Sacrifice

I am not getting transferred I will be killing my companion this transfer.

Well this past week was full of excitement and growth. I was very blessed to go on two wonderful exchanges. The first one Sister Owens came to the area with me and we had some really awesome lessons. This Sister is someone who has made a full 190 flip in her mission and her testimony is so amazing. I love spending time with her and seeing the difference she has made. One of the lessons that we had was with our investigator Patricia. We invited all of her family to come join us. She has three daughters that have a lot of good questions. They all wanted a better understanding of who they are and what their purpose is. We ended up teaching like all three lessons in 20 minutes and extended a date, and they all accepted :) I love them all so much and can't wait to help them understand that they are all daughters of our Heavenly Father. Today we will be teaching them about the Plan and temples :) and we will be extending a temple date a week after their baptismal date. :)

 

Emily's new area

The other exchange was with Sister Sellers who is my Sister Training Leader. I also believe she was my long lost twin :) We have so much in common. Things from before the mission, who we are now, and what goals we want to reach on the mission and after. She is from a small town in Utah that is right next to LAKE POWELL!! She lives on a ranch of 1100 acres. I will be moving in with her after the mission and learning the ranch life and going to lake powell everyday haha. But I am not exaggerating when I say that it was the best exchange of my whole mission. We were on bikes all day long and we had two service opportunities where we helped these guys out in their yards. One of them actually turned into a lesson with his whole family and the other we have a lesson with him today :) I finally got to do yard work!! Prayers are answered. We also talked to a lot of people on the roads and set up lots of lessons for this week.

Sister Sellers and Emily

 

I am still getting to know the area and I accidently was led by the spirit down the wrong road and we ended up meeting my long lost friend Ashley. We only had 5 minutes to talk with her before her bus came, but she is LEGIT and I really feel like she is one of the prepared. We have a lesson with her on Wednesday so I will let you know how that goes. Pray for her!! I know she can be baptized soon. 

 

After the exchange was over we switched back at Stake Conference. My Stake consists of everyone that works at NASA or owns some big business. I was a little overwhelmed when I first got there. Saturday session was really different. Elder Keele is a General Authority and he put together a panel of young kids who are family history reps. The whole conference was him and the Stake leaders asking these kids inspired questions about the come follow me program and family history work/ temples. Surprisingly during the conference Elder Keele called me and Sister Sellers and two other Elders to come up and be part of the panel... It was pretty scary, but all the questions I got were about temples and their importance, so I was more than happy to talk about them. Afterwards I had couples come up to me telling me that my answers were their answers to their prayers. One guy said because of my answer he is going to go to the temple and be sealed with his family. I tell you what the spirit truly does wonders and miracles.

 

Real quick I was very blessed this week to be in a special training with some of the leaders. The training was on how we can truly become who the lord wants us to become. We are asked to take the name of Christ upon us. As a missionary/ member I need to pick up my cross and follow Him. Something I learned is that I literally need to sacrifice the Natural Man. Though I was called to repentance more than once this week I have come to understand how I can become like my Savior. I Matthew 18:9 talks about how we need to pluck out our eye if it offends us... well this applies to everything in our lives. If the TV offend us (the spirit) we need to pluck it out of our lives. If me laying my head on my bed in the morning offends the spirit I need to sacrifice that and kneel where I can't place my head. Sometimes it might be good things that we are doing that we sacrifice for better things. Please think of your life and what things you can change. I have made the goal to never think of home life before or after the mission, and past areas. I am to only talk about and think about things that are present in my area. 

I love you all and I only want the best for you, and I know that comes when we truly give it all to God so he can make us the people we truly want to be. :) Sacrifice the natural man!

 

Have a wonderful week!

Hermana Watkins