Oct. 28, 2013

So this week has been a crazy week of miracles! First off, for the past month we have been praying to find a single mother and three children (random, I know, but that is what we felt like we should pray for). This past week we were able to go and have dinner at a members house and they had invited their step-grandchildren and their biological mother over for dinner as well, we really connected with the two younger daughters and the mom was asking lots of questions. We really didn't think much of it until this past Saturday when they came to the trunk or treat and were really excited to see us and tell us that they were going to come to church the next day. It was then we realized that this was the single mother and three children that we had been praying for! They came to church and the mom was really touched and she wanted us to come back and eat with them and teach them more this next week, and they plan on coming to church again! It has truly been a miracle!

We had some sad news this week, a less active sister that we had been working with passed away. She had been really sick and had kidney failure and cancer in her throat from her smoking habit. We were one of the first people to find out and so it really came as a shock to the rest of the ward. I am so glad that we spent the time with her and showed her that we cared.

So this week was also the trunk-or-treat! Me and Sister Davidson were a hoot! Everybody loved that we dressed up and decorated our car!  Anyway, we had a lot of miracles at the trunk-or-treat we honestly had more less active and nonmembers join us than active members! I hope that the pass along cards we passed out will be great and that we can get some good things from that!

So funny story for the week, we contacted a media referral and she introduced herself as a Pastor. She has just started her own church and has exactly 7 members, but not all of her children have joined yet. She basically wanted us to become missionaries for her church and she wants us to help recruit members for her. It got even better when we were saying the closing prayer and she stared talking and praising the Lord after every sentence I uttered. All of this happened on her doorstep and in the mean time Sister Davidson got two large fire ant bites on her arm, it was quite an entertaining night!

There are so many blessings that come from being here and the biggest is getting to see the light of Christ come to the eyes of those we teach! 

Oct. 21, 2013

I can't believe that Halloween is just around the corner!  So here we have a trunk-or-treat this Saturday and we are going to put suckers on pass along cards! We have a lot of non-members coming and so we felt like it would be a good way to get some good "PR".  We are also dressing up, Sister Davidson is going to be a cheetah and I am going to be a witch, we spent like $5 at the store buying our costumes and we are so excited! I have a cute blue and black hat and some black and green striped tights, I am going to wear them with my black skirt and it should be super cute.

So one really exciting thing that happened this week is that I saved a turtle from being run over! It was great the car had stopped to try and let it pass, but it stopped right in the middle of the road, so I went and picked it up, took a picture, and then put it back in the pond it had come out of.

This has been a really good week! It has actually been our most successful week as far as numbers go. We have had more referrals than ever this week and a few of them are really solid. We are finally establishing trust with our members and the ward absolutely adores us sister missionaries. We actually had some media referrals this week which is a miracle in and of itself. We have been able to contact one and he wanted a Book of Mormon. He wasn't really into talking with us at first, but then the Spirit took over and we talked about the restoration and the plan of salvation for about 15-20 minutes. I have never had an experience like that before, he kept asking questions and I knew all of the right answers and words to say to him. The most amazing thing was that he didn't argue with anything we were saying, he was really interested and he basically agreed with what we taught him. He even asked what the Holy Spirit was like in our minds and we explained exactly what he was thinking (and feeling) the Holy Ghost was. It was absolutely amazing!

So in other news, we have not been able to see our investigator and her family this week because they have been sick with the flu. We also have been temporarily dropped by another investigator. She has been in the hospital for the past few days because of panic attacks and then she was in a car accident and so she isn't ready for us to visit her yet. It is so frustrating to know what we know about the Gospel and its power and then to have our investigators not realize it. Satan is working so hard to keep them from coming to church and is really working on their minds to use "valid" excuses to keep them from progressing.

Thanks for all of your support! Can you believe it has almost been two months already! I will be back before you know it.

P.S. I tried sushi for the first time today, I am not sure if I like it or if I want to throw it back up.

Oct. 16, 2013

It has been a hard week numbers wise, and I needed a little encouragement. I LOVE the picture of Katie in my lab coat! I miss that little cutie so much! I love all of the pictures that you send me of home! I especially love the leaves, everything is green here (which is great) but you don't get any other colors, just light and dark green. 

So things have been going good here! Yesterday was transfer calls and so we didn't have p-day until today. Sister Davidson and I are staying here in Fleming Island.

This week we got to go do service at a horse farm in St. Johns. There were some BEAUTIFUL horses there and there were some really sad looking horses as well. The owner rescues horses and she is an investigator for the St. Johns Elders. She was very nice and she had some cool stories. One of her horses is from Secretariat's line and she was absolutely GORGEOUS!  A lot of the horses that are there are former race horses who were injured. We put up a fence lining and we got to use machetes and other fun stuff! 

We have been seeing a less active woman in our ward. She lives in a nursing home in Green Cove and she is so funny! She tells us stories about how she is the nurses least favorite because she doesn't take any slack from them. She also tells us about a particular nurse she wants to fight with out back. She lived a hard life when she was young and so she feels like she has to defend herself from everyone. She also is very forgetful and she forgot that she was a member of the church and she asked what church we were from several times, but she remembers faces really well. 

Last night we were eating at a members home and the Hibernia Baptist missionaries knocked on the door, it was pretty funny. It's like they knew we were there ;) We also go a couch from Germany yesterday! A family in our ward donated it to us and they bought it when they were stationed in Germany and they shipped it overseas when they retired, and now it is in our living room.

October 7, 2013

So this week has been a bit long. It was actually the longest week I have been here, but it contained the best day of my mission so far. No one has been home this week, it has been absolutely frustrating! Every time we would go to visit someone we would get no answer. Then we went and saw a less active sister (she has multiple personality disorder) and we got her bad personality. It was so weird and you could just feel the tension on the doorstep.

Amidst the terribleness of it all we were able to meet with a great family. We had a lesson on the Plan of Salvation and out of the blue the 9 year old daughter said that she wanted to be BAPTIZED! She is going to be baptized on the 19 of November (her birthday) and hopefully we can have her sister and mom baptized on the same day!

Conference was great this week! It definitely was the spiritual kick in the pants that I needed to move forward with the work. I was so excited that basically all of the Saturday talks were about member missionary work! That is really what is effective, because people don't want to hear about the Gospel from someone on their doorstep. In order for the work to progress we need to be on the same page as the members and they need to be with us. I hope that you at home will try your best to find missionary moments and help others feel our Savior's love. I hope that members here will be able to find people for us to teach in their homes, because it is the greatest feeling to know that you have helped someone accept their Savior and that they have the opportunity for an eternal family.