Week 18

   

  HELLO UPGRADE! Welcome to our new little piece of paradise! We've been SOO blessed this week and my heart is so full of gratitude and love for this area! We officially moved out of the trailer Saturday and we have the cutest little lakeside cottage! It was built in the 50s and it's just so perfectly cute and vintagey and I'm kinda a little obsessed with it. It has wainscoatting throughout the whole house and has the cutest we have our own personal dock! Guess where we'll be studying in the morning from now on! Best Christmas ever.

 

Our new address is:

6565 Immokalee

Keystone Heights, Florida 32656

 

     This week has been super busy but soooo good! We had our second Proselyting Family movie night. Four nonmembers came and three of them were in tears by the end of the movie! Holy cow was the Spirit so strong in there. Our ward is getting more and more involved in missionary work. We've been working a lot with our Bishop's family and we have lessons every week in their home for one of our investigators who is SOOO getting baptized not as soon as I'd like but it will happen. But anyway Sister Carver, the Bishop's wife, was talking to me about the challenges we've given them to reach out to their friends and to get "nos" and she expressed to me how grateful she was for all the times we pushed them. She said that she's seen her family do things that they never would've done and never would have if it weren't for us. That built my testimony a whole ton! I'm grateful for the members we have to work with and for the willingness they have to participate in this work no matter how difficult it is for them! So many blessings are promised when we do member missionary work! I've seen these families grow and seen their happiness increase as they help bring their friends and neighbors closer to Christ! LOOOOOVE IT!!

      Last Monday we were walking through the grocery store and I saw those cheese balls that we get from the Daileys every year and it hit me that I was going to miss out on all the Christmas food. And then I had a tragic thought that I wasn't going to get any meat and cheese from Hickorys this year. I gave Sister Hillman this 30 minute schpill about my favorite Carr family Christmas tradition and how that just makes my year and I hate how I won't be getting any this year. And then guess what I got in the mail the next day? Hello best Christmas gift ever?! I kinda freaked out a little bit when I saw that sitting on our porch. Scared some neighbors. Some joyful tears were shed over that wonderful little surprise. Kinda like the best day of my life.

  This is the absolute best time of the year. The Spirit is just so dang strong where ever you go and we've been using and abusing it to its fullest. We'll come in to 'share a Christmas message' and end up with a full Restoration. Gotcha. It works. My testimony has grown so much this past week and it's been such a great testament of why I was supposed to come out and serve a mission. I absolutely am obsessed with the advent package that mom sent me and I look forward to reading those stories every morning. My favorite was the third day with the Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus pieces of the Nativity set. First time I cried opening a present. Lame, I know. How amazing is it that we have a Savior who submitted Himself to the will of His Father and came to this earth so innocently and willingly to give us a chance to return back to our Father?! This month I've been rereading the first four books of the New Testament and His ministry and His teachings blow me away. His Gospel is so simple, so powerful, and so insanely true. I can't get enough of it!

      A few nights ago we were teaching this one family that we've met with a few times. We were talking about the Plan of Salvation and the husband was so hung up on the fact that God has a body. It's one of the simplest truths of this Gospel! I asked him how he saw God and who God was to him. He corrected me and said that God is a "what" not a "who," that's like a sci-fi type light that touches each of us but no one can ever see it or even comprehend what it is. What on earth, dude? I was a little dumbfounded when he said that. It was the first time that I realized the importance of the knowledge that comes with this Gospel. I pulled out a picture of the First Vision - hello, welcome to the truth, here's a picture of God.

     I've ALWAYS known that we were created in God's image, He has a body of flesh and bones, He is our Heavenly Father who hears and answers our prayers, who watches out for us, who loves us, and is actively involved in our lives. It for real hit me so hard that a lot of people don't know even that simple truth. I can't even express how grateful I am that I have this Gospel in my life. We have the truth! We know who we are, Whose we are, and how to get back to Him!

     We have an investigator named Alex that we've been meeting with a lot. He just found out that his cousin is a member of the Church and the Bishop of the Palatka ward, which is maybe like 30 minutes away. I absolutely love Alex to death, but he just won't come to church. He's had 3 different baptismal dates set up, but we've had to push them back cause he won't come to church. We had a ride arranged for him to come last week but he said he wasn't coming. Got a call from him on Monday and he went to the Palatka ward! Holy cow I was dying. You have no idea what a miracle that was! We had a lesson with him Saturday and the first thing he said to me was "I'm joining this church." AHHHHHHHH!!!! He had never felt so much peace before in his life (hello Spirit) and he was shocked to find that the majority of the people in that ward were people that he had grown up with. Each one of them all found this Gospel and he was able to hear them bear testimony of how true this gospel is and how they've found so much peace and happiness in their lives from it. I felt like being really bold and told him that he too has found this Gospel and it's not something to take for granted. It's true and it's his choice to act on the truth that's been placed before him. He simply responded with "Oh sweetheart, I know." Miracles are happening in the Heights.

     This Gospel is true. It's so ridiculously true. I can't even begin to tell you how true it is. It's true. I've never felt the Spirit so strongly in my life before. It comes from living and breathing this true Gospel. I've never been so happy in my life. I just absolutely LOVE this Gospel. It's just so dang true. It's true! God lives! He loves us! I'm so grateful for this time of year. It's like the whole earth suddenly remembers that we have a Savior Jesus Christ who has given us opportunity for exaltation and eternal happiness. He's there all year even if people don't remember. But I'm grateful for this short time that I have to help them remember Him no matter what time of the year it is. He lives!  

Love yall!

Sister C