- HOW IS EVERYTHING GOING??
You can see the Spanish Elders playing soccer in the back ground with
some of the little boys (we had to hand them off :( ) also, all the kids want name tags like ours!
This has been an eventful week! The work in Corvallis is slow... Sister Crabb and I have been fasting to find! However, despite the work being slow, we continue to see miracles daily! We also have so much fun that it really isn't missionary work!
On Tuesday we had a mission wide conference-it is the first time in all of OEM history that our entire mission has gathered together. Elder Neilson from the seventy came and spoke to us, as did Brother Heaton, the director of the MTC. Our mission was a test mission for ipads, and the church has officially decided to use ipads in all of the stateside missions and missions in Europe. It is such a wonderful blessing and opportunity! We are going to be able to teach ANYONE at ANYTIME. On top of that, they want the missionaries to know how to use technology appropriately when we go home. I got to see ALL of my previous companions, I was so excited I could have cried! Sister Hamilton goes home in three weeks, Sister Vance is a ROCKSTAR missionary, and Sister Carter is like a whole new person. Sister Carter told me, "My new companion doesn't talk a lot, so I am turning into you!" She was SMILING and LAUGHING! Alvin is getting baptized, Mindy is getting baptized, the Nugens are getting baptized, Mary-Ann quit smoking and got her patriarchal blessing!! I had some of my favorite people in one place at a time! I am grateful that I at least got to play a SMALL part in some of these peoples stories! Even though I wont get to be there for their baptisms, I helped plant a seed! Sometimes as a missionary you wonder if you are actually making a difference, so I was overcome with gratitude as I heard of these people progressing. GOD IS GOOD TO ME.
Also, something which Elder Neilson spoke about moral agency. He told something along the lines of, "If you have been baptized and gone through the temple, your agency is spent. You don't have agency anymore. If agency was credit, you spent yours and gave it to God. Now, when you choose to "use your agency to not go to church," you aren't using your agency. You are a covenant breaker." It was actually comforting to me to know that I have given my agency to God, I now just have to live in line of those covenants.
This week I locked myself in a members bathroom. Ooops. Not the first time it has happened on my mission.
Also, pretty eventful story of the week, I am practically fluent in spanish... We met a little Spanish boy named Luise!! Pretty soon he had introduced us to everyone in his complex who speaks Spanish! These people are AMAZING. They have hearts that love Jesus Christ! We eventually ended up playing soccer with TONS of little kids, and they begged us over and over again not to leave! It tugged at my little heart. This week the Chinese elders also had a baptism which we attended- it was the most spiritual baptism. Half of the people there were singing in chinese, and the other half in English. I KNOW THAT GOD LOVES ALL OF HIS CHILDREN. There is so much diversity in Corvallis- I have met Christians, budhist, people from Vietnam, athiests, radical christians, Muslims, and so much more. I ALWAYS feel God whisper to me that they are his child, and they are loved.
YOU ARE ALSO GOD'S CHILD AND ARE LOVED.
I love you all! and being a missionary!
Sister Jones
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