Easterz!!

Hello my beautiful family and friends!

I hope everyone had a happy Easter inspite of flu bugs and finals. Our week had really high highs and really low lows. Welcome to missionary work, right? We currently have 2 investigators. Everyone else has either gone home for the summer or is M.I.A. My goodness it was a discouraging week, but thank heavens I have a great companion who never lets a day go by without making me laugh! We have certainly used humor to fight our disappointments. However, the Lord always sends miracles to those who serve him.

Our Easter weekend was nothing short of mission perfection. We had a baptism on Friday for our beloved Jeffrey! Oh my goodness I love that little guy so much! When I was in Gatineau I thought "No one could ever steal my heart quite like Hatians." Now that I'm here in Ottawa I feel that way about the Chinese they are the cutest things. Jeffrey was also confirmed yesterday which made our Easter Sunday perfect. I can't even describe the glow that surround him through church he was literally beaming. William told me yesterday "Sister Perkins you look perfect today."

"Oh thank you, William."

Jeffrey: "Yes. We (William, Jeffrey, and Jie Liu) decided you look like a flight attendent. Which airline do you work for?" (followed by three little stinkers laughing) All day they kept asking me for drinks and snacks. I'm glad they are so funny:)

I think last week I wrote about this boy named Kyle that gave me his number on the bus. So, my companion talked me into calling him. Actually desperation for new investigators talked me into calling him. Everyone needs to hear the message, right?:) So I called. He was stunned that I actually called him. I told him I was only actually calling because I was a missionary for my church and if he like we would love to share a message with him about God and Jesus Christ. "So, you only called because you want to teach me about God?" "Um yep." "I can't believe I did this." So, needless to say he is not a new investigator:)

Tuesday was insane. Really it was one of those days where anything and everything that could have gone wrong went wrong. I'm sure it only seemed that way because we've had weeks of rejection and talk about our area closing. But we visited a recent convert named Nicole. We love this girl so dearly. I think I mentioned this last week, but Nicole is fighting cancer. And I mean fighting it. She doesn't let it get her down. We went over to her house to help her out because she just had surgery and she was not doing well at all. She had a temperature of 102 and she felt like some of her stitches had burst. There were all other kinds of issues her water was turned off because the city of Ottawa was doing construction outside of her apartment, She had no liquids in her house for her to drink, no food she could really eat, etc. It was bad. So we called the ZL's who brought over some liquids and gave her a blessing they were also kind enough to move our car which had been in one hour parking for 2 hours. Well, about 20 minutes after they left Nicole told us that she needed to get to a hospital ASAP. So we called President and he told us to get her there. So, I went to get the car (breaking white handbook rules our of necessity) and my companion stayed with Nicole. Big problem I could not figure out for the life of me which street the Elders parked our car on. By the time I found the car Nicole had already called Sister C to call an ambulance. So as the paramedics are loading her up on the gurney her neighbor comes out and says, "where is Nicole going?" I thought you've got to be kidding me. I thought it looked pretty obvious. And then she asks "Why didn't Nicole tell me she was going to the hospital?" I looked at this lady like she was completely loco. Mostly because I felt like both of these questions were super obvious. So we followed the ambulance to the hospital and tried to find parking. Wouldn't you know it that in Canada they charge you $3.50 for every half hour you park at the hospital. So in essence it's cheaper to ride in an ambulance because then you don't have to pay for parking. Well, we finally found parking and ran up to meet Nicole in the ER. She was a trooper and kept being so positive. Once we got her more settled with the nurses and doctors and her boyfriend showed up Sister C and I decided we should probably head out since we were just in the way at this point. Before we left I pulled out a bottle of ginger ale (her favorite drink) that I grabbed for our little chica on the way out. The problem was it decided to leak all over my BOM. No good, rotten, very bad day. And THEN we walked out to our car feeling tired and worn and do you know what we found? A parking ticket. Thank you, Ottawa. We decided it would be a good idea to go home and eat before we got struck by lightning or a piano fell on our heads and I'm not going to lie that was bad too. I stained my white shirt, Sister C melted our spatula. We called our "investigators" and no one had time for us or didn't answer. It was just a rotten day. As you can imagine the next morning I woke up not really wanting to get out of bed. But I did the routine excercising, shower, breakfast, scripture study all of the while pleading with my Father in Heaven to lift this dark cloud of worry that seemed to be culminating. And wouldn't you know it, He did. While I was doing my studies from my ginger soaked book I read Alma 26:27 which says, "Now when our hearts were depressed, an we were about to turn back, behold, the Lord comforted us, and said: Go amongst thy brethren, the Lamanites and bear with patience thine afflictions, and I will give unto you success." That was exactly what I needed to hear from my Father in Heaven. Has our area flourished over night, No. But I don't think that's what I need. I just needed to know that he hears me. And I can testify that no matter how rotten your day may be, he hears you. And in those quite moments where it's just you and Him he will show you tender mercies if you just look.

I hope that this helped someone. I also hope that you are getting healthy and are keeping your heads above water. Remember that I love you so dearly. Remember that the Lord is always there and that no matter how dark the hour may seem, the sun will always shine tomorrow:)

I love you.

Sister Perkins

P.s. If you could please do us a favor? Please pray for my companion and I to find those who are ready to accept this message. We are getting the members of our ward to choose a time every day to pray for us and for investigators. Set it on your watch, your phone, whatever it takes. Please and thank you:)