Hello from the land of kudzu and trees and BUGS.

I counted 23 mosquito bites from standing outside for a total of maybe...MAYBE five minutes. It should be a fun summer!

The weather has been incredibly mild thus far this summer. It is wonderful! Sis. Tillman says she brought Utah weather with her. I am okay with that. I hope it stays that way. :]

We had a great week this week.

 

Nothing too exciting happened on Monday. It was just very busy. I was still folding laundry at 9:45 pm that night.

 

Tuesday: Happy Birthday Grandpa! We went and did some service for Sis. Arrington. Her little girls love us! They are so cute too. We spent the day trying to contact formers and some potentials. We received a miracle referral from Temple Square! His name is Tyler and he lives in Buies Creek. He wants to know how his family can be togehter forever. (We can answer that!) We called him and set up an appointment with him. I am so excited to go and visit him and his family.

We had dinner with the Anderson family and Sis. Anderson came on exchanges with us to see the Hudsons afterwards. We had a good lesson with them. We read the talk from conference, "To Hold Sacred" by Elder Pieper with them. It went pretty well. Sis. Hudson is concerned about some things that she could resolve if she knew the Book of Mormon was true and that Joseph Smith was a prophet. I know she'll get it eventually. Change is hard though...for some folks.

 

Wednesday: Happy Birthday to me! 23 years. If any of you have some extra canes or walkers lying around, they would be much appreciated ;). Sis. Tillman made it a special day which was so kind of her. She made me breakfast, made a happy birthday sign out of sticky notes, and made me a giant pan of brownies (I LOVE brownies! They are my downfall). I feel like everyone else knew it was my birthday too. We were finally able to meet with a family history referral named June. She invited us over and told us she had some "light" refreshments. the "light" refreshments included carrot cake, german choclolate cake, cheesecake, m&m's and fruit. It was anything but light. She also had happy birthday napkins. She talked for a LONG time. I think that was the longest appointment I have ever been in. Two hours later we finally left. Then, we had dinner with my favorite family...the Swaffords! They had a strawberry cheesecake pie for dessert that was divine. We were also able to meet with Bro. King (old man who lives in front of us). He isn't doing too well. So, we visited with him with Sis. Dale for a bit. He is a great poet! He has some beautiful poetry that he has composed. He recited a few from memory and they were incredible. We were supposed to meet with Lewis that evening, but he bailed on us so we decided to go see Sis. Langdon in the Lillington Nursing home. She told us a crazy story about how she had to bury a horse and that because of rigor mortis, the legs were sticking straight up out of the ground so they just sawed them off. lol. She was one of the first members in teh Dunn area. She has a lot of great stories about when everything first started here.

 

Thursday: Happy Birthday Connie! Happy Flag day too! Thursday we had district meeting. It was so good. We talked about the difference between being obedient and being exactly obedient. Exact obedience is doing something and understanding why. There were also some scriptures referenced including Alma 57:21, and 2 Nephi 5:10-11. Pres. Cotterell came and we had a good lesson about working more effectively with the members. He invited us to schedule appointments with members during the week to help them strengthen their covenants and help them to do missionary work. Sis. Tillman and I role played with the Cotterells. They are going to talk to some of their neighbors this week about the biblevideos.org. :) We had a great opportunity to practice what we learned that evening with the Guymon family. We read 3 Nephi 27:21-22 and talked about what the Savior expects of us and then we invited them to do things to prepare certain individuals to accept an invitation to learn more about the gopsel. We are hoping to meet with one of their friends this friday!

 

Friday: So this was a miracle! We were calling some of the less active members in the ward to schedule times to come and share a message with them. We called one brother whose last name is Kinard. He did not answer, but we noticed that there was another number in our phone for a "brother Kinard". We just assumed it was the same Kinard. We called that number, left a message and left it at that. About two days later this Brother Kinard called back and clarified that he was different Kinard than the one we thought he was. He indicated that he was moving to texas at the end of this month. We offered to help his family with moving or anything. He said that they had everything covered, but asked if we could tend their kids. We explained that we couldn't do that, but told him we could find some YW who might be willing. We called the YW president and she found a couple of girls who are willing to watch them for service. We called him back to let him know and he invited us to come to dinner with his family. We just met with them this week. His wife is from Japan and doesn't know much about the church. Brother Kinard is a convert of only a few years. He has been struggling to stay active and hasn't been in a year or so, but loves the church. We talked to them about reading the Book of Mormon and invited them to church. They came yesterday!  The elders quorum and YM are now getting involved with them moving whether or not they like it. :) It was so good to see them at church!  We also met with Jan and watched speical witnesses of Christ with her and went over the baptism interview questions (this Saturday is her day!). It was so neat to hear her explain what it means to her to know that there is a prophet on the earth today. That was something she really struggled with for a quite a while. She is so well prepared. I love her. :)

 

Saturday: More service! This time for Sis. Fredell. We scrubbed her walls and vacuumed for her and reorganized her food storage! I was also humbled. By the GPS. We were looking for a road called Lipscomb rd and I was totally outsmarted by the GPS! We drove in a circle a few times and then discovered that we were going in a circle. Then, to top it off, we put in our address to go home and I was just cruising along and all of the sudden the road we live on turned into a different road...which wasn't supposed to happen. We discovered that I had been going the wrong direction for about 12.4 miles. This isn't the first time this has happened. (sigh) We eventually made it home about 1/2 hour later. lol. Sis. Tillman was super annoyed. All I could do was just laugh. We met with a different Bro. King later that evening and had a good lesson with him about the 10 commandements.

 

Sunday: Happy Father's Day! I hope you had a great day dad. You are the best father I could ever ever have and I am so lucky to have you. Thank you for teaching me how to be strong and how to work hard and for just being there for me. I love you so much. No one can ever take you place in my heart.

We had a great turnout at church. Lewis, the Hudsons, Jan, and the Kinard family all came to church! It was definitely a blessing and tender mercy from Heavenly Father. The Kinards received a very warm welcome and their kids did really well with primary and all. The talks were a little random for sacrament...they were on modesty. I'm not sure whose plan that was, but I think they must have forgotten it was Father's day. lol.

We had a great evening with Sis. Skinner and her kids. We went and visited some sisters in the nursing home and sang them some hymns. It's a good thing they are mostly deaf. We visited one sister, Sis. Blankenship. She kept telling us how "behooved" she was that we all came to see her and that we had "made her year!" She loved Sis. Skinners kids and kept hugging and kissing them the whole time. Sis. Skinners 11 and 13 year old boys were a little unsure about that, but it sure did make her day...or year I guess. :]

 

The Lord blesses us everyday. Sometimes the things we hope he will bless us with don't come immediately; or sometimes not at all. He does know what we need and what will be best for us though. He will bless us as we strive to follow him more perfectly. Remember that you are a child of God who knows you better than you know yourself and He loves you more than you can comprehend.

 

Have a blessed week! (Everyone says that here...)

 

Lots of Love,

 

Sister J

Another great week in Dunn, NC - June 10, 2012

Dearest family and friends,

 

Here is a quick overview of this past week (my time is far spent!)

 

Monday: Shopping everywhere. Sis. Tillman didn't have any short sleeve shirts. I didn't want her to die of heat stroke. We found some really cute shirts at this amazing outlet store that I didn't even know existed until today. We gave the cashier a pass-along card after she asked about the church. We had a great lesson with the Barney family (less active). We read our favorite scripture and told why. They are starting to come back to church!

 

Tuesday: Lesson with Sis. Jan Saylor about following the prophet (see 3 Nephi 3:19-21) and tithing. She is excited for her baptism and feels very much at peace with her decision. We met with a former investigator, Jimmy. He was nice, but not interested. We met with the Hudsons in the evening and read Alma 36 with them. Bruce shared a lot of experiences that were very dear to him. He was touched by this chapter and really enjoyed it. Margaret didn't say much. She is a tough cookie!

 

Wednesday: We met a "kiddie dipper" victim named John. He isn't the first one I've met. (explanation: the "Kiddie Dippers" are kids who were bribed by some very selfish/prideful Elders in the 60's to be baptized.) He remembered "two guys in suits" who told him they would give him a bag of candy if he went with them. So they loaded him and a bunch of other kids up in a van and took them to the church and baptized all of them. I would hate to be in those Elders' shoes.

We had a miracle lesson that evening. Bro. Dalton in the ward home teaches a family whose nonmember wife speaks spanish. The sisters have tried meeting with her in the past and her husband told them not to come back. Bro. Dalton talked with them and set up an appointment for us to go and see them. When we arrived no one was there, but then Dolores (the wife) showed up with her sister. We talked with her for a bit and then she told us to come back another time. Bro. Dalton pulled up at almost that exact same time and then she said that "actually, you can come in." We invited her to read the Book of Mormon and pray about it. They recently lost a baby and it is still really hard for them. Her husband did not come. She wants to talk with him before setting up another appointment, but we were able to have a lesson! and she has the Book of Mormon now!

 

Thursday: We met with Lewis. We went to dinner with his mom (Lettie) and him. Lettie has been a member since 2001 and she is a great lady. She loves sharing the gospel with everyone. We had a lesson afterwards at the church building and talked about how we could invite the spirit into our lives. We used some things from E. Bednars talk, "That we may always ahve his spirit to be with us" about how the Liahona is like the Holy Ghost. It is a really good talk! We also met with a former "do not contact" family. The wife is not a member. She is from Afghanistan and converted from Muslim to Baptist...because it was the closet church to her house. lol. She told us her life story...which was very sad, but was not interested in reading the Book of Mormon. Her husband is basically Atheist now. We were very sad to hear that.

 

Friday: Zone Conference! It was amazing. We read some from 3 Nephi 11. Pres. Cotterell told us this really neat story about how some elders in Mongolia didn't have the Book of Mormon in Mongolian (or whatever language they speak there) So as they were contemplating about how they could help the people they were teaching to know the Book of Mormon was true, they decided to translate a few verses from 3 nephi 11 and have them ponder those scriptures and pray to know they are true. Many people prayed about those verses and joined the church because they knew those verses were true. That chapter is such a powerful chapter of scripture. I love it. I thought it was a really neat story. There is so much power in the words and verses of the Book of Mormon. It really is such a blessing to have those truths restored.

 

Saturday: Sis. Tillman was sick. :( I spent the day going through the massive former investigator book in our apartment and calling a lot of them. It was unsuccessful, but who knows. Maybe something will come of it.

 

Sunday: Jan came to church! She particapted in Gospel Principles and in Relief Society. It is so neat to see her grow and the light and confidence she develops as she learns more about the gospel. We drove all the way out to Godwin (which is a good 30 minute drive) to see Deborah, our new investigator from last week. She called Sis. Ramage to let her know that she wouldn't be able to meet with us that evening. It was disappointing, but we had a good lesson with the Ramages on the restoration. We are going to help Sis. Ramage with her VTing to some less actives who no one knows anything about. I love working with members.

 

In other happy news, I heard from Sis. Welch that Nathan (whom we taught in Deep Run) contacted the sisters in Jacksonville (finally) and asked how he could get baptized. lol. She said he wanted to join the church before he left for basic training in the army and he is going to do it!

I also received a very happy email from Sis. Matthews who recently returned home and she found Matthew (from Greenville) on facebook and he contacted the Sisters in Greenville just recently and wants to start coming back to church!

 

The power of the gospel is amazing. It brings so much peace and comfort into our lives. I love every aspect of the Atonement. It gives us hope and that is something we need in the world today.

 

Have a wonderful week! Thank you for all you love and prayers. They do make a difference. :)

 

Love,

 

Sister J

At the feet of an Apostle (June 4, 2012)

Hello hello hello!

 

It has been a great week here in NC. The weather has even been very pleasant. So last monday was crazy. We went to Bishop Ginns for lunch and I got to play the piano and it was wonderful! We were able to finally meet with a potential that we have been trying and trying to meet with that evening and had a great lesson with his girlfriend, Sasha. She is from Guyana and was raised Hindu. It should be a fun teaching experience with her and Ricardo (her boyfriend).

 

Tuesday we were up before the sun was awake to get ready to go to transfer meeting. We stopped at Sherry's Bakery and got some tasty treats. I wasn't too hungry though. My nerves were getting the best of me. Sister Truelove (who is amazing) took us to Raleigh for transfer meeting. I had to be there by 8:30 for a training meeting. I was the only sister there. I only felt slightly out of place (hint of sarcasm). We reviewed the new 12 week program that they are doing with all the new missionaries now. It is an amazing program. There is so much revelation to receive! I did part of it with Sister Wilson and it was the best thing ever. So, we were singing (trying to anyways) Praise to the Man when all the new missionaries come in to meet their trainers. I was mostly just mouthing the words. I was so nervous! Sister Tillman is great though. I think I worked myself up over nothing....

I heard great news about dear miss Clara we were teaching in Deep Run from Elder Otteson. Clara's boyfriend who was afraid to come out and say so much as "hi" to us and finally came to church the last week we were there has been coming to church every week since then and reads the Book of Mormon more than Clara does and he wants to get baptized and has invited like 3 of his friends to listen to the elders as well! It was probably the most exciting thing I've heard in a long time.

We met with the Hudsons that evening. Dear miss Margaret is still stuck. We are praying for a miracle.

 

Wednesday's district meeting was great! Elder May (whom I served with in the Kinston stake) is our new District Leader. He knows sister Joseph. They are both from the same home town. We had a good district meeting about asking referrals from everyone. That evening, we were able to meet with the illusive Sister Irwin who has been avoiding us for the past six weeks. Her husband doesn't like the church. So, that is why she hasn't been for a long while. She is amazing though. She even spoke at stake conference when she first joined the church. We invited her to read the Book of Mormon.

 

All of our appointments on Thursday were stand-ups. (sigh) And then, all of our backup plans seemed to have moved. Poor Sister T was getting pretty down about it. It started dumping buckets of rain again mid afternoon and the wind made the stop lights go out. I guess there was/is(?) a tropical storm somewhere out there in the Atlantic ocean...

It was definitely a good character building day. :)

 

We had a miracle occur on Friday! We met with Sister Jan and she has decided that she wants to be baptized on the 23 of June! She said she had been praying and praying about it and when she was talking with the Fay 4th elders, she just felt like it was the right day. So, she broke the news to us and we were ecstatic to say the least! She is doing really well. She had a lot of questions about infant baptism and we were able to use Moroni 8 to answer every single one of them. We had an enjoyable evening with the Baysa family. (he's a member, she is not). We met with them last week and his wife has no desire to read the book of Mormon or pray about it or anything, but they invited us back for dinner. So, we went.  It was a feast. Bro. Baysa is polynesian. Enough said. Sis. Baysa is a music major and has some amazing piano skills. We played and sang hymns for a while. She added a southern baptist touch to the hymns. It was pretty entertaining.

 

Saturday we had our mission tour in Apex and got to hear from Elders Giddens, Clayton, and Holland. They were all incredible talks. We got to shake hands with Elder Holland which he told us he insisted upon because that was our interview with him. We all passed! (whew).

Elder Giddens impressed upon our minds the great importance of companion study. It is so true. Comp study makes or breaks your day.

Elder Clayton talked about a whole bunch of things, but the one thing that stood out the most to me was that we should strive to make the church experience for our investigators a place where they won't want to leave. He talked about how we are really good at buidling bigger buildings, but that we need to focus on building bigger buildings that are designed where people cannot leave because they do not want to. I found  a scripture today that kind of talked about that in John 15:16.

Elder Holland told us no matter how important we think this is, it's a lot more important that that. He also said that missionary work is the most important thing we can do in the universe because it contributes to the salvation of a human soul. He told us that we are God's investigators, and that preach my gospel is designed to convert the missionary who can then take that knowledge and share it with others. He told us we darn well better not return and be the same person we left as and that we should be expected to do the same things we invite our investigators to do everyday of our lives. He also said that the church is literally in the hands of "escapees of the Aaronic Priesthood." I thought that was pretty funny. :)

I had the priviledge of giving the closing prayer.

 

I love fast sundays in Dunn. The Kunz's little four year girl always gets up and bears the cutest,sweetest testimony. This time she talked about school and church and prophets. She is a doll. We got to teach the priests during third hour and had a great lesson about why we have commandments. Then we went to the Ramages and had a lesson with their friend, Deborah who wanted to know more about the church. She is very smart and knows a whole lot about the Old Testament. She wants to read the Book of Mormon and we are really looking forward to teaching her!

 

I love you all. I send my love to the Fitch family and also the Bowmans. I know there isn't much I can say that would ease the hurt, but I do know that God knows what you are going through and that He is always there to help us in our trials (See 2 nephi 2:2)

 

I love you all! Have a great week!

 

Love,

Sister J

I have some Good NEWS!!! (5/30/2012)

I have some news for everyone....

 

 

I am a mom! A missionary mom that is. I am training a new missionary. Her name is Sister Tillman. President Cotterell called to inform me that I would be training a new missionary on Saturday. Sister Wilson and I both cried. I think we were having way too much fun together. Sister Tillman is amazing. To describe Sister Tillman in a nutshell: She is from Corinne, UT and she worked on a dairy farm. Her job was to milk the cows and 4 am and 4 pm everyday. She graduated from Box Elder High in '09. She likes to play the piano, her favorite color is pink and her birthday is Feb. 9th. Both her parentals served missions and her brother is currently serving a mission in Guatemala.

 

This past week was really good though. We met with a lot of less active members and part member families. Bishop gave us a couple of less active sisters to go by this week. We stopped by and had a good lesson with them. One of them is really interested in coming back to church. She asked about a singles ward and agreed to read the Book of Mormon everyday. She works every other sunday though. :( However, she will be at church this sunday! :)

 

We met with Sister Jan on Tuesday. She is still praying about a baptism date. We finished teaching her the Plan of Salvation again. She just soaks it up.

 

Wednesday was our last district meeting of the transfer. It was Elder Merrill's last district meeting ever. (He is a dying missionary...aka: he is going home next week). It was sad. We talked about receiving revleation through the Book of Mormon and role played that. It was so good! On our way home from district meeting we stopped by a few members who live in Linden (since we never get to go to Linden much because it is out in the boonies). We talked to the Prescott family. Sister Prescott's daughter was there and talked about how she would like to come back to church. Her husband is not a member. We are hoping we can work with them in the near future. We also stopped by a family who lived at the end of a really really long dirt road. When we finally got there, we discovered there was no entrance into their house because it was an electric fence and had like 10 dogs. It was pretty intense to say the least. We spent probably 20 minutes trying to figure out a way to get into their yard. We finally got the dogs to bark, but I guess they got tired of barking after a while. We tried to lure them over toward us by shaking a package of tic-tacs. It kind of worked, but we eventually just gave up and left a note on their fence. We got caught in a flash flood on our way to dinner! We were just driving along and all of the sudden the wind picked up and it started raining like all get out! (I hope you enjoyed that southern talk :] ) We survived though.

 

Thursday we went out with the Daltons and met with a couple of less active families. Then they took us to Dairy Queen. I got some frozen hot chocolate and it brought back a lot of really good memories with my bestie. (Thanks Sister L for introducing me to DQ's frozen hot chocolate. mmmm!)

 

Friday we met with Jan again. She wants to be baptized, but wants to make sure that the date we invited her to be baptized on is going to be the right day. She has been praying a lot about it. We are praying for her too. We met with a lady in Spring Lake (also in the boonnies). I felt bad for the poor lady. She is very lost. She invited us to come back. I hope that she will start coming back to church. We went out with the Guymons in the evening and contacted a part member family. The daughter is really interested in coming to church! yay!

 

We went to dinner with Bruce and Margaret on Saturday because we found out Sister Wilson would be leaving. We went to Cracker Barrel and had breakfast for dinner. :) I got an apple bran muffin and it was amazing.

 

Sunday was great! All four of our investigators came to church! Lewis showed up all on his own. We tried asking him if he needed a ride or anything for church, but he never answered our phone calls. And then, we come to church and he was there! It was really good.

We went out on exchanges with Sis. Knight and Bro. Hill in the evening and visited the Brunson family and then had a lesson with Lewis.

 

Things are going good in Dunn. That's for sure. Thank you for your prayers and outpouring of love. It is greatly appreciated. I love you all and want you to know that I know that the Book of Mormon is true. There really is no way that it couldn't be. I am glad my testimony is rooted so deeply in the Book of Mormon. It has made all the difference in my life and I know it can in your life too! I have witnessed that first hand.

 

I love you all!

 

Love,

Sister J

Whoa. Did that just happen?

Greetings from rainy, but warm Dunn!

 

It has been dumping buckets basically all week. Luckily we get some sunshine pretty much everyday too, but then it dumps buckets. At least the 'bacco plants and cotton plants will have plenty of water this summer! It might be better if tobacco ones didn't though...

 

We had a great week this week. We were incredibly busy this week and saw so many miracles. It was amazing!

 

We had a relaxing P-day last week. It's so nice to just rest sometimes. I am thankful for the convenience of close stores. that is definitely something I took for granted back home. We had a lesson with the Hudsons that evening. It was really good! We each chose our favorite scripture from the Book of Mormon and talked about why it was our favorite. The spirit was so strong there. The Deans came with us and they are just the cutest old couple ever. We talked to them about baptism. Bruce says 'yes!', but Margaret says she can't truthfully answer that she believes Joseph Smith was a prophet. Bless her heart. She wants to know, but just can't seem to accept it. I sure do love the Hudsons. She will get there. I know she will.

 

Tuesday we had another sweet experience with sweet miss Jan. She didn't come to church last week. We asked her why she wasn't there and she said that she didn't go because Russ didn't feel like going. She then went on to explain that she had felt awful all Sunday because she knew that she needed to come to church. I love the spirit. :) We talked to her about how that was the spirit telling her she needed to come to church. She opened up with us a lot and told us that she wants to know this true for herself and not because she is trying please Russ. That made our hearts so happy! She is praying about a baptism date for June 23rd. She also bore her testimony to us about how she had felt very much alone before she started meeting with missionaries and that ever since she had been coming to church and reading the Book of Mormon she didn't feel alone anymore. I thought that was a very profound statement she made. She is very right in saying that. We do feel alone when we aren't doing things to allow Christ into our lives. I pondered a lot about that this week and realized that He doesn't ever leave us. We either choose to leave him or don't know where to look to find Him. That's why being a missionary is definitely the most rewarding job we can do. You get to help people develop faith in Jesus Christ and see how the gospel changes everything about their lives. Hearing Jan say that was definitley one of the sweetest moments I have experienced.

We went on exchanges with a couple of future missionaries later that day (Sis. Gunn and Bro. Guymon) to go and see Lewis. When we got to Lewis' house, he had his George Albert Smith book out and was reviewing Sunday's lesson. He said he really liked it and wanted to learn more about it (it was all about prayer). We had a great lesson on the Atonement with him. We then spent the evening trying to meet with less active and part member families. Nothing came of it.

 

Wednesday we had a great district meeting as always. Elder Merrill is a great district leader. We focused on teaching people, not lessons. We made cinnamon rolls for our district and they were gone in a jiffy! Elder Merrill doesn't eat sugar. At all. I don't know how he does it. He told us a story about how a snake almost got into the cottage in Dunn. I was thinking to myself, "Great. we might find a slithery creature in our cottage. At least in Deep Run we only had to worry about spiders getting into our beds. Now we have snakes!" I am completely paranoid now. Elder Merrill and Sister Wilson think it is hilarious. We keep a bamboo stick right outside the door just in case now. :) (That's how Elder Merrill killed the last snake that was there). I don't know if I'll ever be able to live that one down now.

We had this crazy miracle happen Wednesday night. We didn't have any appointments so we decided to drive out to Benson and contact some PM families and LA families there. We had zero luck until we knocked on the door of a less active lady. She wasnt home, but her son was there. He hadn't been to church in almost 10 years. We talked to him for a few minutes. He told us about how he had wanted to serve a mission at one point. We told him he still could if he wanted to start coming bck to church. He said he didn't think so and we left. We decided to do some proximity work around the neighborhood there (which took about 30 minutes) and were unsuccessful with that. As we headed back to the car, we saw Derek (the less active) run out to our car. He asked if he could meet with us the next day because he had decided that going back to church would be a good idea. We were completely ecstatic and told him that we most certainly could! It was definitely a tender mercy. Especially since I was thinking to myself while we were there, "what in the world are we doing in Benson? Nothing has happened since we've been here." And then, a miracle happened.

 

Thursday we took the future missionaries (sis Gunn and Bro. Guymon) and went to see Derek. He was running behind schedule so we decided to meet at the ice cream parlor in Angier called Sunni Skies. I think we taste tested all 99 flavors. They even had this ridiculously spicy kind. I thought my mouth was going to burn up! My eyes were watering and it was bad. Luckliy the taste tester lady gave me some vanilla to sooth the burning. I guess they have you sign a disclaimer if you decide to buy the spicy ice cream. lol. We ended up meeting with Derek there and had a great lesson. It was kind of like an Ammon and King Lamoni (see Alma 22) experience. Derek isn't sure that god even exists, but he feels like he needs to come back to church because he has seen how happy people are who are in the church. He is moving to Florida this week. So, we forwarded his info to the elders that are there. He text us and asked if we had sent it to them today. He is on fire and totally ready for the gopsel in his life. It reminded me a lot of Elder Holland's talk from conference about the laborers in the vinyard. It's never too late as long as the master is still asking for more helpers.

 

Friday we met with Jan again and reviewed some of the Plan of Salvation. We also had a lesson with Bro. King (he lives in front of us) He is a funny old man. He was going off about some song that talks about whiskey. It was pretty funny. We met a very nice less active man. He was very drunk when we contacted him, but he really liked going to church when he was a kid. His wife is baptist and wouldn't come out to meet us though...she thinks we are heathens according to him. He told us that we could come back, but to call so he wouldn't be drunk. lol. We also had a miracle happen! We had recieved some referrals from the Clayton elders (elder pace and elder jaros) and we were able to go and contact one of them. The elders had originally met him while helping to jumpstart his car and had talked to him about meeting with the missionaries. We drove out to Angier, found his house, and contacted him. He came out and was SO suprised that we actually came! It was really funny. We set a return appointment with him for saturday, but he jaked us.

 

Saturday was an adventure. We went to a baptism in Fayetteville with the Hudsons. It was their first time ever coming to a baptism! Jan and Russ also came and they all had a good experience. After the baptism the hudsons took us out to lunch to a place that is kind of like Zupas, but Zupas wins. It was good and then we had to make some stops with them since they don't come to Fayetteville very often. We went to Sams Club. It was kind of funny walking around Sam's with the Hudsons, on  a saturday. We came home and washed Bro. King's cars for him. He told us we should make him some brownies again because they were really good. lol.

 

Sunday was wonderful! It was ward conference and Pres. and Sis. Cotterell were there. They taught the gospel principles class and it was amazing. The spirit was so strong in that room. Jan came to church all by herself! She called Russ to go, but he didn't want to :( She came though! She really enjoyed church and Sis. Knight took her right under her wing and made her feel right at home. The Hudsons were able to talk with Pres. Cotterell after church and he was able to talk specifically with Margaret for quite a while. I think it really helped her. She started crying when he asked her what her question was that she had. I was so grateful he was able to talk with her. we had a lesson with them that evening and watched 'safety for the soul' by Elder Holland. She thinks the Book of Mormon is true! She just needs to listen to her heart now.

 

Speaking of Elder Holland, he is coming to our mission on June 2nd! I am nervous. He is super intense. It should be quite the experience though!

 

The church is true. I know the Book of Mormon contains the words of Christ. (see 2 Nephi 33:10-11)

 

Have a great week!

 

Love you all.

 

With lots of love,

 

Sister A. Johnson

Happy Mother's Day 2012 - May 13, 2012

This past week was the fastest week of my life. I can't believe it's Monday again. Where does time go? (sigh) Sometimes I wish it would slow down just a bit.

 

Sister Wilson and I had the best preparation day EVER! The Arps are an older couple in the ward who love to go bowling and as we were discussing this over dinner the week before, Brother Arp challenged us to a game of bowling. So, we did just that on preparation day. We had a great time at the bowling alley. Bro Arp's score pretty much was all of our (mine, Sis. W and Sis. Arp) scores combined. Bowling is definitely not my forte in life. However, by the third game, I broke 100 for the first time I can remember in my life! Miracles have not ceased! It was a lot of fun. We also went to waffle house for lunch. Sister W had never been there. I was famished and decided I could handle two chocolate chip waffles. It was a bit of an overexaggeration. I could only get through one and a half. So much chocolate! mmm... We did FHE with the Anderson family. Sis. Anderson is from Layton, UT. She went to Layton High and graduated in "05 and now has three kids. They are the cutest kids ever. We told the story of  Enos and the kids dressed up with their dad's sunday shirts and ties on their heads as Enos and had their bows (hangers) and arrows (straws) ready to go. It was so cute. After dinner, we spent the evening contacting referrals with no reaping unfortunately. Oh well. We planted seeds!

 

Tuesday we went to see the lovely miss Jan. She is reading the book of Mormon everyday and praying and feels really good about everything. We had a great lesson on the commandments. She now understands why we don't shop and go to the movies on Sunday or do other things we would do on any other day of the week. It's always fulfilling to see investigators understanding doctrine. It's fun to see the "wheels turning in their heads." She is such a sweet lady. Russ (her less active boyfriend) has been to church 3 sundays in a row now! Amazing! True doctrine understood changes behavior. President Packer was right. Russ is working on overcoming some word of wisdom hurdles, but he is making so much progress. It's neat to hear him talk about it too because he knows it's only because he is relying on Jesus Christ to help him do what he can't do by himself. We met with the Hudsons that evening with Sister Knight. I love sister Knight. She's like a walking talking Google. She knows A LOT. We read "Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration" by Bruce's favorite seventy, Tad Callister. They are still dealing with their issues in D&C 132. We witnessed a miracle while reading the talk. Margaret turned to D&C 132 and read a scripture that answered her question about that section and it seems to be less of an issue for her now. (hallelujah!) The spirit definitley helps people recieve revelation for themselves. It really is such a blessing to have the spirit who can witness of truth and give us guidance and direction. It was amazing. They are still being stubborn about committing to anything to do with joining the church though. One of these days...

 

Wednesday we met with a young man named Daven. He talked to one of our members, Sis. Bennett while his mom was getting her hair done and Sis. Bennett had a good conversation with him about the church, gave him a Book of Mormon and our phone number. He called us and wanted to meet with us so we met him at the church and had a great lesson with him. He has heard a lot of negative things about the church, but said he would be willing to pray and ponder and read the Book of Mormon to find out for himself. He is very smart and knew a lot about prophets, apostasy, and all of that. It was awesome.  We also had a great experience with a less active family, The Barneys. We had dinner with the Barneys which was good. Their son had a friend over named Deonte. He is going to UNC Greensboro. The whole conversation at dinner was on the amendment for families being defined as between man and woman only. They asked us our opinion and we quickly referred them to the family: a proclamation to the world and left it at that...seeing as that is all we really can do. Politics as a missionary are always a fun can of worms! After dinner we did a lesson with them all about putting on the whole armour of God and then talked to Deonte about the restoration and gave him a Book of Mormon. He seemed really interested and agreed to have the missionaries in Greensboro (which is in the Charlottle mission) to teach him more. I am so excited to hear about what happens with that! Missionary work is the best. Even if the people you teach are out of your area. It makes some missionaries somewhere really happy when they recieve a referral letter! :)

 

Thursday we drove to Morganton (which is in Fayetteville area) for zone training. Sis. W had to get some blood work done so we left bright and early and then ended up being ridiculously early for training. We helped Sis. Cotterell fix the lunch for the other zone who was there for their training and then we made some phone calls and tried to keep ourselves busy there. Training was really good. I saw Elder Fowkes, who was in the MTC with me. I haven't seen him since last June! He came up to me, said hi and then said, "You're getting old on the mission!" Such great words of encourgement from my fellow missionary....

We learned about the doctrine of christ and how we can better help our investigators understand why we invite them to be baptized. It was really good. We did some role plays resolving concerns and it was amazing. I always learn so much when we do role plays. I used to hate doing role plays...

We met with Crystal in the evening and ate dinner with her and then had a lesson. She agreed to read the Book of Mormon and pray about it. Yay!

 

We had a great weekly planning session on friday. We made some pretty extensive plans for helping this area to grow and I hope they will be effective. We went to military promotion dinner for a member in the ward with less active, Bro. King and his daughter Cherish (who is not a member) and we were able to have a good conversation with them. It was good to see the ward reaching out to them as well. Lewis didn't show up. :(

 

Saturday we were up early and helped Crystal set up a yard sale and then we were of to the Kunz family who were demolishing their front room. We got to tear off that awful wood paneling that everyone puts on the walls here and removed sheetrock and base molding. It was so much fun! We were to recieve a referral from a couple who were there visiting from Apex. His aunt basically lives up the street from us. We contacted her later that day and are planning on going back soon!

 

Sunday was good. It was hard, but life is hard so what can you do? Just take it in stride and turn to God I guess. Lewis came to church! I was so happy to see him. Jan and Russ went to the Fay 4th ward...so we didn't get to see them. Church was good though. We had some good talks. I realized again how much I love my mom and how much I appreicate everything she taught me. I have such a respect for her. I hope she knew that I loved her and looked up to her and appreciated her patience and cheerful countenance that she always had with us. She really was an incredible woman and no one can ever take her place. I feel like I have a big bar to measure up to in life as her daughter. I wish I could tell her how much she means to me, but I think she probably knows. I believe she was successful in raising us three hooligan children. We seem to have turned out pretty good if I do say so myself. :) I love her.

We had dinner with Bishop Ginn and his family and then did FHE about gratitude. They have a little girl named Kim who reminds me so much of Ashlyn. She kept making pictures for me that said things like, "I love you so much!" and so forth. She is so cute.

 

Mothers are the best. I am thankful for all the women who have played such a huge role in my life. I spent a lot of yesterday reflecting on that. I am thankful for my 2nd mom, Sis. Lindstrom and for my fantastic YW leaders, Sis. Nielson and Sis. Gooch and all of the other women who were there in my life as a YW. I am thankful for my wonderful aunts and my grandmothers. I love them all so much. Most of all, I am thankful for my mother. She IS incredible.

 

Have a great week.

 

Love you all!

 

Love, Sister J

May 7, 2012

We had a great week this week and my time on the computer is REALLY limited today so you will get the rundown of things in these parts of the world really quick.,..like 60 seconds, but not really. Okay.

 

We had a great lesson with Miss Margaret on monday evening at the Arp's home. She is still worried about polygamy and Joseph Smith. She agrees with everything else though. So frustrating!!!

We met with both Margaret and Bruce and invited them to start at square one: reading the Book of Mormon and focusing on their relationship with Jesus Christ and the question we invited them to consider as they read. They agreed. We read Moroni 7:13-16. Those are such good scriptures. Margaret really liked them a lot.

We also had combined district meeting with the Hope Mills district because President and Sister Cotterell came to do interviews. It was a great district meeting. We talked about find when you teach, teach when you find. Even the Savior asked for referrals when he was teaching (see 3 Nephi 17:4-9) We are setting goals to help us remember to ask who people we see can invite to our next meeting. It works really well. There is a family in the Hope MIlls area that have all been slowly agreeing to take the lessons because of that concept. Preach My Gospel is so inspired.

We met with Jan again. She talked with her father. He is not pleased with her choice to join the church, but said he will still love her. She wants to make sure this is really something she wants to do before jumping into it and therefore will not agree to a date to be baptized. She will get there though. She is very teachable and recognizes truth when she hears, sees, feels it. It's really amazing. We asked her who she knew she could invite to our next lesson. She invited her sister who said no. However, she was really excited to tell us because she then had the opportunity to talk to her sister about what we had shared with her earlier that day (the Gift of the Holy Ghost) and they had a really goood conversation and Jan was really happy about that. I was happy for her!

This week was a difficult week of finding. We tried and tried and tried, but had no success for the whole week. We contacted lots of less actives. There are SO many in this ward. Turns our three of them that we talked to were former "do not contacts" That could explain the slightly confused looks we received. However, all of them agreed to let us come back over so, that was definitley a miracle. No one got mad at us. I am always thankful for that.

We went on exchages with a girl I went to high school with. Her name is Kelsey Campbell. It totally caught me off guard when I saw her. It was crazy! But a good crazy. She just graduated from Campbell University which is pretty close to where we live.

I learned a huge lesson about being humble this week. My natural man (or I guess woman...) tends to get in the way a lot and I think that I can do things by myself. I learned that I can't rely just on myself alone. I need to rely on Heavenly Father and trust him. I also learned that I need to trust Sister Wilson more. Luckily Heavenly Father knows my weaknesses and gently rebukes/reminds me that it is not that way. :) I sure am thankful for Sister Wilson. I have learned a lot from her. She has so many strengths where I lack. I believe Heavenly Father knew that and that we could learn from each other.

We had dinner with some members who just moved from TX on Saturday. We played Book of Mormon baseball for a while, but none of us were much good at that so we watched some mormon messages instead and then went to a referral that Elder Merrill gave us. It was neat because we asked Elder Merrill who he knew in Dunn (he served here) and he didn't know at the time, but this house came to mind when he was studying one day so he told us to go by her. Her name is Crystal. We were able to contact her with Sis. Martin and had a good lesson with her. Her best friend is LDS and she has taken all the lessons before and wanted to be baptized, but her parentals wouldn't let her. Now, she is almost 30 though. We talked to her about the temple (she doesn't like that not everyone can go to the wedding ceremony). She wants to feed us dinnner and wants us to come back. She has some sticky situations that will make teaching her tricky, but hopefully we will be able to help her remember what she felt once upon a time. It was definitley a miracle.

Sunday was a really good day. The whole stake fasted for missionary work. Bishop Ginn expressed his gratitude to the missionaries. He is so thankful to have sister missionaries in the ward. I've never felt so loved as a missionary in my life. One of the little girls got up and bore her testimony. It was so cute. She is probably 4? "I would like to bear my testimony that Jesus lives and there are lights in the church and Jesus is where the light is and there are walls and lights everywhere in the church and Jesus is everywhere. And one time we had a pool party....um... I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen." Everyone was giggling to some degree.

We taught the priests during 3rd hour of the block and had a great lesson about the Plan of Salvation. The Plan of Salvation is so amazing. It is a part of everything we do.

We went with Jan and Russ to Fayettville to Pres. Cluff's house (stake president) and had a fireside for recent converts, investigators, and less actives. It was such a powerful fireside. The whole thing is just investigators, recent converts, etc that bear their testimonies. Jan bore her testimony and it was very touching. That is definitely an inspired idea. They do firesides like that every quarter I guess and it is amazing. We rode back home with them, missed our turn so took an extra long way home and were able to talk to Jan about keeping the sabbath day holy and going on mormon.org and the articles of faith. She is an amazing lady.

 

I love that we have the scriptures and that they can give us guidance. The Book of Mormon was translated by the Power of God. It is another witness of Jesus Christ.

 

Have a wonderul week! I love you all and pray for you often.

 

Thank you for all your love and support. I really do appreciate it.

 

With lots of love,

 

Sister J