Another great week

Hola Family!

 

How have you been? Have you all been really busy because my emails are getting sparse...? I only heard from Peder this week.

 

We had a confirmation yesterday for Maddie! It was really wonderful to see that. She said she felt really good yesterday afternoon. We gave her a journal for her to write down her experience. :)

 

Also, Mike blessed the sacrament for the first time yesterday and he did so well! We knew he was really nervous, but he didn't show it at all. It was so good! I love seeing recent converts progress in the gospel. Mike and Kody have been growing so much in the gospel. That brings so much joy! :)

 

Last week we taught two new investigators! It was really amazing how it happened. Let me tell you. :)

     So, Sister Jones was on splits and met the mother before she went into a lesson. The woman took the card and then that was about it. Then Sister Jones, Sister Fankhauser, and I were in the same area a couple of days later and we talked with her again and her daughter. We were able to give her daughter a card as well and we didn't think much of it.

     Then we received a referral this past Tuesday. As we were driving to it, we both realized who it was. It was those two ladies we met! We went into their home, and the daughter said, "So right after you left that day, I thought that you could come and pray with me and my mother." So, she went out to find us! (Which is kind of odd because she should have had our number, but oh well) She went to the church and the family history center happened to be open. She went in there and told them that she wanted the sister missionaries to come back. The FHC then called the mission home and we got the information. This woman really wanted us to come back! It was really amazing to see how the Lord works. We ended up seeing them twice and because of it, we have two new people to teach!

 

This work is so amazing, I just love it!

 

So I want to share something from a talk yesterday given in Sacrament meeting. This brother from the stake started off talking about Joseph Smith's first vision and then shared six personal insights that we can learn from this. I thought they were really good and I wrote them down:

1. Have we ever had hard decisions? Just like Joseph Smith trying to decide which church was true, we often have hard decisions, where we don't know where to turn for direction. We can easily relate to his state of confusion.

2. What should we do? Go to the scriptures! Joseph Smith had been taught to go to the scriptures and study them to find the answer. He knew that the scriptures contained truth and could guide him. That is the same with us. We can go to the scriptures and find answers, or find direction in what to do.

3. Once we have read the scriptures, we have to Go and Do. Joseph Smith didn't just read James 1:5 and say, "That was nice." He decided to act on that scripture. Just like him, we must go and do!

4. When we know what to do we may often become discouraged, have doubts, or fears, but we have to remember how we felt. We have to remember that the adversary is against our progress and the more discouragement we face, the more of a threat we are to Satan. We just have to remember that Satan is a punk! :)

5. And we have to remember that there is opposition in all things. When that doubt comes, we have to remember our determination to go and do and remember that opposition is real. But there is a bright hope!

6. We have to resolve and commit to the Lord. Joseph Smith didn't commit when the opposition came, he resolved to receive an answer and commit to never deny what he saw. He could not deny what he had seen that day and a resolved to live true to his testimony. We must do that too. We must stay firm to our testimony of truth. We Must resolve and commit.

 

There  is so much we can learn from the scriptures and from others who came before us. I know that Joseph Smith was a man of God. His experiences can be related to our lives. There is much to learn from that man.

 

I love this work! Things are going well! I love my companion!

 

Hope you all are doing well! Hope to hear from you soon! Thanks for your letter Mama. :) I also got my first letter from Peder this week! I was soo excited to get that! :) I am pretty sure that the one I sent was lost... But I finally got yours Peder!

 

Love you a million!

Sister Schillemat

 

ps. We hiked Mt. Rubidioux this morning! It was lovely! It was a lot cooler than last week. We hit a couple of days over 100 last week and some major humidity for California. But today was great!