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