invited you two ladies inside to argue with you about your beliefs, but last week my son was baptized into the Mormon Church, and he's now a way better person!" She invited us in and we shared with her the new Easter video! She felt the Spirit so strong I know it! Although she didn't want to hear more about the gospel, her heart was touched by the video we got to share. Her heart will continue to soften to where it needs to be one day to hear the message of the Restoration. That was such a testimony builder for me! I acted on the prompting of the Spirit and we were able to meet and talk about Jesus Christ with that woman! Her heart was touched. It was so cool. Always act on your first prompting you guys, even if you think you are NUTS!! It's worth it!!

This Gospel is a gospel of happiness and I'm so happy to be a part of it. I'm so grateful to share God's word with the crazy people of Chillicothe. Some days are really rough and it's hard to find the motivation to keep going, but somehow I find strength and I just keep swimming. When I do, the Lord seems to bless me with some sort of crazy, funny, or beautiful, tender mercy or miracle. Like meeting that woman whose son was baptized, or like walking into Walgreens and hearing One Direction over the speakers!! It happens! Blessings!! Miracles!!  I love this work!  I love the gospel!

Anyway,

I hope you all have a gr8 week. Be good! Pray! Keep the commandments! Remember I love you!

-Sister Hannah Thomas

P.S. Rumor has it that HARRY STYLES RELEASED A SINGLE??? WHAT?!!!?!