Monday, December 23, 2013

Il est né le divin enfant! Chantons tous son avènement!

Get ready to laugh. I had a TOTAL kales moment yesterday...
but first an update on this incredible week of CHRISTMAS MIRACLES,
Our boy Jimmy is progressing splendidly. He is really changing and it is amazing to witness. We taught him this week about the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and specifically invited him to be baptized on the 11th, and he said YES! His only concern, "wait, you said I have to wear white socks...but what if I only have beige?" Take one guess at what we got him for Christmas...haha. At church on Sunday we had a lesson about Exaltation, and afterwards I saw him staring at the pictures of the temple. I told him that it was even more beautiful on the inside, and he just smiled. Then in sacrament meeting they announced a baptisms temple trip for the young adults in February, and he leaned over to us with his agenda open and said, "when did they say that was?", ahhhh yeahhhhhh.
We also met this week with an ami named Rose. She is from the Philippines, and has met with the missionaries on and off since the summer time.  She is just a little BALL of joy. I really love her! And she came to church on Sunday for the first time ever, and CRIED because she "felt it so strong in here." She wants to bring her friends to the church next week!
Viola, the BIG happenings from the amis côté, but now... story time: the best chain of events yet to happen on my mission.
After dinner yesterday night we set out to do some Christmas Porting with the formula that Président gave us last week at zone conference which consists of asking if we can sing a Christmas hymn and pray with the people who we meet. As soon as we got on the tram we started talking with this adorable family with a mom, dad and two kids. The mom asked us if we were like the bonne soeurs (nuns) and I said no, and jokingly told her that I was excited to get married one day. We ended up talking a little more about why we are here and what we do as missionaires, but then they had to get off, and it didn't really go anywhere. Welllll then we got off and started walking down the road and this man walked up to us and said, "you know I am really curious about what you said in there..." I started asking him about his beliefs (muslim, already knew before I asked), and told him that he could meet with the elders if he wanted to know more. "But wait, I thought you said on the tram that you were here to get married..." HAHA. Once I explained to him that no, we were here to talk about Jesus he ran away, but he gave us a good little laugh and set the tone for the crazy night we were about to have. We continued on our way after that and started porting. The first house we knocked on was the cutest little family with a mom, dad, and two kids. They had just celebrated Christmas, and were more than willing to let us in their house, and film us while we sang for them in front of their picture perfect Christmas tree. They were so cute, and I'm excited to pass by them again soon. After them we continued porting and getting rejected by the ONLY country in the world that would turn down Christmas carolers. Then we came to a big house and rang the fence doorbell, which would allow us to get into their front yard and knock on their door. We rang it and were immediately let in, solid. Then we knocked on the front door and no one answered. Which would have been fine except that we were now locked in their front yard. We stood there for a decent 5 minutes in confusion before I said, "well I'm not sitting in here all night". So I hiked up my skirt and starting climbing their big green fence. Just as I had one leg hiked up ready to jump over THE ENTIRE EXTENDED FAMILY came outside. I hopped back down and tried to pull down my skirt as fast as I could and start explaining myself in French. Thankfully they were all a little drunk and found it hilarious. They still didn't let us sing for them, but they did let us out, and for that I was very grateful. A night like this had to end with a super spectacular miracle right? right. As we were heading back to our apartment...if I can call it that... I sent our statistics to the district leader, and then realized that it was 8:57, so I asked Soeur Francis if we could do one more house, she was obviously down. We walked a little bit up our street and knocked on the door of a beautiful Portuguese family  who let us right in to sing for them. After we sang we talked a little bit about why we are here, and then asked if we could pray with them, they said yes, so I asked if they had any specific needs. They asked if we could pray for their brother who was sick, and we prayed. The mother was really touched and told us that she would love for us to come back after Christmas. Viola, a last minute miracle, and a beautiful family who is willing to see us again! I LOVE CHRISTMAS ON THE MISSION!!! It is blessed.
Well y'all I really love ya. I have LOVED reading all of the letters everyday from those who contributed to my cute Christmas advent. You really are TOO good to me. Family, I CANNOT wait to see your faces in 2 DAYS!! Speaking of which...we are getting to the family Tournoux's house at 4:00, Paris time. I want to let Soeur Francis go first for sure, so that should put us around 5:30. So be around a phone slash computer at 10:30ish Texas time, okay?!?!?! Also, pray that we can skype. They have a tablet, that has skype, but they say that sometimes it doesn't work great. But prayer works....so it shouldn't be a problem.
MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!   
Love, kales.