Is This What Missionaries Do? -Yajaira

HAPPY FATHERS DAY EVERYBODY!!!!! 

So at the beginning of the week our mission president promised Hermana Wallis and I that our tiny branch will become a ward soon. I was skeptical. We have a consistent 30 people at church and that's IT! And I can only think of a few that are converted to the gospel. But Wallis had enough faith to believe it so I just rode on that and was quickly humbled by the end of the week. No we aren't a ward yet, but the hand of the Lord was working over-time this week! I'll just go day by day and share what He did in Santa Fe.

-Monday: We were at the store doing our groceries and I smiled at some random man. He came right up to us and said, "Are you Mormons?". We pointed to the tags and said yes! He said something along the lines of, "I didn't see the tags, but I thought I would take a chance because of your smiles! I could just tell! I got baptized 4 years ago in Arizona. I lost contact with the church a year ago when I moved here and I miss it so much!"

THEN get this. On Monday night Luis took us to dinner. We were just chatting and I made some joke about everyone asking us when he will get baptized. He said, so casually with out looking up, "Let's plan it."  I about choked on my orange chicken. I say, "WHAT". And he says, "Let's plan it, i feel ready." Just so casual. I think I left my body for a moment. But now I am calm and the baptism is planned and we are on for next Monday night!!!!!!!

-Tuesday! Tuesday was a little unproductive because we made a stop into urgent care cause the mission made me x-ray my ankle. I tried to teach everyone the gospel but nobody bit the bait haha.

-Wednesday we went to see a less active/recent convert who we were losing hope on. We couldn't get her to want to progress. But this time we started talking about the temple and she said that she wants to go! She came back to church this last Sunday and is getting ready for the temple! 

-Thursday we got out to contact some potentials. We knocked a door and they let us right in. They say "Hey sisters, we are members!" It was a mom and her son. Turns out the son used to be best friends with the elders like 5 years ago. He actually referred his whole extended family and they all got baptized! So he knows where nearly all of our less actives families are! AND he said he can't wait to start coming back to church! He also is connected to all of the families who got offended and started the huge problem when 99% of the branch left the church about 3 years back. He is going to help us find all of those families and rebuild the branch from the ground up! So exciting!

-Friday we went out contacting and talked to EVERYONE!!!! By the end of the day we had 7 solid news to teach. We also taught the regular investigators which was fun. Hopefully we see some progression coming up!

-Saturday we took Yajaira, our recent convert, out for the whole day again. We found so many news and talked to so many people! As we approached the first person Yajaira says, "What are you doing? We don't know this guy- oh wait....is this what you do?" HAHA.  By the end of the night Yajaira was actually contacting on her own! She just walked right up to people saying "Hi! What's your name? We are missionaries for Jesus Christ. Are you religious? That's great. We are MORMONS! Have you ever wanted to learn about how to be more happy through Jesus Christ?" 

It was AWESOME! By the end of the day she was so tired so we took her to ice-cream, took some ice-cream to Luis, and called it a day.

-AND SUNDAY!!!! Sunday morning we got a phone call from a random number. It turned out to be a less active who we had texted a while back. He wanted to know what time church started! Once we got to church we sat down in our little Gospel Principles class. We only had Luis, a recent convert, and Douglas (our JW investigator.) As we were about to say the prayer the branch president brought in a non-member and 4 more completely less actives who decided to show up for the first time in years! It was a miracle! Our class has never been so full!!!! 

After church we were still so blown away by the miracles. We have never seen that many less actives all in one place! We decided to go try some former investigators. We knocked on a door and a woman answered. She said "Hi sisters! I'm Hermana Rincon! Sorry I haven't been to church in a while!" Turns out she is a less active that we try by almost EVERY DAY. She is never home, we always leave a note, and we text her all the time and never get a response. Come to find out that she is married so she usually hangs at her in-laws house. We about fell off the porch once we realized who she was. Another lost-forever less active FOUND.

So as you can see, I have been humbled to the ground. There is no room for skeptics in the mission! Especially when the Lord has a plan! He knows His children and knows how to bring them into His Church! We just need to work hard enough for him to be able to show forth His hand. 

I also want to say that dad's are the BEST! I think I have the best one in the whole world! I am so grateful for the example that my dad has always shown me. Thank's to all of the righteous dads out there who teach their families the gospel! You all make a huge difference in the world!!!

LOVE YOU ALL!!! 

xoxoxoxox

PICS:

our most PRECIOUS recent converts Zayan and Esmerelda reading their book of mormons on their own! Their mom snapped this pic and sent it! Couldn't be prouder!!!!

My fun little trip to urgent care for my ankle lol

The present I sent to my dad! I'm happy to report that the PB&Honey made it to idaho. He totally ate the sandwich, too:)

The Plaza

GLORIOUS!

Hola Familia! 

I have riddle for you: I'm thinking of a person who is 1. Kinda Short  2. Was on American Idol  3. Is basically Justin Bieber for Mormons and 4. CAME TO OUR TINY BRANCH ON SUNDAY

That's right. David Archuleta came to our branch for church!!!! I was shaking hands before church and all of these white people came into the back. I thought they might need translators so I went to talk to them. I shook all of their hands, asked their names, and when David said his name I said AS IN DAVID ARCHULETA?? and he's like..."yes?". And then I tried to be casual but it was more like weird missionary. Then I texted our branch president and told him not to freak out....but he freaked out. He went up to David after the meeting and sang...to his face..." It's GLLOOORRRIIOOUUSSS to meet you." David didn't think it was funny. At all. 

Anyway. The best part of all of that is that they bumped our sacrament count from 40 to 50!

Couple more, less significant updates:

-Not getting transferred and sticking with hermana Wallis!

-We found another 10 news this week! Heavenly Father is so good to us! Now we just have to figure out how to teach all these people and get them to progress.

-Douglas fell in love with hermana Wallis so I got to deal with that drama. People always fall in love with her!!! Anyway....I told Douglas the rules on an emergency exchange and he agreed. He also said he wants to read the whole Book of Mormon! So stoked for him! Also he is crazy wise about the Bible. Keeps us on our toes!

-We found the greatest family of all time! They have the cutest little boys:) AND THEY CAME TO CHURCH!!!! it was so fun. The branch LOVED them. Hopefully we see them enter the waters pretty soon!

-Just getting prepped for Luis' baptism today! We are SO EXCITED! All of Santa Fe is coming to support him. He thinks nobody is coming. He keeps saying "if it's just us and president I'll be happy!" and we tell him that EVERYONE is coming and he doesn't believe us! Such a humble man. He's in for a treat haha.

-We went to this place called "The Plaza" last week for P-day. IT WAS SO COOL! I was in heaven! So much art and weird things. We talked to tons of people! We even found some very less active people and some formers who picked us out of crowds. The best part was meeting some West African Brothers!!!! It was so cool! We started talking an I got bargaining with them on their paintings and they thought it was the darndest thing! They freaked out and gave me the painting for free.:) So Sweet!

So the most spiritual part of my week was asking Luis why he finally decided to get baptized. He said that he was at the temple helping plant flowers and he looked around at an ocean of happy people. He said he wanted that...and he realized that the missionaries (us) had already told him exactly how to get it! The next day we went over and taught him about his true relationship with Heavenly Father. He said "When you put it this way, I think it's selfish of me to not live the commandments and get baptized!" So he finally decided to think about it that night. He was pondering the decision when he got a text from us telling him how much Heavenly Father loves him and wants to hear from him. Then for the first time he decided he would try and ask God what he should do. As he did he felt that he should be baptized without delay. 

Well that's about it for today! LOVE YOU ALL!!!

xoxoxox

pics:

Holding squirrils at our recent convert Britney's house

A member gave us this tuna salad....so we put it under our car during church cause we didn't want it to stink up the car. and then we forgot and ran it over. And of all the pictures I could have taken on the day that David came to our church...this is the only one I got.

Is That God? I Like His Beard- Children of Santa Fe

Hola Familia! This week has been a major turning point the area!.

Highlight of the week was studying in the apartment and some rascals decided to play with their toy trucks right outside our door. Very noisy. But at one point one of them must have seen the Jesus picture on our door and said, "Is that God?" and the other kid said, "Who knows, but I like his beard."

I heard this quote from Dan Clark, a BYU professor who said, "Work like it all depends on you, and pray like it all depends on the Lord." So that's what we have been doing!

I decided that we need to kick it into gear if we want this branch to grow more. And I have felt that it will grow through convert baptisms. So with that being said we prayed and decided that we must find families to baptize...key word is FIND. There is a mission statistic that out of every 15 new investigators, one gets baptized. My mission average has been finding 3-5 news a week (with an occasional 6 or 8). I did the math and I have baptized once about every 3 weeks of my mission. The statistic adds up right? So on Thursday we decided that we were going to find like crazy through more bold, more spiritual, on-the-spot lessons. By the end of the week we had gone from 2 news to 12! Many of which were member referrals and families who are prepared! We did many things that we sometimes shy away from (like stopping people in their paths and knocking doors). It was so much fun. We know that if it is the Lord's will that we can do the same this week AND put at least one of those people on solid bap-date, and hopefully more! 

We went to Luis' house and taught him that God is his Heavenly Father, again. This time we explained what that truly means. That Heavenly Father literally created his spirit. He raised him in the spirit world for eons of time. He knows Luis better than anyone on earth will ever know him. He loves him and it breaks His heart when any of us forget that divine relationship. Then someday we will come back to Him and He will call us by name. All of our memories from the pre-mortal life will come flooding back. We will REMEMBER that HE LOVES US. That we NEVER were alone. He is always there. The spirit was so strong and he opened up about many life experiences that have directly effected his conversion that he had never shared. He said that when he was younger he had a very strong trust in God even though nobody had taught that to him. Case and point? I think yes.

 He also was inspired as he helped plant flowers at the temple last week with the branch. We had arranged for the mission leader and a recent convert from a YSA branch to be there. They did a GREAT job fellow-shipping Luis. Luis said of the experience, "Coffee and tithing are nothing. I'm being so selfish! I should just do what the YSA guys said and get baptized...don't ya think?" That's a statement I can definitely agree with. 

We are trying to use the temple for conversion more and more. We have had an FHE with our branch to get people started on family history. One woman found out that her parents who passed away are already sealed! And she isn't sealed to them! Everyone was so excited. We have also been starting with "the end in mind" with many of our investigators by preparing them for the temple and doing family history right off the bat- and it is working beautifully!

We have received a lot of guidance from zone conferences about focusing on identity, revelation, and Jesus Christ in the first lesson! We taught a former this week and she said, through her tears, "I have never understood this until now." Even I got choked up sharing the first vision. I will never forget that spirit!

I went on exchanges with Sister Hubbard this week! It's nice because we have the same area, she is just English and I am Spanish. So I still had chances of finding Spanish people to teach! We asked everyone that we saw for referrals and through that we found a less active, un-recorded, FAMILY for our branch! Such a miracle!

Finally, we did a youth fireside was INCREDIBLE. I have only felt the spirit that strong on rare occasions. We put it together with the english sisters. All of the youth submitted questions for the missionaries. We narrowed it down to a few quesions and invited Luis to answer a few from an investigators perspective. We all gathered in a circle and shared answers to their awesome questions. We talked about what to expect at the MTC, how to prepare (repentance), how to feel the spirit, how to be worthy of the priesthood, what our hardest trials on the mission have been, sister Hazen shared her conversion story, and Luis shared his. Sister Hubbard stopped the discussion many times to point out the spirit that we were feeling and ask inspired questions. And the best part was that Luis told the whole group that he would soon be a member! If anything has been done in Santa Fe it is that MANY youth now have STRONG desires to serve missions. One youth was asked, "would you come again if we did it in a few months?" She said, "Heck I'd come again if you did it tomorrow!". I would strongly recommend this to any ward and stake. It was such a wonderful experience!

There are so many miracles I can hardly count! Just know that the Lord is working here in Santa Fe. I feel so humbled to be a part of this work. Next transfer we will see many enter into the waters of baptism who will be a great strength to the branch. 

LOS AMO!

Pics:

We went on THE BEST 7 mile hike this morning! Hermana Wallis and I ran back down the mountain. It actually felt like freedom...until I sprained my ankle and got my knees all bloody. So fun though. zero regrets

We tried to find a less active, but this mess was their address. hoping they don't actually live here....but i thought, hey i'm a trashy missionary, might as well snap a photo with this trashy "house".

Also, this bird has been hanging from our investigator's house for weeks. I always say hi to him. He must be sleeping or something.

Weekly

This week was excelent! I want to share just two miracles that happened on Sunday.

Miracle 1.) On Friday of this week our recent convert Yajaira called us up and asked if she could come out with us. We told her what appointments we had lined up and she said that she wanted to help with them all! So we took her out to lessons from 1:00pm- 9:00pm! Non of our appointments fell through and she even took us to knock on some of her friends doors. In every lesson she opened her mouth and testified powerfully and boldly. Each time she shared something different and clearly inspired by the spirit. I was so amazed! 

Then on Sunday she came to church! (She hasn't been in a few weeks.) We sat there listening to the testimonies and I leaned over to her and said, like I do every fast and testimony meeting, "Your turn!". Usually she just gets and attitude and tells me no. But this time her reply was, "What am I supposed to say?" I explained briefly how to format it and she went up!!!! Her testimony went something like this:

"I know this is the true church. I was always so confused because I didn't know who God and Jesus were exactly, but now I know and I am so much happier. Ever since I got baptized I have felt like I can be somebody. The other day I went out on missions with the Hermanas. We went and saw a lot of people and I was amazed at all of the people who don't know! The biggest thing I saw was that people tell the hermanas all of their problems...and of course they told them that things like church and scriptures and prayer would help. But people came up with excuses! They thought their problems were too big for God!

I know that Jesus lived a perfect life. And they killed him! They didn't just kill him...they tortured him and mocked him and beat him. They whole time he went through that he blessed the people, he had love for them, and in his final moments as he HUNG ON A CROSS, he asked his Father to forgive them. And people think that Jesus can't help their problems??? They think He doesn't understand?? I know He will always help. He understands us. I invite all of you to open the Book of Mormon and I promise He will help you. He does understand YOU. In the name of Jesus Christ amen."

It was one of the most touching moments of my whole mission. 

Following Yajaira less active after less active got up and said that she made them want to be better. We finally had a spiritual testimony meeting where everybody left completely filled with the spirit and a desire to do good.

#2.) Meanwhile, Luis was sitting right next to us. All three meetings had been SO perfect for him. We talked all about the blessings of the commandments and he seemed to really understand (as his struggle is paying tithing right now). He finally looked comfortable at church with the branch! As the meeting ended he asked me, "Where can I find a tithing envelope?". I tried to show him without giving away how happy I was. He ended up paying an offering to the mission fund!!! He walked it right up to president with a smile on his face. Considering that the last letter he handed to president said he doesn't feel he should continue with the church, just a week ago, I would call that a MIRACLE.

We have been working on are having an activity for the youth. Last Saturday we had an activity for the youth to bring their friends to the park to play kick-ball. We invited the english ward too! It was really a fun bonding night. One of our investigators came to help with food and one of the english kids brought a non-member friend! My favorite part was that all of our ward missionaries came to support and provide refreshments. Ever since we started doing weekly correlation with them they have been SO INVOLVED! I could not be more excited about the effort that the members are putting in!!!

Hope you had an awesome week!!! Sorry it's short! Enjoy the pics!!!

Hermana Johnson

-It got really rainy one day

- I got to see my greenie on eschanges

-Some fun kickball in the park pics

-Going out with Yajaira

-Zone activity in the mountains!

6 New Investigators, 1 New Stun Gun

This week was awesome. We found some people, taught some people, built some ward relationships, and over all we are just SO SO happy

I chose two things last Monday that I want to focus on to be a better companion. So the two things I am striving for is to 1.) help my companion trust in her ability to trust the spirit. And 2.) Help my companion learn Spanish!

I set the first focus because my comp always says she doesn't know when the spirit is talking to her (she totally gets promptings all the time...she's incredible). So I thought I would help build her confidence in that by always acting on her ideas without debate. Just trusting in her right to the spirit 100%. 

Well no sooner than I had made that goal, we had an appointment cancel and Wallis said, "Maybe we should visit the Linares' (two of our converts)". I had committed to act on all of her thoughts as promptings, so we went immediately. We showed up to find one of our sweet converts shut in her room crying and panicking and feeling terrible about herself. It was vital that we were there for her. We stayed with her for two hours and figured out what to do with the situations she was facing. The next day she got sent to her mom's house and we have had no contact with her since. 

How incredible is the Spirit? It will touch our hearts in the quietest ways for the most important reasons. Hermana Wallis has become the queen of recognizing promptings in just a week! She is showing me up! It is such an honor to be serving with her!

The second thing is Spanish. Hermana Wallis is not a fan of the celestial language...so it really bothers her to have to speak it. I told her that everything I say will be in Spanish, and she can do what she pleases. So far we've been having a great week only speaking in Spansih (actually spanglish....still learning) But it's GREAT!

Companions are the best, especially mine. I don't know if I've mentioned it, but Hermana Wallis loves to run! We used to pass eachother on runs in the canyon haha! We have found some gorgeous trails right next to our apartments and we run every morning! It's so so fun. It's everything I need to feel like myself and be a missionary. 

We found two awesome new families! I get anxious before teaching families because I know how important they are to Father. But hopefully we don't scare them off and they can come to know the gospel is true!

We are still teaching Douglas, the Jehovas Witness. Last night we had to break it to him that Jehova isn't Heavenly Father, but Jesus. I was stressin' about it. I love Douglas and we have the BEST discussions. I have learned a lot trying to study for him. He has really deep questions and really wants to know truth. Every time I have tried to explain the truth about Jehova to someone the investigator isn't super pleased. But this time I was just really bold. We used the scriptures and a lot of love. Douglas said "I have never heard this. It's like Philip in the old testament. He was riding along in his cart, reading the scriptures, but someone had to come and expound them to him. Then he immediately got baptized." 

I was STUNNED by the response. Actually giddy. HOW HUMBLE. This is a guy who can tell you what it says in any scripture, word for word, if you just give him the reference. He has studied the Bible more than any person I have ever known. And he humbly accepted the invitation to pray to Heavenly Father, in the name of Christ, knowing that he is not praying TO Jehova but in the NAME of Him, to seek revelation- which he never believed in in the first place. SO EXCITING.

We taught Luis tithing this week with the branch President. Luis is the most incredible person in the world. He will be THE BEST member and someday THE BEST bishop. He WANTS to pay tithing, but his mortgage might prohibit him taking another 10% from his tithing. I want to ask that if anyone out there reading this has a powerful tithing experience, please send it to my e-mail susannah.johnson@myldsmail.net. I would love to share with him some tithing miracles. Sounds like he might be calling it quits with his road to baptism tonight at dinner....but keep him in your prayers. 

Over-all this week has been great. We found 6 great news and got the cutest little girl on date for June! Can't wait! Only rough part of the week was that my energy was at ZERO for a few days. All I had left in the fridge was a huge thing of cookie dough. I ate that for breakfast lunch and dinner for a few days.....it was rough. Then I found beef Jerky in the cupboard so that was exciting. And my companion shared as much as she could too. I hope the guy that robbed me is pleased......I'm gonna pray that my bank gets it together and sends me a new card before I wither away out here lol. 

Well I love you all TONS! Have a great week!

xoxoxoxo

Hermana Johnson

P.S. The elders got a stun gun from a sketchy member in their ward who lives in the boonies. They gave it to us! Plus I broke out the good ole pepper spray. Nobody's gonna be messin' with us again!

Oh and here are the notes that Esmeralda and Zayan wrote about their baptisms!!! CUTENESS!

TEMPLE TRIPS and STAYING IN SANTA FE

Well family it was INCREDIBLE to talk to you all last night. It was so fun to see all of you and I am so glad some of the cousins could join for a second! Made my whole transfer! 

I feel like I just talked to you all, but I still have an update on the week! The branch is doing great. We set a goal to get 50+ in attendance two times this transfer, and this Sunday it happened again! That's three Sundays in a row! We have some awesome less active families returning and building their faith. I never understood how great it is to work with less actives, but it is one of the most rewarding feelings to see these families come back and take on callings/leadership positions in no time at all! 

Temple Trip!

WE WENT TO THE TEMPLE WITH YAJAIRA! It was the greatest day EVER. She loved it and loved the spirit there. One of my favorite parts though was the drive down. Her young womens leader took us and they sat in the front talking all about life. Yajaira hasn't had it easy, and she has been needing a role model desperately. It was so great to see her leader taking her under her wing and helping her feel loved. It takes a great leader to drive a young women with gages, who swears the whole car ride, to the temple. Here's to all of the young womens leaders who see every girl as a perfect daughter of God. You women are heroes!

My favorite thing about being in the temple was the peace and comfort that is there. At this point I have been there enough that it feels familiar. It feels like a constant in my life that will never go away. It's like a refuge of the spirit that is available to anyone who has a desire to get worthy and go. I love it more than I can describe! Like Yajaira said, "it feels like heaven!" And like our recent convert said to Luis at church "If you haven't been to the temple, I highly recommend it."

Don't be dumb, YOU KNOW IT'S TRUE

Luis is doing GREAT. We had a lesson with him the other day and he was acting so iffy about his baptism. I said something like, "Luis, what are your doubts? I know you know the Book of Mormon is true so don't pretend like you don't". And he started smiling SO BIG. Ear to ear. He said something like "Yes I know it's true. And I love the prophets. And this is the Church of Jesus Christ. I just don't want to get baptized without knowing if I will marry someone else who is baptized or not."

HAHA so we taught him about eternal marriage and all that and he was PUMPED. Such a good person. I haven't met a 20ish guy with this kind of quality in my whole life. Just a good good person trying to do what's right. I know the Lord prepared him and I can't wait for him to be a general authority or something haha. 

My favorite thing about all of this is that Luis has been bombarded with anti info about the prophets and the church and stuff. And he isn't ignorant, he takes it all into account. But he has 1.) Read the Book of Mormon with real intent 2.) Attended all church meetings to see for himself and 3.) Prayed with faith to simply ask God what is true and what is false. That is all that God asks of us. I know that if we do these things, truly put our trust in God instead of men, He will reveal truth to each of us!

We Are All Just Trying to do What's Right, Right?

We also just started teaching our ward mission leaders wife. She is Jehovas Witness AND has a lot of anti-info. I'm not worried though. I love teaching Jehova's Witness because they are a people who study intently to try and figure out the mysteries of God. 9x out of 10 they just call us in to bash us, but the one that listens finds their faith growing.  As missionaries we aren't out here to take away what anyone believes, but to add to it. I have a firm conviction that we work for Heavenly Father. The one and only God. We work for the same being that EVERYONE is searching for. That's why I am so excited to teach her. She searches the scriptures, tries to follow God, and grabs hold of anti info because she is just trying to find truth. So i'm doing tons of studying and praying so that we can hopefully answer her questions and help her come even closer to God than she already is. 

Baptisms to Come!

We have been teaching the cutest little girls Zayan and Esmerelda. There is a good chunk of un-baptized kids out here who have been bombarded by missionaries...so they basically hated us. But we came up with some crafts and games to make the gospel fun and have been doing them with all the unbaptized kids! I have like 5 new BFFs ages 9-12. It's awesome. Zayan and Esmerelda are a couple of those kids and their baptism is this Saturday! Can't wait!

OH btw I'M STAYING HERE! Hermana Wallis and I are going to have THE BEST TRANSFER EVER. I AM SO EXCITED. We just had an incredible zone training about working with members and planning more effectively. Hermana Wallis and I are determined to implement all of it. We started last night by having a lesson in a members home. The spirit was so strong! We have also organized a correlation meeting that will happen each week (with or without the mission leader because he is always MIA) that is welcome to all branch members. We will specifically invite the ward missionaries and auxiliaries, but we want everybody who wants to be involved to be there! Hermana Wallis is ON FIRE. I love her so much. We are going to have the most productive transfer of my mission, i can feel it. 

Also, she loves to run. So we are going to run all of the gorgeous trails in santa fe...and we are going to borrow some bikes from the members for bike rides. I couldn't be happier. Really truly so happy. 

I LOVE YOU ALL! I hope you have a great week! And HAPPY MOTHERS DAY!!!

p.s ANGEL MAYRA BLANCA AND JOSE all went and did family names this week, too!!!!! COULD THIS WEEK BE ANY BETTER?????? SUCH A HAPPY THING! i'll try and get them to send pics!