5/18/15: Light Worth Living...and And Living.

Hey everyone!

This week was great! I feel like I just emailed! So we had some miracles this past week! We met with this lady named Melodie. Another person we are teaching invited us to come over and share with her uplifting messages, and so we went over. Her house is currently being remodeled and it was very distracted when we went over, but we shared with her our testimonies and mostly just listened to her as she opened up about some struggles in her life right now. So yay! We are teaching her now!

So last week when I was sick, Sister Eyden had called absolutely everyone in the area book. She had set up a dinner with the "G" family. Craig and Valerie had had missionaries tract into them before and had let them in to leave a house blessing and had chatted for a while with them and then nothing more every really came of it, but they had had missionaries a long long time before that too, apparently, and so they had offered to feed the sisters at had left a house blessing. That was a few months ago. They were excited to feed us.
Well, earlier that day we had some emergency meetings in our zone, so our zone leaders drove us out to a neighboring town to meet with another companionship out there, and earlier that day we had had a zone service project at a local park spreading mulch. It's really cool because their church has a new website called "Just Serve" and the city of Davis just picked it right up, and we do a lot of service
projects weekly in the community, and this is one of those ongoing service projects. Every month we spread mulch. It's great; I love it. It gives me time to just worked with my body and to give my head a
break. And it's a lot of fun with the zone! So we did that Saturday morning. Then we went to this meeting. Long story short here has just been a little drama and miscommunication and it wasn't as big a deal as some thought. So yeah, then we went back to our dinner with the G family, and it was weird, because I realized as the elders dropped Sister Eyden and I off at their front door that we didn't even know these people, and now hey we're going to feed us and let us teach them the gospel. I don't know why it was such a big deal to me, because that is what is supposed to happen, right? But for some reason, it just felt surreal.

We went in, and they visited with us. We thought we were just chatting while dinner finish cooking, but then Valerie got up and out something in the oven. So then we chatted for a longer bit. They are really family oriented. They are both middle aged, with their son and daughter both in college. They showed us there house, and tons of pictures. They made hints at the gospel now and then, but would not ever go into detail.
For dinner we ate the best salmon and asparagus I had ever had, with a roasted pepper sauce on rice, and rolls. As we ate our candlelight dinner, we talked even more about there life. I started to sense a bit of sadness and longing when they shared certain things with us. Out of nowhere, a question popped out of my mouth. "What is one thing that you did that made all the difference in your parenting." Craig shared how he felt it was that they out there kids first. They talked about how their kids aren't the most religious, but how they are good, and have high moral standards. They talked about technology and about how they put the family first and how that was their top priority.

Then after that we helped clean up a bit and asked if we could share a message. They Saturday s back down in the living, right where we started. The day before, my companion had been inspired to share the Because He Lives video,

https://www.lds.org/media-library/video/2015-04-1010-he-lives-celebrate-easter-because-jesus-christ-lives?lang=eng

 and so we did.
Craig was noticeably different. Usually talkative and confident in a cheery way, he was now still, deeply touched, hand on chin, and deep in thought. Valerie was crying. None of us said anything.

The spirit is a funny feeling.
On my mission, I have felt many things, all emotions in their vast array, depths that I didn't understand before my mission. In the process, I have come to realize that with me, very rarely does the spirit make me cry, but if you had asked me that a few years ago, I would have told you that every time I feel the spirit I cry. The difference is not in me, I have learned; the difference is that now I am constantly looking for the spirit, and so now I know better what it feels like, and all the many ways it reaches out and touches me. Each of us react differently when we feel the spirit, and each individual
is in their own life touched by the spirit in different ways in each different circumstance they are presented with. It has been amazing insist past week. I have started to notice it in the little things. As a member of the church, having entered into the covenant of baptism, and having received the Holy Ghost, and accepted the Atonement of Jesus Christ, I have learned that truly that Holy Ghost can be with me at all times. I have learned this as a missionary especially in times where I have lost the spirit by some act of disobedience or in a situation where someone else has done something that would cause a loss of the spirit. I have felt the spirit in a voice of warning telling me and my companion to flee very real darkness, and I have also felt the peaceful, curiosity that it strikes within me, guiding me, and also the confident certainty that the way we were going was the right path. This may seem off topic, but hold onto what I just said for a moment about the G family, and also about the spirit, and how I've learned to notice it.

I read a scripture this morning that has stuck in my brain, a jewel I have never before even noticed.
"And I do this for a wise purpose; for thus it whispereth me, according to the workings of the Spirit of the Lord which is in me. And now, I do not know all things; but the Lord knoweth all things which are to come; wherefore, he worketh in me to do according to his will."
Words of Mormon 1:7

It's a whisper. The Spirit is a whisper. Now, here is another thing that you have to know about me, that I'm sure most of you know anyway. I can't hear anything. Really. I have bad hearing, so most of the other missionaries I serve around know that they have to speak up when they are speaking to me, otherwise I am lost because I don't understand. Now, what does Sister Miller's hearing (or lack of it) have to do with the Spirit?

Most of the time, we ask "why aren't we getting our answers!" Now, if we are a little smarter, we might ask "Why aren't we hearing our answers?"

Unlike hearing noise, hearing the spirit is something we have to tune ourselves to. The reality of it, is that we are spiritually deafened, and that to hear the precious message that  the world drowns out we
have to pull our head out of the world, and put ourselves in a place to receive answers... A place where we can hear the whisper, a place where the whisper can no longer be drowned out.

The other thing that I have learned is that when we have put ourselves, our lives, our attitudes into a place where we are humble enough and willing enough with real intent to get answers, there is still another problem that we may face. The problem is that we may have spent so much time in the world,
without trying to hear the spirit, that we forget what it is like, especially for us.  We have to learn to understand, and that takes time and practice. It is like a relationship. It takes time.

So the reason I say this is this past week, as I have been sitting in lessons, I have had countless experiences where I feel the spirit, but not in the usual whole body tingling sensation, or in the rush of joy feeling inside, although those are some ways that I do definitely feel the spirit in lessons at just the right moments. I have been learning that if I listen more often, I I hear Him more often. It is like a
steady hand on your shoulder feeling, but on your heart more. I'm still trying to figure out how to describe it, but it is really cool. Just because the spirit isn't saying something specific doesn't mean He isn't with you at all times. The only time that He leaves is when you leave him by any disobedience in act or feeling of your own choice, otherwise, the spirit is just always with you.


Anyway, I relate all this to you because I felt this during the G family lesson. I felt the ebb and flow of the spirit.... When He too was just whispering, and when He was whispering something specific and strong, just for them. It was a really cool feeling and I just can't quite explain it. But during their lesson, they expressed the health hardships they have had, and also, out of the blue, right after one of
those silences during which the spirit was strong, and Craig asked me why I had asked about their parenting. I told him because the family is important. Immediately he followed up with asking us what is the thing that is most precious to us that draws us to the gospel. Sister Eyden and I just looked at each other. :) we had the same exact answer.

We spoke of eternal families, and eternal marriage and the blessings that Heavenly Father has given to us through His Son, and how it is through Jesus Christ that we can be together forever.

They soaked it all up, had many questions about baptism, and we invited them to read the Book of Mormon and to pray and ask if it true. They were a little hesitant, but Craig said that he was going to
search through all the videos on lds.org because he has been looking for a while. They both felt it. My question is do they know that they felt it?


I know that this gospel is true. My mind is turned back to the experience I had with the WeLick as and Sister Whimpey, where we both proclaimed with everything inside of us that "I know. I know for
myself the gospel is true." It is no longer just a believe sort of thing, I know now, but that is how it started. And like the scripture at I shared earlier states, "I do not know all things, but the Lord knoweth all things; wherefore, he worketh in me to do according to his will." I know that He knows
everything. And I know that He knows, and I know it because of the whispering so of the spirit, and the feelings of the spirit that has filled my whole soul with light... Light worth living.



So pray for us. I feel your prayers. Pray for those we teach, they feel it, even if they don't yet know it. Pray that they will recognize their answers, and also pray for yourself, that you will recognize answers that come through the Spirit.
Moroni 10:6-7

I love all of you, and love your support.

Love, Sister Miller