July 6, 2015

It's Official:  California Modesto Mission

 

 

New Mission, New Me

 

Welp, it is official. I'm in the California Modesto Mission. Everything online is changed and everything. That is crazy. Now when I get home and people asked me where I served my mission I will say "Well, I served half of my mission in the California Sacramento Mission but then I was rejected to the California Modesto Mission." Okay, rejected that is a little harsh. This week we got to meet our new mission president. I didn't get a picture with him but I did get to meet him, so he is a real person.

President and Sister Palmer are awesome. They are so sweet. Sister Palmer is a convert to the church and he isn't. He served his mission where she lived, near Plymara,  but they didn't meet while he was on his mission. He owns his own business and does pension funds. They have 5 kids, I think. They are really funny and really sweet. I feel so bad for them because they are basically shot-gunning a mission. How cow, that would be stressful. 

This week has been a little bit stressful. The last three days have been really hard. This week we decided that we were going to plan a miracle baptism. My first baptism. We felt really good about it and we felt that it needed to be Janelle. She is 10 and the only reason that she can't get baptized is because her mom hasn't said yes yet. She has been coming to church since the beginning of the year and has only missed 2 weeks. Her dad has been taking her. We fasted and we prayed for it and we worked up until the last minute. We worked with her all week to tell her mom her testimony and get permission. We tried talking to her mom a few times and she would blow us off. We had Janelle's address but we thought it would be better if Janelle got the permission and not us. Welp Saturday came along and we still didn't have the "yes" from mom. We had to start filling up the font at 2 to have it ready for her by 4. At 1 we went to try to talk to her mom. She wasn't home and at 2:00 her dad, Jorge, called us and told us to call the whole thing off. Her mom was ticked.  We made all the calls to tell people it wasn't going to happen. President Palmer was even planning on coming...it was hard to tell the AP's to call that off. Me and Hermana Carpenter were super depressed. 

It was hard because we felt like it was the right thing to do but then it didn't work out. We know that the Lord has a plan in all of this. It is a time where Janelle has the chance to share the gospel with her mom instead of just ask for permission to be baptized. We know this is His work and He knows what He is doing. We just have to wait a little while. She will be baptized eventually. 

The good news from this week. 

We had an awesome lesson with is guy named Fidencio and his friend Deena. Deena has been making some changes in her life and really wants to find a church to go to. She LOVED everything that we had to say. She was so prepared. She even accepted a date for the 15 of August. So did Fidencio. The way we found him was really cool. He was a referral from the Spanish Elders. We gave him and call and he said "So when are you coming to visit me?" We was even there when we went to see him! It was so cool. He didn't come to church yesterday but when we went for our appointment he has been reading in the Book of Mormon and he was in 1 Nephi 4 already...we had just asked him to read the introduction. Then we asked him to pray. he told us that he had NEVER prayed in his life before so we taught him how and he prayed right after. It was so cool. It was a really good experience and we are so excited to teach him. 

This week we were asked to study John 4:34 that says "Jesus saith unto them, My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work." I've been thinking of that scripture a lot lately and I LOVE it. I love that it says that "my meat is to the the will of him that sent me." Now I'm not sure about all of you, but I love me some meat. I feel like that should be the same of doing the Lords work and following his commandment. I should make that my meat, the think that I love. As I do so my will will align with his and we will become one in purpose. I invite you all to ponder on that this week. 

I Love all of you so much.

Love, 

Hermana Porter

 Me and Elder Perry!!!

Me and Puppy