Six Month Mark

Dear everyone,

Today is my six months mark! Every time that I look at a picture of Jem I remember that he has about the same age as me in the mission! And sometimes I feel like it too. I've still got a long ways to go and a lot of things to learn.

This was a good week. We have been really working on contacting more people. Yesterday we watched an émission with Elder Caussé and it was so inspiring. He told us that is not that there are people out there that we are going to coerce to get baptised. On the contrary. There are people who are waiting and wanting the gospel and we are there to give it to them! He talked to the Nice stake and told them that in the years we can double the the thousand members of we doubles ourselves. Wow! Also Soeur Caussé spoke about how things will happen in our lives that we hadn't planned or wanted and in those times we should just adapt ourselves for the better and cling to what doesn't change: our Heavenly Father's love and his plan for us. I loved that.

This week we met President Giraud-Carrier and his wife and son and daughter! They are super! Really solid and faithful. I really love and respect them already and I'm excited to learn from their experiences. They both grew up in France so it's ideal!

Also we had a good lesson with our ami Christian this week. We finished the gospel of the Jésus Christ focusing on baptism, the gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end. But we revisited faith and repentance. Actually he was really touched when we talked about being purified from our sins and even started crying. It was super sweet because he was trying to hide it. We think he felt the Spirit but he hadn't learned to recognise it yet. We going to continue to help him to do that. We invited him to be baptized but he insisted that he needed to reflect on it because he said it was serious for him. He's getting there. :) At the beginning of the lesson he asked me to give the prayer. We didn't even ask if we could have one. :) Then at the end he prayed. It was a prayer of a mixture of French and Italian and it was beautiful.

I'm going à little everywhere, but yesterday I gave a talk in sacrament about missionary work. I told the story you told me, Madre, from your stake conference. For the third hour we were asked to help in primary with the music so I got to play the children's Hymns for a game. I LOVE primary! I hope I can pick up that calling again after the mission. :)

I also learned a lot from a talk by Elder Cook about the four loves of missionaries. He talked at the end about learning to live the Lord. He said that we need to increase our knowledge of doctrine, witness His hand in our lives and receive spiritual promptings, see the Atonement work in the lives of others, and act in a consecrated fashion. All of those points and his additions to each really struck me. I've decided to look for a miracle every day in order to see His hand better.

This week the foot matches continue. We went out to work and all of the sudden the air erupted in shouts and cheering and horns blowing. France had won a match against Uruguay. People drove through the streets honking horns with their French flags out the windows.

Another thing is there are some pretty mean mosquitoes here. I counted 19 bites on one calf this week. XP Also there are these bugs that are in the trees called Cigales that make a lot of noise! I'm not sure what they are in English....

For my six months we went out to a restaurant for a French meal. It was delicious! I tried fois gras and noix de Saint Jacques and sea bass and duck! Sœur Stucki and I shared our plats so we got to try double the amount of things. :)

But really this was a good week. I felt power beyond my own this week. There are days when we go to sleep not seeing how we'll make it through another day but we make it anyways. Those are the days we know it's not just us. The Lord is there to help us. :)

I am so, so grateful for this gospel. I'm so grateful for the Atonement. I read in Moroni this week the verse that says that all good things from Christ. That means that every blessing that we have, every single thing that is good comes from Him. Without Him we would have nothing, we would be nothing now, and be would never ever be anything in the future. I know He is our Savior. He has truly prepared the way for us to return to Heaven in the future and to be as close as possible to Heaven during our earthly life.

Thank you for all that you do!

Sœur Marriott

Our French meal: Noix Saint Jacques, Fois gras, sea bass, canard, macaron, ananas et glace noix de coco