Episode 57: The One with Halloween!

Happy Halloween everybody! Sister Bolos and I are dressed up as a lemon and a lime. It's cute!

We have been doing a lot of finding this week, and it has payed off! We have added 10 new people to our teaching pool, one of whom has been coming to church for a few weeks already. We actually thought she was already a member until someone told us she wasn't. 

It is turning into fall here, which means it is really beautiful, with tons of colorful leaves and the perfect temperature. Except when it rains. Then it is just wet.

As has been typical lately, I have been thinking about joy, and I found a great quote about it from General Conference earlier this month:

"Joy is powerful, and focusing on joy brings God's power into our lives. As in all things, Jesus Christ is our ultimate exemplar, "who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross." Think of that! In order for Him to endure the most excruciating experience ever endured on earth, our Savior focused on joy!"

I know personally that focusing on the joy that the gospel brings into our lives can get us through the hardest things. And joy comes when we focus on Christ. He is our hope.

Have a great week everyone!

Love,

Sister Lemon

Episode 56: The One with Cowboy - Part 2

Hello everyone! This week has been a wet one. It reminds me of when I first got to Washington. It's crazy to think that I have lived here for all 4 seasons now!

So, if you remember back to Episode 52: The One with the Cowboy, before I got transferred, Sister Powell and I were teaching an older man named Delbert who we called cowboy. Well, he got baptized yesterday!!

It was one of the best baptisms I have been to. Cowboy was so excited, he let go of his walker and started dancing! It's amazing to me how much the gospel can change our lives, no matter how much of our life we have already lived, or how much we have left to go. 

We've also been working with a lady named Alyssa, and she has taught me a lot about teaching the way the Savior taught. She told us that she has has tons of missionaries knock on her door, and she has even let a few into her house, but she has never invited them back for another lesson. What made her interested this time is that Sister Bolos used an analogy about her daughter on her doorstep, and that was the first time she really felt like the gospel related to her life. Ever the next few lessons we have taught her, we used a lot of analogies, and she finally asked how we knew she liked analogies so much, because she hadn't told us yet. We explained that we try to teach in a way that fits the individual we are teaching, and that the Spirit is the one who is really touching her heart and making things make sense. That really touched her, and I think she really felt the Savior's love for her through us.

Other than that, Sister Bolos and I are still being goofy and loving life!

We found some funny, fluffy pig slippers at Walmart on Monday. I couldn't convince Sister Bolos to buy them.

Well, that's all for this week! 

Love,

Sister Lemon

Episode 53: The One with Another Excellent General Conference

Hello everyone!I hope you all got a chance to watch General Conference, because it was amazing! I learned so much, and I am definitely inspired to be a better missionary and a better person. Which is good because...

I'm getting transferred! I'm going to Soundview, which is the Sister Training Leader area for the Tacoma part of our mission. For those of you who don't know, a Sister Training Leader (STL) is pretty much exactly what it sounds like. We go on exchanges with 5 or so companionship of sisters to model missionary work for them and to help council them with any questions or concerns they are having. We are getting doubled in, which means that both of the sisters that were in that area are leaving (one is going home because she has finished her 18 months, and the other is getting transferred). My new companion will be Sister Bolos, who trained Sister Powell, and is just an amazing missionary. I'm super excited about it!

This week was a great week, and I can't really put into words why that is, other than that serving God to the best of my ability and loving people with all my heart brings pure joy into my life. I hope that I can share that joy with others, because it is truly an amazing feeling.

This is me and Sister Powell at the mission home for General Conference yesterday. It was a gloomy morning, so I decided to bring the sunshine with my shirt!

We found the most adorable fluffy dog while we were knocking doors. It looked like a teddy bear, but the owner said it likes to bite people!

Have a great week everyone!

Love,

Sister Lemon

Episode 52: The One with the Cowboy

Hello everyone! It has been a week of miracles, as pretty much every week is here.

On Monday night we went to go check up on a girl who had been interested in getting baptized, but then kind of disappeared (it happens more often than you might think because some neighborhoods in this area are pretty transient). We were not able to find her, but we ran into a lady named Paige outside of the laundry room of the apartment complex, and we asked if she would like to learn more about Jesus Christ and His gospel, and she said yes, so we taught her the whole first lesson right then and there. Since then we have taught her 2 other times, and she came to church yesterday, which is the biggest thing that people are flaky about. She is praying about whether she should get baptized, and I am so excited for her!

On Tuesday we were knocking some houses that I had knocked once before, and no one had been interested last time, so I was not very confident that we would find anyone willing to listen, but I decided to just try it and see, and I am so glad we did. We met a 75 year old man named Delbert, but we call him Cowboy. He was a professional bull rider, and he also did saddle broncs until his leg got messed up. He still wears the belt buckles he won, and he has a lariat rope on the front of his walker, and he lassos stuff in his front yard. We talked to him about coming to church and about getting baptized, and he is so excited to come closer to Christ. 

Also, General Conference officially started with the women's session on Saturday. It was amazing! If you missed it, I am sorry, but it will be posted on LDS.org in a couple weeks. You can also watch the rest of conference on Saturday and Sunday, which I would highly recommend. It is a huge blessing that we have a living prophet and apostles, and that they speak to us so often and so specifically.

Also, it was really hot one day, but I didn't have a hair tie, so I braided my hair with a bread bag clip:

I think I deserve some points for creativity.

Well, that's all for this week. I love you all!

Love, 

Sister Lemon

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Episode 51: The One

Hello everyone! It has been another great week of ups and downs. Being a missionary is certainly never boring!

So, on Tuesday we were knocking doors from 5 to 7 like we do every day. It all seemed pretty normal, until we found out that we had somehow wandered out of our area (oops!). As we were headed back to our car to figure out out how to get back into our area, we heard a big popping or smacking sound followed by screeching tires. We just looked at each other and started running toward the sound. It turns out there had been an accident at the end of the street, and there were witnesses, but no one had a phone to call 911, so we did that promptly. It was really lucky that we were there to make the call, because it was a pretty bad accident, and one older man had some lacerations on his arm that needed attention. We also had to open up one of the cars because the door was dented in and smoke was coming out. Luckily no one was seriously hurt, and I'm really glad that we were there, even if it wasn't in our area.

One of my favorite parts of missionary work is all the people we get to meet. Even when people don;t accept the gospel or don't do the things they say they will (like come to church or meet with us again later in the week), I really feel like it is a blessing just to meet so may amazing people and talk with them for a few minutes. I have learned so much from people I barely know, and it has really changed my life. Sister Powell and I are are particularly working on leaving everyone better than we found them, even if they aren't interested in or receptive to our message. It has been really cool to see the impact we can have in their lives, and I am grateful for that opportunity.

I have also been studying humility a lot this week. I love the idea that humility doesn't mean thinking less of yourself; it means thinking of yourself less. I am finding that the more I get outside of myself, the happier I am. If I truly focus on the needs of others and on how I can help them, I find I worry and stress a lot less. It's amazing how the gospel can bless us in literally EVERY aspect of our lives.  

Well, that is all for this week! I love you all. Have a great day!

Love,

Sister Lemon

Episode 50: The One where We Got Kicked Out... A Lot!

Hello everyone! 

So, this week has felt like a month because so much has changed with our investigators. We found a lot of people, and then dropped them within a day or two, which feels kind of crazy, but apparently this are tends to be that way. There are lots of people that have a desire to learn and progress in their lives, but they lack the commitment to make it happen. But don;t worry, we found some diamonds in the rough!

One "diamond" in particular is Wendell. I think I have never been so comfortable being myself with an investigator. When we teach Wendell, it is just so real. And the best part is, he actually keeps commitments and shows up for appointments. Wendell has a lot of faith, but he also has a lot of questions, so we are really working on helping him find his own answers from God, rather than just taking someone's word for it. He also is kind of against organized religion because of some bad experiences he had in the past, but he said our church seems different so far. I have high hopes for Wendell.

As for the title of this email, here's the story. When we knock doors in apartment complexes, people sometimes get kind of grumpy, and they call their apartment manager, and the manager kicks us out. Religious proselyting is not considered soliciting or trespassing in Washington, but we don't want to make a scene either, so we just leave. Well, on Friday, Sister Powell and I got kicked out of 3 apartment complexes and a mall parking lot, which is a new record for me. At first I was really frustrated about it, but upon reflection, I started seeing God's hand in it. If we hadn't gotten kicked out of the first 2 complexes, we wouldn't have gone to the third, which is where we found Wendell and another really great investigator named Armando. Also, it's pretty amazing that we were able to meet Wendell and Armando before we got kicked out.

Actually, that has been a really big theme for me this week. God's plan for each of us is so perfect, so detailed, and so personal. No matter what your circumstances, God's plan for you got you where you are and it's going to get you right back out, and it's all for a reason. Isn't that amazing!

Well, that's all for this week. Have a great day, and I'll talk to you again soon!

Love,

Sister Lemon

Episode 49: The One where the Rain Came Back

Hello everyone! 

This week has gone by super fast, and I almost can't even remember what happened. But that's a good thing, because one of the best things a missionary can be is busy. If you're busy, you're working hard, and that means that more people have the chance to let this message change their lives. 

It started raining again, which means that people started hiding in their houses more again, but that's not going to slow us down! 

We found an amazing lady this week named Aiisha. She is from Guam, and she has 6 kids, and she has more faith than almost anyone I have met. She basically taught herself the lesson, and we just guided the conversation. We have also talked to her husband a lot over the past week. At first, he was not very interested, but his heart is getting softer, and I have high hopes for their family.

I have been studying about joy a lot recently, and the more I study, the more I realize that the gospel is what will bring us the most joy in our lives. The whole purpose of God's plan for each one of us is to allow us to have more joy. That's really why we try to share the gospel with everyone: because we want everyone to have the joy that God intends them to have. That's why I love my "job"!

Have a great Labor Day!

Love,

Sister Lemon