February 24th Letter

ello everybody! 

Mississippi is awesome! The weather is beautiful and the food is delicious! Well, for me anyway.  Not for my companion who got FOOD POISONING! Poor thing.  She still put her skirt on in preparation to go out and work until I yelled at her to get back in bed! We love her, but my third companion and I sat outside so we didnt have to hear her throw up.

Funny story- We were sitting in Jackson getting ready to go teach a lesson in a home, when three boys rode by on their bicycles.  We were a little weirded out because they were staring at us the whole time.  A few minutes later they rode by again and we heard one exclaim to the others, "There's white girls in there!" We laughed about that for a good long while.

Update on my visa: My completed application is sitting in Salt Lake waiting for the OK from the consulate to send more applications in.  The woman told me that my visa is in the very next batch that will be sent in and the turn around rate after that is about 2.5 weeks.  This is very promising news!  I'm almost opposed to going because I really love the people we're working with here!

Because my companion was sick part of the week, we weren't able to get as much done as we would have, but I have included two people who highlighted my week:

Danielle Jackson came to church on Sunday with 5 kids! The are between the ages of 2-14.  She loved sacrament meeting and they loved it too! I sat next to the 6 year olds (they're twins!) and asked them to sing with me.  They didn't know what the hymns were, but they sang with me anyway! I even showed them how to follow along the different verses with their finger and they did it on their own for every hymn.  It was so amazing! I know it's probably not right, but I was so proud to sit with Danielle's family in sacrament meeting.  Another miracle that happened.  There was an impromptu missionary leadership meeting where all the zone leaders and sister training leaders met at our building with the stake presidents and mission president during church.  One of the sisters who came for this meeting was the original one who tried to teach Danielle.  She only saw Danielle at church with her family for a second and didnt recognize her.  After her meeting we told her that the person was Danielle and she burst in to tears.  She told us that the lesson she tried to teach Danielle was the first lesson she ever taught after her trainer left and she had to run the area.  She always felt like a failure because Danielle didn't want to learn more.  It really brought her (and me) comfort to know that even though that was a failed lesson (and I've had many of those) we're still sowing the seeds of the gospel.  Now Danielle is ready to receive the gospel in to her life.  We invited her to be baptized last night during our lesson.  She whole heartedly agreed and loves everything about the gospel.  She still has a lot to learn, but she knows that she's found the truth because of the joy and happiness she sees it bring to the lives of its members.  

That leads me in to talking about the Krason family.  Ashley and Tim Krason met the missionaries a year ago.  They knocked on her door and she turned them away, but then her dog ran out the door and the sisters chased it down for her.  After that, the sisters started helping her clean her house once a week because she had just had a baby and broke her foot.  She had the lessons from the sisters but never felt like it was true.  She is southern baptist and and loves the church and how family oriented it is, but has a couple hang ups with the church.  She's super nice and we recently recontacted her.  She told us last time we saw her that she believes that we're all saved by God's grace regardless of what we do.  She believes, in essence, that Mormons perform service to buy our place in heaven instead of believing that we're all just "saved by grace."  I was honestly a little offended by that statement.  Anyway, they were trying to move this week and asked us sisters to come help.  I told her that I would let another member in the ward know about their need and he would find some people to come help.  The day of the move she didn't think anyone was going to come help her and she was super stressed out.  At the specified time, 3 van loads of youth and men from the elders quorum showed up and had them moved in less than an hour.  She was completely blown away by the outpouring of service.  In my head I was thinking "you cant tell me that 30 people between the ages of 9-50 showed up to help a complete stranger on a Thursday afternoon right after work JUST to buy the bricks for their mansions in heaven."  It's absurd.  Anyway, she asked us to come have another lesson with her this week and we're going to address that and many other issues she may have about the church.  We're preparing a lesson that compares Christ's church in the NT to our church today with scripture citations and everything. 

Those are the top people I'm praying about.  I ask you to please include me and these people in your prayers as well.  And those are the top two miracles I saw this week!  Don't doubt that I saw many more though! 

I want to end by sharing with the family my testimony that this work is real.  I'm so grateful to be a part of the Lord's work at this time and in His chosen location.  I can testify with my whole heart that God does not forget about us.  He's given us so many tools to help us through life and help us find the truth.  He loves us and wants us to be happy.  I had a very humbling week full of experiences that have shown me how aware our Heavenly Father is of our individual needs.  I'm so grateful for the experiences I shared today, and the many others I have every single day.

I love you guys.  I know has gotten really crazy all of a sudden, but keep your chins high and your hopes higher.  

Love,

Sister McElderry