Sleepy Hollow

Hola mi familia!

This week was definitely different but awesome! We had a lot of fun adventures and fabulous lessons. 

Halloween was definitely a highlight day of the week! We had to be home by six, so we took advantage of our break time and had girls night! We did nails, ate brownies, and just sat on the couch. Holy cow, it felt so good to sit down for a few hours and not feel any guilt ; ) This break time was a big tender mercy. 

Girl's night!!

Earlier in the day we had a lesson with our investigator, Paula.  She is INCREDIBLE. She is probably around the same age as us, but she has two kids, the oldest of which has Autism. In Preach my Gospel, it talks about how the Book of Mormon has the power to answer the questions of the soul. I have been waiting for about 2 months to be able to do a lesson where we use the Book to answer our investigators/member/whoever's questions of the soul. The idea is this: You explain that the Book of Mormon has the power to answer the questions of the soul because it is a book that comes directly from God.  Then you give your investigator/member a notecard and invite them to write down a few questions they may have about who God is, or what is their purpose in life, or how they can be a better parent.  Then, guided by inspiration of the Holy Ghost, we use the Book of Mormon to answer their question!  We decided to use this game plan with Paula.  After praying, we invited her to write down a question.  She doesn't have tons of knowledge about God, so I expected it to be something along the lines of "How do I know God exists?" or something like that. Paula sits and thinks for a little bit, then writes down her question and slides her notecard over to us.  Sister Brower and I glance at it: "Will there ever be a cure for autism?" We both have looks on our face that say, "What the heck have we gotten ourselves into?!?"  This was a little far from what we expected and really specific! We weren't dealing with finding a scripture about God's love or finding joy through repentance, we were dealing with a very serious question where the answer wasn't specifically written out as "the cure for autism is blankkity blank blank blank."

We decide to have Paula pray and ask God her question directly and ask for her (and us!!) to be guided through the Book of Mormon to an answer.  She prayed a sweet humble prayer, asking her question, and then we sat there just kind of waiting a bit for revelation.  Sister Brower tells Paula that sometimes when she wants an answer she just flips open the book and sometimes it is there.  So Paula flips open the book and starts reading.  Just our luck, Paula had found the chapter where the Lamanites swear vengeance on the Nephites and say they are going to spill their blood.  Loooovelyyy.  The Spirit takes over and the incredible Sister Brower explains how we can relate the war chapters to our lives and how we sometimes have hard challenges, but the Lord always provides.  The Spirit then brought to our minds Alma 11:40-45, which we had just read the week previous.  These verses talk about the power of the Resurrection, that it is a free gift to everyone, and that through the Resurrection we will have perfect bodies, without even a hair of our heads missing.  We read and testified to Paula that while her son may or may not have a perfect body here, in the life to come and for eternity after, he will be perfect, free from illness or disabilities.  The Spirit was soo powerful  as we expounded upon the scriptures.  WE JUST FREAKING FOUND THE CURE FOR AUTSIM IN THE BOOK OF MORMON!!! What the heck is that??!?!!  The Spirit was definitely our teacher and guide through God's words.  Paula said she felt "at peace" with the answer we had found.  I felt my testimony of revelation, and especially of the Book of Mormon strengthened.  It HAS to be a book from God, and it definitely has the power  to answer the questions of the soul. 

Later that day we went to Sleepy Hollow to do some Halloween APFs! (finding activity)  Sleepy Hollow is the home of the Legend of Sleepy Hollow/ The Headless Horseman, and the town goes all out for Halloween.  Just on normal days all their street signs and fire trucks are painted orange and black!  During October everything is amplified. We decided to do face painting and it was such a big success. We painted tons of faces and talked to tons of people from all over the Tri-state area who were all coming to town to see the Halloween Parade. (Which started right after our curfew :(     As it got later and later people started to dress up. I seriously felt like I was doing missionary work in the Disney Channel movie "Halloween Town". Hahaha. It was a really successful happy day. 

Sleepy Hollow

We have seen lots of miracles this week, including on Monday we had an FHE with Sandra and her husband and kids! Sandra and Leon had told us that their kids are really not interested and don't care for church or God, but as we taught them they really opened up and had tons and tons of questions for us.   We hope they will keep progressing and learning. 

I know this Gospel is a family based Gospel!  We have testified time and time again of the power that Jesus Christ and His teachings have to strengthen the family. I know that as we LIVE what we are taught, that He will amplify our abilities to love one another and have peace in our homes. 

Love you all,

Sister Dodson