I feel like every week has been incredible on the mission. I never know where to begin with how everything played out this week. gah. I am so humbled to be serving the Lord. He never ceases to amaze me. We have been focusing a lot on prayer this past week and I KNOW that God truly hears and answers our prayers!!!!!!!
Let prayer be your steering wheel. Let the answers and promptings you receive control everything you do during the day and you WON'T go wrong!!!!!!!!!
Here are some examples from this past week:
-We had 2 hours left of the night with all of our plans cancelled. We sat in the car and decided to pray and ask Heavenly Father where HE would like us to be. During the prayer, the random name "kenya" popped into my mind. I questioned myself and thought I was crazy for thinking of that name, but told Sister Moore about it. She then told me that Chick fil a popped into her mind. We followed both promptings and headed over to good ole' chick fil a. We didn't get any food (YES. I HAVE SELF CONTROL NOW Y'ALL. CHICK FIL A IS MY FAVORITE AND I DIDN'T EVEN HAVE ANY.) but instead, we went from table to table and asked the kind southerners if they knew anyone named Kenya. Most responded saying, "uh. no. What does she look like?" and then we would respond saying, "we have no idea! We have never met her! We just have a unique message to share with her. When can we share it with you and your family?" hahhahah it was hilarious. We met this really nice man named Ted who asked us ALL about our religion and was super nice. He is a lawyer and is super motivated to change the world. He brainstormed ideas with us on how we can get people to draw closer to Jesus Christ. It was the coolest experience! ONLY in the south can you walk into a restaurant and talk to a nice lawyer about Jesus Christ for 30 minutes.
We were still VERY determined to find Kenya and had an hour left of the night. So yes. We ventured to Walmart. (and yes. I still can't stand that store). We asked a good 30 people there if they knew a Kenya and everyone said no. We were getting discouraged, but still had that inkling of hope within us. It was 8:55 and we were fixin to head out the store because we had to be home by 9. We decided to ask the last bit of workers who were standing by the door if they knew a Kenya. They confusingly looked at us and asked us why we were asking them that question. We started to explain our experience of prayer and how we asked God who we needed to see and how the name Kenya popped in my mind. All the workers just shook their heads no and we began to walk away... THEN. One of the workers started to squeal as she called after us and said, "NO WAY. NO WAY." She then had her jaw dropped as she started to point her fingers at a lady walking in the store. The worker then said, "ASK THAT WOMAN WALKING IN IF SHE KNOWS SOMEONE NAMED KENYA!!!!" We did and GUESS WHAT????? THE LADY WHO WALKED INTO THE STORE HAS A DAUGHTER NAMED KENYA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! CRAZZZZZZZYYYYYYYYYY. HEAVENLY FATHER IS SO REAL AND IS A GOD OF MIRACLES. SO COOL.
We told the lady our story of the name kenya and she was freaking out as well. I could barely talk because I was so excited. Sister Moore and I were shaking our voices as we said to her, "WE NEED TO SEE YOU SOMETIME SOON!!!! WE KNOW WE HAVE A MESSAGE THAT YOU AND YOUR DAUGHTER NEED. GOD LED US TO YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" The lady agreed and said we could stop by :))))
We are going to see her this upcoming week!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
If Sister Moore wouldn't of thought of going to Chick fil A, we wouldn't have run into the lady whose daughter was named Kenya. Man, God's timing is everything!!!!!
I KNOW that the experience we had that night was definitely (as southerners say) "a God thing."
Heavenly Father is in the very details of our lives and totally cares about everything that we do. We can ask Him for anything and HeWILL answer!!!!!
-Sister Moore and I were out biking and it was freezing outside. We found a wonderful neighborhood that neither of us had ever been to before. It was starting to get really dark around 5 and didn't know if we should bike there or not because we had an appointment at 6. We both felt prompted to go anyway and just start tracting in the dark. The first house we went to was an answered prayer. Sidenote: Our mission has been focusing on asking people inspired questions while tracting. For some reason, I felt like we should avoid asking her an inspired question and asked her if we could just say a prayer with her. Sister Moore felt the same way as I did. SO COOL. A cute mom named Michelle answered the door and we just told her that we were representatives of Jesus Christ and that we were leaving prayers with people. Without hesitation, she let us in!!!!! Her friend Mishayla was there as well. Before we offered the prayer, Michelle just started to ask us a million questions about what we believed in and so did Mishayla. They both started to express to us that they had been praying the past few days to understand truth more. It was crazy. They are both no longer going to a church because they don't trust anything the preachers say.
This is basically some of the things they said that just made my heart burst with joy:
"I don't understand the Bible! I don't know what is truth and what isn't. I wish there was a better translation of it."
"I have been just praying and asking God to send me a sign or something to let me know what truth He wants me to hear."
"We are so glad we let y'all in. I feel like God is giving us a sign by y'all coming inside. I usually say no to people at the door, but something told me to let y'all in."
AH. THIS EXPERIENCE IS SOMETHING THAT I HAVE DREAMED ABOUT MY WHOLE MISSION. THEY ARE SO PREPARED.
We were able to teach them about the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and they LOVED it. We invited them each to say a kneeling prayer at the end and it was precious...
"Dear Heavenly Father, I just wanna thank you for sending these sisters to my door. I know it's a sign from you. Thanks for answering my prayer."
The spirit was SO thick in that room. They both recognized it as well. I love asking investigators how they feel. In my opinion, it's the best question to ask. Mishayla smiled after we asked her how she felt and she just lifted up her arm and said, "LOOK! I have goose bumps." :)
We have a return appointment with them this week. STOKED.
-Yesterday after church, Sister Moore offered the prayer as she asked Heavenly Father to guide us to people who were truly ready. We went biking towards a neighborhood that we wanted to tract. On the way there, we found a cute lady named Audra who was sitting outside on her porch. (thank goodness for the south and their porches). We started talking with her about her life and she opened up to us a lot and told us about all of the medical problems she is having. (People are SO open here in the south). We asked her if we could share a scripture with her in which she replied saying, "sure! can you please share one from The Book of Mormon? Just share one of the popular verses that y'all use a lot. I want to know more about it." UM. WHAT? This never happens y'all. It was crazy. NO ONE EVER ASKS US TO SHARE A SCRIPTURE FROM THE BOOK OF MORMON.
(We usually share a scripture from it with people and they end up loving the scripture and ask us where they can find that scripture in their bible and then we explain it's only in The Book of Mormon and then they usually become all defensive)
BUT AUDRA IS SO OPEN. We handed her a copy of The Book of Mormon and she said, "Oh no. I can't take that from you. I don't have any money." NO AUDRA. IT'S FOR FREE!!!! She was so excited to get it!!!! She then asked us if we had ever seen the movie "17 miracles" about the pioneers. um. what. She told us that she watched it just 2 weeks ago and cried through the whole thing. hahaha she told us every story that happened in that movie. She is basically already Mormon and we are seeing her again tomorrow. So excited. People are being prepared left and right!!!!!!!
-Diamond and Marquarious are doing great!!!! They both came to mutual on Wednesday night and loved it! Marquarious is shy so he stayed with us as we did crafts with the Young women :) hahaha it was great!!!! Diamond also went on a hike with all the young women in the stake on saturday morning and LOVED IT!!!!!!! She was able to make so many new friends and all the young women love her.
They were unfortunately not able to come to church yesterday because their aunt unexpectedly is in the hospital and they stayed all day with her yesterday.
It was so cute because at church yesterday, all of the young women leaders came up to us and asked us where Diamond was and even gave us cute hand outs that they made for her. GAH. I love this ward so much :)
-Brother Mack is such a stud. He is still doing really well!!!! He is so faithful. When we saw him last sunday, he told us his experience with fasting and how hard it was for him because it was his first time doing it, but he told us that God answered His prayer right away :)
-I went on two exchanges this past week with some AMAZING SISTERS!!!! I LOVE EXCHANGES. I was able to be with Sister Nelson in Sylacuaga and we were able to have so many wonderful lessons. I learned so much from her. I'm grateful for her love and her unconditional service that she renders. We taught the Plan of Salvation to a family of 3 kids. The 10 year old girl totally shocked me with how much she knew. She was asking such deep questions!!!! Little kids just remember and know God at such a different level than adults. She was a great example to me of just being humble and being willing to ask questions.
I also had the opportunity to be with Sister Taylor and serve in Leeds with her for the day. Holy cow. I didn't know Sister Taylor at all before the exchange because she is a new sister in the zone and has only been out for 3 transfers, but wow, we became best friends right away! SHE IS HILARIOUS. I wish I knew her beforehand, but I'm glad I finally got to meet her!!! She is the most humble sister I know and I learned so much. We were able to have some good talks about life and she is such a strong person. We were able to teach some workers outside of walmart about The Book of Mormon and Sister Taylor was so excited afterwards. She just said, "SISTER PLATT. I HAVE NEVER DONE THAT BEFORE. THAT WAS SO COOL TO TEACH THEM JUST OUTSIDE OF WALMART." I am so grateful for the leaders who taught me how to be bold and I'm grateful for the chance I had to show her how to do it as well. Heavenly Father is so great to us!!!!!
That is about it for this week!!!!! There are so many other things that happened, but I don't have much time left. I KNOW Heavenly Father lives and answers prayer. He really does. Here are some quotes that I LOVE about prayer:
"Have we prayed about it as much as we have talked about it?"
"Fight all of your battles on your knees and you will win everytime."
"Satan tries to limit your prayers because your prayers limit him."
"What if you woke up tomorrow with only the things you thanked God for today?"
"If you don't have time to pray and read your scriptures you are busier than your Heavenly Father ever intended you to be."
CAN I GET AN AMEN????? AMEN!!!!!!!!!!!!
I urge y'all to kneel down every night and morning and offer up a prayer to Heavenly Father. Let Him know EVERYTHING!!!!!!!!! HE WILL ANSWER.
In other news...
-We met a guy yesterday who owns a company that makes camoflauge hot tubs... He showed us pictures on his phone of him with Si from "duck dynasty" in one of his hot tubs. NBD. Just met Si's best friend yesterday.
-Only in the south do they have a congregation that goes hunting on sunday and then has a church service out in the woods with all the animals they killed.
-(referring to southerners) "We die young, but we eat better" ---random guy we tracted into.
-"You is precious. May God bless you and prosper you." ----cute old man complimenting Sister Moore and us. #lovethepeoplehere
-We are going to the mall today!!!!!! #haven'tbeentoamallmywholemission #thisismyfirstareawithamall
-I'm sorry for this email being ALL OVER the place. Thanks for dealing with my scattered brain every monday. yikes.
-I saw t-swift's new cd @ walmart and a little part inside me died a little. SO WEIRD to think I haven't listened to her in quite a long time. #misstswizzle #missionsareworththesacrifice
-Brother Gause is still coming to church :)
I love y'all so much! I'm so grateful for my life and this mission. Prayers work. Jesus Christ lives. The truth is back on the earth. Just pray about it and God WILL answer you. HAVE CONFIDENCE IN THE ANSWER YOU RECEIVE AND FOLLOW THE PROMPTINGS.
MYKY,
Sister Platt
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