From an email dated 21 October, 2013:
Alex where are you going?
To see if theres a pub!!!
Ahhh good times. However, jokes & brincadeiras aside this has been quite a week for me & my comp Sis Cassiano. I dont honestly know where to begin but let me say this, to quote from a very fav movie of mine:
Some dreams you have to fight to come true.
Well, some miracles you have to fight to make happen.
Our young rapazes (or young men) investigators have really been giving us heartache & grief. One of them, Daniel, was stoked to attend Sacrament meeting yesterday & we 2 other people accepted our invite. So when we walked the 45 minutes to their apt complex, one of them didnt answer his cell (as per usual) & the other one was stuck one (Daniel) was stuck on the fact that we couldnt attend his church.
Well bro, theres a lil white handbook that specifically states we cant out of respect for other religions. Just as we dont like it when protesters & weirdies stand outside our temple gates were not gonna go offend people of other religions. Well he straight up rejected us when less than 24 hrs he was pumped to come to sacrament.
Sis Cassiano broke down into tears & I held her as she cried & composed herself.
Well, this had kind of been the last straw for me, I'll say.
I remembered the feelings of resentment & anger that swept over me. Did these people have no idea how much we sacrificed for them? We walk miles & miles to teach them a 30 minute lesson, theyre constantly in our prayers, we cry for them, we weep for them, we rejoice with them, we even give them food when they have nothing & this is how they repay us?
Oh it was so easy to be angry. So easy to sink into despair & grief over these 2 boys.
I did not leave my family, my friends, my language, my culture, my home, my neices & nephews Id give my life for, if I didnt know this church, this gospel is true....
I did not travel 3000 miles to a strange country, to a strange culture, to a strange language, where I know no one if I didntknow that this is same church that was established when Christ was on the earth
& I did not leave my dreams, my wishes, my hopes & aspirations folded in a drawer if I didnt know without a shadow of a doubt that this Christ lives & that this is his restored gospel.
NO. Im not giving 18 months of my life to a false dream. Im not.
But then I remembered, when I & my comp are rejected, to remember that someone else who was a lot better was rejected, despised, spit upon & suffered every kind of pain & excruciating thing imaginable.
Our Savior is real. He is painfully aware of us. And he will NEVER forget us. May we NEVER forget him in return. Its so easy for us to forget Him, how often do we?
So family & friends remember Him more this week. May we not reject the truths we know & we have clung to all this time.
Love yall so much!!!!
xoxo
Sister VerHoef
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