Hola y'all!
Heyo I know this was like a month ago, but this was a pretty awesome week full of some pretty BOMB miracles y'all!!
Monday was Zone (big area of missionaries) pday (preparation), Sister Lynch’s first ever Zone pday. After getting our groceries we went straight to Alexandria and we were the first ones there! Don’t worry though the Elders got there a few minutes after us and we decided to go get lunch at the obvious choice - Cane’s. We picked up our Cane’s and brought it back to the church building and ate it with everyone. Then we got a game of volleyball started, luckily I was on Sister Lynch’s team, she is awesome! Then I called my family. My dad was in England for work but my mom spilled the tea about what was going on with everyone at home...Ethan has a girlfriend and Aidan plays a lot of Minecraft jajaja. Afterwards we came home, made some pizza, did some planning and did some Facebook work before bed.
On Tuesday we had our Zone conference, mission tour with Elder Martino of the Seventy (group of church leaders). We woke up early and drove to Alexandria (on comped miles….oh yeah!). We set up a Zoom meeting in the chapel with half the mission! First Sister Amos spoke about being disciples of Jesus Christ, then President Amos spoke and gave us some pretty cool statistics about the missionaries in our mission and our goals. Then Sister Martino spoke, she was super hopeful and talked about the importance of smiling and got Elder Martino to share a mission story about one of his companions - he is hilarious! Then Elder Martino spoke and called on each Zone...he asked us questions and asked us for our REAL opinions and ideas, giving us very straight up HONEST feedback. I don’t know what I expected from a member of the Seventy, but he was very bold and fairly normal. Who would've guessed?! After the call we went and grabbed Wendy’s for lunch before our next call with all the language learners and reassigned missionaries. That call was a lot different than I thought it would be...Elder Martino has served in a couple of Spanish speaking areas and basically only talked about Spanish speaking people...which was great for me, but not for the non-Spanish speaking reassigned missionaries...oof. Sadly he didn’t give us any updates about going back to our originally assigned areas, but that's ok. After all these meetings, we drove home and had an appointment with a less active member, Brother Eastwood. It was our first time meeting him and man do people open up to the missionaries. He basically shared everything with us...but I was able to share one of my favorite scriptures with him in 3 Nephi 11: 14 when Jesus Christ is speaking to the people in the Americas after His resurrection saying "Arise and come forth unto me, that ye may thrust your hands into my side, and also that ye may feel the prints of the nails in my hands and in my feet, that ye may know that I am the God of Israel, and the God of the whole earth, and have been slain for the sins of the world." and I shared one of my favorite quotes from Elder Jeffrey R. Holland that says "Pain in this world is not evidence that God doesn't love you." I mean look at His Beloved Son, Jesus Christ, and all He suffered for us! Just because Jesus suffered, doesn't mean Heavenly Father didn't love Him. And that applies to us too. Then we went to the Jackson’s right after, but sadly no one answered the door and Janaya texted us to cancel...sadness... But we came home and were able to get in some personal study.
Wednesday was moving day! We started with some daily planning. We tried calling one of our members but apparently had the wrong number - that was the first time Sister Lynch ever witnessed getting cussed out over the phone on the mission, but not the worst time I've ever been cussed out before...oof. After we planned we went into full on moving mode. We started cleaning and packing up EVERYTHING in our old apartment. After a couple hours we went over to get the keys from the apartment manager, but she wasn’t ready….so we went back to pack some more. Then the Leesville sisters (Sister Murdoch, Sister Hansen, Sister Zook, Sister Cave) came over to help us. Bless their souls. They helped us move everything over in 2 hours. We even got the help of a couple trucks, what a MIRACLE man!! There were 2 different guys in 2 different trucks that saw us moving and volunteered to help, it was so nice. MIRACLES! By 1:30pm we had everything in our apartment and it was a mess...so we broke for lunch jaja. We went and picked up some Sonic and brought it back and ate it as the first meal in our new apartment. Then we unpacked and organized everything, the Leesville sisters were pretty excited to redecorate the place jaja. After a couple of hours, the Leesville sisters left and we cleaned EVERYTHING. We had a call with Brother Larimer reading the Book of Mormon before heading over to the Woolley’s for dinner. It was just Brother Woolley, his son and adopted daughter, McKayla, and her boyfriend and their baby. Sadly only Brother Wooley stayed for the spiritual thought, but that is okay, we will get them next time ;) On the way home from the Woolley’s we saw an armadillo at our apartment complex. This was Sister Lynch’s first armadillo, so we quickly parked the car and chased it! It was awesome. We then finished cleaning and unpacking our stuff. We even squeezed in some personal study time. :)
On Thursday morning we went to the Jones's house to help them unpack since his wife had just moved in. We helped Sister Jones’ unpack ALL of her things...and there was a lot! Let’s just say, she is big into cosmetology and anime. Then we came home and had lunch. I tried making my own alfredo pasta sauce and it turned out good, not as good as Sister Earl’s, but still pretty good. After lunch we had the maintenance guy come over and try to fix our dryer...apparently the apartment complex uses 2 different types of outlets, so our dryer needed a different cord to fit into the outlet in our new apartment. It still didn’t work….but they're working on it...After they left, we did some personal study. Then we got a surprise call from President Amos, that usually doesn’t happen...but he encouraged us to have district council over Zoom...wack! Then we called Brother Larimer, had some companionship study, and went out to dinner with one of our members, Sister Bolyan. She bought us Subway and a pie - she is so sweet. Then we went to our lesson with the Jackson’s, we invited Sister Pemberton and she even gave us dinner (we saved it for later). Sadly AJ was busy doing homework, so he didn’t join us for the lesson. But Janaya is trying really hard to get Sundays off to come to church with us. Ja'Ron had a lot of questions and Sister Pemberton did awesome explaining it and applying it to their lives. That family really trusts God man!
Friday morning we were still trying to get the dryer situation figured out...some lady walked into our apartment and tried to fix it, but she couldn’t….oof. Eventually we were able to get it figured out though. After our morning studies, we had district council (meeting with 10 other missionaries in our general area) over Zoom. It was good. After district council, we had Sister Pemberton's leftovers for lunch, it was some delicious chicken! The rest of the day we did our studies, called Brother Larimer, planned for the week and had dinner. That night we also set up a lesson with our referrals, Darlene and Robert. We frantically were calling members to find someone to bring to our lesson the next day. After many calls we decided to call the Pembertons because their name kept coming to my mind, even though we have asked them for A LOT recently, but they said “yes”! MIRACLE!
Saturday we did our usual morning studies and went over to Brother Eastwood’s again. This time we brought the Bishop and they already knew each other. It was awesome! Brother Eastwood even started reading the Book of Mormon and he loves it. Bishop Baeslee was even able to give him a priesthood blessing (blessing of comfort given by the authority of God). It made Brother Eastwood so excited and seemed like it was exactly what he needed. When we talked outside and asked him how he felt, he said he couldn’t describe the feeling but knew it was the spirit. We were able to share Matthew 11:28-30 about coming unto Christ to have Him lift our burdens. Then we booked it over to our lesson with Darlene and Robert and the Pembertons. On the way there Darlene left us a voice mail...we were so worried that they were going to cancel on us again...but they didn’t! They were just calling to say they were going to be a little late. The Pembertons were super excited to meet them. When Darlene and Robert arrived there was an instant connection between them and Brother and Sister Pemberton. As soon as we walked into the church, the men broke off and the women broke off and they started bonding. Darlene and Robert connected so well with the Pembertons. Robert was hesitant to believe us 20 year old girls at first, but by the end of the lesson, and with the Pembertons help, he knew the message of the Restoration was true. We asked him to pray about it and he said he already believed all of it. WOAH! The Pembertons even took it upon themselves to invite them to watch Stake Conference (church meeting over Zoom for the Alexandria area) at their house the next day. They exchanged phone numbers and everything!! Then we came home, ate some lunch and went over to Ray's to help him fill out some documents since he has a hard time writing. He even trusted us enough to ask a favor from us. He just wanted us to mail a gift to his 2 granddaughters for him. It was so sweet. AND before we left he asked us to pray with him. T'was a good day that ended with some more studies and a pancake breakfast for dinner! My favorite! :)
On Sunday we went over to the Pembertons in the morning to watch Stake Conference. They gave us breakfast bagels and everything! Sadly Darlene and Robert had to cancel though. But the Pembertons even fed us lunch. This yummy chicken and rice soup. Then we came home, watched the Sunday live devotional on Facebook and went to visit Ms. Judy who I taught way back in August. We talked about the Book of Mormon, but I think she's more interested in having company that talks about Jesus than in our message of the Restoration of Christ's gospel...but her ex-boyfriend, Ricky, was there too and we got to talk to him. After Hurricane Laura the missionaries even gave him a Book of Mormon after cleaning up his property. What a coincidence! Then we went over to visit Pete (less active member) and his girlfriend, Brinda. They had read 3 chapters in the Book of Mormon. Brinda even said she prayed about it and just couldn't stop reading it because she felt the spirit so strongly. MIRACLE! We were able to explain where it came from a little more and Pete even helped out a little. They're so sweet and just loving hearing the word of God. Then we had to go so I could go to a Trainer meeting since next transfer I'll continue to be training Sister Lynch. :) Afterwards we had a meeting with the ward, ate some leftovers for dinner and had a 3-way companionship study with 2 sets of Sisters under the direction of Sister Farris to help us with the training program. It was so nice to see her, even just for a bit (she goes home this week).
Monday was a full proselyting day since transfers were on Wednesday. We had a pretty normal day, studies in the morning, then we went to send Ray's letter to his granddaughters, called some folks, read the Book of Mormon with Brother Larimer and visited Brother Eastwood. We brought Brother Baesler with us to his lesson and they connected so well. They're at the same stage in life, have had some of the same life experiences and Brother Baesler was really able to share the light of the gospel with him!! It was awesome! They even exchanged phone numbers and Brother Baesler said that Brother Eastwood could give him a call anytime. That's exactly what he needed; a friend! MIRACLE! Then we came home, had dinner and watched the "Social Sing and Serve" event by the Church with christmas songs and service ideas. So cool!
Basically this week I saw how the Lord prepares all of His people. The people we start teaching, the members we bring to lessons and ourselves as missionaries. When God asks us to do something, He prepares a way for it to happen according to His will and timing. Sometimes that's really hard, but in the end Heavenly Father is always there for us, in the details. And He WILL magnify our efforts!
Have a blessed week!
Smile because God loves you and remember that I love, love, love y'all too!
Love,
Sister Johnson
December Bug Bite Count: 7 bites
November Bug Bite Count: 18 bites
October Bug Bite Count: 39 bites
September Bike Mileage: 0.0 miles
August Bike Mileage: 46.9 miles
July Bike Mileage: 161.0 miles
June Bike Mileage: 61.6 miles
Pictures!!!
1. The Leesville DeRidder squad redecorating our new apartment
2. The squad moving selfie part 1
3. The squad moving selfie part 2
4. Our "Jesus Wall" in our new living room :)
