Last Email from Jocey from GA (I'm coming home)

I had many things to write, but I will not with ink and pen write unto thee:

 14 But I trust I shall shortly see thee, and we shall speak face to face. Peace be to thee. Our friends salute thee. Greet the friends by name.

3 John 1:13-14

Love you the most!

Sister Smith

Sister Kafoa, Lanay (just baptized) and Dear Sister Smith (charming & happy)

Sister Kafoa, Lanay, Sister Smith

Pics of Jocey

sister Jocey with some of her other Sister missionaries

Lanay Was Baptized!

This week consisted of lots of planning, phone calls and the likes all for Lanay's baptism. It went really well to say the least. 

We had her new visiting teacher speak on baptism and she did a really good object lesson. Then she was baptized. Got dressed in half a second (she was in the military and things like that shows that she was), had a musical number, a talk on the Holy Ghost, she was confirmed and impromptu she shared her testimony/story about getting in contact with the missionaries. 

First it starts with she being raised in a tiny town somewhere in Arizona where there happens to be a lot of Mormons. Her dad would tell her some things about the Mormons, nothing bad, not necessarily true, but he wasn't not resentful toward Mormons so she just knew that they were different from her. At her ten year reunion she realized that most of the guys she had had crushes on were Mormon. She recognized that they had a good focus on family values, were a strong community and seemed to have something different than she. Fast forward to last year in the Fall, a couple of Elders knocked on her door. Bad timing. Her baby, who has multiple medical conditions, was throwing up, she was upset, stressed out, and her daughter was yelling in the back ground. Needless to say, as she half-listened to the Elders she told them, "Another time would be best." Then weeks later, she was upset. She kept wondering, "Did I miss my chance? Did I really miss my chance?" 

Then in clinicals for nursing school, one of the students ended up saying she was Mormon. Lanay and she went out to lunch with another gentleman and during the entire lunch they discussed Mormons. Later, at the end of the day, Lanay told said student that she would like to see her after class. This student, Jamie, thought Lanay was going to pay her back for lunch, so she thought it best not to return simply because she didn't want Lanay to pay her back. Lanay did not see Jamie the rest of the semester. Again she wondered, "Did I miss my chance?"

As luck, or the Spirit, would have it. Sister Kafoa and I were tracting one day, not having much success. Sister Kafoa had only been out about 7 days at this point. We decided to go try another area, and began to turn around. Then Sister Kafoa piped up and said timidly, "Sister Smith?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you mind if we just try one more door?"

"Sure."

So we go. I didn't really think much of it, but trying to have Sister Kafoa have good experiences following the Spirit, I was fine with following her suggestions. We knock and Lanay immediately let us in. At her baptismal service she said that as soon as she saw us she thought, "I'm not letting them leave this time!" 

Third time's the charm. 

We met quickly, left her with some material and set up an appointment. Two days later we returned and had a wonderful lesson with her that began her journey learning about the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. Now she is a baptized and confirmed member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

All thanks to good examples around her in her youth, and for Sister Kafoa following the Spirit.

The baptism was beautiful and she's already preparing to go to the temple to do baptisms there. 

Love y'all, 

Sister Smith

Gus the Rooster is Upstairs

Monday was crazy, everything got pushed down, moved around and switched. We didn't even have time to get groceries. While discussing this, Sister Kafoa and I decided to just have faith and see if we could get by. Let's just say, creativity was at it's finest this week with our breakfast and lunch menus. It was kind of fun though. 

Lanay is still doing really well. 

I almost don't remember what happened this week. It is all a blur. We were busy almost every single day. We had a lot of lessons, which was a blessing, and got a lot accomplished this week. 

Thursday we had Zone Conference and, as usual, it was just what I needed. There were a lot of things about being simple and bold in our teaching. Basically just taking our teaching up a notch. We began implementing it immediately and the whole zone has already seen results. It's been really amazing. 

We had exchanges after Zone Conference, I got to go to Coal Mountain with one of my old STL's and Sister Kafoa stayed in Sugar Hill. They had a really neat experience. We had planned on them going to go see some less actives, some of which we haven't met yet. Well, in their search they couldn't find the house number that was written down. Mind you, this was in a trailer park so their house numbers are all switched around, backward and messed up. They were about to go back to the car when they thought to knock on a door and see if they knew who this family was. They knocked, a lady saw them in the freezing cold and let them in. Upon discussion they found out that Sister Childs had taught and baptized her uncle in one of her old areas! Totally not coincidence. So the next day Sister Kafoa and I went their and implemented our new teaching skills and got her on date for March 7th! Don't know for sure if she'll be prepared, but at least it's got her thinking about baptism. 

Then on Saturday we did a church tour with a part member family. It went really well and the husband, who is the nonmember, is praying about being baptized on March 14th. He was like, "I'm fine with gettin' baptized... But will that mean I'm a Mormon?".... Yes. Yes it does. Hahah. Such is life.

oh and on Monday, the part member came to the fhe and it was really successful! But after we got home we realized we left our phone there so we went upstairs to ask if we could use the Prichard's phone to contact the Wernli's. We get up there and they want us to look at Sister Prichard's birthday present. We couldn't see it, then suddenly I look down and inside their dogs cage is a rooster. A real live rooster. He bought her a rooster for her birthday. Well, this week they went to Disney World with their family and we had to feed it and lay down newspaper. Needless to say, I'm never going to own a rooster, especially one in a dog cage. 

Life is Great. 

Love you all,

Sister Smith

Jocelyn's HomeComing (for all her fans)

Jocelyn arrives home on the evening of March 5th.

Her Homecoming will be at the Heil Building 5402 Heil Ave. Huntington Beach
on March 8th at 9:00 AM .  

You are all welcome to attend

Sister Smith's New Mission Vehicle

they want the Sisters to have more success with the Retirees in Buford

Practice Lessons from Heaven

Hello Family and Friends!

This week was great.

Thursday night Sister Kafoa and I went over to a member's home. Her name is Lily, she just moved from New Jersey but was baptized in the Sugar Hill ward in 2010. Her daughter Grace, who is 12 now, was also baptized. In 2012 she married a non-member, David, and they moved to New Jersey. Sister Kafoa and I went and visited her a couple weeks ago before her husband came in town, we did a practice lesson and the Spirit was really strong. This past Thursday we went over, planning to do another practice lesson, and her husband answers the door. He's a big black guy with a REALLY deep voice, the kind that could easily put you to sleep (in a good way). They let us in and we begin teaching about the Restoration. Grace and Lily bore their testimonies throughout the lesson and then, somehow, it shifted to us inviting David to read the Book of Mormon and to be baptized. Not sure what changed, pretty sure the Spirit interjected and took hold of the lesson, but he said yes to both and said he might come to church on Sunday. 

Well, we didn't see them during sacrament meeting, so we assumed they didn't come. Then we get to Gospel Principles and they walk in! I asked, "Were y'all here during sacrament?" Lilly replied, "Yeah, but we were just sitting out in the foyer because we were a little late." Throughout the rest of class and then when we showed him to Elder's Quorum, he seemed very comfortable and welcomed. Tonight they promised to come to Tyler and Valentina's FHE so that should be good. 

Oh and last Monday's FHE was a bust :/ the people who said they could come cancelled about 1-2 hours before the fhe and that was really sad. Thankfully, we all discussed the importance of faith and patience, so we decided to hold another one this week and felt that the Lord would provide people to come!

Lanay is doing well. Still preparing for baptism. She met with the Bishop  yesterday, and we were able to go and that was good, he could get a feel for who she is and officially meet her. She's holding her own FHE tonight and we'll be presenting the lesson. 

Everything is doing great. The awesome couple we met probably got into some anti because they have been kind of avoiding us :(. But that's okay. Faith and patience. 

Love y'all!

Sister Smith

Jocey and Kafoa on dock

Sister Kafoa & Sister Jocey 

So Unbelievably Blessed!

Lanay is being baptized on the 21st now instead of this weekend. She works three 12 hour shifts these next two weeks and it would have been impossible to properly prepare her before baptism. She's doing great though. Our lesson on Tuesday went really well because she got into a lot of anti and we discussed her concerns. She loved that we knew about it, acknowledged it even, yet didn't let it deter our testimonies in Christ's restored church. She left soothed and still ready to be baptized. 

Thursday we had a lesson with Isabella, a child of record, and we had time to kill so we knocked a few doors. We get to one house that we almost didn't tract because it wasn't really a part of the street, but we did it anyway. This lady holding a tiny baby answers the door and we talk to her for a bit. Her baby is 4 weeks and is the cutest thing ever. She lets us in. Tells us a little bit about herself and asks us a few questions. We discussed a little bit about the Restoration and asksed if we could come back on Saturday. She gave us her number and said that we could return. 

Saturday morning we left her a message asking when would be a good time for us to stop by. Later, after our lesson with Lanay, we felt like we should just stop by. We knocked and she waved to us through the glass in the door. She opened the door and let us in. Her husband was there as well. Sometimes that makes me nervous if we haven't met the spouse yet because usually one is a little more apprehensive than the other. He greeted us cordially and we sat down and began getting to know a little bit about them. 

I cannot recount everything that was said, but that lesson was one of the most beautiful lessons that I've ever had. I felt so peaceful and calm the entire time. Everything felt like it was falling into place. It was so strange, but good. The husband was extremely receptive. He was so into everything we talked about. He basically talked about the plan of salvation without us saying anything and somehow we tied it all into the Restoration. Honestly, so good. 

Sister Kafoa and I were on cloud 9 the rest of the day. We probably looked so stupid. He wasn't able to come to church yesterday, but she did and she brought their precious baby. Tonight the Wernli's are doing an FHE and they're coming. We're so excited!!!

Everything is great. Loving the work. Love being a missionary.

Love y'all

Sister Smith

PS

Also, the girl who went to BYUI but is home this semester went to Big Shanty yesterday and was telling us about it during dinner. I told her that that was my first area and if she met an Alex Coleman. She said, "Yes! He got up today and bore his testimony about missionary work and how he was thankful the Lord sent the Sisters to him and reactivated him." How cool is that! He had been inactive for 7-11 years, and we met him on campus and he came back to church. He attended institute 100%, the only one in the entire branch. Then she thought it was cool because she didn't think it was coincidence that she went there on the fast Sunday that he got up, talked about us, and I was at her home for dinner that same night. God is in the details. 

Pics of Jocey in GA with Companions

 

Sister Kafoa from Tonga & Sister Fabulous Jocey

 

After some Beach Volleyball in GA

She likes that her Tongan Sister gets it when she talks about the Beach and Sand.......

 Selfie after Beach Volleyball in GA

Following the Spirit Works Guys!

Hey. I'll just give y'all a really cool story about what happened to us.

Monday Sister Kafoa and I were planning and had the thought to look over our potential investigators. We looked back at some pretty old ones that haven't been followed up. We saw a few names on a street called Candlewyk and felt impressed to go see those people. 

The next day, as is usual, our plans ended up changing and we weren't really anywhere near that area we had picked to follow up on potentials. We prayed and still felt like we should drive there and just see. We get there and follow up with them.  No one really. A girl did answer let us in and we taught her the Restoration and set up another appointment. That was good. Then we decided to knock some doors and the second door we knock on a lady answers and excitedly lets us in. We talk to her for a bit and she says, "God sent me the Book of Mormon already! I have one! One day I saw a bag of chips and two sodas and it looked like it was placed there for someone, but the next day I went back and there was a book of  Mormon and I feel like God sent it to me. I feel like you two angels were sent to me!"

We set up an appointment with her and she came to church with us on Sunday. She doesn't get that we were sent from God to show her the Restored Gospel, but she's reading the Book of Mormon and really enjoyed church. She'll get it over time. 

Lanay is doing well. She couldn't come to church on Sunday because of work, but we're meeting with her today. 

Also, pday is today because President likes us to proselyte on Holidays, thus we had pday today. 

Love you all,

Sister Smith :)

Barry pic...He gets baptized

​That's Brother Wernli next to me and Barry is next to Sister Kafoa

Mini mission for the Youth

 Tuesday night we were invited to mutual because they combined all the classes and made a mock MTC. The youth all got call letters sent to them in the mail and they were called to various missions and were to report to the Sugar Hill MTC to begin their 1 and 1/2 to 2 hour mission. When they arrived at the Sugar Hill MTC they received nametags with the dork dots and took pictures with their parents outside of the chapel doors. Eventually, they were all seperated to their respective mission and the teachers were the leaders that had served in said mission. They talked about the culture of their mission and the language, geography, food, etc. Then we role played contacting someone and teaching them about the Book of Mormon. It was pretty neat, all the kids who want to go on missions really enjoyed it and it brought back a lot of great memories of the MTC for me. 

As a follow up, the leader that put it together called our mission President and asked if he'd do a fireside with the youth. Last night President and Sister Bennion came and had us missionaries in the ward talk about how we can prepare for a mission now and what to expect on the mission and  how hard it is, but rewarding, etc. It was pretty cool. One of the Laurels drove us to it so one the way home we talked about it with her and she really liked it. Some other kids kind of freaked out because President Bennion told them to start talking to people in person, put away the video games, texting frequently, and begin reading real books. Basically, telling them how they will need to function in real life, he just came off pretty passionately. It think it's because a lot of missionaries come out and they can't cope with the stress correctly. Before they would cope with stress through video games, or just pure entertainment. But now, they have to cope with stress by reading and praying? That's hard. It was interesting for me because I personally don't think I prepared enough for the mission, but I got lucky because I am stubborn and proud enough to work my hardest and not waste my time, so eventually, everything came together for me. But that's me. 

Anyway, food for thought to see if y'al want to try that there. 

Great Week...ending with a baptism.

This week was awesome.

Wednesday we had a follow up meeting for the trainer-trainees and that was fun. We talked about obedience and stuff and Sister Kafoa was happy because she feels like we keep all the rules they emphasized so that's good. 

Thursday we had exchanges and that was fun. During exchanges we quickly went over to the yw pres. house and we role played her husband asking a friend to church. Turns out that she's speaking next week which is the perfect time to invite someone. And she's having the Elders over for dinner that day so she's probably going to have them come after church and do a lunch with his friend and the Elders. It was just cool because we felt like the Spirit prompted us to go over there since that occured. We also had a lesson with Lanay that went very well, she cried and said that she doesn't typically open up about those things and we told her that the Spirit softens hearts. Good sign. 

Friday we had district meeting and interviews. It was good because President was smiling the entire interview and said, "You're just doing terrific! Keep it up!" I'm glad he did because sometimes I feel like there's so much I need to improve on, but then I realized that I just need to take it one step at a time. 

Saturday was Barry's baptism. That was wonderful. The Wernli's drove us up to Cornelia. I think that was good for me. I realized just how many people I loved and how much I learned while I was there. Barry seemed pleased and the baptismal service went very well. There Spirit was present and clear. He looked committed and concentrated when he was being baptized. I loved it. Sister Wernli played an arrangement of "Amazing Grace" on the violin and it was very touching. I felt the Spirit very strongly then as well. The Elders told us that his first Sunday could not have been better. Apparently everyone was basically teaching and congratulating him on being baptized and confirmed. Everything just went so well. Him and his daughter are planning on coming to my farewell in March, I'm excited :).

Lanay came to church yesterday and it was very good. She opened up a lot in Gospel Principles, probably a little more than standard, but I guess that's what happens when investigators come to church haha. She has questions and we'll be meeting with her again on Tuesday. 

Everything is going really well. We're having a FHE with a family on Feb 2 and it should be really good. We'll see how it all goes. Love the work.  Love the Lord. Love being a missionary. 

Love y'all,

Sister Smith

Jocelyn goes to the temple and meets up with past companions....

Loving the Mission life at the temple

Come back from the Holidays..!!

This past week was gray. Mostly by the weather's standards. This week also seemed to fly by very quickly!

For the most part we received a lot of "Come back after the Holidays."It was good though because I was feeling maybe just a slight bit down then yesterday Lanay came to church. Yay! Then a girl who we will be teaching on Wednesday for the first time who is 10, came to church as well. Then, after a while, in walks Wyatt! He disappeared out of nowhere for the past couple weeks. Thankfully we stopped by the other day and didn't see him and talked to his sister who said she'd tell him we stopped by. Woot woot. We had three investigators at church! Honestly, couldn't ask for anything better. 

I don't know what to report on other than Barry is doing really well and we had a wonderful lesson with him on Friday. The spirit was very strong and our team up was awesome. Couldn't ask for anything better. He's getting baptized this Saturday in Cornelia and we finished the program and he'll be there today. The Elders are ready to receive him. We get to go to the baptism and we're hoping it all turns out really well. 

Yesterday we role played with a family and ended up discussing the fact that we have a loving Heavenly Father. Typically, we have pretty similar views as other Christians. Generally speaking. However, our perception of God is different. We believe He has a perfect body, that we lived with Him before we came to this earth. Because of His love for us He created a plan. That plan is centered on Christ and His Atonement. The interesting thing is that that was the one thing that needed to change in order to change all of the doctrine of Christ's original church. And once the nature of God was changed, everything came along with it. It's just interesting. I don't think I wrote it as well as it was discussed last night, but I had a spiritual witness that my Father in Heaven indeed loves me as well as everyone else. 

I'm so grateful for everything. I am grateful for my life, my parents, the experiences I'm having on the mission. I am just thankful.

Love you all,

Sister Smith