We finally moved! HURRAY!! My new address is: 2 Rue Du Lieutenant Ohresser 94130 Nogent-Sur-Marne FRANCE. But we don't have a doorbell system...which makes packages tricky. So if you want to send packages, you can just send them to the Elders apartment! Which is my old address.
La Famille Lam Yam. Windy Lam Yam is from Tennessee and I ADORE her! Her husband is chinese, but was raised in France. Their Son, Ryan, is 4 years old and speaks a very hilarious and constant stream of Franglais.
Our new apartment is SOOOO
adorable!! Creaky old wood floors, windy staircases, blue doors with ancient
door handles, windows with shutters, and a real live fireplace.
On my new bed with some home
made squash soup.
Our fireplace with our Christmas tree we found in a closet
and our little fake fire (made from little fake candles that my mom sent me in
my birthday package).
I gave my first
talk on the mission in church yesterday! In French. Just a few notes and my
PMG [Preach My Gospel]. I am usually pretty terrified of these sort of things, but even with only
about a days notice I was feeling pretty calm. I think my pride and any sort of
fear of what other humans think of me has been smeared all over the streets of France
so much, I don't know if I have much left. And now it's all becoming very, very
clear why returned missionaries can be so awkward. When you have to push
through the awkward and the abnormal for that long, you become immune. This
probably means I am turning into one of those weirdo missionaries. Well.
It can't be too
bad because people still like us. :) Especially Australian girls named
Katherine who woof in far away lands and then hang out with you on P-days. She
was seriously the most adorable girl ever. We talked all about our families,
our normal human lives, and then also about how many girls are serving
missions. I hope she serves. I know it's not for everyone, and girls aren't
mandated. But this has seriously been the best decision of my entire life.
Someone gave me some really great advice when I was trying to decide whether or
not I was supposed to serve. "You will never regret serving a mission, but
you might regret not serving." It's really true. If the Lord prompts
you, just do it.
So last week at stake conference... we met a
girl named Katherine from Australia who is just here by herself doing this
thing called woofing. (Which I am doing after my mission...in England...with
Soeur Garrett.) So the next day, we met her at Disneyland Paris and hung out!
We can't go in, but we just hung out in Disney village and wandered through the
shops and talked. LOVE THIS GIRL.
Our feet...on the world in Disneyland.
Disneyland with our Australian friend and the
Torcy Soeurs.
I LOVE DISNEYLAND.
But I'll be
honest, missions are incredible and also really hard. When I arrived in Nogent,
I felt like things were slow starting. I felt so out of place. Nancy was my
home. Here in Nogent, I didn't have that deep profound love for my city and my
investigators that I had in the east. I felt like a blue again... but minus all
the miracles.
Where had the
miracles gone? I was feeling pretty discouraged and just wanted to see even
just a few fruits of our labors. I just wanted to feel like I was in the right
place, here with these people for a reason, and even making a dent. I spent a
week praying about it, thinking about it, and mulling it over in my mind. Then
one day, I got a random letter from my dear beautiful Soeur Rhondeau in
Versailles. Inside was a little birthday letter and a talk.
The talk was
called 'Raising your Ebenezer.' It talks about the story in Samuel where the
Lord saves them from the Philistine armies. After this great miracle had
occured, 'Then Samuel took a stone, and set it between Mizpeh and Shen, and
called the name of it Eben-ezer, saying, Hitherto hath the Lord helped us.' (1
Samuel 7:12) On the footnote of this verse it says that eben-zer means stone of
help. The stone was a reminder to everyone of the great miracle they had seen
and how the Lord had saved them.
Like all humans,
without reminders of what the Lord had already done for them, they were prone
to forget. Prone to wander. As I was reading this talk, this voice ran through
my mind:
Maybe you saw more
miracles before because you expected the miracles. Maybe you saw more miracles
before because you were looking for the miracles. Maybe you saw more miracles
before because you counted the miracles. Maybe you saw more miracles
before because you were grateful for the miracles.
And I realized
that it really wasn't that I wasn't seeing miracles. I have seen incredible
things here in Nogent. From teaching a lady living with her boyfriend about
something completely different... but then after the prayer, her stopping us
and saying that she realized during the prayer that she needs to either marry
her boyfriend or move out. To opening up to random chapters in my French book
and learning a handful of new words... and then having my amie use those exact
words later during our lesson and being able to understand clearly the worries
and needs of her heart. But how soon I forget... if I don't acknowledge it
and show my gratitude.
So this is my
new goal this week. I'm raising my ebenezer. Making sure I don't let any little
miracles slip by without me writing them down and thanking God for them. This
is for my family. This is for my children. This is for my grandchildren. And
this is also for me. If I ever find myself doubting my testimony years down the
road, I hope I remember to come back and read my journals.
It's like the
story in Joshua 4 where the children of Israel cross the river Jordan after the
Lord parts the waters again. And then Joshua builds a monument of stones so
that they can always remember. 'That this may be a sign among you, that when
your children ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean ye by these
stones? Then ye shall answer them, That the waters of Jordan were cut off before
the ark of the covenant of the Lord; when it passed over Jordan, the waters of
Jordan were cut off: and these stones shall be for a memorial unto the children
of Israel for ever.' (Joshua 4:6-7)
I want my
children and grandchildren to know that God brought me through my river Jordan
on dry ground. He has done it over and over and over again. And he will do it
again for you.
Christ lives! He
is our Redeemer and Savior. God love us! He spoke yesterday, he speaks today,
and he will always speak to His children.
Happy
Thanksgiving! Show God you're grateful and raise your own ebenezer.
xoxo
Soeur Autumn
Bradley
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