Happy 9 months....

My 9 month mark is tomorrow and I think I'm going through a mid mission crisis. I know 9 months is a long time, but considering I feel like I just got here 2 weeks ago, 9 months in the missionary perspective really isn't a long time and I am kinda freaking out about not having enough time left to do everything I need to! Not that I won't have enough time, but there's so much I want to learn and study...it's a good thing I've got eternity for that as well =].This week has been good. Sister Cardoso taught her first lesson yesterday with a man named Deng (said like Dang....hehehe) from Sudan. He's open and humble which is so important, but he has his agency, so while he exercises his agency we're gonna exercise our faith and see who wins =]. While we were teaching him yesterday he was telling us about him experiencing the refugee camps in Africa, and how his faith in God got him through everything. It was a good experience to teach him, and especially for my comp's first lesson. She's sweet and bold. LOVE it!Our mission here is doing an experiment and if it works they're gonna spread it to other missions. It's a new pass along card...but it's for members! It so cool. I'm sure you'll see it soon cuz I've used it tons and it really helps members get into missionary work (if they use it right). What they do is write their own plan for who they are going to work with and what they are going to do (talk to them, share the BofM, invite them to an activity, invite them to church, etc.), then they give the card back to us and we make a copy so we have their plan then give them back the card so we both have it. We pray for the names of the people they have written down and the member works with them. This last week we had 2 people at church because of it, and many other marvelous things happen because the members are following their plans. I just love it, in fact it's probably one of my favorite things right now =].OH!!! I almost forgot to tell you. Tina came to church on Sunday!!!!!! I wanted to shout for joy when I saw her walk in, but I didn't think that would be appropriate considering sac mtg had already started. However, she stayed for the full 3 hours and set another appt for us to teach her tomorrow. The Lord is blessing us! Since we dropped all of our less than sincere investigators recently, we've been able to find some that are tons more committed than the last ones, now the trick is to find some who are truly committed and get them baptized with a testimony. Tricky, but possible =].I just love being a missionary. I didn't realize how much I've changed until I started training S. Cardoso and showing her the missionary life. Of course she's new so the world is still a part of her, but it's so cool to see her doing the same things I did when I first came and asking me the same questions I asked my trainer. I have a completely different perspective on the mission now...Well, I hope you are all still alive and well (especially Beth since I never heard anything about your "problems" till today....ya bum), and are loving life and God. I love you all!!!!! Have a marvelous week!

~Sister Witbeck~