Happy Thanksgiving!!

Dear family, friends, and favorite people,

Happy Thanksgiving!
Turkey day here was great. It was crazy, but it was great all at the same time.. The Clays had like 10 of their grand-kids over. We locked ourselves in our tiny little room upstairs so we could do our weekly planning...and guess what?! We actually finished it all in one day! We took a break for lunch and played tag with some of the grandkids in the backyard. That made their day. Afterwards we went to the Waldorf/Gandolph family's home for dinner and had a delicious thanksgiving dinner. I love little kids. The Waldorf's daughter, Kaylee is the cutest little girl (besides Ashlyn). Sister Asay and I spent about 2 hours after dinner serenading all their family with "The Sound of Music" and select hymns. It was so much fun. Kaylee and their son Tillman also came and sang with us.
There is a lot to be thankful for. I am thankful for my family; they are the best ever. I am thankful for my health, for all of the wonderful companions I have been blessed with, for all the amazing people I have been able to teach, the Book of Mormon (because it is the most amazing book ever), prophets, etc. The list could go on forever. I realized as I was pondering about all the things we are blessed with that it really comes down to remembering to be thankful to our Savior and Redeemer, Jesus Christ. We are forever indebted to him. The scriptures from Mosiah 2 have been going through my mind this whole week (see verses 20-25). I am forever grateful for Jesus Christ. I am thankful for the hope that the Atonement brings and that I have had the privilege of being raised in a home where that knowledge was taught and practiced.

Reshell has officially moved to Durham. :( She said she still wants to meet with missionaries there! I hope it works out okay. We had some great miracles this week.

Here are a couple:

Sister Asay felt impressed to go by an active member of the ward. I was somewhat hesitant, but agreed that we could call her and set up a time to visit her. We had a good lesson with her and by the end of the conversation she was telling us about a mother and son that she had invited to live with her until they can find a place to live. They are not members and they came to church last week. We talked to the sister (Sister Boyd) about asking them if they would like to talk with missionaries. She agreed to do that and we are going to see them this week! Sister Boyd also invited them to the Community Christmas Celebration (aka: Creche. Creche is a word from Greek(?) that means nativity)
Sister Asay and I have seen several "tender mercies" which I believe is in part due to our efforts in asking for referrals from everyone and trying to talk with everyone we see. As we were getting ready to leave church yesterday an older brother in the ward came up to us and told us about his son's family that he wants us to work with. They are less active and their daughter has started opening up some about learning more (she's not a member). We are hoping to set something up with them this week.
The Clay family we live with has really caught the missionary fire as well. Their daughter Joy was telling us about another girl in the ward who invited a couple of friends to meet with missionaries. One of them is getting baptized, but the other isn't....yet. She wants to invite her over and have us teach her to see if she would be more receptive to Sisters. It is exciting!

Well, my time is about ready to expire, but I know this is the Lord's work.

Have a wonderful week! Love y'all!

Love, Sister J

We Are "Elderettes"!

Hello!

I hope you are enjoying the snow. It's just windy and cold here. Today is exactly one month until I become a part-time missionary. :] I think Sister Asay is trunky for me. She tells EVERYONE when I am going home.

We had the craziest week this week. It was so much fun and it went by way too fast.

Last Monday we decided to be a little extreme and we cut our preparation day short so we could have a lesson with Daisy. We had the best lesson with her about fasting and living the word of wisdom. We are going to fast with her next sunday. I am excited for her to experience that. Fasting is such a wonderful way to tap into spiritual power. We dinner with the Pixton family. Their son reminds me a lot of Lance. He is ridiculously tall too. Bro. Pixton (the dad) is about 6'7". They are such a wonderful family. Afterwards went to the Coombs household and had a lesson with Sis. Coombs and "Bro. Bill." Bill told us he doesn't really want to have the lessons anymore which was sad. We had such high hopes for him, but at least we planted a seed! I feel like the song "We are Sowing" is the story of my life...which is fine, but discouraging at times.
I found a really great scripture in Ether during my personal study that morning. It's Ether 12:41. It's so good!

Tuesday was insane. We had an appointment with a man named Donovan at 11 that morning so we met a member at the church to take us there for the lesson. Donovan is less active. He had been wanting to come back to church for a while and thought it was interesting that we just happened to show up on his doorstep one evening. We had a good lesson with him. Sister Evans shared a lot of good things with him. She is a convert and has a really powerful testimony. He told us a really neat story about how his son had texted him that same week and told him that he had decided to start attending the "Mormon church" again. So, it's neat to see how the Lord is working in both of their lives. He was supposed to come to church yesterday, but didn't come. (sigh). It is hard to come back to good things when you have strayed away from them.
When we went back to the church transfer meeting was going on. We ate our lunch in the kitchen and by the time we were finishing up, transfer meeting was over. I got to see Sister Welch and Sister Tillman and a few of the other sisters.
GUESS WHAT?!? Sister Welch told me that the Hudsons (from Dunn) finally have decided to get baptized!!! They are going to get baptized in January. I was so excited! Sister Tillman was telling me about Greenville and I guess they are teaching a girl Sister Joseph and I started teaching named Hawa and she has also worked really hard and wants to get baptized. It is exciting to hear about these people. I am happy for them.
Sister Welch was by herself with all of the elders who were going home (she was the only sister going home) So we asked Pres. and Sister Bernhisel if we could "kidnap" her for the day and go on "exchanges" to an appointment that we had with Reshell. They said that would be fine so we did just that. Reshell was sick so we ended up contacting a few people. We talked to a really nice man named Jose. He didn't speak much english, but we asked him if he would like to learn about Jesus Christ and his face lit up and he said, "Yes!" The spanish elders will now have a good referral to go to. :) Our dinner appointment cancelled so when we took Sister Welch back to the mission home the Bernhisels told us to stay for dinner. We had burritos and laughed ourselves sick. Sister Welch is so funny. I love that girl.

Wednesday was district meeting. The new elder in our district is Elder Waniel. He is from the South Pacific somewhere. (I can't really understand him very well). He is a good elder though. We did a fun district meeting where we were each assigned a topic associated with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and we taught about how it applies to us as missionaries, to members, and to investigators. It was fun. We sang a hymn to go with each section so I got a lot of piano playing in! It was great! We had a lesson with a less active named Sister Lybarger afterwards and taught the restoration. She really enjoyed the lesson and gave us pumpkin pie afterwards. We went on exchages with the office sisters afterwards and had no success contacting our backup plans (our original appointment cancelled).

Thursday was great! We had dinner with the Petty family. Their daughter just returned from a mission in Brazil. She a great member missionary now. She brought three nonmembers to dinner. We had a really good lesson with them afterwards. Sister Asay sang and I played the piano and it brought the spirit so strongly and then we testified of Jesus Christ and of prophets and apostles and of the Book of Mormon. We are hoping we can meet with their neighbor, Charles again this week..and we're still working on Sister Petty's unofficial boyfriend, Jared. :]

Friday we went to IHOP with Sister Patrick and her daughter Allison for lunch. I like pancakes. We had a good little lesson with them and then we went and contacted a lot of less active members of the ward that lived in that area. We were able to set up some appointments with some of them and it was a productive afternoon. We had dinner with Sister Donaldson afterwards. I think I'm still full from that meal.

Saturday we stayed busy all day and had a lesson with Shaunti and helped her get organized in her new apartment. We then had a lesson with Sister Falco. The most amazing thing has happened with Sister Falco. I always have some reservations about how things will work out when we promise people blessings for keeping commandments and such. Since Sister Falco has been paying her tithing, she has been incredibly blessed. Her son who lives in Fayetteville had previously estranged her basically, but that morning she received a phone-call from his wife and they talked for a long time and they are going to make plans for the holidays! Sister Falco was so happy and it was neat to see that she recognized that it was Heavenly Father blessing her. We dinner with the Willis family who invited a less active named Sister Barbour over for dinner and then we did a little "music party" afterwards. Sister Willis plays the accordian and her and her husband yodeled for us and their kids did the mexican hat dance too. It was fun and it was really good for Sister Barbour to be there.

Sunday was crazy. It was a taste of Greenville again. We went to three sacraments! We went to the third ward because the Clays were performing a musical number and had invited a non-member friend they wanted us to meet. So, we went. We got to hear from a returned Sister missionary. She served in Mesa, AZ. She gave a great talk and it was by far the best sacrament meeting of the day. A less active member came to church in second ward and he referred to us as elderettes. It made my day.

The church is true and I love you all!

Have a great week!

Love, Sister J

Color Explosion!!!

Dear family and friends,


Well, we received the results of black Saturday and you'll never believe it (actually you probably will)....Sister Asay and I are companions still. Transfer #3. That means I will only have had six companions my entire mission. The only person that is even leaving from our district is Elder Lee.

As usual, I don't have much time to write, but a few highlights from this past week include:

Sister Falco: She is the less active lady we have been working with since we first came to Raleigh. She has come to church every week except for the week her car broke down. We called her this week to see how she was doing and as she answered the phone in a sing-song way she explained to us that she had listened to all of conference again this week and that she had found some talks from Carlos Asay and LeGrand Richards. Look up "Simplicity in Christ" by LeGrand Richards. Sister Falco pulled it up for us and we watched it. Elder Richards is so funny. I don't think it was intended to be as funny as it was, but I love the way he talks and how he phrases things. We then watched Elder Holland's "Safety for the Soul" talk. That one will knock your socks off!

The Relief Society in 2nd ward had a dinner/service activity. It was fun to be with the sisters and help them clean up afterwards.

We had a great lesson with Daisy. It turns out she is a guitar pro! She played us some songs and enjoyed listening to her talent. Our lesson was all about fasting. We are going to fast with her at the end of the month. I really think it will be a big turning point for her. There is so much spiritual power that comes from fasting.

I forgot to mention last week, but I want to mention it now because it was my favorite thing that happened last week! The Wakefield family came to church last week! It was the best thing ever! My favorite part was seeing Bro. Wakefield be able to take the sacrament again. We had a great lesson with them afterwards and Sister Wakefield is praying about the Book of Mormon. We are praying for her too.

We met a man who is less active named Bro. Perkins today. He wants to come back to church. He said he had actually been thinking about that and it was really neat to see how the Lord works on people because just a few days after we stopped by initially his son (who is also a less active member) text him and told him that he wants to start going back to the "mormon church." It's great that the Lord prepares His children is so many ways.

Well, my time is pretty much up. I love you all and hope that you enjoy all the snow. Please make a snowman :)

I know that the Lord prepares His children to hear the gospel. See Alma 16:16.

God bless!

Love,

Sister Johnson

Fall is finally here!

Fall is finally here! The air is crisp and the cold goes straight to your bones. I think I will be permanently cold until next summer. (sigh).

Things went really well this week! We had a delicious dinner with the Wade family on Monday night. They made these delicious orange rolls and their little girl Ausha made us laugh. We also got to meet with a part member family, sister Coombs and her husband whom we affectionately refer to as "brother Bill." (He requested that we call him that haha..) We taught them the last half of the Plan of Salvation. Bill really wants to make sure he is doing everything he needs to in order to make it to "Heaven." He is also very stubborn and likes to stand by his catholic beliefs. It is fun teaching him the gospel. Now he just needs to start coming to church!

We met with a less active on tuesday. Her name is sister Drake. I love sister Drake. She is a riot.  She joined the church about 2 years ago and has been struggling as of late. We went over and she asked us a zillion questions. We mostly just listened and told her about the importance of reading the Book of Mormon and praying about it. Going back to the basics so to say. It will be fun working with her more in the future.
We met with Dennis and Reshell afterwards. They are both doing great! Dennis has been working on quitting smoking. He went and bought a whole bunch of smokeless cigarettes (they use water vapor). Reshell was so happy. I think it is so neat to see how the gospel changes people. One of my favorite things is seeing how reading from the Book of Mormon helps a person gain confidence and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and then, they begin to gain confidence and faith in their own selves because they begin to understand their relationship with God. It is the best!
2 ward had their trunk-or-treat in the evening. It was chaos. Mona came! Also another crazy miracle was that Charmaina's kids all came and as they were walking around, a recent convert (Shaunti) saw Shade (Charmaina's daughter) and said hi to her. We asked Shaunti about it and she told us, "Oh yeah. I've known Charmaina and Shade for years! We used to babysit each others' kids." So, that was providential if I do say so myself!

Happy Halloween! Wednesday was a crazy district meeting. We told Elder Masulonis we wanted to do introductions (now that it is the end of the transfer) so we knew who our district members were a little better. He took it to the extreme and made us answer a bunch of ridiculous questions that were totally gentile! (By gentile we mean that it doesn't have anything to do with the gospel. For example, "Who is your favorite Disney character and why?")
The elders all wore the ugliest ties they had since it was Halloween. They really were ugly.
Afterwards we painted pumpkins with Sister Patrick and her daughter, Allison and shared a message about prayer from the ensign. The Savior sets the perfect example of how we should pray in 3 Nephi 19:19-20,23.

We went on exchanges with Sister Hocking on Thursday and visited the sweetest less active lady named Sister Van Riper. She is the most service-oriented person I think I've ever met. She was so sweet.

Friday was fun! We went to Sister Falco (returning less active) and had a pizza party with her. She told us she had been craving pizza so we went and bought one to share with her. Sister Arkell and Sister Burdick, the office sisters came and we had a great time. We also had a bizarre lesson with her. It definitely didn't go as planned, but ended on a high note. :]

Saturday we had coordination with second ward which is always a trip. We have some funny folks in that ward.
We had lunch with less active sister Nachel and her daughter Jessica and afterwards went to Sister Beck's house to get some music for Sister Asay. (She's singing in sacrament next week! I am playing the piano! Yay!)

Sunday was a day I was quite honestly very nervous about. I wasn't sure if I would be an emotional wreck or not. Surprisingly, I was just fine. I still feel fine right now too. I felt very calm and peaceful and I really believe that it was because mom doesn't want us to be sad. She wants us to find joy in life. I love her and I miss her so much. It still hurts, but when it does, I always am comforted. Especially as I read the Book of Mormon. That Book is true.

I love you all!

Have a wonderful week!