Whithersoever I Will

This week was amazing! I know I say that every week, but it truly was :) We were busy all week with exchanges, and we were blessed to spend a few days serving with the wonderful Sisters in our zone! I am so grateful to have opportunities so often to learn from their examples, they are all amazing, fun, consecrated missionaries! :)

We went on a hike with the Thompsons, they are amazing!

On exchanges with Sister Herrera earlier this week we met so many awesome people and she taught me a lot about following promptings and seizing the moment! We hadn't been able to get in contact with one of our new investigators so we stopped by his house. When we had first met him we just talked on the porch briefly, so this time when he immediately invited us in it took me a little by surprise. His wife was home and we were able to sit down with both of them and teach them the whole first lesson. It felt as if we were coming for a scheduled appointment. The two of us just jumped right in and were very unified in our teaching even though we had only been together a few hours. It was so cool! 

Later that evening we were walking up to knock on a door right as someone was getting dropped off. Honestly, we were still far enough away that I kind of wanted to wait until they got inside and then knock.  But Sister Herrera is fearless. she ran across the street and their yard and said hi to them. But ended up scaring her half to death, but it was a good icebreaker haha. She was so cool and when we told her we had an important message to share with her she said, "ok, shoot" and was very engaged as we taught her about the Restoration. It was such a miracle that we were in the right places at just the right time :)

Ok, I have a super awesome story for you, that I will probably not do justice but here we go! Well earlier this week Sister Clark introduced me to Tasty Made shakes, which are pretty great. A few days later we went back for dinner...and I was pretty embarrassed when we were helped by the same cashier as a few days before, who also remembered us. Well while we were there we found a new friend in this cashier and he asked us if we could connect on Facebook! So of course we did and we now have the opportunity to teach him more about the restored gospel! He is amazing and I know it was no coincidence that we went to Tasty Made twice this last week..... so never question a prompting, even if it is telling you to go eat fast food :)

I am so grateful for the Holy Ghost, for His continual guidance. This promise from the scriptures means a lot to me,

"Go your way whithersoever I will, and it shall be given you by the Comforter what you shall do and whither you shall go" (Doctrine and Covenants 31:11)

As we seek to do the Lord's will, then we will always be given guidance of where we should go and the things that we are meant to do. The key is that it is the Lord's will.  It is not what we want or what we think is a good idea that is important, even if it would accomplish good things. The most success will be found as we follow the plan the Lord has set. I am grateful that we are able to receive direct inspiration from He who knows all, who loves perfectly and wants nothing more than our eternal happiness. As we follow those promptings and do what the Lord desires for us, we will find joy :)

Have a great week! And just keep smiling :)

We Brought It With Us

Well,  this week I experienced frozen rain for the first time! Thankfully, it happened while we were sleeping but it looked really awesome when we woke up! And scraping the huge layer of ice off our car was really fun :)

We also did some fun maneuvers when we got stuck in the snow on the side of the road. We were very proud of ourselves when we got out all by ourselves :) We made quite the mess though haha.

 

 

Another first for my mission was walking a dog yesterday! There is a woman that we visit occasionally and she mentioned that her dog needed a walk but her health keeps her from getting out as much as she used to so we offered to walk her dog! It was so much fun :)

 

 

We had a really cool experience with one of the youth in our ward. Last Sunday we had a really awesome discussion about how we can help the youth. Well after that lesson we saw Sydney in the hall and we got to talk to her. It turns out she has a friend she would like us to meet! AND that she would really like to go out with us. So she spent part of an evening with us and it was so perfect! She received inspiration that day at school that she needed to share a specific personal experience and she did and was able to connect with our investigator on a personal level because of similar things they have faced in their lives. She bore such powerful testimony and it was such a tender experience. Youth are the best!

This week our District Leader received the inspiration that we should each study our Patriarchal blessing. In case you don't know what that is, it is the greatest thing ever! It is a blessing you receive that is very sacred and personal to you.  It is recorded and written down so you can study it throughout your life. It contains warnings, instruction, information about yourself and insight into how God sees you. It is basically the road map for your life. As I have been studying it I have been able to better understand who I am in God's eyes and who I am meant to become, which has given me such great strength. Part of the assignment has been to share some of those strengths we find in ourselves with our companion, and it was incredible how much the love and unity in our companionship grew after that exercise. As Sister Clark listed to me her divine strengths I noticed that all of them were things I already see in her. It made me realize that those divine attributes and qualities aren't something we are trying to attain in this life, but they were brought here with us. 

 

 

We were someone before we came here, and the purpose of this life is to choose to be that amazing individual again. Our responsibility here is to choose Jesus Christ and His ways in this life so that those qualities can be refined, so we can become who God intends for us to be.

I am so grateful for my knowledge of the Plan of Salvation, God's plan of happiness for His children. I am grateful for the trials and tests that I face in this life because it is evidence that I am ready for more growth. Every difficult thing we face, that is met with a righteous choice on our part, leads us one step closer to being the person God is anxiously guiding us to become!

I love you all, just keep smiling :)

Happiness Is A Choice

THIS WEEK WAS AMAZING!!!! It was so FULL of miracles! But sadly I only have time for a few.

I went on exchanges with the amazing Sister Nielson this week! I love exchanges so much! It is so fun to get to spend time with so many other missionaries and we seem to always see crazy awesome miracles! The biggest miracle was probably that we saw everyone in our plans and had really great, meaningful contacts with all of them. That doesn't happen, ever, so we were very excited. We had a focus that day to use the Book of Mormon in every contact and the miracles from that were endless! The Book of Mormon will help us get nearer to God than any other book and I know that the people we talked to that day felt that. One man wasn't even interested in learning more himself, but because of the testimony we bore he recognized it was the word of God and could help people, so he is going to give it to someone who can use it. How awesome is that?!

 

 

Most of the miracles we experienced this week came from Facebook! I am so grateful for this amazing new tool that we have been given to reach so many more people. It is amazing how when we use this tool, guided by the spirit, we will be led to those prepared to receive the gospel. I have been directed to so many people this week who have posted questions and concerns that can be directly resolved by the Restoration, and others have seen my posts and because of their reactions we have been able to see who is open to the message we share. Because of our diligent efforts in trying to be more effective with this new tool, we have been blessed to make contact with so many prepared people, and have started teaching two of them! It truly amazes me how the work of the Lord is hastening in our day.

Honestly, this week has been a roller coaster of emotions. I have seen that the amount of stress experiences is proportional to the miracles and personal growth experienced as well, and this week was no exception. I am still getting used to my new role as a Sister Training Leader, but loving every minute of it. In life when we are given a hard task we could just sit down and wallow, wondering why me and accept that we are going to struggle, but I think it is amazing that in those moments if we look around we will see that God has given us resources that are always more numerous than the task ahead of us. I am so grateful that God has reminded me of my divine worth and potential in these unsure times for me. He reminds me of that every time I pray, read from the scriptures and choose to look outside of myself. He has also given me a wonderful companion who loves me and supports me. He has given me inspired leaders to guide me in the right direction, even though they may not know on a personal level how much I needed the counsel they gave. The resources are always infinitely more, I encourage each of you to look for them.

Theme for this week: 

*Happiness Is A Choice* 

That is something God has been trying to drill into my head this week, and unfortunately sometimes I am not the best listener. But we learn from out mistakes and keep on trying!  We can choose to be humble enough to accept the Lord's will and love it! That choice is the most important one I make in my day.

I hope you all have a wonderful week and when life gets you down, just keep smiling! Love you!

 

 

Home of the Hills

My new home is Lancaster Ohio! It is the first place I have seen in Ohio that has not been incredibly flat haha. It is a great place and I love it already. The people here are so loving and feel like family, a lot like how Piqua felt so I think I am going to do just fine here :)

My new companion is the wonderful Sister Clark! Honestly, I have never met someone more loving. She is so sweet and kind and SO funny! She is taking good care of me and we have already had some great adventures together!

One of my favorite things happened the first night I was here. One of the first doors we knocked on was a great contact. We met an awesome guy who was interested in what we had to say, but in the middle of our conversation his cat bolted out of the door! So of course being the service oriented disciples of Christ we are, we helped him look for his cat. I'm pretty sure that's what Jesus would have done. We walked around in the dark for about half an hour with him with flashlights, and may or may not have been slinking through people's yards...that must have been an interesting picture. I am surprised no one called the police. Sadly we did not find his cat, but hopefully when we go back for his return appointment it will have come back. Service softens hearts!

This is our friend Starlee who greeted me upon my arrival.....It used to be an Elder's apartment and for some reason they got their hands on a deer and mounted it to the wall. It was just left there when it was no longer an Elders apartment, so it has since been Sister-fied haha.

 

 

Anywho, it has been fun getting to know all of our awesome investigators! We are teaching quite a few children which is really cool! On top of our normal missionary work, Sister Clark and I are serving as the Sister Training Leaders for our zone so we get to work closely with the other Sisters serving in our area! It has been awesome, and crazy, and a bit stressful. But definitely so rewarding already and I know that this is where the Lord needs me to be! And like I said last week, the Lord has felt everything we will ever feel and I know He is always right by my side to sustain me. And I am grateful, because I definitely need him every moment of the day.

I want to leave you with one of my favorite quotes by Elder Jeffrey R. Holland

"Keep loving. Keep trying. Keep trusting. Keep believing. Keep growing. Heaven is cheering you on today, tomorrow, and forever."

I read this everyday and it has been such a huge motivation for me!

We will be just fine as long as we love. Love the Lord, those around us and ourselves. It is the Love we have for Him that motivates us to keep trying. And because He loves us so perfectly, we can trust His guidance and believe that He will fulfill His promises. As we do these things we will grow to meet the tasks and challenges we face, with Heaven's help.

I know that God is our loving Heavenly Father. He is mindful of each of us and always gives us exactly what we need, blessing and trial alike. 

I hope you all have a wonderful week! Just keep smiling!