Dear Family,
A few things:
Bike Day went A LOT smoother for us this week ;) ha.
It's tornado season and we've had some awesome lightning storms
Sister Turner
Thursday, May 30, 2013
May 28
It's tornado season and we've had some awesome lightning storms
Sister Turner
May 20
Dear Family,
Well this week was an adventurous week.
First off, we haven't had air conditioning the whole time since we have been here. There were three days this week that were 104 degrees. It finally got to the point where we couldn't handle it anymore, so we talked to the owner, and turns out we just didn't know how to turn the dang thing on. ha ha.
Then on Thursday we had Bike Day. I had a flat tire, so we went around to a bunch of members' homes trying to find a pump. No one had one, so we ended up going to a gas station. When we thought the problem was fixed, my chain fell off. A man came over and helped us, and when we thought that was fixed, my breaks locked and I couldn't get the tires to move. We had person after person pull up and try to help, but no luck. Then a member in the singles' ward came and he had a truck and took us to a bike shop. When they fixed the problem they went to fill up more air in my tires when the man accidentally popped the tire! So we spent another half an hour waiting for them to give me a brand new tire. Luckily they didn't make me pay. Finally we were on our way again when we decided to take a short cut through a field. Bad idea. There were stickers everywhere. So then both my tires got flat, as well as Sister Kramer's and then Sister Fife's tires were completely coming off! ( I will include a picture) Definitely a day of trials, but it's something we can look back and laugh about now. So much for a brand new tire.. ha.
Then on Thursday we had Bike Day. I had a flat tire, so we went around to a bunch of members' homes trying to find a pump. No one had one, so we ended up going to a gas station. When we thought the problem was fixed, my chain fell off. A man came over and helped us, and when we thought that was fixed, my breaks locked and I couldn't get the tires to move. We had person after person pull up and try to help, but no luck. Then a member in the singles' ward came and he had a truck and took us to a bike shop. When they fixed the problem they went to fill up more air in my tires when the man accidentally popped the tire! So we spent another half an hour waiting for them to give me a brand new tire. Luckily they didn't make me pay. Finally we were on our way again when we decided to take a short cut through a field. Bad idea. There were stickers everywhere. So then both my tires got flat, as well as Sister Kramer's and then Sister Fife's tires were completely coming off! ( I will include a picture) Definitely a day of trials, but it's something we can look back and laugh about now. So much for a brand new tire.. ha.
"Bike Day Gone Bad"
We were knocking this week and a typical southern belle answered the door. Holding a margarita in her hand she screams "OH MY GOODNESS, are ya'll a singing group?" We informed her we were missionaries and she replied, "OH MY, SINGING FOR JESUS!" ha ha. So funny. She then offered us a margarita and then said, "Oh wait, y'all probably can't on your little journey." ha ha. Moments like that on my mission I will never forget.
There was a baptism this weekend. The Elders have been working with "S" for a month and half. She was EXTREMELY addicted to smoking but the Atonement works for everyone. Just in the week I have known her I have seen a change. She truly is incredible and just has the convert fire. Her husband I feel is being prepared by the Lord as well. So its just a matter of time.
Love,
Sister Turner
The companions
Everything is Texas in Texas
May 13
Dear Family,
It was great talking to y'all yesterday!! It was great to hear all the good news about jobs, homes, vacations, and weddings. :)
Midland, TX 79701
Here is a pic of my companions Sister Kramer, Spanish Fork UT (right) and Sister Fife, Richmond VA (left)
May 6
Dear Family,
Again I don't have much time. I will be able to talk to you on Sunday though!! Honestly because of transfers I have no clue what time will work for us.. But here is the news on transfers!
This week was really tough. We had our six investigators drop us. Four of those six had baptismal dates. I will have to tell you more about this on Sunday, but I know everything happens for a reason, and I really am learning to rely on the Lord.
Saying my goodbyes to this area is hard. I love the ward and the less actives so much, and not to mention Sister Cooper and Brother George who were baptized. Friendships that will last a lifetime are created on a mission. :)
We met a woman at the park. She gave us her address and said we could come back and visit her. I wrote her address down wrong though, and I was really sad. We thought we had lost her. Well the next week the Spirit prompted us to knock a certain street. The very last house (it's always the last) was this woman's! I luckily remembered her name, and she let us in! The next visit she told us she knows what we share is good. She told us after the park she prayed to the Lord that if we were evil that we would not come to her house, and her family would be protected. She recognized that as an answer to her prayers and because we came back she knows we are good people and she must be able to benefit from our message. I am so grateful we followed the Spirit, because if we didn't come back, in the future she probably never would have let missionaries in because she would have thought we were all evil. ha. She's a very sweet and humble woman. She is the only solid investigator now that we have at this time.
April 29
Dearest Family,
I have like NO time today. I am sorry this will be short. We got news today because of the influx of missionaries we are moving. TODAY! So it is going to be kinda crazy.
We have so many investigators! Our teaching pool is the biggest its ever been! The Lord is blessing Sister Dunham and I for our positivity and for our dedication! He also is protecting us! I have so many other AMAZING things I wish I could tell you this week, but they will just have to wait.
Love and miss you all!
Dear Family,
As my mission president says every week. "These are journal writing days." The Lord is hastening his work! The Sister Training Leaders will be coming soon where sisters will have leadership positions similar to the Elders. We are planning on having nearly 25 new missionaries this next transfer which is in 2 weeks! And there was an exciting announcement made about sister missionaries! This past week in the MTC for the first time in the history of the church, there were MORE sister missionaries entering the MTC than Elders!! I couldn't believe it! That is crazy to believe, because when I was there, everywhere you looked was a boy in a suit and tie. ha These really are historic times to be a missionary, and I feel so lucky to be a part of it! We already are having record breaking numbers for baptisms this month, and I'll be sure to share with you the total at the end of the month.
This week we faced some speed bumps. We had a few people drop us, and a lot of cancellations and rescheduling. I am learning how to stay positive no matter what though, and take every disappointment as a learning opportunity.
"R" is going to SLC this weekend to visit Temple Square! He also just received the Priesthood and is happier than ever! :) He is going to do BIG things within the church. I can feel it.
In two weeks a general Authority will be speaking to us in Stake Conference. We don't know who it is yet, but we are very excited!
Vivint, the home security system is now here for the summer. Many of the team is LDS and they are giving us referrals left and right! Its so awesome!! The two men in charge cover our area, and they actually have had baptisms from sharing the gospel as they go into the homes of their clients! They told us some of their conversion stories they had! So awesome!
I had the opportunity to go on exchanges this week. I stayed in my area, and another sister came here. I learned a lot from her! It is awesome learning other missionaries' teachings skills. Its weird to think I've been in this area for so long. I have no clue whether I will be staying or going. I love this area and the ward, but I would love to experience other areas as well.
Hope all is well with you!
Love,
Sister Turner
As my mission president says every week. "These are journal writing days." The Lord is hastening his work! The Sister Training Leaders will be coming soon where sisters will have leadership positions similar to the Elders. We are planning on having nearly 25 new missionaries this next transfer which is in 2 weeks! And there was an exciting announcement made about sister missionaries! This past week in the MTC for the first time in the history of the church, there were MORE sister missionaries entering the MTC than Elders!! I couldn't believe it! That is crazy to believe, because when I was there, everywhere you looked was a boy in a suit and tie. ha These really are historic times to be a missionary, and I feel so lucky to be a part of it! We already are having record breaking numbers for baptisms this month, and I'll be sure to share with you the total at the end of the month.
This week we faced some speed bumps. We had a few people drop us, and a lot of cancellations and rescheduling. I am learning how to stay positive no matter what though, and take every disappointment as a learning opportunity.
"R" is going to SLC this weekend to visit Temple Square! He also just received the Priesthood and is happier than ever! :) He is going to do BIG things within the church. I can feel it.
In two weeks a general Authority will be speaking to us in Stake Conference. We don't know who it is yet, but we are very excited!
Vivint, the home security system is now here for the summer. Many of the team is LDS and they are giving us referrals left and right! Its so awesome!! The two men in charge cover our area, and they actually have had baptisms from sharing the gospel as they go into the homes of their clients! They told us some of their conversion stories they had! So awesome!
I had the opportunity to go on exchanges this week. I stayed in my area, and another sister came here. I learned a lot from her! It is awesome learning other missionaries' teachings skills. Its weird to think I've been in this area for so long. I have no clue whether I will be staying or going. I love this area and the ward, but I would love to experience other areas as well.
Hope all is well with you!
Love,
Sister Turner
Dear Family,
Miracles are happening in Regal Park!! We seriously had no one on our teaching pool at the beginning of this week, and we were starting from scratch. Now we have a part member family that we met, and the wife is Catholic. She has agreed to start taking the discussions and is very open! So we are very excited and hopeful about that!
We also met an amazing family! The "G" family. They have never heard about Mormons, or Joseph Smith or anything (very rare here in the Bible Belt). They seem very promising! They told us its all very new and different than anything they have ever heard, but they want to get to know us more, and learn more of our teachings. When we taught the restoration we know they felt the Spirit. So we are looking forward to continuing teaching this family.
Also we have another very promising referral from the ward that should be coming soon! This is actually a really awesome story. So we noticed a women in our ward yesterday in fast and testimony meeting had someone unfamiliar sitting by her. We were going to introduce ourselves to her, but she booked it out of there pretty quickly, so she was gone by the time we made our way over there. We decided to call the member up yesterday. Turns out this women, "C" has known about the church for about a year. She actually took the first lesson with other sister missionaries 8 months ago, but the Joseph Smith story really scared her off, so she stopped taking the lessons. I guess now though she told the member that she believes everything about the church. Even the Joseph Smith story. This is where the story gets even more exciting ....
On Saturday we felt SOO good about this certain street. It was a very long street, but we really felt there was someone we needed to talk to. We knocked, and knocked and knocked. And no one. It took us way longer than we thought, but we told ourselves we had to push on because there had to be someone on the street. The second to last house we did place a book of Mormon, and thought perhaps that was the person, but it sure wasn't. Turns out "C" lives on that street! She saw us through the window, but didn't answer the door.
In fast and testimony meeting, everyone was talking about their experiences with the sister missionaries! It was a very emotional meeting for me because these past few weeks I was worried that we were spending too much time focusing on members and less active and part member families, and I wasn't sure if we really were making all that much difference. I had been praying to the Lord to let me know if we should still continue with these goals. I thought that my prayers had been answered, cause I didn't realize how much of an impact we had been making until all these people started bearing their testimonies about us. Turns out though it wasn't just for us. "C" after sacrament meeting felt TERRIBLE that she didn't answer the door for us. She thought her member friend had sent us over, and she had no clue we proselyted like the Elders. She also knows "R" (the man who got baptized last week) because she is a nurse at the hospital he works at, and so when they announced he had been baptized last week, she was in shock. She told her friend, "Wow, I didn't realize people actually got baptized later in the church, and that they weren't just born into the church."
Its so amazing how the Lord works. How all these puzzle pieces fit together, and how if we all are in tune with the spirit, things start happening! "C" has been to our church before, but she has always thought it was boring compared to her church. The member has invited her many times to church in the past, but on Saturday, the same day we knocked her street, this member felt prompted again to ask. Usually the reply is a kind no, but right off the bat "C" said, Yeah! I'll be there! said she loved it, and that she had tears in her eyes four different times from the testimonies. The Lord is truly showing us those who are ready and prepared.
Love and miss you all!
Sister Turner
Miracles are happening in Regal Park!! We seriously had no one on our teaching pool at the beginning of this week, and we were starting from scratch. Now we have a part member family that we met, and the wife is Catholic. She has agreed to start taking the discussions and is very open! So we are very excited and hopeful about that!
We also met an amazing family! The "G" family. They have never heard about Mormons, or Joseph Smith or anything (very rare here in the Bible Belt). They seem very promising! They told us its all very new and different than anything they have ever heard, but they want to get to know us more, and learn more of our teachings. When we taught the restoration we know they felt the Spirit. So we are looking forward to continuing teaching this family.
Also we have another very promising referral from the ward that should be coming soon! This is actually a really awesome story. So we noticed a women in our ward yesterday in fast and testimony meeting had someone unfamiliar sitting by her. We were going to introduce ourselves to her, but she booked it out of there pretty quickly, so she was gone by the time we made our way over there. We decided to call the member up yesterday. Turns out this women, "C" has known about the church for about a year. She actually took the first lesson with other sister missionaries 8 months ago, but the Joseph Smith story really scared her off, so she stopped taking the lessons. I guess now though she told the member that she believes everything about the church. Even the Joseph Smith story. This is where the story gets even more exciting ....
On Saturday we felt SOO good about this certain street. It was a very long street, but we really felt there was someone we needed to talk to. We knocked, and knocked and knocked. And no one. It took us way longer than we thought, but we told ourselves we had to push on because there had to be someone on the street. The second to last house we did place a book of Mormon, and thought perhaps that was the person, but it sure wasn't. Turns out "C" lives on that street! She saw us through the window, but didn't answer the door.
In fast and testimony meeting, everyone was talking about their experiences with the sister missionaries! It was a very emotional meeting for me because these past few weeks I was worried that we were spending too much time focusing on members and less active and part member families, and I wasn't sure if we really were making all that much difference. I had been praying to the Lord to let me know if we should still continue with these goals. I thought that my prayers had been answered, cause I didn't realize how much of an impact we had been making until all these people started bearing their testimonies about us. Turns out though it wasn't just for us. "C" after sacrament meeting felt TERRIBLE that she didn't answer the door for us. She thought her member friend had sent us over, and she had no clue we proselyted like the Elders. She also knows "R" (the man who got baptized last week) because she is a nurse at the hospital he works at, and so when they announced he had been baptized last week, she was in shock. She told her friend, "Wow, I didn't realize people actually got baptized later in the church, and that they weren't just born into the church."
Its so amazing how the Lord works. How all these puzzle pieces fit together, and how if we all are in tune with the spirit, things start happening! "C" has been to our church before, but she has always thought it was boring compared to her church. The member has invited her many times to church in the past, but on Saturday, the same day we knocked her street, this member felt prompted again to ask. Usually the reply is a kind no, but right off the bat "C" said, Yeah! I'll be there! said she loved it, and that she had tears in her eyes four different times from the testimonies. The Lord is truly showing us those who are ready and prepared.
Love and miss you all!
Sister Turner
Howdy Family,
First off R. was baptized!! I truly love that man like a brother. He was so prepared and ready. He is the one that is a very well known surgeon here in town. He was attending a very popular and well known Church in Lubbock, but he knew this was the true church, and we helped him really recognize the feelings of the sSirit for the first time. It was a really neat experience to see him change over this past month. He gave up coffee, tea, beer, and his most favorite--cigars. He told us if we knew anyone that could use some nice cigars he could send them their way. ha. He has SO much fellowship in the ward, so honestly it made our job easy. I can't remember if I told you but he is SO smart. I was a little intimidated at first teaching him, because honestly he probably already knows more than my companion and I. He had already read Preach My Gospel and knew all the lessons, so he was really checking up to see if we had done our homework. ;) In one lesson he quoted Lorenzo Snow (yes--what investigator even knows who that is?!) and talked about the pickle analogy he gave. We start off as cucumbers and we are being pickled, but its a LONG process. So we had to get him a jar of pickles as a gift!
He knew a lot of history and doctrine of the Church, but he was lacking the spiritual aspect, and so that's where us missionaries came in! He had a plan to read and study (and by study I mean right now he is cross referencing Doctrine and Covenants with Ether) The Book of Mormon for 2 months and then consider baptism, but at the very first lesson we taught him which was about 3 weeks ago, the Spirit was SO thick, he couldn't say no to our invitation to baptism on the 6th! The next day he wondered why he had said yes when he really was thinking "No, i'm not ready." That's when we were able to explain to him that the Spirit was confirming to him that it was true and that he could be ready by the 6th. After that it was pretty smooth sailing, he began just eating everything up and enjoying all our lessons at member's homes. He said there is an attraction with LDS values and beliefs and he just wants to know it all! We told him he's got the rest of his life for that ;) ha. It truly was an amazing and spiritual day, because not only did we have a baptism, but it was General Conference!
I have an awesome story a member shared with us this week. How lucky we are to have the gift of the Holy Ghost and how we need to follow the promptings. A few years ago, this woman in our ward got a strong prompting that her husband needed to apply for graduate school. He had already gone to school and had a good job, and thought no we are good, I'm done with school and I have a good job. She kept getting that prompting though, so finally he applied to a bunch of different graduate schools. He didn't get in to most of the schools, and a couple he never heard back from..... 7 months later he gets laid off from his job. They had 4 children and didn't know what they were going to do. The very NEXT day they get a letter in the mail, an acceptance letter to Texas Tech for graduate school. Tears filled her eyes as she shared this story with us. The Lord knows our paths better than we do. As we follow the promptings of the Spirit we are blessed, both for our temporal and spiritual needs. I hear stories on my mission like this ALL the time. I wish I could share them all with you, but its just a faith builder for me to know that God is there and aware of all our needs. He knows better than we do what path we need to take in life. In fact, he usually has a better life planned for us than we would be able to come up with on our own ;) ha. So remember to always trust in the Lord, and know that everything happens for a reason!
I love this gospel so much. I know this is the Lord's Kingdom, and I know the Book of Mormon is the word of God.
Hope you all had a great week!!
Love,
Sister Turner
First off R. was baptized!! I truly love that man like a brother. He was so prepared and ready. He is the one that is a very well known surgeon here in town. He was attending a very popular and well known Church in Lubbock, but he knew this was the true church, and we helped him really recognize the feelings of the sSirit for the first time. It was a really neat experience to see him change over this past month. He gave up coffee, tea, beer, and his most favorite--cigars. He told us if we knew anyone that could use some nice cigars he could send them their way. ha. He has SO much fellowship in the ward, so honestly it made our job easy. I can't remember if I told you but he is SO smart. I was a little intimidated at first teaching him, because honestly he probably already knows more than my companion and I. He had already read Preach My Gospel and knew all the lessons, so he was really checking up to see if we had done our homework. ;) In one lesson he quoted Lorenzo Snow (yes--what investigator even knows who that is?!) and talked about the pickle analogy he gave. We start off as cucumbers and we are being pickled, but its a LONG process. So we had to get him a jar of pickles as a gift!
I have an awesome story a member shared with us this week. How lucky we are to have the gift of the Holy Ghost and how we need to follow the promptings. A few years ago, this woman in our ward got a strong prompting that her husband needed to apply for graduate school. He had already gone to school and had a good job, and thought no we are good, I'm done with school and I have a good job. She kept getting that prompting though, so finally he applied to a bunch of different graduate schools. He didn't get in to most of the schools, and a couple he never heard back from..... 7 months later he gets laid off from his job. They had 4 children and didn't know what they were going to do. The very NEXT day they get a letter in the mail, an acceptance letter to Texas Tech for graduate school. Tears filled her eyes as she shared this story with us. The Lord knows our paths better than we do. As we follow the promptings of the Spirit we are blessed, both for our temporal and spiritual needs. I hear stories on my mission like this ALL the time. I wish I could share them all with you, but its just a faith builder for me to know that God is there and aware of all our needs. He knows better than we do what path we need to take in life. In fact, he usually has a better life planned for us than we would be able to come up with on our own ;) ha. So remember to always trust in the Lord, and know that everything happens for a reason!
I love this gospel so much. I know this is the Lord's Kingdom, and I know the Book of Mormon is the word of God.
Hope you all had a great week!!
Love,
Sister Turner
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