Frankenstorm Arrives!

Hurricane Sandy has apparently acquired a nickname, "Frankenstorm."

Luckily, we haven't been affected hardly at all. Mostly just lots of wind and a "fizzy" rain. It's really not that exciting. It could be that we're pretty far inland though.

We had a good week. Lots of people stood us up this week which was disappointing, but it was still a good week. :)

We went and did some shopping around last Monday. We found a Target in our area! I haven't been to Target in over a year.
We found some good deals which was great!

Our investigator, Candy stood us up on Tuesday so we went and stopped by a less active/recent convert family (the Drakes). They are great! Sis. Drake had actually just been talking with Sis. Swift the day before and was talking about how she wanted us to come by and teach the lessons again and then, we show up on her doorstep! So, that went well. We brought her brownies and she told us we were way better than the elders :]  We were able to finally get up with our investigator, Charmaina afterwards as well. In the evening we went and taught the activity day girls in the 2nd ward the restoration with the cups. They all thought it was the best thing since sliced bread.

Wednesday was District Meeting. We discussed the importance of teaching by the spirit. Our district really is hilarious this transfer. They played a game of "ninja" afterwards which was entertaining to say the least. We were also able to have a lesson with Dennis and Reshell and that went great! Dennis asked us before we could ask him about baptism. He asked us "So, if I wanted to...you know...join myself with the church...what exactly would I have to do?" It was so great. We were able to help him understand what was expected of him we set a date for him and Reshell to get baptized on the 24th of Nov.
We took brownies to the Wakefield family (we just started teaching his wife last week). She talked our ears off for a good 20 minutes and all I have to say is that sugary goodness soften hearts.
We had a really good lesson with the Coombs/Freschette family afterwards. They are also a part member family. We taught the first part of the Plan of Salvation and it went very well. Bro. Freschette asked a lot of questions and was really interested in the whole idea of the pre-earth life.

Thursday was insane! We volunteered to teach early morning seminary for the Bishop's wife in the 2nd ward. We are such brown nosers... Teaching early morning seminary entailed that we wake up at 4:30 in the morning to make it on time by 6 am. I can now say I have experienced "real seminary" and I don't think I would have survived living outside of UT. No one fell asleep so that was good! Those youth are so dedicated. We met with Sis. Donaldson in the afternoon. She is doing really well! We also taught her the Plan of Salvation. She didn't remember anything about it so it was a good review and we definitely all left feeling edified. I love the Plan of Salvation. :]
So remember how I told you about Mona who hasn't been interested in meeting with missionaries forever? We called her this week and she actually let us set up a time to meet. She just cancels before our appointment ever happens, but we do have an appointment set up for friday. We are hoping she won't cancel again.

Friday was just everyone and their dog standing us up. Nothing too exciting to report on. We tracted a lot and planted many seeds!

Sunday was very similar. At least Daisy came to church!

The Plan of Salvation is true

My time is up, but I love you all!

Have a wonderful week.

Love, Sister J

Keepin' Busy

Hello!

Hope y'all had a wonderful week!

So last monday was GREAT! we had a wonderful lesson with little miss Daisy at the Wades' home. The Wades are both return missionaries and love, love, love to do missionary work. They have been wanting to have someone taught in their home for the longest time it finally happened! Sister Wade was so happy she was crying (tears of joy of course) almost the entire lesson. We had the most perfect lesson with Daisy. We taught her about the gospel of Jesus Christ (faith, repentance, baptism, receiving the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end). Since there were 5 of us, we assigned everyone a topic and had them used the index to look up a few scriptures that they liked about each of the topics. We gave Daisy the topic of baptism and it was so amazing. She found a scripture in Alma 5:62 that is basically an invitation to repent and be baptized. We talked about the verses and she told us that she felt like that verse was speaking right to her and she wanted to get baptized on the 27th. We were like, "Wahoo!" and then we were like, "uh...that's coming up really fast!" The lesson was so powerful and the spirit was incredible there. We talked with Daisy later this week and she told her mom that she wants to get baptized. Her mom still feels like she needs to make sure she knows more before she makes that decision. So, her baptism is postponed for now. She is a spiritual giant though. It is amazing.

We met with our new investigator, Candy last tuesday. She is a funny lady. She was being taught by the elders, but told them she wanted us to teach her instead (mostly because she felt like she could be more open with us than with the elders). We talked about patience and the Word of Wisdom. She has some real struggles there and wants so badly to be baptized, but is having a really difficult time giving up her coffee. She has the desire to do what's right so she should be a lot of fun to teach. :] 
A less active lady named Mona lives like 5 apartments away from Candy. As we were walking the opposite direction to go back to our car I felt like we really needed to go by Mona. We turned around and walked back down. Her car wasn't there so we decided to just leave her a note to tell her we loved her and missed her. As we were finishing up her note to stick on her door, she pulled up! She came down and talked with us on her porch for about 10 minutes. She was so happy to see us. She started to cry because she was so happy. It was amazing because she told us that just the day before she had been praying for help and had even opened her Book of Mormon again to try and find some direction and felt quite in despair. She told us that it didn't matter who had sent us, but she was grateful that we were there and felt like it was a sign that God was mindful of her and loved her. We told her she was right. She still wasn't willing to set up an appointment for us to meet, but she said that we could call and stop by again and maybe she would let us in to teach a little. Progress!
We also met with Reshell and Dennis and had a great lesson on the restoration and the Word of Wisdom. We were a little unsure about how they would receive the Word of Wisdom, but once they understood why it was important, they both agreed to live it and said they felt like this was the right path for them and that they were making the right decisions. Reshell found out she won't be moving for another two weeks which means we can continue to teach her for 2 more weeks! :D
We had dinner with the Beck family (and I usually only mention dinner if it was aboslutely amazing). We had a feast! It was like thanksgiving. Then we ended it all with apple crisp made with freshly picked apples (2 days old) from the Blue Ridge Mountains...where ever those are. It was the best apple crisp. Fresh apples make all the difference. I feel like I had forgotten what a good apple tastes like. Mmm!

Wednesday's district meeting was great! Our district is really great this transfer. There are several elders in our district who have tasteful senses of humor and make district meetings quite entertaining. My favorite one liner was from Elder Gilespie when we were talking about the difference between being bold and overbearing when making commitments. He said, "You shouldn't be sneaky when you extend invitations. It hurts to get hit with the bold stick a whole lot more when you're not expecting it." haha...I wrote that down in my study journal and so did Sis. Asay. We had our weekly lunch/lesson with Sis. Patrick. She made some yummy soup with rolls. We watched the John Tanner Story movie and talked about sacrifice. It was a really nice lesson. We met with Sis. Donaldson who is still not feeling well. Bless her heart. I hope she gets feeling better soon. She has struggled so much. Sister Bernhisel asked us if we would take a 19 year old girl named Hannah on exchanges with us because she wants to serve a mission. She lives in Durham, but she drove down to Raleigh to come with us. We went to dinner and had some scrumptious lasagna with the Fuller family. Bro. Fuller had made it completely from scratch. He loves the food network. lol. We then went to visit with Sis. Falco and also taught her about sacrifice. She is so solid. Her car starter quit working this week and cost her a huge sum of money. She wasn't sure how things were going to work out, but she went ahead and paid her tithing. She is exercising so much faith. It is great to see.

We spent all of friday tracting (and I mean all of friday) for lack of other things to do. No one would respond to our phone calls. So, we decided to park the car and just go and talk to people. Unfortunately, not many people wanted to talk with us. The weather was nice though and we had an enjoyable time talking with the people who actually did engage in conversation with us.

We spent all of Saturday morning helping a recent convert move. She is not the most organized packer so we helped her get things organized. She was about ready to panic. Good thing the ward was there to help her!

Sunday was stake conference. It was jam packed. There were a lot of good talks. Daisy, Reshell, and Dennis all came to church and loved the conference. We had a lesson with a girl named Brooklynn and her parents after church. Brooklynn has been coming to church for almost a year now and loves the church. She asked her parents about meeting with missionaries and they agreed that we could come over. Her parents didn't have any intentions of changing from their Lutheran background, but want Brooklynn to make her own decisions about religion. It was kind of a weird situation because when we asked about a time that we could come back, they asked us what was normal. We told them we would like to come back in a few days. They didn't like that idea. Her mom said they were thinking more like the end of December (that's forever away!). They want Brooklynn to be "educated" about the religion, but said they won't let her make any decisions about joining the church until she is at least 18. She's 17 right now. At least we got to plant some good seeds! :)

We also met with a part member family, the Wakefields. Elder Pace actually referred them to us when we asked him who he knew we could teach in the Raleigh area (he served in Raleigh almost 2 years ago).  We went by one night and they agreed to have us over. We had a great lesson with them. I was so nervous for some reason. Sister Asay and I both felt like we should teach them about the Plan of Salvation. So, we did. Nothing amazing happened, but I guess Sis. Wakefield just needed to know that. We also talked a little about families and gave them copies of The Family: A Proclamation to the World. They want us to come back...so that's a good sign! I hope things will progress with them. Bro. Wakefield is very nice. He loves the church. Just got out of the habit of going.

I read an ensign article today that talked about the importance of looking up to the Lord to know how we are doing and not looking sideways to see how other people think we are doing in our progress of life. I learned that we aren't supposed to be pleasing other people; we only need to be concerned with pleasing the Lord. If we keep our eyes focused on Him, everything will work together for our good in His time.

I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week!

Read the Book of Mormon! It's the best book ever! (seriously!)

Love,
Sister J

So Many Blessings

Dearest Family, friends, etc,

Hello! The leaves are changing and are ridiculously vibrant. It is so pretty.

I am so tired today. Our fire alarm decided to give up the ghost last night around 10:45 and would not hush up even after we took the batteries out! We finally mustered up the courage to go ask Sis. Clay to help us find some batteries and we finally had it fixed sometime after 11. I'm not sure how this incident is supposed to play a part in the Lord's plan, but I guess everything happens for a reason. :)

We had the best week EVER! There were so many good things that happened this week. The Lord is definitely in the details of our lives.
We had a really good lesson with Daisy last Monday on the 10 commandments. We read from Mosiah 12 and 13 and discussed them. Daisy is just amazing. She is in 2 Nephi now and she is reading the New Testament as well for seminary. She told us that she talked with her mom and we are going to be meeting with her tonight! Also, they both came to a fireside last night that was at the mission home. It was incredible. The fireside was for recent converts and investigators and basically, they just had some recent converts bear testimony of the Book of Mormon and how they were introduced to the church. There was such a special spirit there. I was so glad her mom was able to come with her. Daisy loved the fireside too. So, things are going really well there. I hope they will continue.

We got a call Monday night from Charmaina (investigator) who informed us that her daughter Shade (pronounced Sha-day) got hit by a truck earlier in the evening and was in the hospital. Naturally, we were excessively concerned about them. The relief society definitely fulfilled their purpose and offered necessary assistance to Charmaina and her family. Shade is home, but has some broken bones in her back and a LOT of road rash. Poor thing. She told us she is bed-bound for the next three weeks. We were talking with Sis. Swift, the WML wife who introduced Charmaina to the church originally and she told us that Shade was planning on going to YW the following night and then she said, "Satan definitely went below the belt with Shade." I would have to agree. It made me smile that she said that though.

Tuesday we contacted a zillion referrals which was great! Unfortunate for them, they did not choose to accept our invitation to learn more about the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and how it can bless their lives (sigh). We did get to visit with less active, Sis. Edmonson. We helped her vacuum and sweep her floor and shared some scriptures with her. She came to church yesterday too! We had dinner with the Whitt family and ate giant red velvet cupcakes that were seriously the size of my face. Afterwards we had a great lesson with Sis. Huber (less active) about obedience and read from 1 Nephi 16 and Mosiah 2:41 and Ether 12:27. It was such a good lesson! She then informed us that she would be bringing her boyfriend and kids to church on Sunday. We had no idea she even had a boyfriend. It was great though! They all came to church on Sunday. We were stuck in 1st ward's ward council meeting during 2nd ward's gospel principles class so we didn't get to meet them which was sad, but it was great to see that Sis. Huber is sharing the gospel and that her testimony is growing. We're doing our job!

Wednesday we had lunch with one of my favorite people, Sis. Patrick. She is so great. She made this delicious chili. Sis. Asay thought it was gross. I loved it. It had carrots, green peppers, onions, tomatoes, beans, etc in it and just made me so happy. I love vegetables!  After sharing a message with her about General Conference we proceeded with a crazy afternoon. We met with recent convert, Sis. Donaldson. She has been very sick. She wasn't feeling particularly well when we were over there, but we had a nice lesson with her and discussed some of the things we learned from conference. After we had dinner, we went to see recent convert, Sis. Smith who was blasting Christmas music when we got to her apartment. She LOVED conference and printed off basically every talk. It was so funny.

We had zone training on Thursday which was definitely an answer to many prayers. We focused a lot on finding and how to involve members. It was just another testimony to me that the Lord really is in the details of our lives. Sis. Asay and I came up with a lot of creative ways to find last week after having a rather slow week (that is an understatement by the way) and as we have been applying those things this week the most amazing thing has happened! We have been led to those who are prepared to hear the gospel. I feel like the Lord recognizes when we are doing our best and He shows that He trusts us to teach people the more we do everything we can to further the work. We had a fulfilling evening by going to the RS homemaking activity for the 2nd ward which was called, "Making Pies and Missionary Moments." We talked to the sisters about Pres. Uchtdorf's talk called, "Lift Where You Stand" and read from Alma 8 and talked about ways they could "lift where they stand" to share the gospel. The pie was delicious too. There are some good pie makers here. I especially enjoy the pecan (PEE-can) pie here. It is now my favorite pie.

Thursday was madness. We had a great lesson with the less active Gonzalez family and taught the restoration to them. Sis. Gonzalez told us as we were leaving that she really enjoyed the lesson. Now we just need to figure out how to help them come to church! We went contacting afterwards and talked to several people. People are so funny. We tried to help a lady wash out her flower pots, but she insisted that we just keep moving along our way. We left a mormon.org card for her anyways. :]
We had a great lesson with our investigator Reshell. Reshell has been listening to her Book of Mormon on CD that we gave her diligently. It has been so neat to see how she has changed. She is so happy now! I love that the Book of Mormon can help people find peace and happiness in life. BUT the miracle was this: when we went over to Reshell's, her boyfriend (whom we also were not aware existed) was there. His name is Dennis. He had a roommate a year or so ago who had met with missionaries when he was living in New York. Dennis said he had sat in on the lessons, but didn't remember much. We taught the Plan of Salvation and they both participated, asked great questions, etc. It was fun. We invited Dennis to church and he initially declined, but then as we were leaving he said, "you know, I think I would like to come to church." So, we found a ride for the two of them and they came to church yesterday! A member told us that he had asked Dennis about his experience at church. Dennis told him he loved it and would definitely be back! We found out that Reshell is moving to Durham. :( At least the missionaries there will have someone amazing to teach!
We then had dinner with Bro. Lopez, the Ehrismans, and the Moores and a Mexican restaurant with giant burritos. I ate the whole thing. It was delicious. We also met with Sis. Falco afterwards and had a great lesson with her. I love her so much!

Saturday and Sunday were great. Church was super busy. We went to the fireside on Sunday night and it was such a neat experience. It's amazing how people find the gospel.

The church is true.

I love you all!

Love, Sis J

Witnessing History

Hello dear family and friends!

It is officially October weather here in NC. We finally had a cold-snap! It is enjoyable. I think it would be more enjoyable if I wasn't in a skirt. :]

I hope you all had an enjoyable conference weekend and that you were able to learn much from the speakers. It was definitely a spiritual feast. I learned SO much. I can't believe they changed the ages for missionaries! That is so exciting! It was pretty hilarious to see the crowd's reaction when Pres. Monson announced that. We just witnessed history! Lance can go when he's 18 now!
Elder Lee heard a rumor last year that they were going to change elders' length of time back to three years and he told us afterwards that he thought for sure when Pres. Monson was talking about change and missionary work that they were changing it back. He said he was bracing himself when Pres. Monson was speaking. He's only been out 12 weeks. I would be nervous about that too. LOL!!!
I thought it would be appropriate to share a few insights and thoughts from conference:
"Life is not a race. It is a journey. Enjoy the moment!" Pres. Uchtdorf
"Anything essential is only visible to the heart. It is invisible to the eyes." Pres. Uchtdorf and Elder Gonzalez (they both used the same quote!)
From Elder Eyring's talk about removing the pavilions we have I pondered the question of what pavilions I may have that are preventing me from doing the Lord's will.
Elder Eyring also had a great quote about how we should "come to know the Lord as well as He knows us" (I am paraphrasing because I grabbed the wrong notebook and therefore cannot remember all of the things I learned from conference. :/ )
Do we have grime our the walls of our soul or are there squares in the windows that aren't quite in line within the windows of our soul?
"Are you willing to sell your soul for a nickel?" -Elder Gay
Take an inventory of your life and look for the blessings; great and small that the Lord has given you -Pres. Monson
There were a lot of other things that were so great from conference. It's a shame I grabbed the wrong study journal. (sigh).
My two favorite talks were Elder Ballard's about bees and doing service and Elder Bednar's (of course) and the connection between testimony and conversion. I can't wait until we get the ensign!

This week was another trying week in the aspect of missionary work in Raleigh. It's a good thing we had general  conference. It always comes right when I need it most. All of our appointments with investigators fell through. Daisy's mom doesn't want her out so much, Reshell was sick, Dale stood us up, and Charmaina was working crazy hours. Lehi knew what he was talking about when he said that there is opposition in all things!

There were a lot of really tender moments this week as well though. Last Monday Sis. Jacobson whom I adore took us to William B. Umstead park. The Fuquay Sisters went with us and we had a great time hiking through the trees. It was so peaceful (besides the occasional airplane that would fly. The park is literally right next door the RDU airport.) We had a great time though. Our appointment for the evening stood us up so we went home and did some area book updating since it was dark and we are not allowed to proselyte after dark.

Tuesday was a lot of fun. We went to see Dale who also stood us up. Sister Epps came with us. She is a fire cracker! Dale's aunt was home and sister epps got us in the door, set up a return appointment, and invited her to church. She is a great missionary. We went to visit less active Sister Bennett afterwards. She is a great seamstress and had a whole room of theater clothing that she has sewed. It was absolutely amazing! We had dinner with the Thaxtons afterwards. Bro. Thaxton served his mission here. He had a lot of funny stories. It was fun talking to someone who had served here previously.

We lunch with Sis. Patrick on Wednesday. She is the best person ever! She is also a great member missionary. She is going to invite one of friends over the next time we come and hopefully it will be a good result. We had a tender moment with less active Sis. Falco on that evening. Sis. Falco is a lady we have been working with for several weeks now. She has been less active for quite a while, but once we invited her to change a few things, she did it! She told us her feats of the week when we met with her and she was so excited! She is working towards getting her temple recommend again and thanked us for coming. She told us she didn't think she could have come back on her own accord if we wouldn't have come. I am grateful we get to act as the Lord's representatives and invite people to come back and change their lives. It is so rewarding.

General Conference weekend was insane. The Clements family had us over for waffles in the morning. We made a variety of waffles which included: chocolate chip, bacon and cheese (weird, right? well, it tastes good!), and banana. I absolutely LOVED the banana waffles. They were so good. They are hands down my favorite kind of waffle now. We went to the church and watched all of the sessions there except the last session on Sunday. We headed over the the Henderson's home in first ward and watched it there. I discovered that I prefer watching conference in the church building. I am less inclined to feel the temptation to fall asleep. :]

The church is true. I love you all and I am so thankful for the gospel of Jesus Christ. I hope we can all continue to develop and strengthen our testimonies and conversions of the gospel as we ponder the words of the prophets and apostles from this past conference and study from the scriptures. They will tell us "all things what [we] should do" (2 Nephi 32:3)

Have a wonderful week!


Love, Sister J

I'm Drowning In Missionary Work!!!

Hello! Happy October! It looks like the leaves are turning all sorts of gorgeous colors out west. Thank you for the pictures.
They are just starting to turn here. I am really looking forward to seeing them in full swing this year. Raleigh has so many trees. It is really a beautiful place.

This week was nothing short of completely and utterly insane. We were up to our eyeballs in missionary work. We had a zillion appointments this week. All with less actives and recent converts.It was great! I loved it!

Sis. Wilson was with us for the majority of the week. It was fun teaching in a trio again. I think it helped us to find more balance in our teaching.

Since my time is going faster than I can keep track of, I will give a brief overview of the highlights of the week:

Zone Leader/District Leader council was this past Friday. It was amazing! A few things that I learned:
*Observe to identify needs of investigators and members. Pres. Bernhisel called this "living the higher law." Sis. Asay and I have been trying to do a better job of that this week. It is a lot of fun!
*We had a few people from the department of proselyting or something like that. Bro. Watson gave a great lesson on what our purpose is and what it means. Bringing people unto Christ means helping them, assisting them, guiding them, etc. It also simply means that we help people make and keep covenants with God. He talked about incorporating the Doctrine of Christ into everything. I felt like what he taught was one of those 'puzzle pieces' that you just can't seem to find the right place for and then you finally get it! He told us to consider asking these questions after a lesson:
What evidence is there that (insert name of person)'s faith is increasing?
What evidence is there that they are repenting?
What evidence is there that they are working towards making/keeping their baptismal covenants?
What evidence is there that the spirit was present?
What evidence is there that they are eduring to the end? (i.e. working towards going to the temple, etc)
*Bro Wade also spoke. He is from Fruit Heights. He told us that if we ask for referrals we better follow up with them because it would be better that we had never asked if we aren't making plans to follow up.
There were so many great things that we learned from that! It's been fun to try and apply as many of the things as we can in our lessons.

All of our appointments with our investigators fell through this week. :( It was frustrating. We were able to stay in contact with them all though and Reshell and Daisy both made it to church yesterday! It is neat to see people change. We definitely stayed plenty busy with all of the less actives and recent converts we are teaching.

We took Sis. Wilson back to Fuquay on Saturday so she could stay with her companion until her companion goes home tomorrow. We met the family they live with, the Measoms. They are a great family. Fuquay is a lot like Dunn. It is a good balance of country and city. I decided I missed all of the tobacco and cotton fields! There aren't any of those in these parts of the woods!

We were able to schedule a time to meet with Charmaina and her family! (she was the referral from Bro. Swift, our ward mission leader in the R2 ward). I am excited to teach them about the gospel and how it can bless them. There are so many blessings that come from the gospel. It is amazing.

The relief society broadcast was wonderful as always. Sis. Asay was crying through the whole thing. I was kind of worried. She is okay though. :) Just being a typical sister missionary. It was definitely an incredible broadcast. I am looking forward to reading it when the ensign comes! Don't forget to prepare to here the prophet speak this week!
Here's a link that can help you find ideas of how to prepare for conference:
http://www.lds.org/general-conference/prepare-for?lang=eng

I love you all and I know that the prophet speaks for God and that if we listen to and follow his direction we will be blessed and we will 'prosper in the land.'


Love y'all!

Love,
Sister J