Obedience is the first law of heaven

Hola Amigos!

This week was pretty interesting. I'm in Mesa Grande and 20th Ward
still. While tracting (knocking on doors) in our Spanish ward, we
found two English families who are interested! They are in 25th ward
boundaries. The gospel is the gospel, but it would be cool to teach
them. I know that the missionaries for 25th ward will do a good job
teaching them though!

We had Missionary Leadership Council this past week instead of this
upcoming week. Usually MLC is the first Friday of each month. Elder
Kevin W. Pearson, a member of the Seventy, came to give a training. It
was so neat! The training was about two hours long, so I'm not really
able to say what he focused on. For a good amount of the training, he
explained what faith is and how to gain more faith in Jesus Christ. He
explained that the way to having more faith is being more obedient to
the commandments. Obedience is the first law of heaven, and as we
choose to follow Christ, choose to abide by his teachings and example,
our faith in Him increases. We also show our love for the Savior as we
keep the commandments (John 14:15).

We taught a number of less active members this week, but the most
exciting thing was how many of the less active members came to church
on Sunday. These are members who don't have the habit of coming or who
haven't been in years. Seven. Six less active members out of nine who
we taught last week came to church, and one who we didn't teach last
week came to church. I know that because they came to church, they
felt the Holy Spirit testify to them of the importance of taking the
sacrament each week. Maybe we will see them at church again next week!

Maybe you'll be at church next week.

Enjoy this picture of our zone after playing ultimate frisbee for
morning workouts.



Hasta Luego!

Hermana Valentine

Phoenix for a day

Hola Amigos!

This week was pretty neat. I went to Phoenix for a day to be with a
different Sister, and I talked to a lot of people. I didn't see
anything crazy, but I did get soaked. It rained really hard for maybe
ten minutes.

Something neat happened on Sunday! We were making our rounds of
inviting less active members to a short church service held in an
assisted living center, when Sister Patterson and I both felt that we
should invite Bill. I've talked to him twice. Maybe. He was a referral
from a member, and he wasn't super interested. Surprise! He came to
church! AND HE LOVED IT.

We also talked to a man who wasn't interested in anything we had to
say. After chatting for maybe 15 minutes,  we sent him away with our
number, a restoration pamphlet, and a Book of Mormon. Also, we have
his number, and we know we're he lives. We plan to teach him now!

I really like it here in Mesa, Arizona. The people are nice and aren't
usually crazy. They like the missionaries even if they don't like what
we teach (which is that we have a Heavenly Father who loves us and a
Savior who loves us and lots of other true and wonderful things). I
like it.

1. Sometimes, to practice teaching lessons, we play headbands with
topics. And by that I mean, today we played headbands one time and
practiced two topics. (Mine is on sister Patterson, and hers on my
head)

6 months down 12 more to go!

Hola Amigos!

This week went by so quickly!

Did you know that there is cotton on the reservations out here? How
neat! We have some!

This week we knocked on someone's door who kept saying "We're good
we're good" over and over again and then closed the door! We didn't
even know what to think. We had other good experiences though. We have
three families who were interesting in learning more, so we hope to
talk to them this week!


1. Cotton. It literally looks and feels like a cotton ball. 

2. I've been a missionary for 6 months! So has Sister Patterson! Celebration lunch!

3. Puddles are rare, but it happens to be monsoon season. 

Hasta Luego!

Hermana Valentine

That's not ideal, but it's almost always funny!

Hola Amigos!

The past few weeks have been so busy! I know not all of my emails sent
one week, so I think I sent my weekly email from the week before..last
week... This email is current and up-to-date. Mostly.

Sister Patterson is super funny! I'm glad she's cool, or I don't know
what I would do. We came out here at the same time. That fact makes
our Spanish visits interesting sometimes. She sounds really good when
she speaks Spanish, and her vocab is a little different mine; I'm
grateful to have her here. When she doesn't understand what's going
on, I usually do, and when I don't know what's going on, she usually
does. However, one time we were talking to man on the street, and we
had gathered that he wasn't super interested, but we looked at each
other afterwards and both asked, "what was he saying?" ... That's not
ideal, but it's almost always funny!

We've been trying to find new people to teach. We usually pick a
street and go knocking on doors. Last week, we didn't have loads of
time, but we wanted to go down a street with a mini missionary (a
member from the area staying with us for a few days). We did. The goal
was to avoid members' homes that night which isn't super easy in that
half of our area. A few people answered; no one was interested. Then.
We knocked on a door. An older couple answered who I didn't know: "Oh
it's the missionaries! Come on in! Are you thirsty? I'll get some
water. Have a seat! It's too hot outside." Our brains were thinking,
which members are these? We can't stay here super long.

Surprise! They weren't members! We talked for about five minutes, then
I realized who they were (a super community-active family), but Sister
Patterson didn't know them. When she realized they weren't members,
they kind of laughed at us. In a good way. It was super funny. They
aren't interested, yet. They've just had so many missionaries come
through and have even fed the missionaries a number of times that they
love missionaries. We plan to do service for them. It'll be cool.

We have had some success with finding! We plan to visit about three
families this week who want to learn more about the restored gospel of
Jesus Christ.

Time to go!

Hasta Luego!

Hermana Valentine

This is last weeks email...

For some reason Laney's e-mail didn't send last week. No e-mail this week

- Christal

Hola amigos!

Sister Pierson is gone. She's home now...

Tomorrow I will have Sister Patterson as my companion! Until then, I
am with the sisters we live with and a mini missionary!

1: good bye Sister Pierson! We love you!
2: I am a Child of God family home evening (they wouldn't stay still..)

Hasta Luego!
Hermana Valentine