Our Georgia Peach: Walk by Faith and Not by Sight

Hello Everyone!

Boy did this week fly by! So many amazing and wonderful things happened this week. We are so busy here in Chamblee. I think this is the busiest i have ever been in my whole entire mission. It is so wonderful! What a beautiful time it is to be a missionary in the Atlanta Georgia misison. there really isnt any other place i would rather be right now then here, living the dream.

This week we did so much service. It was so much fun! There is something so great about serving others. It makes them happy, you happy, and a leads to great opportunities to share this gospel. I think i talked a little bit about what we did last Monday. We helped pack up a less actives house and we met her friend and her kids and now we are going to teach their family tomorrow. so on Friday we went and helped that same less active move to her new appartment and this time we met some more friends, the same friend and her husband Balbina and Alfredo. The little girls were in school. But it was so wonderful because in those hours of helping Gio the less active move, we completley broke the ice with this family and we were able to form a wonderful relationship of trust with them. They are so fun and it was just such a hoot to be with them and get to know them more! Hermana Bringhurst and I are super excited to have our official first lesson with them tomorrow and we have a wonderful member coming out with us tomorrow night. It will be so great!!! Helping her move though was so much fun and boy did we get a good work out! Hermana Bringhurst and i were sure pooped afterwards. it was funny because right before we left Balbina wanted to order pizza and she called and then she chucked her phone at me and was like "can you help me order pizza" haha it was so funny! Oh they are the sweetest family!

We had two amazing lessons with Hector this week! Yesterday's lesson went so well! We finished teaching the commandment and taught lesson 5. After many hours of studing the Priestood we are finally getting better at teaching that. I dont think i ever really realized all aspects of the priestood. Wow we are so blessed to have God's priestood on the earth today! Without it we could not preform any saving ordinaces thus making it not possible to return to live with God again. Hector is serisouly progressing so well! he is reading the Book of Mormon everyday, and he is so excited to be baptized on Saturday!

Church was so wondurful yesterday! Sundays are definitely my most favorite day of the week!! We had branch counsil this week and that was amazing! It is so cool to have seen this huge change in the Chamblee Branch and their focuss on misisonary work. Missionary work is now CENTRAL in the meetings which is so great! The leaders of the Chamblee branch are serisisouly amazing and have some serious fire burning within them for missionary work! As of yesterday we now have a Branch Missionary Plan!! wahooo so wonderful!! Things are happeningin the Chamblee Branch! The kingdom of God is growing one step at a time! I honestly dont want to leave Chamblee. Aw it is just so great here! But anywhere the Lord needs us is great! It is what you make it to be after all :)

Saturday night we went to eat at one of the families in our Branch and the dad cooked for us tacos. It was chicken and some sort of beef it looked like! They were so delish and we were just putting them down like no other! We kept saying "es rico!!!" it was so good!!! Then the elders went to eat there after us and they called us that night to give us a refferal and they told us that Florencio(the dad that cooked for us) has a surprise for us tommorow at church. So we went to church and went up to him and he told us that we ate COW TONGUE!!!!!!!! It all makes sense now! It was awfully squishy!! Aw i cant believe we ate cow tongue and didnt even know it! We probably eat all sorts of weird things and we dont even know it haha! Hermana Bringhurst and I made a list of "weird things we've eaten on the misison" So here is is: fish eyes, pig intestons, strips of pig fat, cow stomache, cow tongue, chicken gizzards, chicken feet, weird thing around bones and in bones, and dove....i am invisible now haha!!! No more being a picky eater. Such wonderful memories!

Life is so wonderful, and it is all because we have the gospel of Jesus Christ in our lives. I was reading this morning in preach my gospel about pre earth life and the creation of the earth. It was so great to read that and just feel the holy spirit testify to me through the good feeling i was feeling as i read about it and learned more about it that it is true. Heavenly Father's plan is perfect. His purpose is truly to "bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man." As i read i came upon a sentance that really stood out to me. "We walk by faith and not by sight." How true this is. Our purpose here in life is not to have everything just laid out infront of us and desisions already made for us. One of God's greatest gifts to us is our agency, the ability to choose between good and bad. Our progression is based on every good and bad decision we make. We are here to be tested and tried, to choose for ourselves whether we want eternal happiness or eternal misery. Our ultimate goal is to be like our Heavenly Father. In order to do that we needed to come to earth and gain a body and gain earthy experiences. Luckily we have a loving Savior that has shown us the way. If we but follow him, we will make it back to our Heavenly Father again. In the Book of Mormon this morning i was reading in 2 Nephi 25, and there is a really great verse in this chapter. "and now behold, i say unto you that the right way is to believe in Christ, and deny him not; and Christ is the Holy one of Israel; wherefore ye must bow down before him, and worship him with all your might, mind, and strength, and your whole soul; if ye do this ye shall in nowise be cast out." 2 nephi 25:29 I love this chapter because of its beautiful testimony that Jesus truly is the Christ. I just want to testify that the man they called Jesus Christ is truly the Savior and Redeemer of this World. He is the Son of God. He is the Prince of Peace. He is our Perfect example. He is the light. He is the way. Although we may not see him, we may not see God, we may not see the big picture, with faith we walk, we endure, we press forward with steadfastness, holding on to that rod of Iron and feast upon the Words of Christ. We will make it to the end. We will reach and achieve our end goal of being like Heavenly Father, having eternal life, and enjoying eternal happiness. We walk by faith and not by sight. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

I love you all so much! Have a most wonderful week! Always remember who you are and what you stand for. Remember that God Loves you. I love you my wonderful family so very much. Have a Peachy Day!

With much love,

Hermana Stewart