Transfers tomorrow, possible I change missions

Hello Family and friends! Today is P Day, because yesterday was memorial day and the library was closed.

Our investigators are doing great! Susan came to church, and she has a baptismal date. We had a lesson with her this week about the Word of Wisdom, and she threw away her cigarettes before we even got there to teach her the stop smoking lesson. She had already done it! It was awesome. I love her. She loves the Book of Mormon too, and is reading it like crazy and has lots of questions! It just shows the power and beauty that is in the book. I know it's truly from God, as I see people's lives change because of it.

Bishop came with us to see Bernard and his wife. He is the one who is friends with our Stake President. They came to church and loved it! They also love the Book of Mormon :)

And Charlene came to church with her Mom and is getting baptized on June 8th! Woot woot! She is so cute and she loves church.

On Saturday though, I got the call that I am being transferred!!!! Don't know where yet, but Sister Thacker and Sister Cowley are staying here in Lincolnton East and I am going to another new area with a new sister to train. I had kind of felt it all week though, almost like I knew it was coming so I tried to get Sister Thacker and Sister Cowley ready for it. Of course I will miss them, but they will do great!

If I get sent to a certain Zone, the Ashville Zone, it will be a part of the Knoxville, Tennesee mission! I could be going to a different mission today.. that's crazy. We'll see! That would be a big change, but I know I am here to serve, no matter where!

Mike mentioned he wants to hear more stories/ funny things that happen... uh..well yesterday we were visiting a less active named "Tim Putt" and we were praying in the car before we went in and Sister Thacker accidentally said "Tim BUTT" in her prayer and we all started laughing really hard. Silly moment of the week I guess..

Last Week of this (third) transfer!

Hello family and friends!

I love Heather's pictures from the Philipines, they are so cool! And Steve' pictures from Sweeden. It's amazing how we are all doing the same work, in different parts of the world! :) It's different in a lot of ways, but it's similar in some ways.

This week an investigator was out of town, so she wasn't able to come to church so we'll have to move her baptismal date. But she's still reading the Book of Mormon and so excited! She's visiting her Mom in West Virginia for two weeks. She called us last night though and told us she bought some skirts she could wear to church, and was asking questions about her Book of Mormon reading! She's so sweet. Yayyyyy!
 

We met with the daughters of the less active parents again and they are so sweet. The younger one said she hadn't read in the Book of Mormon much but the older one who is 11 told us how she felt the spirit when she read it and she loved it! I know that even children can feel of the spirit of it! She said she would read with her Sister. Aww :) And their other Sister who han't been interested before wants to have discusions with us too! YAY! They weren't able to come to church because of a camp this weekend but hopefully next weekend! 

We saw the Less Active family we're working hard with, again, that we have been trying to meet with FOREVER. They got married in the temple about 12 years ago and have been not active ever since. The Mom works, but the Dad just boats on Sundays. When we got there he was like "I'm not coming back to church just so you know." We shared a message with him and his daughters though, and his sweet 7 year old girl started reading the Book of  Mormon and was like "Wow, this is true!" We were like "How do you know that?" She's like "Because it talks of Jesus and it's good. It makes me feel good." She read from it in her cute 7 year old voice and her father started tearing up. I think he knows he needs to come back! At the end we committed them to read and the Dad said he would. We weren't going to mention church because he had been so defensive about it earlier but his daughter jumped up and was like "SOOOO WHEN'S CHURCH?!? DADDY CAN WE GO PLEASE PLEASE!!!" :) It was awesome! Hearts are softening! Children are the key to bringing a lot of these Less Active families back :) Children are so close to the spirit!

We had a Zone Conference on Thursday and it was most of the day. I love zone conferences/district meetings! Being around other missionaries is just so great. President Craven talked all about planning and how to effectively "Plan with a purpose" instead of "scheduling". We have been trying to apply it, planning with the Spirit seeing where we can go and who we could see the next day instead of just "scheduling."

We did meet with Charlene again, she's the 9 year old daughter of the less active (who has been coming for the past month so is no longer less active) :) and she's good for her baptismal date of the 8th of June! Her grandpa is an active member and he's going to baptize her :) :)

And the one Sister's husband is softening again. It was his birthday this week so we took him balloons and his favorite cookies :) She said it made his day! Awesome!

We did do a "MTC night" with the youth for mutual this week. We did different stations where they could practice different aspects of being a missionary. It was super fun! They loved it. The Young Women's president said one of the young women in the ward told her after it helped her consider going on a mission :)

We met with the couple who is friends with our Stake President and it went really well! They were really facinated and wanted to read the Book of Mormon. They are funny and it was fun teaching them. We called our Stake President about coming with us to an appoitnment with them (even if he doesn't live in our ward)... They weren't able to come to church this Sunday, but we have an appointment with them again on Tuesday! They said they'd be baptized when they knew it was true, and they wanted to come and try it out!

We are continuing to work hard! Transfers are next week, we'll get the call on Saturday about whose staying and whose going! We'll see!!!!

Thanks for all of the love and support!

Mother's Day weekend

Helloooo family and friends!!!!!

Good to talk to you yesterday everyone! Love you Mom and Dad. :) Especially HAPPY MOTHERS DAY to the best mother in the world!

Heather sounds like she's doing good in the Philipines and has way cool pictures.

This week was good, we worked hard. Whew. We have been working hard to get members involved in the work and get referrals and work with their family and friends!

We also have been focusing on "Harvesting" or when we leave a blessing on them and their home, pray for them and their home. That's what we have been asked to do in our mission. It's from Alma 10 ( I think!) We have found a few new investigators this way!

We were out and we ran into this guy who is friends with our Stake President (who is awesome) and had met with Elders before but they got transferred and stopped coming. He thought what we were doing was nice, and he said he was interested in learning more and had a few questions. So we are meeting with him and his wife this week!

We left the Saviors Peace and Blessing ( the prayer for them and their home) with a man about a month ago who said we could come back and have a discussion, but never called. We stopped by his house because we were in his neighboorhood and he said come on in! We taught the Restoration to him and his wife. It went really well and the spirit was strong! He was like "Why do you keep saying this is "true?" what does that mean?" His wife was like "If this is true, we need to be mormon!" Ha ha. She was like " Dont' worry, I speak his language. I have to translate for you." We laughed. They were out of town this weekend, but we're going to hopefully meet with them again this week!

We finally got in with this Less Active that we have been trying to catch FOREVER. She was home, and we taught her and her daughters. Her daughters are adorable. She says she still has a testimony, but just works on Sundays and so can never come. But her husband doesn't and he could take the girls to church. He was with his parents this week though..

The Johnson girls were supposed to be baptized on May 25th but their Mom is preganant and due in the beginning of July. All of her family is coming into town for the baby blessing and so she told us she wants to wait until the baby is born, and do it all in the same weekend when everyone is there :( Sad for us, because we might not be here. But the most important thing is they still want to be baptized and are reading and praying and coming to church.

Charlene, the daughter of a less active, is 9 and she's so cute.  Her Mom is not really Less Active anymore because she's been coming to church for the past 3 weeks! Woot! We met with her this week and we finally got Charlene to talk to us. She never really talks. But they did come to church, and her grandpa went down in the baptismal font with her and practiced so she wouldn't be scared. We talked to her mom and she says Charlene wants to be baptized June 8th! Woot! She's scared of water though, so we may have to practice a few more times.

Another lady we left the Saviors Peace and Blessing with we committed to be baptized but hasn't come to church but she finally came yesterday! She loved it and had a good experience. She said she felt like everything was true, and she felt like it was a big family! Aw! During the sacrament, she was like "Is this where Jesus says "This do in rememberance of my body and blood?" I was like YESSSSS SUSAN!!! She went to Gospel Principles and tried to sneak out after that but I put my arm around her and was like "Releif society is the best partttt!!!!" and walked her back into the room and she stayed the whole 3 blocks!! YAY! We saw her after church and she said she felt good, and she committed for June 1st to be baptized! Woot! Church is awesome.

Other than that we have been tracting and working really hard! My companions you met on Google hangout yesterday, they are great and hilarious. We have a good time. We laugh a lot. Probably too much.

Everything is great here, thanks for all of the love and support! I am doing well, happy, healthy, and working hard!

Everyone down here says "Have a blessed day"

May 6, 2013

Friends and family-

Thank you for your love and prayers!! This week we had a big Trainers/Trainee meeting at the mission office in Charlotte. We had lots of counsel from the Assistants to the President, and President and Sister Craven. They talked alot about the "Doctrine of Christ" and how it is a process of becoming. A lot of people down here think it is a "checklist" of things to do, but really it is about becoming more like Christ! It's something we do and need every day! We role played a lot of "How to Begin Teaching" or what to say when you first meet people. It was pretty neat because usually they have Zone Leaders come and evaluate our role plays and be there to train us but this time they had SISTERS come ( experienced sisters who have been out for more than a year) because there were alot more sisters there than Elders :) Then President Craven told us that the First Presidency has implemented Sister Leadership callings now, called "Sister Trainers" who will go on exchanges with the Sister Missionaries regularly. One of them was my awesome trainer, Sister Bowman. It's pretty exciting. Sisters really can do amazing things! Not that I'm biased or anything...

We had another meeting the next day, Zone Conference where we had a lot of training from our Zone Leaders. We were trained on one of the "Fundementals" of Preach My Gospel, how to help people make and keep commitments. Our Zone Leaders are awesome. One of our Zone Leaders demonstrated and invited the "investigator" to read the Book of Mormon and bore powerful testimony of it and the spirit was so strong the room went silent. The Book of Mormon combined with the spirit really is the most powerful tool in conversion, just like Preach my Gospel says.

We met with Bob again, we are not sure he can actually read... we're going to help him to learn how to read so he can read the Book of Mormon!

We are still working with the daughters of a less active, the Johnson girls, and they are getting baptized on the 25th! YAY!! We are excited, and we are really seeing a change in their Less Active parents too who want to come back to church and have the gospel in their lives!

Sister Hovis (our super member who gives us referrals every day and gives us rides and is incredible and has such a powerful testimony) called us last night because she was really discouraged we had hit a road block with her husband we have been teaching. He will have a hard time making the change to come to church. I opened the scriptures and prayed I would find a verse to comfort her. I think it was Doctrine and Covenants 98:1-3 that I found, about the Lord keeping his promises and making our trials work together for our good! I texted that and another scripture to her and she said she started crying feeling so much comfort and peace knowing everything would be okay. It's just what she needed. It's amazing that if you listen to the spirit and follow the promptings, the Holy Ghost will guide you with what to say and what to do in every situation!

We met with a lady named Sarah who we have met with before, off and on. She really wants to know the truth! She read the Book of Mormon and she has so many good questions! She wants to come to church, she just has a lot of health problems so we are praying that she'll feel well enough to come this week!

Susan is still good, we haven't been able to meet with her this week, she's been out of town but she was out of the Hospital after the Elders gave her a blessing! 

I know the Gospel blesses families so much! Thank you for being a wonderful family and great examples to me. Talk to you on Mothers Day! There is a lady in our ward who is letting us use her computers and she has a son who is Skyping home as well, she didn't know what time he was calling until he emailed today so we'll have to work around her schedule with him but hopefully after church, around 12:00 your time.

Love, Sister Forsyth