Prayers Are Answered

March 2

HAPPY ALMOST BIRTHDAY MOM!! I didn't forget :) Too bad I can't get anything for you. Next year haha. Have a good one though! I am sure grandpa will spoil you :). Love you lots!

This week we are stressing because of this area. This has been the neediest area and the most up and down roller coaster I have been on but at the same time it is going ok. Sarah we are worried about. We didn't hear from her at all yesterday which makes us wonder what is going on. We tried to get a hold of her but she didn't answer us at all. So we are just praying really hard for her. We had a great lesson with her though. We read the talk "Approaching the Throne of God with Confidence". It went really well, she really opened up and told us some big concerns that are good to know about but it ended well and the spirit was very strong as she spoke. I know God has a plan for everyone because the concerns she told us about, the member that we brought had the same thing when she was younger. He has His hand in this work.

Danny is doing better. We had a lesson with his dad which went really well. He told us that Danny still wants to keep his date and work toward that. So that is exciting!
We also had a spiritual lesson with Michele last night. We read Joseph's story in Joseph Smith History and then watched the Restoration DVD with her. We had her pray to know if it was true while she watched it. To close Sister Collings and I sang "Joseph Smith's First Prayer" to the tune of "Come Thou Fount". It was powerful. Once we were finished singing we closed with the a prayer and left while the spirit was still strong. That is such a good feeling!
The title of the blog this week is because we had some cool little miracles. On Saturday we had to stay in because we were sick again. We decided though that we would still get slightly ready for the day. So we had showered and put some mascara on but that was about it. Then at 2:35 a recent return missionary called us and asked if we were going to go to her nephew's baptism that day at 3. We told her we weren't sure and asked if she thought it would be good. She told us that there would be lots of nonmembers to meet. So of course we jumped out of bed and started getting ready to go. We got ready in a record 15 minutes and were out the door by 2:50. That is cutting it really close considering that the church usually takes 15 minutes to get to. So we said our safety prayer and in it we asked to be able to get to the baptism on time. Get this: We got there in 6 minutes and all of the lights turned green before we even had to put the brakes on. As Sister Collings says: God is good. :)

Then we went to the weekly bible study and this week we prayed to be able to teach and not just read from the bible. There were only two of the regulars there and guess what. The whole time we talked about the apostasy and the Restoration. So great! I love being able to see prayers answered. It strengthens my faith so much because I know He is listening to me. Even when the answer doesn't come in the way I want it I know that it comes in His way which is so much more important and enjoyable. 

Testimony: Each day I gain more and more respect for the leaders of our church and what Joseph Smith did for us. I loved having the lesson with Michele last night because it was so focused on the simple doctrine and coming to know for ourselves that it is true. Who cares about all of the garbage that the world is throwing at us? All we need to know is that Joseph Smith is a prophet and that the Book of Mormon is true. That is all it takes!

Sister Skeeter

Ps: My hair is red now :) hehe

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"This is the Lord's Doing, it is Marvelous in His Eyes." Psalms 118:23

Feb. 23

Wow, this week. I don't think I have been on such a wild up and down roller coaster since Millie got baptized. So many things went down and I have no idea where to start.

We will start with Monday I guess. Well, I colored Sister colling's hair. Don't worry mom it wasn't like the time I did Mikayla's hair. It actually is evenly applied and looks good! haha not to brag or anything....but it happened. 

Then we colored my hair. Oh wait...that is today haha!

Tuesday, pause I just found out the Payson temple is having their open house starting in April. I want to go!

ok, back to what I was saying: Tuesday I had my last zone conference and the coolest thing about it was that it was ALL about the Savior. Normally they do some training and other things but this time it was focused on the Savior and learning more about Him. How appropriate! I didn't realize it was my last until Sister Collings pointed it out to me. 

Then we had a lesson with Sarah about the 10 commandments and following the Prophet. It has been such a neat experience teaching her. The spirit is always so strong! 

Wednesday we had exchanges which went really well! I went with Sister Cox, yes my MTC companion :). It was such a great day! It was so fun to see how much both of us have changed and grown. I loved being able to work with her again! She is so solid!

Thursday:We found out that one of the recent converts and his son got into a huge fight. This was a rough day for us. the Recent convert reverted back to drinking and we ended up going to talk to him and found him drunk. Then his son who we are teaching hasn't answered our texts back yet. NOT ANOTHER MISSION BREAKUP! satan. Sometimes I just want to wring his neck. Which is worse the fact that he doesn't have a neck to wring or that I can't wring his neck because of the commandments? Either way, he seems to step into the picture just when things are getting good. But hey that is to be expected right? We will fight on and the light will prevail! 

Also our new favorite saying is fight on. It fits so perfectly for everything that is happening. We say it all of the time. But the cool thing is that the peace sign that you do with your hand also means "fight on" so don't be surprised if you see me throwing a peace sign in pictures. That is what I am doing. 

Ok so to finish that story, we went and taught this recent convert and it was the coolest lesson. We shared a few mormon messages and talked about Christ and how to apply His atonement to help us get through hard times. We watched the one about Chris Williams who's family got killed in a car accident by a drunk driver. After we had him listen to the song "Nearer my God to Thee" from the cd Reflections of Christ". the Spirit was SO powerful. After the song we told them we had to leave and closed with a prayer. You could cut the spirit with a knife. It was the best feeling walking about knowing that he could feel the spirit. Best way to end!

Oh we also did service this week and one of the investigators gave me a brand new purse from Thailand and she says "oh don't worry I got a really good deal on it. It was only 100 bucks." Wait. that is a good deal? Well, either way I am stoked because it is super cute! But I will probably wait until I get home to use it.      

   Yesterday during my studies I had the idea to pray again for a confirmation of the truth of the Gospel and the Book of Mormon. I did and last night at the fireside the speaker showed us a Geneva bible from the 5th century. It had a picture of a baptismal font with 12 oxen around it. the spirit was able to testify to me of the truthfulness of this gospel again. I am so grateful for Joseph Smith and his sacrifice so that I could fully apply the Savior's sacrifice in my life.

Oh and for the spiritual thought this week I wanted to close with a story. 

There was a boy who was sitting on the fence. One side of the fence was God's and the other was satan's. His family and friends were on God's side and were all calling after him begging him to come to their side. He noticed that satan and his followers were calm and not really bothered with him. So the boy asked satan, "why aren't you calling for me?" in response satan said "I own the fence."

Whew! So good! It is so true! if He can get us from officially going to God's side then he has won. Which way do you face? 

Well, Hope all is well with you! Love you all!

Sister Skeeter

. 

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Going Strong!

Feb. 16

Well Hello! This has been another great week! Guess what all happened! Ok, you won't be able to guess but I will tell you.

   So this week Sarah dropped us. Yes the awesome Sarah that I was telling you all about dropped us. She texted us and told us that it was too much and she didn't want to disappoint us and that there was too much going on to really give 100%. Don't worry, we didn't cry. But almost. I tell you when people say things like that, ESPECIALLY when they are doing so well it is the saddest "break up" I decided that I am just going to refer to those as mission break ups. So yeah. Ok but here is the rest of the story. We had an appointment the day she texted us that so we decided to just go see her anyway. We showed up and knocked on the door. Sister Collings and I looked and each other and our hearts were pounding. We weren't sure how she would take us showing up at her door even after she said it was too much, but we felt like we should do that instead of just let her go. We heard the lock on the door click and she opened the door. She graciously welcomed us in and we started talking. And here is the best part. We picked her back up again! She was able to tell us her fears and concerns and it worked out well! By the time we were done talking she said she wanted us to come back and that she felt really at peace. She realized that this was important and that it could help her. AND THEN! She came to church this week! She loved it! She said she felt super welcomed and comfortable there! We are excited about that. We will be teaching her tomorrow night. Pray for us!

     Ok, on to Danny. Well, guess what. He is set to be baptized on June 20th!!!!! Yep! He wants to be baptized. The reason he chose that date is because that is the new beginning for him. He talked about how people usually think of January being the new beginning but for his it is the Summer. So he is set and doing really well! Sister Arndt, Snow, Collings, and I will have to go out this summer for that but that will be fun! He is going strong and loves the church. We read the baptismal interview questions with him and he didn't seem to have any issues with them which is so exciting! We just need to keep strengthening him until then and he will be set! (And don't tell him this but Sister Collings and I want to set him up with Sarah. They would be cute together....Not that I am thinking about that though, because I am a missionary not a match maker :P)

    Well, I don't know what else to tell you. This week has been full of miracles. We had 4 investigators at church this week which was super exciting! The work is going well and I love it here! 

 So for this transfer I told you that we were doing the Psalms of the Sisters for the sisters in our stewardship. We have come up with one so far. It is dumb and short but we needed one to send out last week to the sisters. This is how is goes (and by the way, we BOTH came up with these lyrics so yeah...)

To the tune of There is a Green Hill Far Away 

My companion is sister Woods

And she is beautiful!

And together we will baptize all of Simi 5.

My comp is Sister Collings,

And she has pink eye!

And together we will baptize all of Simi 5.

   

  Well, there you go. It took about 5 seconds to put it all together and even less to sing it. We sent that to the sisters as an example that it didn't have to be serious. So we will be writing more this week. Hopefully ones that are more about our fun experiences. :)

Ok I think that is really it for the week. Have a great week everyone! Love you all!

Sister Skeeter

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Fight On!

Post from Feb. 9, 2015

Holy cow! Today has been crazy! It is only 10:30 and we have already had to do a lot of stuff! One of the hermanas that we lived with went home so last night and today we have been working everything out with making sure her companion has a place to go and companions to be with and then the Sr. couple that came to pick her up had their van stop working so they took our car and then we had to start our p-day stuff and now we don't have a car because the Sr couple had to get back to oxnard but the hermanas left their car so we are going to be driving theirs but the problem with that is that they took the keys with them so the Sr. couple drove us to emails and now we are waiting for the hermanas to get her so that we can go get our car and get on with our p-day shopping. It has been fun but crazy trying to get everything figured out. We also have to be home for when the tow truck calls so that we can unlock the car for them. And now I just realized that if they call right now we wouldn't have a way to get there. yikes. Got to love missionary life! :) 

   Did that even make sense?

   I am so scatter brained today. Also I just need to say, my family and friends crack me up. They do things that surprise me every week. I almost never expect to hear what they are going to say each week. Love it! 

The area is so great! Sarah is doing so well! We taught her the Plan of Salvation this week and she loved it! It brought her a lot of peace and comfort. She also texted us this week and told us that she had been reading the Book of Mormon and listening to LDS pod casts while she was at work. She said she read and re-read 1 Nephi 1:1-20 because she loved how Nephi was showing us the tender mercies of the Lord. We are so excited for her! We tried to set her with a baptismal date again but she told us that she wanted to learn more about how we repent and are baptized so she could start repenting and preparing! I can't even express to you how prepared she is and how great she is! We are excited that Heavenly Father has trusted her to us. We were also able to have two lessons in member's homes this week. That was great! The members were such a great example to these investigators! 
We also had a less-active family come to mutual this week which was exciting! The Cards came to bring their 16 year old and they stayed to meet the bishop and talk with them! We are really going to be focusing on them and trying to reactivate them. I don't think they have anything against the church. Brother Card is very sick so I think it is just really hard for them to get to church. So it shouldn't be too bad working with them and strengthening them. They are such a nice family and I am excited for the 16-year old to get involved with the Young Women.

  Also I just wanted you to all know that I have not popped my knuckles in 3 weeks. I would say that is good progress! Seeing as how I have never been able to make it past one day. So be excited for me. I WILL break this habit. :) Ok, my time is up! I hope you all have a great week and Happy Valentines Day! I will be living it up like a single person on Saturday. :) Maybe Sister Collings and I will go get some sushi together haha. 

Have a great week! Love you all!

Sister Skeeter

Ps we went to another funeral this week. This time we just helped setting up and getting the food ready. We didn't have to sing or anything. It was a good service though.

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"...Because You're the Normal One and Everyone Else is odd! "

 We had a really great week this week! We did some good service and started teaching the lady that we did service for. It turns out that she had a mormon professor at college and he gave her a Book of Mormon. She told us that we could start reading it with her! We are excited. We invited her to pray about the Book of Mormon and she said that she had never thought to do that. She will is doing that this week. We also were able to teach two less actives at once this week and one of their non-member spouses. This spouse is Brother Lisoski. He is agnostic and the nicest guy. He wishes there was a god but he is very smart and thinks that we need to be able to prove that He is there. His wife has a strong testimony but because of the situation she can't come to church very often. So he wants her to be right in the fact that there is a god. I think if we start to meet with him he could easily get baptized. We also had an awesome miracle this week! Week 5 of last transfer Sister Arndt and I were out walking and we stopped this lady and she told us that her name was Sarah. She didn't seem super interested but was nice. It was 8:50 at night when we found her and she was out walking her dog. We gave her a mormon.org card and invited her to look at the website. A week later or so we got a referral frommormon.org saying a Sarah wanted us to come by. We were finally able to see her on Wednesday and talk to her. When she opened the door it was the same Sarah that Sister Arndt and I had met! She told is that our timing was so perfect. She said that the day that we met her she had been talking to a friend and he told her to go on her own spiritual journey. Then we met her and talked to her that night. We were able to teach her the restoration right there and she loved it. She read Moroni's promise and told us that it was so powerful to her. It was a great lesson and then we invted her to be baptized. She said she would be if she knew it was true! She told us that she had already been baptized twice (I thought she was going to tell us that she didn't need to be again) but that she would do it again and wanted that. It was so great! We are meeting with her tonight!

   We also had another miracle with a less-active Brother Card. He called us a few nights ago with a couple of questions about where he could get a Book of Mormon for his son. He then invited us to come over and talk to his family. He also said that our bishop could come and talk to him and his family. Sister Arndt and Sister Snow had been searching for this family and couldn't set up a time to get together with them. Then it turns out that I know three of Brother Card's children from junior high in northern California! It was crazy! Then to top if off their 16 year old daughter wants to start coming to mutual to meet the girls her age. Great miracle!

    I also learned a new skill this week! I cleaned our rain gutters and used a snake to unclog the pipe. I felt cool! Oh the things you learn on a mission!

    Testimony: This week my testimony of the Savior  and His apostles was strengthened. We had a solid lesson with Michele on the Living Christ and The Apostle's duty to bring others closer to Him. I know that everything the apostles say is to help us come closer to Christ. They do represent Him and only teach His word.

    Well, I feel like I had something else I wanted to say but I don't remember. oh, I don't know if I clarified but I feel like I should. I hope you all don't think that we are teaching the bass player from Panic! because he is famous. That is not the case. 

Anyway, this week was great. We did a lot of planning for our sisters that we have stewardship over. We have some fun goals to help the Sisters find joy in the work. We are excited. I will expand on the goals later next week but lets just say Sister Collings and I are going to be writing some lyrics to hymns and singing. It will be funny and fun. I will put the lyrics up once we have some.

Hope you all have a great week! Love you all and miss you!

Sister Skeeter

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"Walk Tall You're a Daughter, a Child of God..."

"...Try to understand you're part of His great plan." That is a cheesy but great song! I like it. So we got transfer calls on Saturday! I am excited for what is going to happen! But as usually I won't tell you right now what is happening :).

   Well, we have officially finished Sister Arndt's last week as a missionary. I am surprised we are still alive. This has been the craziest and busiest week of my entire mission. We had lunch appointments most of the days and the days that we didn't we only got 30 minutes or so because we had appointments that we needed to get to. So now our bodies are exhausted and dying to just sit down for a minute. But we all know that missionaries don't sit down....ever. So we keep going! We found a few new great investigators and the ones we have are doing really well!

 We found this lady named Judy and we invited her to church within the first 5 minutes of talking to her. She came to church yesterday! She is great! We were able to teach her about the Pre-Earth life and Heavenly Father's love and she really liked it. She invited to come back. She didn't love church because she was comparing it to the catholic church but I think she will come back again and like it more. 

    Danny who is the son of a recent convert talked to us about baptism the other day! He wants his dad to baptize him. He doesn't know for sure if he is ready for baptism but while we were teaching him I was able to see him at the alter of the temple. I have no doubt that he will be baptized in the next little bit.

   And I think the most exciting thing for me is that I am finally teaching someone truly famous. So I don't tell you this because I am bragging but I am super excited to teach his wife. She is the funniest person and wants to go to the temple to get sealed. A little bit of background on them. He grew up a member and still has a strong testimony. He served a mission and loved it and when he came back he got into the music business. His wife is a convert and is so solid! She wants to raise her children in the gospel and does a pretty good job of it at home. So now I am sure you are saying, "well if they are so strong and active why the heck are you teaching them?" We have our reasons.:) but we are going to teach them the lessons each week which will be fun and somewhat challenging. They have two little kids so we need to adjust the doctrine so their kids will be interested. By the way my new companion is sister collings. She came out with me. I am not going to tell you their names but for those of you who are music junkies you might know what his name is already. He is the bass player for Panic at the Disco. oh yeah and we are staying here in simi. Yeah, he is super cool! We had dinner with him and his wife the other day and they are so down to earth and such nice people. So there you go, serving in So Cal has its perks. 

   Anyway, I don't know what else to tell you. things are going well. I am kind of scared about this new transfer. Only because I have had a companion who is going home so that has been the topic of a lot of our conversations and it has gotten me thinking about that and what is going to happen to me. It hasn't taken away from teaching or anything yet but I am afraid that it might have started something that I don't want. I am praying that I will be able to forget about all of that and just work now that my new companion and I are both still in the middle of our missions. I don't plan on telling any of the members just how long I have left because they don't stop bringing it up once they know but we will see. 

       OH!!@ I got to go to the temple this week! Happy Belated birthday to me!! I LOVED it! That place is so great! I wish I could help people feel the peace that is there. It is unlike anything else. If others new what they could feel there they would be flocking to us to learn more about the gospel and of the temple. Anyway that was the best part of my week :) Thanks Christina for taking us!!

On a happier note! I finished the Book of Alma for the third time on my mission so I am excited about that! I need to do the math and see how much I need to read in order to finish the Book of Mormon at least one more time. I love that book so much! It has given me so much peace and has really helped to give me the strength that I need. Most importantly though it has brought me closer to Jesus Christ and has helped me to recognize his love and patience that He has for me. He loves us so much and he Just wants us to repent and turn to Him. He is ready and waiting for us. I love that.

    That is about it for this week! And thus I end mine epistle. I am Sister Skeeter.

Have a great week!

Sister Skeeter

 

"Where's the Conviction of the Heart?"

If any of you are as cool as I am hoping you are you will know that those are the lyrics to Jericho Road's song. Mom on exchanges this week one of the sisters had the true north CD so we were able to listen to those which was fun. It reminded me of when we went to their concert haha. They are so 90s! 

    Anyway, this week we had 3 of the investigators come to church which was super exciting! this lady Sandy was there and she is the cutest little old lady. She is so funny. When you talk to her it doesn't seem like she is progressing in the gospel at all and then you ask her a question and she totally is! So Saturday we invited her to come to church and we told her it was at 9. She got the funniest face that said "That is so early! I don't know if I can do that." She asked us to call her and wake her up. So we did. When we called she told us that that night she was asking herself if she was really going to go that day and then she was up at 6 am! She said to herself "Well, I guess I'm going!" haha. 

    We also sang again. We sang the EFY medley but used the lyrics that Janice Kapp Perry made for sister missionaries instead. It was pretty sweet! Got to love being a missionary and being able to be called as part of the army of Helaman! Best thing ever! 

  Ok random little tangent...that I am actually going to continue on for a second. If you haven't read the Book of Mormon, you need to do so. There is an army of 2000 young men who go out to fight for their freedom and religion and families and they have never fought before. However not a single one of them die when they go to battle. This is because of their faith in Christ and love for their leaders. As a missionary we are doing just what they did only in the spiritual sense. Satan is out there and we are there to help others overcome him and grow closer to the Savior. We are literally fighting for our religion and families. It gives me a lot of hope and strength being able to see them succeed and know that I can succeed as well. I have never been a missionary before this but as long as I trust in the Savior and keep His commandments I will be ok and I can and will be a successful missionary.

     Well, things in Simi have been pretty good. Sister Arndt is going home next week and we are both kind of flipping out over it. I can't believe it is her time to go! I never thought this day would come. But it has. I don't really know what else to say on that. It is just a crazy concept right now. 

    I don't know what else to really talk about. Lots of miracles happened this week but I don't have time to type them all up. Most of them have to do with us singing in sacrament meeting but you will all hear about that later I guess. I love you all and hope you have a great week!

Sister Skeeter

ps transfers are next week so I would wait until we find out what is happening to send me anything.