Sister McKenna Watts - Chicago Illinois Mission: Week 16 - Cruise Night and Priesthood blessings

Ariyanna's Baptism

We had the most incredible week this week. :) We worked super hard, we had a blast and a half, and we saw some incredible miracles happen this week.

We started the week off with an absolutely incredible Zone Conference. :) I love Zone Conferences. They are always so powerful and are the best recharges in the world. The whole conference was on being obedient to the promptings that come from the spirit. A big portion of the meeting was just missionaries sharing experiences where they followed what the spirit prompted them to do and then the miracles and blessings that came because they were obedient. :) It was so powerful and just an absolutely incredible meeting. I learned so much and Sister Raccuia and I have been trying super hard to apply what we learned and the things that we felt we can improve on into our area and it has helped us so much this week. :)

Cute Sign

We had the funnest experience this week. :) We were driving down main street in LaPorte and there were people outside? LaPorte is honestly so tiny that there usually is not a whole lot of people outside doing things. So we were super excited to see people outside so we jumped on the opportunity to talk to people and parked our car and went out and started talking to people. :) I guess once a month LaPorte has this thing called "Cruise Night" where they close down main street and a bunch of really old cars basically put on a super cool parade. TONS of people come out and set up blankets and chairs and just hang out with their families, they play really old music and just drive these rad cars down the street for a few hours. We left before the actual thing started, but we were able to talk to a bunch of people. :) We met tons of people who have never seen missionaries before and who were way excited about the message that we have to share. We met the cutest pair of twins who have literally done everything together since day 1. They are about 50 years old and are just joined at the hip. :) They said that one of their favorite things to do is to read Christian books together so we gave them our favorite Christian book (The Book of Mormon) and told them why we loved it so much and testified of how it is the best written testimony that we have of Jesus Christ. :) We invited them to read it and they said they would. They really seemed so excited to read it. We met the coolest guy while we were out walking down the street. :) His name was J*****. He is about 60 years old and was just so excited when we started talking to him. He is the definition of a family man and you could just tell that he loves his family with all of his heart! He got really emotional when we was telling us how special his family is to him. Sister Raccuia bore the most tender testimony about how families can be together forever. He was so excited about that. We are going to go over this week hopefully and get to talk to him again. :) He is one of the sweetest old men ever. We found a lot more people and were able to talk to some really amazing people, it was so much fun. :)

Phillips Family

So. :) We went on a fun little adventure Saturday morning. Most Saturday Mornings we go to a Farmers Market in Chesterton, which is where the Sisters in our District are serving, and we go and talk to people and try to find people who are ready to hear the Gospel. So we got down there this week and when we got there we called the sisters to find out where they were so we could meet up, but we found out that they were sick. :/ We couldn't be out of our area without them, so we had to leave. Sister Raccuia was wanting a blessing so we decided that we would go and meet up with the Zone leaders so they could give her a blessing. :) We had really good intentions in telling the Zone leaders that we would be about 5 minutes away, but somehow we got SO lost. Oh man, we were seriously all over the place. We drove forever trying to find the Elders. It was super stressful at the moment but something that is so funny now. :) We probably drove for about an hour. When we finally got there we were able to have one of the most incredible experiences ever. We were decently stressed out because of our little adventure, but as soon as those Elders started the blessing the spirit INSTANTLY flooded the room and there was an unmistakable calm that came so powerfully. It was amazing. The peace that was immediately felt was so profound. :) We met with M**** earlier this week and had a pretty similar experience. She was struggling a lot and gave us a pretty long list why she was stressed and not happy, so we offered her a blessing. :) A few hours later we were able to go over there with a member and he was able to give her a blessing. Almost the exact same thing happened. Right when he started the blessing the spirit was incredibly strong. I love the priesthood so much and I am so grateful for it. I feel so blessed to have been able to grow up in a home where the Priesthood was always there and we always knew that we could find comfort in the Priesthood. I have been so grateful since I left and especially this last week with Fathers day for my incredible dad who was always such an amazing example to us of a man who respects and honors his Priesthood responsibilities. I just wanted to say Happy Fathers day to all of the men who mean so much to me and who have been such incredible examples to me. :)

Thank you so much for everything you guys are doing. I love you so much and I am so grateful for your prayers and your support. They mean more to me than I could ever say. :) I LOVE YOU.

Make a great week. :)

Love, Sister Watts