Met Some Interesting Characters This Week

Hey yall! Hopefully this one isn't that long haha but I've got some interesting characters I met this week so I hope yall are excited to hear about them😅

December 30

HOLY SHIRT BALLS

SO MUCH GOOD HAPPENED

We had our regular morning then we stopped by someone we are trying to teach to set up a lesson and give them a book of mormon

Their names are Emir and Maya. We met them because we went knocking in the neighborhood of a part member family. They are from Yugoslavia and came to America 30 years ago to escape the wars happening there! Anywho, Emir was the one that popped out to talk to us since Maya is still sick. We talked to him about what the book of mormon is and then he said he was happy to receive it to learn more about religions. He also noted that its interesting that so many wars have started because of religion. He also mentioned something about our life with God before this life. THIS WAS PERFECT! He literally set us up perfectly to teach the plan of salvation! So I asked if we could show him what we know by using my wooden set and we taught him the whole lesson on the plan of salvation!!! 

I was kind of embarrassed but I hope you find it endearing: at the end of teaching the lesson I ended up crying😅 I think I was in the spirit and also I was so happy to finally teach someone this transfer! After I started crying, sister finch kind of took it from there and I held in my sobs until we ended the lesson and got to the car. I cried for like 5 more minutes and I had to explain to sister finch through my sobs that they were happy tears. She thought it was “cute” that I feel so much emotion and gave me a big hug in the car. After that she started laughing at me that I cried over teaching a lesson. But I'm just so happy to teach people! Ive been trying really hard not to view my success with numbers but it truly just makes me so happy to teach people. To share the plan of salvation with someone who's never heard it before is the biggest honor. What a wonderful plan we have!! And to think about how so few people know about it on earth today is baffling!! I feel so pumped even writing this right now and there's more blessings today!! (Context: this is from my journal on a google doc I have)

We went to quiktrip to get some sodas for us and the STLs because they helped us weekly plan. We saw how they daily plan and we asked questions as we did our own daily planning beside them. They also observed how we communicate with each other. After our time was over, they told us their observations and how we can improve. For my improvement, I need to not multitask so much because it stresses sister finch out lol.

In the middle of this weekly planning with the STLs, we had a phone call lesson with a guy named Henry! He was taught by missionaries in August and hasn't been baptized because of his demanding work schedule. We called him for 7 minutes and got him on date for January 17th!!!!!! WHAT A MIRACLE!!!! It was all sister finch btw, shes really good at customer service voice and being nice but getting straight to business. And she was able to do just that! We also have a return appointment with him this week!

We went to the car after our weekly planning with the STLs to do MORE weekly planning because sister finch's phone was almost dead and also we had to leave soon. We continued weekly planning for like 30 minutes then left for our dinner

After that, we had a lesson with Jamie!!

We didnt know if she even was going to open the door and let us teach her, but we brought a member to participate just in case, and she let us in!!

We taught her lesson 1 (the message of the restoration), gave her a bom (book of mormon), and we had her download gospel library so she could show her kids the bom videos!

Our lmp (lmp stands for lesson with member participating) was also super helpful, shes the bishops daughter in the pinery ward who's home for Christmas and she offered her help to us this week because he wants to be the member she never had on her mission😂. Super kind and she was that perfect member! Her added testimony was perfect imo

I wasn't able to use my wooden set my mom got me for Christmas but yk it's okay haha I can next time!

After Jamie, we went to the car and continued weekly planning. Another miracle is that a Grey dot texted us and asked to set up a time to meet!!!!!! WHAT A MIRACLE!!! Sister Finch and I were both squealing with excitement over this and the other blessings today! Our week has 6 lessons so far and I'm so excited! Also we aren't even finished planning our week😅 we still have Sunday and next Tuesday to go

BUT MAN TODAY WAS A GOOD DAY! 

December 31

Wow! This is the last entry of the year! Its so crazy im going to be sister moghimi ALL of next year! Thats so cool to me!

Anywho, we had walking interviews! 

We had to rush to get out the door cuz presidents house is an hour away but we still got mcdonalds😎 On the drive there tho, sister finch was driving in the blind spot of s truck carrying diesel oil😭😭😭 I started crashing out that she was so not fazed by the fact that was so dangerous. We couldn't come to a solution so I just shut up.

We get to walking interviews and wait like 10 ish minutes to start but its fine bcuz we were early anyways. 

Sister finch insists I go first and president and I start walking. 

My goal of this walking interview is that I wanted to know how to be a better comp and know why im with sister finch in Parker South

He said he's put me with the companions that I've had so far to be nudged in the right direction, rather than shoved. He also added that he wants me to become like soft clay in the lords hand, rather than an unmoldable rock (he gave me a rock he picked up on our walk to keep). But he didnt describe how to get there or what he wants me to learn while with sister finch specifically. He said that he prefers the holy ghost to do the heavy lifting on giving those answers. That pissed me off to hear it but I know its probably for the best in the end because its forcing me to listen to the holy ghost better.

I asked sister finch on the way home what her and president talked about and shes much more friendly versus wanting guidance when shes on a walking interview with president clawson. They talked about what sister finch should look for in a husband and some other things. I like that she isn't pressed to learn from president all the time. I want to have a relationship like that with him eventually. I just have a lot more I want to be guided on before I can get there.

We get home, get ready, do pstudy, watch president Holland funeral, do a mentoring session, lunch time, then we start pros time at 2pm

We stop by Julia, our referral we woke up to today, and shes not there but either her brother or husand is! We recheck the number and its wrong😂 So glad sister finch asked about it because we were able to call her that evening! She works 6pm to 6am which is so weird but now we know!

Next thing we do is comp study and we do it out of the back of our car at the end of Julia's neighborhood. We also do the rest of our pstudy in the car too. For my pstudy I read and listened to mosiah 11-13! Im using the audio from the book of mormon app and it's so helpful! It helps a lot because the voices change based on who's talking.

After that, we knock around our dinner’s house before our dinner appointment. No success but im glad we tried!

Our dinner was crazy tho!

They gave us a moving box full of food and treats! Theyre an old couple who used to be missionaries in our mission so they know how to be the best grandparents ever! Im honestly so hype to eat with them again because we will probably get more food😂 But I literally didnt buy groceries this week because I was planning on members giving us food and they did!! God is good bruh.

After that, we did knocking in one neighborhood then rest of the night. We were able to get in contact with a pmf (part member family) who's not interested at all but we met someone whos member friend invited them to church! So we hope to see him on Sunday and also we got two yellow dots! Im quite satisfied with our success on that. And I already have the 3x4s set up for them starting tomorrow!

Also I didnt stay up till midnight, I went to bed at 10:30pm like a good little missionary.

January 1, 26

HOLY CRAP ITS NEXT YEAR

And a lot happened today but not a lot of productivity unfortunately 

Okay the day starts off ordinary then we go to a pond in pinery to do comp study! We do comp study then go finding till lunch. Unfortunately we got sidetracked and it left us with 10 minutes to invite people to church.

After that we have lunch with the Dunfords! They're so nice and pleasant to talk to but we end up staying for basically two hours.

 

We rush to our next appointment (not actually but we were stressed lol), and meet sister Sanders at the friends house. Sister Sanders by the way was also a senior missionary in our mission who is so cool and happy to join us on lessons.

The lesson went to crap immediately haha. Hes a jew recently turned Christian but doesn't want to read the book of Mormon. We started talking to him in the first place because he used to be taught by other missionaries in the area and he responded to our mass text that we send out every Saturday to previously taught people. We were excited that he wanted us to come over but we end up figuring out that he just wants to talk to people. He tells us his story of his conversion to Christianity and how his friend who's a pastor is now his pastor. He told us he also is a celebrity in his church (he says it with pride) because of his story his pastor shares with everyone. He was bragging to us about him being a celebrity😂 Like we dont care bruh. 

The details are kind of blurry on our exact flow of conversation but basically we asked him if he is willing to put the same faith he now puts in the new testament, into the book of mormon and he essentially refuses to do so. He claims hes a history buff and tells us that there is no historical proof of Jesus visiting the Americas like the book of mormon says. I tried to ask if there's any historical proof of Jesus Christ period and he said yes but not in America. Clearly, this guy does not know everything.

Our sweet member, sister Sanders, that came with us, super politely tried to tell him and bring up new ideas to him that there is in fact proof of these religious things in history books but he strongly denied it so much that our member had to just shut herself up to be nice but i could tell she was ticked by him.

The conclusion of our hour long lesson (it was 30 minutes too long btw), was that when hes ready to read the book of mormon he knows where to find us. We will not be teaching him again until then.

We had a debrief with sister Sanders, and we thanked her for dealing with the friend lol. We recognized her efforts to be a disciple of Jesus Christ by her polite actions and she took the experience very constructively I think.

Then we stopped by julia, stopped by Maya, updated pmg, got gas, then traveled back home to eat dinner.

Sister finch reminded me that since the new years is a holiday, I could call my family! I did and it was nice to talk to them❤️ 

 

After that we did walmart finding but our district leader got in contact with us and we were on the phone with him and his comp for way too long so we couldn't do a lot of finding.

And yea not much of a finding day but tomorrow will be good! We've got a lot of lessons and im super excited for them!

January 2, 26

Today was not a good day😂

We originally had 4 lessons set up today and 3 of them fell through

Henry, whos on date for baptism January 17th, was supposed to meet with us at 9am at the chapel so we could meet him and figure out details for his baptism, but he ended up canceling because of his work that's super unpredictable 

Jamie, we were supposed to teach at 6:30pm but she had a stomach bug so she couldn't

Amanda, we were supposed to teach at 7:30pm but she said she was sick and couldnt.

So we were left with Allen at 2:30pm. We super last minute got sister Sanders to come with us to a lesson with him (asked her an hour before), and I feel so bad for making her go through that. This is the second weirdo we've taught! 

We tried to get to know Allen then teach him but hes basically another Rocky (weird guy from my last area) and Gary. What they all have in common to me is that they all want to talk to people about spiritual/religious things but have no desire to convert. What made Allen special from Rocky and Gary is that his thing was being obsessed with the concept of God, Jesus, and love. He used all these big words and tried to explain God and Jesus as this thing that cant be explained but is all around us. I told him that God is a definite concrete thing and we taught him the first principle in lesson one but whenever we actually told him something that was true he looked dumbfounded and I tried to ask clarifying questions but he kept going back into fluffy, buzzworded language that felt like a mega pastor sermon. It made no sense at all. I honestly was silent most of the time because I didnt want to talk to a guy who only wanted to talk to talk but sister finch hit my knee with her knee so I knew she was telling me to say something. 

So I asked him how he knows if something is true and he gives me this huge wordy thing but basically he doesnt know what is true and what it not. He views the world from a philosophical perspective and then he started to annoy me. 

I dont like philosophy. Sorry if any readers do but from what I've found, philosophy is man's explanation for the world around them. Philosophy is what people use when they dont have religion. After Jesus ascended back into heaven and the apostles died, philosophy is what people used to explain God and from my understanding, thats how we got the creeds that Christians and Catholics use as their doctrine for the trinity. Philosophy is not of God at all to me, so to hear this from Allen I knew he was not interested in change. This lead to me asking if he wants to find a true church. Again, he gave this frilly mini sermon that I couldn't follow but I gathered enough that he believed every church was true. Knowing this isn't true, I knew we had to get out of there because we were wasting the Lords time big time. We tried to be nice and like not be cut and dry so it took us like another 10 minutes to get out of his apartment! 

After our “lesson” with Allen, we debrief again with sister Sanders and she asked jokingly to have her join lessons with people who are actually interested😭 I know she was joking but every joke has a bit of truth in it so we need to step up our game.

I thought I had enough of a lesson with weirdos but when we went knocking after dinner, we knocked on a guy's house who kept us there for 45 minutes! 

I knew we were wasting our time but my natural man wanted to stay until I could prove this guy wrong about our church because he seemed nice. 

His biggest beef was Joseph Smith and how he was a fraud and whatnot (his points were stupid btw), and we tried to explain the truth to him and like share our testimony of the book of mormon but we could not win the argument unfortunately. It wasn't actually an argument by the way, he was very respectful and honestly that's kinda what kept us there. I thought since he was so polite maybe we could change his mind but the lesson I learned is that I can't let nice people waste my time. I can be nice back but we could've knocked a whole block of houses if he didnt stay for the amount of time that we did. 

It also made me think that Satan kind of acts like that guy. Hes not Satan but I think Satan works in that way. Satan is not trying to make us go home but distract us just enough so we cant do the Lords work.

These two experiences today have told me that I can't waste my time being polite in the way that I did. I have to take control of the conversation and if the spirit isn't there, I shouldn't be either. 

Anywho, after knocking on the polite bashers house, we sent our Grey dot text and made a Facebook story then went home.

January 3, 26

Okay regular morning, and we did comp study at the bayou Gulch building (our church building) so we could throw our apartment trash away lol

After that we had lunch at in n out and we met the most unique individual😵‍💫

As we were pulling up, I noticed this guy that was kind of dressed like Colonel Sanders and I told sister finch I wanted to tell him that and invite him to church. She freaked out and told me that I definitely shouldn't say that to his face so I didn't haha. Once we parked, we walked up to this guy and complimented his outfit and he asked if I knew who he was. I was like “oh! 😅 No I dont unfortunately.” He then told me either he knows Dolly Parton and Dwight Yoakam or that his music is like theirs. I was just trying not to laugh during the experience because he dressed up like hes famous but definitely is not💀 I then invited him to church and he said he might go. Then I took a picture of him because I had to document such an interesting guy. 

I ended up trying to look him up and he has like 900 followers on Facebook lol.

After that we had DC (district council) which was pretty cool.

Our district leader compared us to Shepards and how they know their sheep personally then he said like Shepard, we need to know our friends personally and we need to show them our personality so they can trust us more. 

Oh and after that elder Taggart had us pray for a bit and I was the last one to get up😭 So everyone had to be quiet until i was done

After that we split with the STLs and i had a lesson with sister weber in her area

I ALSO GOT TO DRIVE!!! It was so nice but I ended up making us late so I feel bad. It also doesn't help my credit of being a good driver.

But yea the lesson was good 

We were trying to have another lesson too but it fell through so we drove even more to do a stop by then went back to the bayou Gulch building and did some reps. 

It was so crazy tho how much driving they do! And I was told that Elizabeth is the most requested area and yea it was weird. Elder Taggart said its because you can goof off if you want and hide it pretty easily. And I believe it because it seems like you could just write anything off as travel time. Personally if I was in Elizabeth I think I might go crazy because of how easy it is to just be driving all day. I want to be productive by talking to people all day! I think if I get the chance to choose an area to go to, I want an area that is heavily populated and not an area that's more in the country.

After we split back, we had dinner from 7pm-8pm then proselyted for like 5 minutes after contacting people.

I felt not productive but maybe its just cuz i dont have the sim in my phone. It sucks not being able to text lowkey especially since sister finch drives as well as have sim.

After that I got ready for bed and tried to talk to more of my quadmates because I haven't been doing a good job at getting to know them.

January 4, 26

Sunday today!! It was so tiring bruh

Okay so we had to leave at 7:50am cuz we wanted to do some stop bys before church and the two people we visited were sick lol

So we did our best to get our friends to church, and then went to the chapel to greet the members of our ward

I ended up giving my testimony in both testimony meetings!! I've never done that and I'm super proud of myself. For context, the first time I ever bore my testimony was when I was 16 at FSY. And since, I've only ever bore my testimony like once or twice a year since. So twice in one day is crazy! The reason I did it is because we were encouraged by our zone leaders and STLs to bear our testimonies because it helps have the ward like us more basically and we also end up feeling more a part of the ward. It's so true!! I've never gotten so many people mention the testimony I gave and it was incredible to see! I kind of forget how important the missionaries are to the members of a ward so it was a nice reminder.

Oh also earlier this week, we asked our our office missionaries to get a Russian book of mormon for our friend Alison but she wasn't there so I was lowkey disappointed by that.

After church we had lunch, but it was fast Sunday so we napped lol. Then we did personal study, it was super late in the day but it was so we could get our stop bys in before church. And after that we drove to a park in our area to do comp study!

What we've been doing for the past few days is practicing memorizing the points in the restoration lesson. Its super boring but it makes sister finch laugh when I struggle to remember the points. I basically go through the 5 stages of grief when I cant think of what word is next in a sentence and she seems to love it.

After that we stopped by a guy named Scott and confirmed our lesson with him tomorrow!

Then we went home and had dinner.

And after that we tried to do some knocking but every light was off in the places we tried to go to so I made some stuff on canva to print this week to pass out then we went to walmart.

And we saw elder Taggart and elder bryan😭

We talked with them for a bit then went home cuz its disobedient to be a pair of sister with a pair of elders.

Also im still trying to get to know the sisters in my quad and I ended staying up till 11:03pm because of it😵‍💫

January 5, 26

We didnt leave the apartment till 11:30am because sister finch and I were calling our families

I was also able to have my dad tell sister finch about the method he used on his mission to find people to teach through the members and she seemed pretty on board with it! During our weekly planning tomorrow, we will decide what aspects of my dad's plan we like to our week.

Once we left the apartment, we got free crumbl dirty sodas then went to Chipotle to get an actual lunch. 

After that we went to a place called murdochs!

It's like tractor supply but especially for horse stuff

Theres also clothes there so I got a sweater and a flannel!

We went to walmart to do our weekly shopping and now im home finishing my email before a member dinner!

Other things:

-I also wanted to show yall the music I listen to during the week as a missionary😁

This is my day to day Playlist. I also have one for Sunday, one for ballad type songs, and one thats just instrumentals.

I have the Beatles song on there cuz the chorus reminds me of what God had reminded me, “no need to be alone, its really love, its real”

And apparently my two current favorite artists are Forrest Frank and the Lower Lights😂

Forest frank makes pop-y songs and the Lower Lights do super awesome covers of hymns!

-I also highly encourage yall to go look at Scriptures Helps! They are books that explain literally every question one might have while reading the bible. So im super excited to read the section about Isaiah because bro is so confusing but I know there's a lot of value in reading his teachings and prophecies.

-And something cool that im doing this week is going to the National Western Stockshow Parade! To me it seems kinda dumb cuz i think were just watching livestock walk down the road lol but sister finch is pumped for it!

Shes from the middle of nowhere Arizona so she has a ranch with animals and horses so this stockshow is her THING! Im so happy that I have a comp who's excited for it cuz I have the opportunity to fully appreciate the experience with her! So ill tell yall how that goes next week

This one wasn't as long as last week's but it still is a Iot lol so I think I just need to get used to that fact.

Thank you to those who read the whole thing and I will write yall soon!

Love ya!

Sister Moghimi

1250 Main Street, Broomfield, CO

https://photos.app.goo.gl/K8riSQGsCa65xx9u6