Family and Friends,
Monday – I was sick at night so I had to stay home and missed a few hours
of work :(
Tuesday – Taught a lady named Sister Mayberry. She lives in a senior housing
area. She has a lot of faith and really a strong desire to learn more. It's incredible the desire she has. It's a great example to me. It makes me ask
myself do I have the desire to learn more and if I don't, why don't I? It's been neat explaining things to her. We teach her in English. When we receive sister referrals we are
allowed to teach English...but normally it's only Spanish speakers. So when we
are tracting, if we come across English speakers we give them over to the
Elders and they do the same for us. We
are getting referrals all the time. The
few exceptions are when people only want the sisters to teach-those are sister
referrals. So Sister Mayberry was a
sister referral. After talking to her a
lot and resolving her concerns, she finally decided to be baptized on Jan.
28th. She has been going to church and
FHE in her Senior Housing area for at least a month now.
We had a great dinner with our sweet
investigators the Arbizu family (formally thought it was spelled Arviso...ha).
They are the ones from Guatemala. It was
so nice of them and we were so happy to eat Spanish food (we have been assigned
to eat dinner with the English wards ever since I got here! It's a rotating schedule...). They are praying, but not reading and they
still can't believe the Joseph Smith story. So we made them a
calendar/reading/praying chart and presented it to them so they can mark off
every day that they've read. We
suggested some scriptures for them to read.
They will read sometimes. It's
just so hard because we have grown to love them so much. We decided to start a
fast after dinnertime. The 4 of us sisters fasted and then Hermana Arbizu
fasted (Hermano Arbizu couldn't because of health reasons).
Wednesday – Fasting was definitely a little harder when we were on our bikes
and going all over town. But honestly, we felt the Spirit so much stronger
throughout the day. I felt like someone was helping me and pushing my bike. One
great thing about this area is that there are no hills! So biking is not as bad as it could be.
We went back to the Arbizu's house and
Hermana Arbizu was doing well. She was nervous that she wouldn't be able to
make it until dinnertime but she did great. She didn't just fast for
them-receiving an answer if Joseph Smith was a prophet, if the Book of Mormon
is the word of God, and if la Iglesia de Jesucristo de los santos de los
ultimos dias is the true church on the earth today, but also how she could help
her family more. It was good and it went
well, but still having challenges progressing.
We are still teaching Beverly from
Honduras. At first it was hard to get a
hold of her and she wouldn't answer her door, but she has been touched. She
knows the church is true. She has a desire to start reading the Book of
Mormon. She wants her sons to serve
missions!!! (They are 11 and 12).
We met this lady named Sarahi. She's from
Mexico. She said that she never let any
missionaries into her home ever before. (She was a member referral). She has 3
adorable kids (2 of baptism age). She doesn't talk much but she is a great
listener. We taught her about the Book of Mormon and read the Introduction
together she said she would read the rest of the intro and pray about the book.
It was great. I taught her how to pray and asked her to say the closing prayer.
She was willing to do it! While she was
saying it, she started crying really hard...she asked Heavenly Father to bless
her 16 year old daughter who ran away from home. Hermana Magdaleno and I had no
idea about this. It just showed me that Heavenly Father knows everyone
personally and places certain people during certain times of our lives to bless
us in certain ways. He is very aware of our needs. Sarahi is ready and now
willing to hear the lessons from the missionaries whereas she was never willing
before. It's incredible how much Heavenly Father loves us and knows us.
Thursday – Today while we visited Beverly, she told us about a dream she
had which was very intense. She said she
was swimming across a river and she came up to a wall blocking her way. She
started to swim under the wall and right as she went under it the wall started
crashing down...but it didn't harm her at all.
She came up out of the water and found herself on the other side and
there was a crowd of people with big smiles and welcoming her with open arms.
She said she felt more joy than ever before.
She asked us what it meant. We
asked her what she thought it meant. She
said she thought it meant that it was her preparing for baptism (her date is on
the 21st) and then after she is baptized...we smiled and said that it was
definitely a possibility. It was so
neat! Then we told her that there was a prophet in the Book of Mormon who had a
dream too. His name was Lehi. We told her about Lehi's dream and used her son
Jason's picture Book of Mormon. Beverly
pointed to the Tree from Lehi's dream.
She said that tree was in her dream.
It was so incredible. She wants to get
baptized so badly. It's been great
teaching her. I am so happy for her. :)
Friday – We visited the Arbizu family again today. We taught them the
Plan of Salvation. They seemed to really understand it. Maybe it's not their time just yet to accept
the gospel. We will see. We invited them to church and they said they
didn't want to be pressured into going and that they want to start going when
they want to...I don't know how many more times we will be visiting them :( :(
Saturday – Was a long day. For the first time since I've been here, it
snowed a ton. We couldn't ride our bikes because they didn't clear the
sidewalks and the streets were icy. So I got my hand warmers and my 5 pairs of
socks and 3 pairs of leggings on and we headed out. I forgot how nice it was to walk. Hermana
Magdaleno and I made a goal to talk to everyone we walked passed on the street.
It was great! We met some amazing
people. We taught a lot of lessons on
the street and who knows, we probably planted a seed in someone's heart.
We visited our investigator, Digna. She knows the church is true, she has a
strong testimony, but she doesn't think she's strong enough to change this
certain thing in her life that is preventing her from getting baptized this
weekend. We are trying hard to work with
her and her daughters.
Beverly is doing so well! Just a couple weeks ago it was opposite. Her
friend Digna was doing great and Beverly was trying to ignore us and now it's
switched. Interesting how things happen.
Sunday – Fast Sunday: It started
out rough! Hermana Harris and I got to
Digna and Beverly's house at around 8:15 A.M.
The snow and ice were all over Digna's car. Beverly was ready for church.
Digna was still sleeping. We started scraping the ice off her car so it
would be all ready to go for her and her girls. They don't own an ice scraper
so Hermana Harris and I scraped with Hermana Harris' old cards...it was rough
to say the least. At 9:00 the ice was
almost scraped off and we were practically out of breath!
Long story short (running out of time). Beverly and her 11 year old son Jason, and
Digna's 4 year old son Steven came to church, but not in the car that we had
been working on for the past hour...we got to church at 9:30. We missed the sacrament. The sacrament has
been so special and significant to me lately-now more than ever before. I was
prompted to bear my testimony. 1 Nephi
11:17. We don't know the reason for all
things that happen in our life, but we do know that God loves us. Sometimes this knowledge is enough.
I am grateful for my life. I am grateful for
this opportunity to be a missionary. I
love the Lord and am growing to love the people here so much.
Have a good week. Please pray and read
scriptures together as a family. It brings power.
Love,
Hermana Laura Johnson
P.S. Found out today 4 sisters got their
visas for Spain and are at the airport right now! I almost forgot about Spain!!! CRAZY!
I have no idea when I will get mine...hopefully sooner than I think?
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