Week 8 - Obedience Brings Blessings

                                                                                          March 23, 2016

Hello family! I love you all so much!

This week has been truly amazing! There is so much I want to share with you, but so little time to share it all! Ahh!

To start off, I want to apologize for the letter I wrote last week... haha that week was actually pretty rough and discouraging. We were going through some struggles and a lot of disappointment with a couple investigators, and it really threw me off. But, I am so grateful for the hard weeks. You gotta have the bad ones so you can know the good ones!

Transfers also happened for us last night, and Sister Maas and I will be staying together in Etobicoke! We both knew this would be the case, and I am grateful for it! There is still so much I need to learn from her, as well as work for us to do together here!

But, this week was filled with great things! I had my first Zone conference which was awesome! I had a 6 week training follow up phone conference with President and Sister Clayton and the other missionaries that came out with me which was fun, and I was able to go to the temple on Saturday morning for the 6:15 session!

This week has been truly amazing, and we are starting to see miracles happen. The work here in Etobicoke South is really starting to pick up! I attribute a large amount of that to Sister Maas and I striving for exact obedience. We are re-evaluating our efforts to be obedient missionaries as we read through the white handbook every day. We are also striving to talk to EVERYONE we see! This means we are doing our best to leave the apartment earlier, and to walk quicker so that we may have more time to contact those who have been placed in our paths. When we go visit someone, or try to contact a referral, we are working around the name. We are working in the area before moving on to our next planned activity. I believe that it is because of these efforts that we are being so greatly blessed in our area! Working like this is hard, and by the end of the night, we are EXHAUSTED! But, I notice that I am beginning to feel better and I am starting to really love missionary work when I am giving it my all! Blessings!

Last Monday night, we received a MEMBER REFERRAL! A Sister in our ward called us up with the news that her nephew and his new fiancé want to get baptized and married in the church! We began to teach them, and they are amazing. They have such a desire to learn! Teaching them has been so good for sister Maas and I. The nephew, Raman, is of a Hindu background, and has very little to no Christian background. His fiancé, Mariam, is of a Muslim background, and so knows of the Old Testament, but that is it. Teaching them is fun because we HAVE to be simple. But we are so grateful for them as well as for their aunt and uncle who have truly lived by example, and who have been so willing to share them with us!

Our investigator Emmanuel is also doing awesome! We taught him the Word of Wisdom this week. We had already committed him to stop drinking alcohol, and were able to talk about how things are going, and the blessings he has seen come from that! It has been a struggle for him, but he is doing it! We are so excited! We have been trying to get him back to church so he can get a priesthood blessing to help! He is so awesome though. We were talking to him about smoking, and he paused for a moment and was all like "I haven't smoked in 2 days!" The Lord was working with him before we even taught him not to smoke! At the end of the lesson, we were talking to him about his baptismal date, which we will most likely change to April 19th. He was telling us that he doesn't know if he is ready for his baptismal day, and we started to get worried... And then he said, "I need to get my hair cut!" haha He is so ready! It is awesome.  

Things in our area really are starting to pick up! The Lord has a vision of 1000 baptisms this year in the Toronto Mission, and I know it is going to happen!

I just wanted to share a few quick thoughts on Adam and Eve and the Garden that I learned this past week! At a dinner at the member's house, the brother asked both Sister Maas and I a few questions that really made me think, as well as learn! He asked, What was the opposition in the Garden? As well as which fruit was bitter and which was sweet? The first answer is the 2 trees! Adam and Eve most likely ate of the Tree of life, they were only commanded to not eat of the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. This made the Tree of Good and Evil desirable and sweet to the taste, and the tree of life bitter because it wasn't anything special. However, after they had eaten of the tree of good and evil, they could no longer eat of the Tree of life or else they would live forever in their sins. So, as they were cast out into the world, the fruit of the tree of life became most desirable, which links it to Lehi's vision of the tree of life! You might already know this, but I thought it was so interesting! The things you learn as a missionary!

I love teaching the Plan of Salvation. Adam and Eve are awesome. Something that we like to talk about is that God is perfect. He knew from the beginning that Adam and Eve would partake of the fruit. They HAD to in order for all of us to get to the earth and get our bodies! We are not in plan B, but plan A! He is perfect and allowed Satan to tempt them.

Man, the Gospel is so cool!! :)

I have been gaining a testimony of the prophets and apostles lately. What they say is inspired of God and should be taken as serious as Scripture! They are men inspired of God and I think that what they say is true!

 I am really excited for general conference and am waiting for Sister Maas to be done with her October ensign so I can read over the talks from last conference! We really need to listen to what they say so we can prepare ourselves for the future!

Well, I love you all very much! I hope you are doing well! Thank you for your prayers. I can't tell you how much they mean to me! Missionary work is not a walk in the park! It really lifts my spirits to know that each Sunday, the entire Summerlin ward prays for me! I am so grateful to all of you! Please take the time to prepare for General Conference! Prayerfully ponder on a few questions to have going into the sessions. I know that if you do so, and seek the answer out, you will get it!

I hope you all have a great week! Stay warm! Or cool, depending on your location!

Much Love,

Sister Robison