Mission Pictures

Lee the Man got baptized!

The Peace Cactus

Dear Family,

Hope you all have had a fantastic week! It has been an amazing one here __! Lots of miracles for sure.

Gabriel came to church!! Gabriel came to church!! And he liked it! I probably shouldn't be so excited and surprised by such things, because the church is true and the Spirit is powerful, but I still am, a little bit. I feel at least somewhat justified in those feelings though because it was fast and testimony meeting this week. I used to think that they were the most boring of our meetings, but now that I'm a missionary, they are far too entertaining and eventful in all the wrong ways when you have investigators.

We were also able to make some progress with Gabriel's parents as well! Although it did not appear that way at first... Lots of stuff happened,and we thought we weren't going to be able to teach him anymore. But we decided to delay ending our fast and go talk with his parents. At the last second, we remembered we had a potted flower that the Relief Society had given us, and that his mother liked gardening, so we brought it as a peace offering. So we walked up to the front door, and she came out and was so touched by us giving her the flower that she gave us a little cactus and is going to let us keep teaching Gabriel! Apparently it's a sign of friendship to trade plants in __!! Then we took artsy pictures with the cactus. I was so so grateful, though, that her heart was softened as we'd been praying for. I hope that soon, she and the rest of the family will be prepared to receive the fulness of the gospel as well!

So these last few weeks we have been having a little bit of a hard time filling up our 8 o clock hour with good activities, because it's getting dark earlier. And everyone seems to go to bed around 7 o clock here. But this week, I totally learned that you just have to have faith and rely on Spirit and that you will be led to the place you need to be. Sister C. had this prompting that we needed to be on a certain street, and lo and behold, we meet this awesome man who was enjoying the beautiful stars. We taught him a brief Restoration lesson, and he said that he would love to read the Book of Mormon. His name is Mauro, and he is Sicilian. (Never compete with a Sicilian, when death is on the line!)

We also got to give lots of service to members this week. We helped our Ward Mission Leader's wife inventory, clean, and sort her food storage. It was an overwhelming job, and we didn't even get close to finishing. But hopefully it will give her a good head start! We also helped a less active sister move into her aparment. 

I love you all! Have a great week!

Sister Ward

A Great Week in the Vineyard!

Dear Family,

Hope all is going well at home, it's been a great week in the vineyard!

We got to share a lot of lessons with our investigators this week, so that was awesome! We also found a lot of new people to teach!

We have this one lady, Amanda, who we talk to, who requested a Book of Mormon on the church's website. We delivered it to her a few weeks ago, and she told us she didn't have time to meet with us. But, in the mean time, she has read 3/4ths of it, and she texted us saying she thought it was really great! I just love the convincing power that the Book of Mormon has! It is so true that reading the Book of Mormon will bring you closer to Jesus Christ than any other book, and how clearly and simply it teaches and testifies about our Savior Jesus Christ. Hopefully we'll be able to meet with Amanda and share our complete message soon :)

Our investigator Gabriel continues to do awesome as well! He is excited to listen to General Conference, and so am I! It is so neat that our Heavenly Father loves us enough that he gives us prophets and apostles to give us direction and counsel specific to our day. I am so excited to hear what Heavenly Father wants me to hear today.

I love you all so much!

Sister Ward

The Miracle Week

Hey Family,

I hope you have all had a great week! And that you are staying warm. It's starting to get cold here at least... Tight season has officially begun! Also I wish I had some cool fall leaves pictures to send you, but the leaves went straight to brown this year in West Virginia. Everyone is upset about it. Come on nature!!

The work here in ___ is going fantastic!! I feel like we've been trying to light the fire here these last few weeks, but we'd only gotten the kindling to catch flame- none of the logs that make for a great missionary work bonfire though. But this last Saturday, a log finally caught flame! The work here has just exploded, all in one day! We taught 6 lessons (which is A LOT for our mission) and picked up 4 new investigators. All in one day. And these investigators are awesome.

One of those investigators is Nora, and she is the perfect example of a person who has been kept from the truth because she "knows not where to find it."  For years, she has thought that Mormons were crazy polygamist fundamentalists who have as many kids as is humanly possible, and therefore avoided it. But recently, she has been praying that God would lead her to the church that she needs to be attending, and voila, He provided the way for her to run into missionaries! We were trying to contact her neighbor, and she was outside on her balcony. We started talking to her, and she accepted a copy of the Book of Mormon and set up an appointment with us. At the appointment on Saturday, she told that when see saw us, the Spirit told her that we were the people she needed to talk to. And then we had come and talked to her and dispelled her misconceptions, and so she knew that God had sent us to her. God truly does answer prayers!

Another really cool experience from the week was meeting JC. He is the father of this awesome little family, and they have been so prepared for the gospel. A number of years ago, some missionaries had stopped by his house after a storm, and had helped him clear away a fallen tree for free. They apparently were never able to begin teaching him, but that experience obviously planted a seed because he was so open to talking with us and hearing our message. It gives me faith that even when things don't lead to immediate conversions like I sometimes hope, that none of my efforts are being wasted.

In my studies this week, I have come to a deeper understanding of humility and agency, or ability to choose. They are both so important!! I kind of always thought that they were conflicting principles though...(Until this week!) I had always wondered why God would give us the ability to make our own choices and be agents unto ourselves if he wanted and expected us to surrender that gift to follow Him. This week though, I realized that it was just the next step in our progression! From the very beginning, there has been only one way to get where we want to go, and that the commandments are just the trail markers on that path. Choosing to follow Jesus Christ doesn't mean with give up our freedom of choice, it just means we trust God enough to make our decisions based off his counsel. It takes humility, but it will always leave us happier in the long run. 

Love you all!

Sister Ward