The Stakeout

Keys, Book of Mormon, phone.

The three basic things that we always remind ourselves to grab before
we go anywhere or do anything. Yet this weekend, when we neglected to
say our routinely used chant, we left our phone in the library.
Later during the day when we tried to make a call- I realised that the
phone wasn't in my bag in its normal, comfortable pocket. We assumed
that we must have left it at home during lunch. After we remembered
having it at the library, we raced back to get it before the library
closed. But, we didn't run quite fast enough! When we got there, it
was already closed until Monday morning. Suddenly the panic started to
set in as I realised that we had no way to contact anyone! Sister Topp
and I rotated between hysteric laughter and crying as we analysed our
crazy situation. We walked to our ward mission leaders home and asked
to use his phone. Luckily we knew our district leaders number and were
able to let him know the situation.  I don't know how missionary work
happened before phones! It was so stressful to not be able to call our
friends about coming to church, or to talk to anyone. It was so weird
to be so cut off from everything! So this morning Sister Topp and I were first
in line when the library opened to see if we had left our phone here. After a
long wait at the front desk, we were finally reunited with our good old brick
phone! Hallelujah! Prayers were answered, and I have never been more
relieved to have a phone.

Yet, apparently we are not the only ones who didn't have a phone! One
of our dear investigators doesn't have a phone, and we lost contact
with her and haven't been able to see her in a long time. We were
determined to find her, so we organised a stake-out. And contrary to
what all crime solving movies and T.V. Shows will dictate: stake outs
are really boring. We took our dinner hour and also our time to do
twelve weeks (a study course for new missionaries) in a park opposite
her house. We sat there and studied, and tried not to make it too
obvious that we were staring at her house. The more itchy my legs got
from the grass, and the darker it got and the more mosquitos that
started eating us confirmed it was time to go home. Yet there was
still no sign of Mirabela. We left, and still haven't been able to get
in contact with her. So please pray that we can find her again!

Other events this week include a new member who just moved into the
ward from Scotland who came teaching with us, and her boldness and
Scottish accent re activated a less active we had been working with
for months in under 20 minutes, Sister Topp falling off her bike,
going to London for the 3 week new missionary meeting, and finding a
family to teach!

Missionary work is great. I love it!
Shall we not go on in so great a cause?

Love always,
Sister McFarland