Beautiful Des Moines



Beautiful Des Moines

Dear Family & Friends:

Have I ever mentioned how much I love Des Moines?  Because I do! I love the area, the city, the people, the ward, being so close to the mission home and office, etc.  And I would be completely fine with staying in Des Moines for the next 9 months.  I can't believe that I have already been in Des Moines for nearly 4 months and that another transfer is coming up on the 27th of March. 

Working on my talk.

Last Monday evening we went and visited the Dalton family, but when Sister Dalton came to let us into the building she mentioned that Brother Dalton (who is in the Bishopric) had been making phone calls trying to find speakers for this coming Sunday.   being the loving, caring companion that I am I quickly volunteered Sister Brown.  It reminded me of the days of being in a trio with Sister Thompson and Sister Cox, because the three of us were always volunteering one another by saying "Sister Cox would love to play the piano" or "Sister Call would love to say the prayer" etc.  At first I thought that I would get out of speaking since it was high council week, but Brother Dalton asked if both of us would speak.  Sister Brown's topic was Blessings we receive from the Atonement, and my topic was teachings from the Book of Mormon that we learn about the Atonement.  Which it was such a blessing to study more about the Atonement and the examples we find in the Book of Mormon.  What a wonderful thing it is to have the Book of Mormon in our lives.  That it is another Testament of Jesus Christ, and ultimately another Testament of His Atonement.  As well as a handbook/guidebook of how we can access the blessings of the Atonement in our own lives! 

Hermana Hunter was freezing
 so we bundled her up in our cold weather gear.

On Tuesday Hermana Hunter was able to spend the day with us, since her companions had a meeting in Iowa City.  It was so fun to be in a trio for the day, even though it is a bit more awkward standing on doorsteps when there are three of you instead of just two, but other than that I love trio's!  Exciting news, last night we received a phone call letting us know that Sister Whipple will be spending the day with Sister Brown and I tomorrow, since her companion is a Nauvoo visitor center missionary and will be going on the departing missionaries temple trip. 

This week was full of dropped appointments, not only for us, but for the elders in our ward as well. But we still had miracles take place! 

 

Thursday we had zone training meeting, and we were supposed to go meet with Jackie right after the meeting.  So we got in our car to head over and we received a text from Jackie, telling us thank you, but that she wanted to walk this path to God alone.  I had no idea how much I loved Jackie, until we got this text and I just started to cry, because it broke my heart, because she is so prepared and I wanted her to experience the joy that comes from the gospel.  Sister Brown and I decided to still drop by Jackie's that evening and it was amazing!  We were able to talk for a while and she is still reading and studying from the Book of Mormon, and we can still stop by every once in a while to see how she is doing. 

 

Right after visiting Jackie, we decided to go and drop by a referral we had received from the hermanas, but she has been hard to catch at home.  But amazingly both she and her dad were home.  So we knocked on the door and her dad, Gary answered the door.  Now the last time that Gary was home when Sofia was not, we gave Gary a Restoration pamphlet.  Anyways, Gary had mentioned that he had tried finding our church but wasn't able to, so we described how to get there again, but then he told us that Sofia was in her car and that we could go and disturb her.  We were able to go and talk with Sofia and set up an appointment for this coming Friday!

 

So fast forward to yesterday,  Sister Brown and I had gone and placed our bags up on the stand and Sacrament meeting was going to start in a couple of minutes, but we decided to go and stand by the door to welcome people as they came.  We walked over to the door, and the Elders were standing by that door, and Sister Brown and I had thought of going over to the other entrance, but decided to stay at this doorway.  I then look outside and see Gary and I am pretty sure my heart about jumped out of my chest!  He walked in the door and goes to introduce himself to the Elders when he looks over and sees Sister Brown and I and he said "those are the two angels who came to my house for my daughter and ended up getting me instead."  I could not stop smiling the entire time during Sacrament Meeting, even though I was going to be speaking.  Well it all went well and after Sacrament Meeting we went and talked with Gary and he is so excited to learn and so we are going over tonight to teach him!  Yesterday as we were driving home from church I was just overwhelmed at how merciful our Father in Heaven is!  That He loves each of us so much and blesses us with things that we don't even deserve.  Also, this week I learned that the majority of times we don't realize that we are being guided by the Spirit until after something has happened and we look back on the events that took place. 

 

I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week!

Love, Sister Call