members are so awesome

Hey all!! 

We have eaten at many members houses over the past weeks. People would always tell me to be careful not to eat too much in the beginning courses so that I have room for the later courses of the meal, but I never really new what they were talking about until this past Sunday. We ate with this one couple (I'll send a picture) and it was so so good as always, but oh my heck, talk about trials! Usually they say as long as you eat slower than the host you can escape them continually piling on tons of food on your plate, but with this meal, we could not eat fast enough! Half-way through the meal I realized I could loosen my belt, but after awhile even that didn't help. Towards the end, everytime I took a bight, I sort of wondered if that one was going to be the one to make my stomach pop. Haha

This week we did the smoking workshop. We had prepared so much, passing out fliers, talking to people, handing out billitini's, and working with the members to invite their friends by word of mouth or social media. We created a slide presentation and had everything set up for the course. Hours before, one of our investigators called and said her brother had fallen and possibly broken his leg so she couldn't come. We were pretty sad because we had high hopes for this course with her, but we continued preparing for the course. Turns out, no one showed up at all to the course. It had the chance to be very discouraging and sad. We had put a lot of hope in this course with our goals and plans. We didn't want to believe it was reality. I remember pausing after realizing no one was going to come and just thinking I could allow this to discourage us or we could just keep pushing and looking for opportunities to serve. I remember feeling such a surreal and warm peace come over me. I know we had done our part and that was all that mattered. I know God will bless us because of our effort. 30 or so minutes after the course was supposed to start, a member came. We hadn't asked her to come, but she decided on her own to drop by and bring her testimony to share with the people at the course (She had once been a smoker before baptism and had quite in a very miraculous way). Even though there were no people in the workshop, just having her there was a profound testimony to me. The members are so awesome! Honestly, never underestimate your power as a member for the missionaries. We have seen so many blessings from having the members with us in lessons and just helping us contact and fellowship people.

I know God is with me and the members are so solid and supportive. It is so inspiring. Thank you for all your prayers. I feel them! I know this gospel is true and Jesus Christ is the head of this work. There's no one else who's name I would like to take upon me and serve under.  

Love you all! Anziano Stucki.