Hola Familia!!
Funny story, so recently we had some roommates move into our apartment with us. But when this happened they only gave us 1 parking space and not 2. So we have to drive around and try to find an open space to park our car. Well we drove around forever last night and couldn't find anything. So we decided that we would park in our old parking space (cause we had just moved). We figured that no one would have moved in yet cause we just barely moved, and we went up to the apartment and there was no furniture in there or anything. So we decided to park there....yeah, bad idea. This morning we got up to exercise and we went over to where we parked our car, and a different car was in the spot! Haha, so now we have to go all the way down to Laguna Beach (it really isn't that far away) and pick up our car. But because of all of this, the mission office let us call our parents to make sure we had enough money and everything to pay for the towing expense! It was AWESOME!!!! Hermana Johnson almost started crying when President gave us the permission, haha. It was really good to talk to mom to see how everything was going, we really couldn't talk for that long but it was still fun.
Other things that happened this week. Oh yeah, we got roommates! I already said that, but it has been super fun. Except it does make it a little harder to do things like write in your journal and get anything else done at night or in the morning cause we always end up talking.
Luz is leaving this week :( We are really sad. I can't believe that she is leaving. We had a lesson with her a couple nights ago and we were all pretty much in tears because we are going to miss her. Hopefully she will get baptized in San Juan. PRAY FOR HER!!!!!! I love her so much, and I know the thing that will help her in her life is this church.
As for other things in the week, I don't really have that much more time to write, but there wasn't a ton that happened I don't feel like. We are doing good at getting a lot of lessons every week, we are pretty much always teaching, but we aren't super good at helping people progress towards baptism. So that is our goal this week, to help our investigators progress and to get new ones that will.
Les quiero bastante! Y espero que todos tengan una buena semana!
Con muchisimo amor,
Hermana Johnson
p.s. Congratulations Mike and Lindy!!!!!!!! That is sooo exciting!
Monday, October 28, 2013
Monday, October 21, 2013
President Orgill
HOLA!!!!!!
Wow, it's already P-day, how glorious :) This week went super fast! Not a ton of new things happened this week though. But one thing that was super fun was our Noche con los Misioneros. I think I talked about the last one that we did. We do one every month, and because we didn't have a huge turn out last month, we decided to do the same thing again this month. But for some reason it got combined with our annual Halloween Party that the Primary puts on. That probably wasn't that good of an idea, haha. The party was super fun, and all the kids came dressed up and went trunk or treating, and we ate, and had a pinata and all that fun stuff, it was a blast. But right in the middle of that we did our noche con los misioneros thing....bad idea. All the kids were eating their candy, crying, laughing, and frankly just weren't that interested in Joseph Smith and the first vision at that time, haha, but it went alright and we now know that you shouldn't ever combine a primary activity with a missionary activity.
Hey but both Luz and Tino came to the activity! But funny story: Felix, Luz's son, while running around eating candy and doing a pinata and stuff, he threw up EVERYWHERE. Ok, it really wasn't that funny, except that afterwards he was even more hyper, it didn't stop him from playing, that's for sure.
Another super cool thing that we had this week was a mission conference. Because our mission is so small, we get the opportunity to do mission conferences ALL the time, sometimes too often, haha. When we found out about this one I was actually really mad because we were going to go help a member move, and had to reschedule it, but then I ended up really liking it, it was exactly what I needed. It was about how to deal with stress and this book that they want all the missionaries to read everyday to help us know how to better deal healthily with the stress that we have. (I would suggest it for anyone who feels stressed, it is written for missionaries, but the principles are the same for anyone) The thing that made this meeting amazing though, was President Orgill. He his seriously the most amazing man I have ever seen in my life, he compares with the prophet. For those who believe your mission president is the best, I'm sorry to burst your bubble, but that just can't be possible. Every time he speaks, it is exactly what I need to hear. He brings the spirit so strongly, he is so humble, yet so amazing, he has so much love for everyone it is unfathomable, and I seriously feel like I am in Christ's presence when I am around him. He talked about his mission and how hard it was (he went to Tonga and served underneath Elder Groberg) and I just realized how easy of a mission I have. I am so blessed to be serving where I am and to have the mission president that I do.
I don't have much more time, but please pray for Luz, Tino, Sully, and Andrea! As I am getting more and more into my mission, I am developing more and more love for the people here. There are so many sad things in people's lives and it makes me so sad sometimes. Pray for them that they will be able to get over all the things that are holding them back from progressing in their path to baptism (or just in their life for Andrea cause she is already a member). Les quiero!!!
Con amor,
Hermana Johnson
p.s. Lindy I am soooooooooooooo excited for you to have your baby!! I want pictures! :) oh and by the way, I LOVE the name
Wow, it's already P-day, how glorious :) This week went super fast! Not a ton of new things happened this week though. But one thing that was super fun was our Noche con los Misioneros. I think I talked about the last one that we did. We do one every month, and because we didn't have a huge turn out last month, we decided to do the same thing again this month. But for some reason it got combined with our annual Halloween Party that the Primary puts on. That probably wasn't that good of an idea, haha. The party was super fun, and all the kids came dressed up and went trunk or treating, and we ate, and had a pinata and all that fun stuff, it was a blast. But right in the middle of that we did our noche con los misioneros thing....bad idea. All the kids were eating their candy, crying, laughing, and frankly just weren't that interested in Joseph Smith and the first vision at that time, haha, but it went alright and we now know that you shouldn't ever combine a primary activity with a missionary activity.
Hey but both Luz and Tino came to the activity! But funny story: Felix, Luz's son, while running around eating candy and doing a pinata and stuff, he threw up EVERYWHERE. Ok, it really wasn't that funny, except that afterwards he was even more hyper, it didn't stop him from playing, that's for sure.
Another super cool thing that we had this week was a mission conference. Because our mission is so small, we get the opportunity to do mission conferences ALL the time, sometimes too often, haha. When we found out about this one I was actually really mad because we were going to go help a member move, and had to reschedule it, but then I ended up really liking it, it was exactly what I needed. It was about how to deal with stress and this book that they want all the missionaries to read everyday to help us know how to better deal healthily with the stress that we have. (I would suggest it for anyone who feels stressed, it is written for missionaries, but the principles are the same for anyone) The thing that made this meeting amazing though, was President Orgill. He his seriously the most amazing man I have ever seen in my life, he compares with the prophet. For those who believe your mission president is the best, I'm sorry to burst your bubble, but that just can't be possible. Every time he speaks, it is exactly what I need to hear. He brings the spirit so strongly, he is so humble, yet so amazing, he has so much love for everyone it is unfathomable, and I seriously feel like I am in Christ's presence when I am around him. He talked about his mission and how hard it was (he went to Tonga and served underneath Elder Groberg) and I just realized how easy of a mission I have. I am so blessed to be serving where I am and to have the mission president that I do.
I don't have much more time, but please pray for Luz, Tino, Sully, and Andrea! As I am getting more and more into my mission, I am developing more and more love for the people here. There are so many sad things in people's lives and it makes me so sad sometimes. Pray for them that they will be able to get over all the things that are holding them back from progressing in their path to baptism (or just in their life for Andrea cause she is already a member). Les quiero!!!
Con amor,
Hermana Johnson
p.s. Lindy I am soooooooooooooo excited for you to have your baby!! I want pictures! :) oh and by the way, I LOVE the name
Tuesday, October 15, 2013
Windows of Heaven
HOLA!!!!
Como estan todos?! Todo esta muy bien aqui en California!!
This week was awesome!! We had a couple super cool things happen. First: we started doing our Windows of Heaven program again because we are in need of more investigators (I told you about that right? Pretty much we just pray to ask God where people who are ready to hear the gospel are and then we go and there for at least an hour) Well anyways, we did 3 of them this week. For the first one, both me and my companion thought of Rocio, a member in our ward, but it was confusing cause she is like the only hispanic person that lives where she lives. But we went anyways, and as we were praying before we started both of us thought that we should go to her house and see if her husband was there cause he isn't a member. So we did that. About 2 minutes after we got inside the house and were talking to her and her husband, someone knocked on the door. Isabel, one of our formers who we have had a really hard time getting a hold of came to the door. It was awesome. So we got to make contact with her, help her with some things she needed, and then afterwards we were able to teach Rocio's husband and we are going to start teaching him today. So cool!! We were definitely guided to go there.
Second one: We thought of Via Lomas, which is like where everyone and their dog lives. It is literally a mini Mexico. We got there, I was not in a super good mood and I didn't really want to do it, but we had promised the Lord we were going to be there at that time and talk to everyone we saw. So we did. It was crazy, like the second person we talked to was a member from Guatemala who has been looking for the church since he got here 5 months ago and he doesn't know anybody. He said that the night before he was talking to the bishop and prayed that he would be able to find someone from the church to help him, and then we showed up. So cool. But that's not all, his friend was next to him and we talked to him about the first vision. He pretty much started crying and told us that he had never felt like that before. Like he has always been confused with which church was right, and we have a return appointment with him. The Lord is amazing.
Third one: We went to a different complex and were talking to people for a while. We were almost on our way out when we ran into an 18 year old. He let us sit down and teach him the first vision as well. He is going through a whole bunch right now, but he wants to meet with us again as well. So awesome. Three new investigators in one week when you ask the Lord where you should go.
Also this week Elder Falabella (a member of the 70) came and visited us. It was super cool! He was awesome! Him and his wife are from Guatemala so we got to talk to them in Spanish. His wife doesn't know very much English so she spoke to us in Spanish and an elder translated for her, but it was pretty cool to be able to understand her in her own language. It was even more awesome because afterwards we were talking to President and we told him one of our miracle stories and he had us go over to the Falabella's and tell it to them in Spanish. I felt so cool talking to a general authority. :)
One more thing...I'm running out of time. But we had an awesome lesson with Tino yesterday. Well it was all Hermana Johnson. One of his friends was there at his house and so I talked to him (and we are actually going to start teaching him!) and Hermana Johnson taught Tino. I was so proud of her! She did the whole lesson by herself and she understood everything he said! And he is hard to understand sometimes. But she said the spirit was super strong. She talked to him about baptism. He said he had a dream where he was Joseph Smith and he was reading the Book of Mormon. He was confused why he needed to be baptized again if there is only "one faith and one baptism" but she explained to him that he needed to be immersed and by the authority for it to count. Then she committed to stop taking lessons from the Testigos de Jehovah and he said yes!!! He is getting closer and closer to baptism it is so exciting! We told him that he has 6 weeks to do it cause there is a chance one of us could leave in 6 weeks, and he is actually thinking about it. So cool.
Anyways, I am completely out of time. Sorry I didn't write yesterday, the libraries were closed. But I love you all, I miss you, and don't forget that God loves you too!
Con much amor,
Hermana Johnson
Como estan todos?! Todo esta muy bien aqui en California!!
This week was awesome!! We had a couple super cool things happen. First: we started doing our Windows of Heaven program again because we are in need of more investigators (I told you about that right? Pretty much we just pray to ask God where people who are ready to hear the gospel are and then we go and there for at least an hour) Well anyways, we did 3 of them this week. For the first one, both me and my companion thought of Rocio, a member in our ward, but it was confusing cause she is like the only hispanic person that lives where she lives. But we went anyways, and as we were praying before we started both of us thought that we should go to her house and see if her husband was there cause he isn't a member. So we did that. About 2 minutes after we got inside the house and were talking to her and her husband, someone knocked on the door. Isabel, one of our formers who we have had a really hard time getting a hold of came to the door. It was awesome. So we got to make contact with her, help her with some things she needed, and then afterwards we were able to teach Rocio's husband and we are going to start teaching him today. So cool!! We were definitely guided to go there.
Second one: We thought of Via Lomas, which is like where everyone and their dog lives. It is literally a mini Mexico. We got there, I was not in a super good mood and I didn't really want to do it, but we had promised the Lord we were going to be there at that time and talk to everyone we saw. So we did. It was crazy, like the second person we talked to was a member from Guatemala who has been looking for the church since he got here 5 months ago and he doesn't know anybody. He said that the night before he was talking to the bishop and prayed that he would be able to find someone from the church to help him, and then we showed up. So cool. But that's not all, his friend was next to him and we talked to him about the first vision. He pretty much started crying and told us that he had never felt like that before. Like he has always been confused with which church was right, and we have a return appointment with him. The Lord is amazing.
Third one: We went to a different complex and were talking to people for a while. We were almost on our way out when we ran into an 18 year old. He let us sit down and teach him the first vision as well. He is going through a whole bunch right now, but he wants to meet with us again as well. So awesome. Three new investigators in one week when you ask the Lord where you should go.
Also this week Elder Falabella (a member of the 70) came and visited us. It was super cool! He was awesome! Him and his wife are from Guatemala so we got to talk to them in Spanish. His wife doesn't know very much English so she spoke to us in Spanish and an elder translated for her, but it was pretty cool to be able to understand her in her own language. It was even more awesome because afterwards we were talking to President and we told him one of our miracle stories and he had us go over to the Falabella's and tell it to them in Spanish. I felt so cool talking to a general authority. :)
One more thing...I'm running out of time. But we had an awesome lesson with Tino yesterday. Well it was all Hermana Johnson. One of his friends was there at his house and so I talked to him (and we are actually going to start teaching him!) and Hermana Johnson taught Tino. I was so proud of her! She did the whole lesson by herself and she understood everything he said! And he is hard to understand sometimes. But she said the spirit was super strong. She talked to him about baptism. He said he had a dream where he was Joseph Smith and he was reading the Book of Mormon. He was confused why he needed to be baptized again if there is only "one faith and one baptism" but she explained to him that he needed to be immersed and by the authority for it to count. Then she committed to stop taking lessons from the Testigos de Jehovah and he said yes!!! He is getting closer and closer to baptism it is so exciting! We told him that he has 6 weeks to do it cause there is a chance one of us could leave in 6 weeks, and he is actually thinking about it. So cool.
Anyways, I am completely out of time. Sorry I didn't write yesterday, the libraries were closed. But I love you all, I miss you, and don't forget that God loves you too!
Con much amor,
Hermana Johnson
Monday, October 7, 2013
La Conferencia!!!
Buenos dias!!
Como estan todos?! Como les gusta la conferencia?
Conference this week obviously was the highlight of the week. It was amazing! It was pretty fun cause in our mission there are so many missionaries and such a small area that there were about 25 or so missionaries watching it in the same spot. One of our investigators Tino came to every single session!! It was awesome! He got a ride to the church at 9 in the morning on Saturday and didn't leave until 7 at night after the priesthood session, and then he did the same thing on Sunday too. So awesome. He loved it. In between sessions on Saturday we had a lesson with him and he said he liked the talk that Elder Uchtorf gave about how it was ok to have doubts, but that we should come anyways. So he said that although he still has a lot of questions he has faith and believes these things and he said he knows that the spirit will tell him when he should join this church so he is just waiting for that conviction. He is pretty awesome.
Also Kimberly and her whole family all came to watch it on Sunday. It was pretty fun cause Hermana Johnson made a conference game notebook things for Kimberly so that she could do like crosswords and other cool games like that during conference but still pay attention. She loved it, it was super fun.
One of the many things I learned from conference is the need to study things out in your mind before you will receive an answer from God. It is a principle I have always known, but that I feel like I keep learning. Sometimes we feel like if we are living righteously then God should just give us the answers when we pray, but really we must pray to have the strength to study by ourselves and then ask God if the things we learned are correct. I think we can always do better at this principle.
Another crazy thing that happened this week is that we moved!! Just to another apartment in the same complex, but it was pretty fun. Our apartment now is huge! But we are going to be getting roommates on transfers, which is in a week. And we also found out we might be getting a third companion too!
But right now it is just us 2 living in a nice and large apartment so that is super nice :) Oh and we found out that Luz is moving too. :( That broke our hearts, she has really been struggling and hasn't been focusing as much on church things lately. Pray for her!!! We really want to help her realized the importance of this gospel in her life!
I love you all. The work is amazing, there will always be bumps in the road but never give up. God loves you all, he loves me, and he has sent me here to preach the gospel to the people in Mission Viejo, CA! And I love it!
Con muchisimo amor,
Hermana Johnson
Como estan todos?! Como les gusta la conferencia?
Conference this week obviously was the highlight of the week. It was amazing! It was pretty fun cause in our mission there are so many missionaries and such a small area that there were about 25 or so missionaries watching it in the same spot. One of our investigators Tino came to every single session!! It was awesome! He got a ride to the church at 9 in the morning on Saturday and didn't leave until 7 at night after the priesthood session, and then he did the same thing on Sunday too. So awesome. He loved it. In between sessions on Saturday we had a lesson with him and he said he liked the talk that Elder Uchtorf gave about how it was ok to have doubts, but that we should come anyways. So he said that although he still has a lot of questions he has faith and believes these things and he said he knows that the spirit will tell him when he should join this church so he is just waiting for that conviction. He is pretty awesome.
Also Kimberly and her whole family all came to watch it on Sunday. It was pretty fun cause Hermana Johnson made a conference game notebook things for Kimberly so that she could do like crosswords and other cool games like that during conference but still pay attention. She loved it, it was super fun.
One of the many things I learned from conference is the need to study things out in your mind before you will receive an answer from God. It is a principle I have always known, but that I feel like I keep learning. Sometimes we feel like if we are living righteously then God should just give us the answers when we pray, but really we must pray to have the strength to study by ourselves and then ask God if the things we learned are correct. I think we can always do better at this principle.
Another crazy thing that happened this week is that we moved!! Just to another apartment in the same complex, but it was pretty fun. Our apartment now is huge! But we are going to be getting roommates on transfers, which is in a week. And we also found out we might be getting a third companion too!
But right now it is just us 2 living in a nice and large apartment so that is super nice :) Oh and we found out that Luz is moving too. :( That broke our hearts, she has really been struggling and hasn't been focusing as much on church things lately. Pray for her!!! We really want to help her realized the importance of this gospel in her life!
I love you all. The work is amazing, there will always be bumps in the road but never give up. God loves you all, he loves me, and he has sent me here to preach the gospel to the people in Mission Viejo, CA! And I love it!
Con muchisimo amor,
Hermana Johnson
Wednesday, October 2, 2013
Bautismo!!!!!
HOLA!!!
Como estan todos?!
It feels like it has been forever since I have written! This week our p-day got switched to Wednesday cause we got to go the the temple today! It was awesome! And last week my email didn't work so I didn't get to email last week either! So it feels great to sit down at the computer today :)
So there have been a demasiado amount of things that have happened in the past 2 weeks and there is no way I will have time for all of them. But the most important is the Kimberly got baptized!!!!!! It was super good. After a whole bunch of changing around the dates because of meetings and relief society general conference stuff, and all sorts of stuff, we finally got it to work out for Sunday night. But because of general conference she won't be able to be confirmed for 2 weeks, so she is still technically our investigator :) But she was so cute. Her whole family got all dressed up in white and everything.
Oh but obviously, the day before I get a call the bishop and he asked me to give a talk on the same Sunday as the baptism! I think I have spoken in church on the same day that my converts have gotten baptized every time but once! Haha, that was my 4th talk and I have only been out 7 months!
Tino- So we did this awesome thing called Noche Con los Misioneros and Tino came to it. We pretty much put on a play of the first lesson about the restoration. It was awesome, everyone loved it! He loved it and has really started progressing since then. Oh, funny story. So we went over to help him move to a different apartment, and we got there and our blonds selves didn't realize that we wouldn't be able to go in his house cause there aren't any girls there. So after searching for another girl to come help us, we resolved to have him bring us stuff outside and then we packed it in boxes. We felt like this was working out great, but then all of a sudden he started calling random people. We didn't know what he was doing until he told us that he had some girls coming on their way to help us. So we were like, hey sweet. All of a sudden, 2 girls show up in skirts, 1 of them had a baby in a stroller, and they were definitely Jehovah Witnesses out doing their preaching as well. It was sooo funny!!! They showed up but they had no idea what was going on, he just asked them to come over to the house but didn't tell them that they would be helping to to move, haha! So both of us are just standing there kind of awkwardly and Tino was like, Ok, these are my Jehovah witness friends, and these are my mormon friends, ok lets go. And then he just walked inside the house. HAHA!! It was sooo funny. We explained what had happened to them and they were super nice and it wasn't awkward at all, just super funny.
Luz- So Luz is doing pretty well also. There is a chance she might be moving soon so we are trying to help her want to get baptized before that :) She was reading the Book of Mormon a lot until she got to the stinking Isaiah chapters and now she is having a super hard time understanding them and so she isn't as excited to read. Stupid Isaiah chapters! But she has really started progressing again as well.
Miracle! We got a referral from the English elders for this girl named Sully. We got it a while ago, but we haven't been able to meet up with her until like 2 days ago. She is awesome! She has a crazy story, but she really has a lot of real intent. She also came to our English class that she teach and she really liked that, so I think that she has a ton of potential! Its exciting cause we are running low on investigators and need some help building up the pool again.
Well, I love you all and I hope everything is going well!! Me encanta estar aqui en mi mision, me encanta el idioma de espanol y me encanta la cultura hispana tambien. Les extrano, y espero que todo este bien! Les quiero!!
Hermana Johnson
Como estan todos?!
It feels like it has been forever since I have written! This week our p-day got switched to Wednesday cause we got to go the the temple today! It was awesome! And last week my email didn't work so I didn't get to email last week either! So it feels great to sit down at the computer today :)
So there have been a demasiado amount of things that have happened in the past 2 weeks and there is no way I will have time for all of them. But the most important is the Kimberly got baptized!!!!!! It was super good. After a whole bunch of changing around the dates because of meetings and relief society general conference stuff, and all sorts of stuff, we finally got it to work out for Sunday night. But because of general conference she won't be able to be confirmed for 2 weeks, so she is still technically our investigator :) But she was so cute. Her whole family got all dressed up in white and everything.
Oh but obviously, the day before I get a call the bishop and he asked me to give a talk on the same Sunday as the baptism! I think I have spoken in church on the same day that my converts have gotten baptized every time but once! Haha, that was my 4th talk and I have only been out 7 months!
Tino- So we did this awesome thing called Noche Con los Misioneros and Tino came to it. We pretty much put on a play of the first lesson about the restoration. It was awesome, everyone loved it! He loved it and has really started progressing since then. Oh, funny story. So we went over to help him move to a different apartment, and we got there and our blonds selves didn't realize that we wouldn't be able to go in his house cause there aren't any girls there. So after searching for another girl to come help us, we resolved to have him bring us stuff outside and then we packed it in boxes. We felt like this was working out great, but then all of a sudden he started calling random people. We didn't know what he was doing until he told us that he had some girls coming on their way to help us. So we were like, hey sweet. All of a sudden, 2 girls show up in skirts, 1 of them had a baby in a stroller, and they were definitely Jehovah Witnesses out doing their preaching as well. It was sooo funny!!! They showed up but they had no idea what was going on, he just asked them to come over to the house but didn't tell them that they would be helping to to move, haha! So both of us are just standing there kind of awkwardly and Tino was like, Ok, these are my Jehovah witness friends, and these are my mormon friends, ok lets go. And then he just walked inside the house. HAHA!! It was sooo funny. We explained what had happened to them and they were super nice and it wasn't awkward at all, just super funny.
Luz- So Luz is doing pretty well also. There is a chance she might be moving soon so we are trying to help her want to get baptized before that :) She was reading the Book of Mormon a lot until she got to the stinking Isaiah chapters and now she is having a super hard time understanding them and so she isn't as excited to read. Stupid Isaiah chapters! But she has really started progressing again as well.
Miracle! We got a referral from the English elders for this girl named Sully. We got it a while ago, but we haven't been able to meet up with her until like 2 days ago. She is awesome! She has a crazy story, but she really has a lot of real intent. She also came to our English class that she teach and she really liked that, so I think that she has a ton of potential! Its exciting cause we are running low on investigators and need some help building up the pool again.
Well, I love you all and I hope everything is going well!! Me encanta estar aqui en mi mision, me encanta el idioma de espanol y me encanta la cultura hispana tambien. Les extrano, y espero que todo este bien! Les quiero!!
Hermana Johnson
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)