Leaving Greenville...tomorrow! :(

Dear Fam,

Hello and HAPPY HALLOWEEN! I hope you all are doing well...it sounds like everyone is doing good from the weekly report. Oh! I got the package you sent! Thanks so much. Now I won't freeeeze! (It finally got cold here.) I also found out I am getting transferred tomorrow. (ah!)

On Monday Sister Matthews and I decided to go shopping and found some attractive sister missionary attire. We ate dinner with Pres. Walker and all the other missionaries in our area. It was good. We talked to them about faith and the levels of faith and had a good lesson with them. Afterwards, we went to Brittany's...with all the elders (because they had to carpool) to give her a blessing. She has been struggling lately and requested a blessing. We didn't tell the elders anything about her situation; just that she needed a blessing. So, they came over and all six of us missionaries sat in there small apartment and taught her about faith and the priesthood. Then, the elders gave her a blessings. It was such a good experience! It was exactly what she needed to hear and she called us the following morning to tell us thank you a zillion times and then commenced to tell us that was the first time she had felt peace in a very, very long time. The priesthood is real. I'm thankful for it.

Tuesday we taught the Plan of Salvation to Nicole. She didn't agree with it at all. She firmly believes there is a heaven and a hell, but none of that degrees of heaven business. We also met with Matthew and talked to him about 1 Nephi 8. There is a really, really good article in the Book of Mormon Ensign by Elder Bednar that is all about the Tree of Life and it relates it to our lives. Read it. We talked to him about his baptismal date of the 4th and he said he was still planning on working towards that. He has a huge amount of faith. It's incredible. He's pretty nervous, but he's sticking with it. He is so in tune with the spirit; and he's willing to act on it.

Wedensday was a rough day. We met with a couple of people who had been "antied" or had dealved into anti material pretty deeply. The first man, Quincy was very respectful and has agreed to read the Book of Mormon because he can't figure out why we are so solidly certain that it is true. The second group was a group of YSA boys who were all roommates. Ironically, their names were John, Mark and Matthew. They just wanted to argue the whole time and Sister Matthews and I felt awful the whole time we were there. We bore testimony and told them we had to leave. They told us we were going to hell for what we believe and that we weren't Christians. I don't think Jesus would have done that. Oh well. We tried. We had dinner with less active Ann. She is such a sweet lady. I enjoyed her. She was the happy spot of the day. Sister Matthews is so full of awesome quotes! When we were studying that morning, we were talking about repentance and she said, "repentance is permanent, personal upgrades." I thought it was good. When we repent, we don't go back. It's a permanent change.

Thursday was the best day ever! We did weekly planning, made pumpkin pies during lunch and then went to contact a referral from the elders. His name is Andrew. He is a YSA and is totally solid. He lives with his parents and they are the nicest people ever. We gave them a pumpkin pie and talked to them about the restoration. The elders had talked to them about the plan of salvation a little bit and she (andrew's mom) used that term a lot. I think she really liked it.

Friday we did a lot of contacting mostly. It wasn't too eventful. Saturday we went to the parade to see Matthew in the band. We told him we could come for a little bit and I've honestly never seen someone get so excited in my life. Their band is pretty highly renowned I guess. He did a great job! We had stake conference in kinston that evening. I played the piano. It was good! I'm glad it's over.

Sunday we went to New Bern for the rest of Stake Conference. New Bern is GORGEOUS! It's right by the water and we froze to death. It got cold all of the sudden. It was the 50th year that the Kinston stake has been around. It's the oldest stake in NC as well. So, they did a lot of historical information and so forth for conference. We had a good lesson with recently baptized Naomi. Her little boy, Matthias is hilarious. I'll send pictures next week, but my time is up!

Love you all!

Sister J

Kingston Zone Conference!

Hello hello!

This week went by far too quickly. Someone said that the days feel like weeks and the weeks feel like days, but I would like to adjust that slightly. The weeks do feel like days, but mostly the days feel like a few minutes. Wake up, go teach, and then it's time for bed again. It's crazy!

Monday we had the best zone conference EVER. I sent the picture they took of all of us. Elder Marlin K. Jensen of the seventy came with his wife and they taught us all day. We met with sister Jensen at 7:30 in the morning and had a great discussion about the importance of not being a perfectionist. I learned that being a worthy servant of the Lord is not synonymous with being perfect. As long as we are constantly striving to improve and continuing in diligence (endurance!) then we are doing what Heavenly Father wants us to do. Elder Jensen gave us a whole bunch of really amazing advice. Mostly he talked about Faith and the different levels of faith that we go through. The first level is just having a particle of faith (Alma 32: 27). This type of faith is where desire begins. Then, the next level is much faith (Mosiah 27:14). This is where our desires turn to priorities. (You can apply this to anything really. If you have a desire to do missionary work, then you can exercise your particle of faith. That desire then becomes something that you continuously look for *priority!*) Then, your faith becomes exceeding faith (Mosiah 4:3). Exceeding faith is when you make the choice to do missionary work. Then, you can move to exceedingly great faith (Moroni 10: 11) This type of faith is when your choice becomes an action and you successfully fulfill what began as a desire to do missionary work. That gift of exceedingly great faith from God then becomes an unshakeable faith (2 Nephi 31: 19 or Jacob 4:6) This is when our faith becomes solidified and becomes knowledge (D&C 93:1) Then we can start the process all over again with a difference principle.

I don't know if that really makes sense, but it does in Sister Johnson's brain. I also learned from Elder Jensen that even though we may have great faith, it doesn't mean we can override an individual's agency. Agency is a great gift, but it feels an awful lot like a curse on the mission. I really am thankful we do have the ability to choose though.

Tuesday was booked with appointments, but then half of them cancelled. We still had some really good lessons with a lady named Jean. She is Methodist and she is friends with a member who lives in the Bahamas. (crazy, right? The church is everywhere!) Then, we had a lesson with Matthew. Matthew is in a predicament of sorts currently. We followed up with his baptismal date and he said he is more than willing to work towards the date (he has incredible faith), but he will need some more time. He said he just feels confused about everything so we moved his date back a few more weeks. His family did not take the news as well as he thought they would and he's really struggling. He's truely amazing though. He told us he wants to pay tithing on the money he earns from playing in the band. He also asked us if he was stealing if he took part of a stoplight that had fallen down in the hurricane. He had been keeping it in the back of his trunk. We told him he should be fine. He said it just looked cool so he took it. I thought it was kind of funny.

Wednesday we did preparation day. We found the greatest grocery store ever! It's called Aldi's and it's generic foods, etc for super cheap. I bought all the essentials for about half of what wallyworld costs. The only problem was that they don't accept credit cards. Thank heavens for ATM machines! We met with Brittany that evening and she is also really struggling. She said she doesn't feel peace hardly at all in her life and that she feels like she is being constantly bombarded by Satan when she even tries to pray. We read part of Joseph Smith story about how he was almost overtaken by Satan and how she can relate that story to her life. Then, we talked about the importance of praying out loud and of praying in their family. They said they would make a greater effort to pray everynight as a family. We also talked about the importance of reading daily from the BOM. It really does work miracles. Kia and Chevaughn are living proof of that. Our family is proof of that. It's like superglue!

Thursday was crazy busy again. We met with Nicole and Johanna and finished up the first lesson. Nicole is very receptive to the spirit. She said that the Joseph Smith story really touched her heart. She is really a fantastic lady. Then we met with Tabitha and finished up the Plan of Salvation. We also ate lunch with Tabitha. Tabitha is Italian apparently. So, we had a real "Italian Feast" She made this ravioli with pumpkin and cheese in it. It was SO good. We had margarita pizza and pasta with pesto. I think I got my fill of carbs for the day there. It was divine! Tabitha understands the Plan really well so we are super excited! She also said she would come to the Pig Pickin' on Saturday.

Saturday was the day of the Pig Pickin' and Tabitha did come! She was late, but she brought her whole family...including her husband who doesn't want anything to do with any kind of religion. It was awesome. The pork barbeque was good. Southern folks really like their sweets. More than half the table was dessert items. The pork was good though. We were able to contact a zillion referrals that day too!

Sunday Tabitha was supposed to come to church, but her little boy was sick all night so she didn't get to bed until 6 AM. Max came to church unexpectedly thanks to bold Sis. McCoy. Then, we had choir practice afterwards until about 6. All in all, we were at the church for about 10 hours yesterday. Both wards had their primary programs which were really good and the branch's whole meeting was on eternal marriage. I have a testimony of singles wards fulfilling their purpose. Our branch has shrunk almost 1/3 thanks to people getting hitched right and left. Hooray eternal families!

Well, I love you all. Hope you have a wonderful week. As always, thank you for you continuing support. The church is true!

Love, Sister J

October 19, 2011

Hello! I know it's the middle of the week now...I forgot that our prep day was being moved because we had zone conference on Monday. So, I apologize for leaving you hanging, holding your breath, etc. :)

This past week went SO fast. I can't believe it's the middle of this week already. Last prep day our district decided to play volleyball. We discovered that we all have room for improvement in developing volleyball "spiritual gifts." It was fun.

When we woke up on Tuesday, both of us felt like we were 100 years old and we could hardly move for most of the day going up and down the stairs everywhere we went. There are a lot of stairs in NC. Everyone lives in apartments. We had a great lesson on the Plan of Salvation (part 1) with Tabitha. Tabitha is Universal Unitarian and has told us that she doesn't think she'll ever join the LDS church, but she knows the BOM is true and feels that Joseph Smith was a prophet. She even watched a little bit of Conference. Anyways, we still have hope that she will change her mind. She asked quite a few questions about the spirit world and about what happens to those who aren't baptized with the priesthood and so forth. I have a lot of hope in her. She is a great lady. Afterwards, we met with a former investigator named Max. Max is Sis. McCoy's friend. Sis. McCoy is very bold. She told Max she needed to start meeting with the missionaries again and set up a time for us to go see her. We met with Max and talked about the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith. Max has a really hard time accepting the Joseph Smith story. We talked to her about recognizing the spirit and bore testimony that if she would read and pray that she would be able to know if it was true. Then, we met with Matthew. Matthew talked to his parents and they weren't too excited about his decision to keep going to church. He still has a lot of doubts, but despite his doubts he does have faith that he will know if he should be baptized on the 29th. We set a date with him for the 29th and we are praying that he will be able to overcome those doubts and fear of rejection from his family. Matthew is stellar.

Wednesday was zone training. Somehow, Pres. Cotterell had forgotten to interview me about a month ago. Sis. Matthews pointed this out so, I got to have my first interview with Pres. Cotterell. I was so nervous, but then it turned out to be great. Pres. Cotterell is amazing. Zone training was amazing too. We learned about the importance of warning those we teach about how satan will try to plant seeds of doubt in their minds after they have been introduced to light and truth. Then we talked about recieving referrals from people. The poor elders don't seem to have a lot of luck with referrals from members or anyone for that matter. We figured out the average percentage of referrals we recieve each week. Sis. Matthews and I have been incredibly blessed to recieve a referral from about 3/4 of the people we talk to. Then, we talked about the importance of prayer and making sure to take time to pray out loud by ourselves. It's hard to do that when you're with someone 24/7. Sister Matthews, Mecklenberg, Welch, and myself all ended up singing in a quartet thanks to a giant misunderstanding. President asked Sis. Mecklenberg and Welch if they would be willing to sing. Then, he asked if they would like an accompianment. I somehow missed something huge and agreed to what I thought was playing the piano. Turns out it wasn't that. We sang I Know that My Redeemer Lives. Sis. Matthews wasn't too excited to sing in front of the whole zone, but she said she was glad that we got confused afterwards. Zone training is the best. I felt like everything that we talked about was something that I had had questions about.

On Thursday we met with Johanna. She is a less active who was baptized, but didn't really know what she was getting baptized for. Her son was the one who had wanted to take the lessons and be baptized so she kind of just followed behind. We had planned to teach her the restoration and then a miracle happened! We drove to her house and her friend, Nicole (who is presbyterian) was there. Johanna asked her if she would like to pretend to be our "investigator." Johanna is funny like that. We really did want her to be our investigator though. Nicole was really confused, but agreed to stay. So, we taught them both the Restoration. Nicole agreed with everything we said and read from the BOM. We are going to meet with her tomorrow! After our lesson the Johanna's twin boys found a HUGE snake in their backyard. It was at least three feet long. Johanna caught it and put it in a pickle jar. She told us it wasn't poisoness and said you could tell by the shape of the pupil of their eyes. I didn't really care. I think it would have been a gonner if it had been slithering in my backyard. I don't like snakes.

Friday we did weekly planning and a whole bunch of calling. Sister Matthews told me a really good quote! She said, "when you give you trust to God, stop trying to take it back." So basically, don't let Satan plant those seeds of doubt. Just trust in God. (Proverbs 3:5-6) I have learned a lot from Sister Matthews. She is very wise and has an incredible spirit about her. She is a great teacher as well. I'm thankful Heavenly Father saw fit for us to be companions. On Saturday we went to Trisha's to help her pack. She is moving to Winterville..which is still in our area. She is moving three houses down from the bishop. Providential? I think so. It was a moving experience (no pun intended) She hadn't moved anything in their garage since her husband passed away a year ago and it was hard to think that he had left everything in exactly that place. Trisha did well though. Her spirits were a little down, but no where near as bad as it has been in the past. We packed with her for about an hour and a half and then we had a great evening of attempting to contact people. We contacted a part member family! I was so excited! They seemed really open and receptive so, we are very excited to go back and teach.

Sunday was pretty typical. Somehow I got pulled into playing the piano for stake conference at the end of the month. No stress. No worries. Whatever. We had Branch conference though and that was amazing! President Walker is a great stake president. He is not afraid to be blunt and I learned a lot. Bro. Jones gave a talk about how worthiness is not synonymous with perfection. I was very thankful to hear that talk. I don't think I'm a perfectionist, but sometimes it is easy to lose patience with one's self. Anyways, it was a really good meeting. There were only 22 people who came to the branch this sunday. I wish they all would have come. It was so good! Plus, we kind of owe it to Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.

Thanks for all you do and for you continual love and support. I love you all sooooooooooo much! I hope you are all doing well and just remember that you are in my prayers! Thanks for everything though.

I'm sure thankful for the Book of Mormon. I really don't know where I'd be without the guidance that is for our day in that book of scripture. I know it's true.

Much love, Sister J

October 10, 2011

Dear Family,

It was a good week here. Monday we did some shopping and wrote letters and cleaned, etc. Then, we set off to save the world! We were supposed to meet with Scott and Fabiola, but they ended up not being able to meet that night because their kids were screaming and just having a "rough day" from the sounds of it. We talked to the branch ward missionaries about doing missionary work and talking to their friends about the gospel. We are trying to find ways to motivate them to do missionary work. The branch is shrinking more than it is growing and we aren't quite sure how to go about doing work there since Pres. Cotterell has asked us not to tract around the student housing for various reasons. Hopefully they will find the courage to invite others. President C. said we haven't failed if they don't accept our invitation. I believe that.

Tuesday we taught Tabitha again. She is great. She has SO much energy for a mom with four wild kids. She told us that she felt like Joseph Smith was in fact a prophet, but that she didn't plan on converting. (sigh) We taught her about recognizing the spirit and had a very good lesson with her and invited her to continue reading and praying to know if that's what God would want her to do with the knowledge she now has. Then, we went to try and contact and recent convert who has since gone less active. Turns out she lived in a pretty sketchy part of town and has since moved. So, we didn't stay there long. Then, we started printing maps off for the HUGE map book we are making for all of Pitt county so we know where everyone lives. I called a lot of people while sat in the library printing off a zillion pages. Now that it gets dark earlier, we don't get to have as much proselyting time...so we find other purposeful activites like making map books and calling everyone.

Wednesday was district meeting. We talked about the doctrine of baptism. Elder Westley taught it and came in singing, "Today! Today! Baptize while you may!" (instead of "work while you may") Everyone started laughing after that. We had a good lesson though and we are trying as a district to build up the area. The elders haven't had much work at all the past couple of weeks so it's been kind of rough. I know there's got to be dozens more people who are longing to hear the gospel though. Greenville is pretty big! (and very spread out..which makes things difficult.) We taught Malcom and Elva later that day. Malcom had a lot of questions about the Book of Mormon. Sister Matthews knows her scriptures inside and out. For that I am thankful. I learned quite a bit during that lesson. Then, we went and taught Brittany about the Word of Wisdom. She likes her tea, but she said she would find a substitute for it. (Hooray!)

On Thursday we taught Matthew. He finally talked to his parents about joining the church! However, he also informed us that he wasn't quite sure if he was comfortable with being baptized and such quite yet. He said it's hard since that's not how he grew up, but he feels it's right. He just asked for more time to ponder and pray and read. Sister Matthews and I read a scripture today in Alma 34: 37-38 about waiting. We are praying he will recieve peace from the spirit to comfort him and help him make this decision.

Friday we taught Miranda. We taught Miranda a long time ago before Hurricane Irene rocked the east coast and she was very receptive. We were able to set up a time with her finally and taught her about the restoration. It was a great lesson. We went to a chili cook off that evening and tried a variety of chilis and cornbreads. Someone cheated and used yellow cake mix. It was rather disappointing...we judged the cornbread. They did not win.

Saturday we went to Steve's and taught him about recognizing the spirit as well. We decided that is what all our investigators need. It was a good lesson. I hope he will get his answer soon. He has been reading a lot from the Book of Mormon.

Sunday was a typical sunday. Played the piano, ran around like chickens with our heads chopped off between the 3 wards. I love Greenville!

Love you all!

Love Sis. J

October 3, 2011

Hello!

I hope you all are doing fantastic!

This week went far too quickly, but it was a great week.

Last Monday, Sister Matthews and I decided to go get haircuts. I don't know what happened really, but I chopped it all off. I think this is the shortest it's been since I was in fifth grade. I have no regrets.

Tuesday was predicted to be a very busy day, but quickly fell apart. Sister Matthews and I were so excited because we had a very full day, but then everyone called us in the morning to inform us that they had other things come up. So, we went and tried to contact some referrals on 2nd street in Ayden. We had no luck there so we resorted to what Sister Matthews calls "spiritual tracting." After knocking on a few doors, we felt impressed to go to one particular house. We knocked on the door, a man answered and we testifed of a living prophet and the of the Book of Mormon being the word of God through the screen door. Then, the man asked us if we would like to come in. His mother was there so we came in, taught him about the rest of the restoration and he agreed to read, pray, etc. His mom did too! His name is Malcom and his mother's name is Elva. They are very sweet people. Later that evening we went and taught Matthew. Matthew was so close to talking to his parents about joining the church, but he says that every time he tries to talk to them, something crazy always happens. He said he still feels really good about talking to them though. We encouraged him and read from Moroni 7 about the ministering of angels and how they help those who are firm in the faith. I know Matthew will be blessed and have angels help him as he finds the courage to talk to his parentals.

Wednesday we had a great district meeting about recieving revelation through the Holy Ghost. Elder Westley had us do an 'object lesson' in the gym. He brought a bag of tennis balls and gave us each a tennis ball. He told us to throw the tennis balls to him. Everyone did this (as hard as they could...elders are kind of ridiculous that way) and Elder Westley obviously was uanble to catch all of the tennis balls. He told us this is how it is when we are teaching. We have to allow the people we are teaching (and even ourselves) recieve revelation through the Holy Ghost by allowing time to ponder. Silence is not a bad thing! We then proceded to throw our tennis balls one at a time to him to demonstrate how if we allow time and listen to the spirit then we can recieve the revelation Heavenly Father desires for us. Sometimes I think the things we learn at district meeting are so elementary, but I've been learning that it's those simple things like that that are the important things and they testify of truth in a way that even small children can learn from. Afterwards, we went to Grimesland to contact some referrals out there. Afterwards, we ate dinner with Brittany her family. They made this chicken stuffed with shrimp over pasta and it was really, really good. Then we had a really good lesson to finish up the last half of the Plan of Salvation. I loooove teaching the Plan of Salvation! She understood it very well and had a lot of questions that we were able to answer with scripture and she is just soaking up everything we teach.

Thursday ended up being another cop-out day with all of our investigators. Everyone we had scheduled in the mornings either called to cancel or didn't answer the door. However, we did get to have a lesson with Scott and Fabiola that evening. Their kids were running around like wild hooligans the whole time, but we were able to teach them about faith and repentance and they said they knew that they needed to come to church in order to get answers to their questions and so forth.

We did weekly planning on Friday and then we spent the evening contacting referrals. We were able to contact a few of our referrals...so that was good! I've learned so much from Sister Matthews. She has this great way of organizing her lesson plans into doctrine, principle, application steps. I feel like it's opened the doors to so many different ways of teaching.

Saturday was GENERAL CONFERENCE! It was so good! We went to the church building and watched conference there. No one else was there except the Elders and a few members here and there. It was awesome! Elder Scott's talk about reading from all the standard works and memorizing scriptures was one of my favorites...it was a good talk to start the conference off with. As Sister Matthews says, "memorizing scriptures helps it go from head knowledge to heart knowledge." I encourage you all to choose a scripture to memorize. Oh man. I don't even know where to begin and end with general conference. The talk that Elder Bednar gave about family history work was a good one too. Sister Matthews and I were wondering why he chose to speak on that subject of all the things he could have chosen. We were reading in true to the faith about family history work and found something amazing. Elder Bednar's last two talks have been on the spirit of revelation, listening the spirit, etc. In true to the faith it says that we can recieve revelation as we do family history work. God definitely has a bigger picture than we can see a lot of the time. I wish that Scott and Fabiola would have come to the last session on Saturday. President Uchtdorf's talk was just for them. I am totally convinced. I wish people would do what they say they are going to do....

Sunday's conference was fantastic as well. I loved it all; especially the talk about the Book of Mormon and how there is no middle ground. Brittany came to both sessions on sunday and she said that when Pres. Monson go up to speak, that she felt like she had seen him before and knew his voice. I know that was the spirit telling her that she was in the right place at the right time. Afterwards, we reviewed the Plan with her and taught her about following the prophet.

The savior's atonement always provides a lifeboat!

Love yall!

Sis. J