Tornadoes for Christmas!!

Okay can I just say that this week was fabulous! It was just such a great week! We didn't teach very many lessons and all our investigators are gone but hey it was still great!

Well first, y'all are probably wondering about the title of this email. We didn't actually see a tornado and it wasn't on Christmas but...on Wednesday we all had to go inside because there were tornado warnings they were upon us!! The whole mission ended up inside that evening (after around 7). The tornado sirens were going off till about 9 but we never saw a tornado or anything (not gonna lie I'm slightly sad about that....haha). Sister Dillon is from Iowa and she's seen a tornado or 2 (several actually) so she knew what to look for and stuff. We weren't worried about it even though sirens were going off because it wasn't raining hardly and there was barely a breeze. Haha but the other Sisters called us and they were asking us all these questions about tornados and we were like, "Sisters are you nervous right now?" And they were like, "Hold on, let me just tell you where we are right now and you can decide. We are currently sitting in our bathroom in the bathtub with blankets over our heads." We laughed and we were just like, "Hey it's fine. You can get out of your bathtub. We will let you know if we think it gets bad!" So funny!

We made lots of dramatic videos during the tornados....haha I guess that's just what you do when you are stuck inside!

Christmas eve was pretty fun! We really didn't do that much though because #noYSAaround. We tracted for dayz slash tried all our potentials...well a few of them...and did some LA finding which was actually really good because many of them were home for Christmas and we found out that they actually weren't LA, they just had moved away. Haha well alrighty then. But for Christmas dinner, one of the members of the branch presidency invited us to his parents (who live right around the corner from them) and all their kids were there and their kid's kids and it was just chaos but SO fun! I miss seeing families and chaotic lives! :) 

Oh and here's a random pretty cool story. So we went and tried this guy we met while trying to find a LA and he seemed interested when we met him but when we tried him on Christmas Eve he had just woken up and so we weren't sure how interested he was or anything and we thought we would probably drop him. Well then later that day the Zone Leaders texted us and called us the next day and told us they met him at the gas station that he works at and they said we shouldn't drop him yet but try him one more time! What are the odds of that?! So I guess we won't drop him yet. Anyway, a random story and probably doesn't mean much to you but we thought that was pretty cool :)

Christmas was AMAZING! We got to sleep in and then Sister Johnson made crepes for breakfast and we had tons of fresh fruit and oh man it was so good!! Then we opened presents! It was fun! Then we got ready and had our studies and then we did weekly planning and then we went to the Andersen's (mission president's house) and had Christmas dinner! The Dunn's and the Montgomery's (the Dunn's are the senior couple in the YSA and the Montgomery's are replacing them) were there and a couple of YSA and investigators! It was a blast! After we ate prime rib, potatoes, asparagus and pie we sang Christmas carols and we shared a Christmas message! I wanted to stay there forever! But leaving meant we got to Skype to the family!!! WAHOO!!! I love my family! :) It was fun to talk and laugh with them and made me pretty trunky while I was talking to them...but I got over that pretty quick after it was over! It was mostly just weird thinking about the fact that I will see them so soon....weird

In other news we are in sugar coma's over here.

Also we had a couple of lessons with Baylee this week! She's pretty cool! She's still just working to know that all of this is true and has a few concerns but it's just the beginning! The key is going to be getting her to read the Book of Mormon because as far as we know she hasn't done that yet but she will!!

Also we didn't get a chance to see Kyle because the couple of appointments we had with him he cancelled because he's had a bunch of family issues come up so we are hoping that clears up soon so that we can meet with him.

So there is this part member family from my first area - Jim and Sheila and I got to see them on Saturday! Although not in the best circumstances! Jim had heart surgery on Monday and he was at St. Thomas in Nashville and President said I could go see them so we went and saw them on Saturday! That is probably the last time I will see them until I come back to visit my mission! :( But It was still so fun to visit with them! I love them to death! :)

Yesterday we went to church in the Green Hills family ward and that was just weird all around because 1. It was a family ward meaning the whole sacrament meeting was SO loud! haha and 2. It was at a different time so it just threw us off! and 3. Well I don't have a 3rd point but needless to say it was weird!

I wanted to share a quote we read in the Ensign for December by President Monson: "There is yet time this year to extend the helping hand, the loving heart, and the willing spirit--in other words, to follow the example set by our Savior and to serve as He would have us serve. As we serve Him, we will not forfeit our opportunity, as did the innkeeper of old, to make time for Him in our lives and room for Him in our hearts."

The Christmas season my be over but there is always time to serve others! The spirit Christmas may be over and ending but the spirit of Christ never ends! We always need to be celebrating Christ and His birth because it impacts us every day!

Well I hope y'all had a WONDERFUL Christmas and I hope you have a HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! :)

I love y'all lots!

Love,

Sister Myers

 

Here's some pics from the week! :)

1. All the fruit for the crepes! :) YUM!

2. I got Tennessee flags for all of us for Christmas!

3. The family pic! Dad....why were you eating while I was taking this picture! It looks like you are frowning! haha

4. Candid pic of me and Jim! :)

5. Us and sister Andersen! I just LOVE her!

6. Us and Anne Parkes. She leaves for Utah this week and we won't see her so we said bye on Sunday...aw I just LOVE her! :(

 

 

 

It's [not] beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Well this week has been pretty fantastic!!!

It was finals week slash when everyone started to go home so it made it a bit interesting but this week is going to be even more of an adventure so that will be good! :) Christmas is this week so that's always fun! Except it doesn't even feel like Christmas really because the work is basically the same and it's been like 70, sometimes colder so it's just odd!

Okay first I want to talk about Kyle!!! WHOO He is so cool! So we had a lesson with him this week and it was like......ASTOUNDING! I am so blown away. He is a celestial investigator, not just a golden investigator, a celestial investigator! He's THAT cool! In our lesson this week, he hadn't read the chapter of the Book of Mormon we gave him and so we read it with him and it was 3 Nephi 11 and that talks about baptism and stuff so we ended up inviting him to be baptized on Feb 6 if he knew it was true! (Well, "ended up" makes it sound like it wasn't planned but it was planned...we prayed about it) and he said he would! Then he literally said this (sit down before you read this): "Yeah it just makes sense. I mean, if missionaries came over about 3-4 times and didn't talk about baptism or ask that question then I would just wonder what the point was." WOW! Then, oh it just gets better, later in the lesson he was like, "I just want to get to a point where I don't need y'all anymore." He TOTALLY gets our purpose! Also, we told him to call us if he has any questions and he has called us a couple of times but it's cool because whenever he asks us questions, he doesn't usually ask us directly, he asks where he can LOOK to find the answer. He's so cool! He even came to church yesterday and stayed the whole time and seemed to really enjoy it! He sat by different people and branch fellowshipped him well!!

Also, we met ANOTHER Baylee!!! This was a referral from President Johnson (kind of). He got a call from a girl who moved here (named Baylee) and she is a nonmember who moved here from Idaho and she was going to take the lessons but moved and she had been to a couple of YSA activities! She is SO cool! I love her so much! She's so chill and just great with people and she's just awesome! I'm excited about her!

The first Bailey and Charlotte are home now for Christmas! We didn't get to meet with Charlotte this week but we are hoping to possibly have a phone lesson with her sometime this week. And Bailey we met with on Monday and had a pretty good lesson. She is...well we aren't really sure where she's at right now. It kind of seems as though she's really only meeting with us for the intellectual side of it. She doesn't seem super interested in actually coming to know that this is TRUE.

Carlos got the priesthood yesterday!!!! It was so great! And he bought a suit and tie for it and he looked real spiffy! Oh I'm just so excited for him! He is doing so great!

So we went on exchanges this week and Sister Dillon and I went to Nolansville with sister Miller (I just LOVE her) and Sister Johnson took over the are for a day! She did so great! And after we got back from the exchange....we had like the greatest finding hour ever! Okay, not ever but it was just really good because we talked to a LOT of people because they were just all home for some reason and set up lots of return appointments and just had really good conversations. It was super awesome!

Interviews were this week and that was SO good! I love interviews! Except when I got in there I just started bawling and I was like, "President! Why do Elders get to serve longer than sisters?" And he just laughed at me haha we have the funniest interviews! Love him! Sister Andersen wasn't able to be there though unfortunately because she got whatever President got a couple weeks ago or last week or whenever that was! Poor girl! I told President that I was sad for her and he was like, "I guess she just didn't have enough compassion on me when I was sick so she was cursed!" Haha classic

We are excited for Christmas! It's going to be a busy day though! But fun!

Sorry that's all I have for today! Not too much happened this week! At least that I care to write about! I love y'all lots and I hope you have a MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Love,

Sister Myers

1-2 We found these emoji pillows that describe us! I am the weirdo and Sister Dillon laughs till she cries and Sister Johnson is just cute and happy haha soooo funny. if only you knew just HOW true this picture was

3. Utah! There's this area that has like...all the states in street names...random 

 

 

The Black Box (dun, dun, DUN!)

This week was super awesome! A lot of good things happened :) 

Well we had zone conferences this week and that was pretty great! The first half of the meeting was trainings and stuff and I especially loved President and Sister Andersen's training. They wanted to focus on Christ because that's what Christmas is all about and so they read "The Living Christ" but between some of the paragraphs we same some hymns about Christ (several of them being Christmas songs) and it was so powerful. I am so grateful for my Savior Jesus Christ. I know He lives.

Also at zone conferences we got trained on what many like to call "the black boxes" or "the Holy Ghost". Haha yes we got a driver accountability program installed in our car - which is actually a program called the Teenage Eyewitness Program or aka the Tiwi. But yeah basically it tells you if you are driving too fast, not wearing a seatbelt, or driving aggressively (turning sharply, going over bumps too fast, stopping and starting too quickly). It actually isn't that bad. It never talked to me until I forgot to log in and so I just had to stop and log in and the other time was when I went 11 in a church parking lot. We called our Tiwi, Simon. It seemed fitting :)

So this week we met this pretty awesome couple named Hal and Chanel and had a really great experience with them! We knocked on their door and they let us in and we started talking to them and he told us some of his concerns about religion and fortunately we were not any of those things he was concerned about and it really peeked his interest. He especially loved how focused on helping people we were, not getting numbers or money. We taught him a basic version of the restoration and set a return appointment. But the thing that was pretty cool was that Hal kept saying that he saw us walk up to that apartment building and he wondered who we were and he really wanted us to knock on his door and said he was just waiting until we came! Cool! We had the appointment yesterday but they had something come up last minute. They live really far away though so we are probably just going to send other missionaries there now (they aren't YSA anyway).

Oh okay and Kyle? He's sooooo awesome!! We had our appointment with him on Wednesday and he actually called us on Tuesday from some random phone because he hadn't got a phone yet to make sure we were still on for Wednesday! So we went on Wednesday and had such an awesome lesson!!! Kyle is really searching for truth! He is so excited to read the Book of Mormon and pray about it. And he really wants to understand! We were teaching him about the apostasy and he didn't quite understand as much as he wanted to and so he was like, "can I just read this page of the pamphlet again?" And so he proceeded to read it out loud and then by the end of the page he like had an "ahah!" moment and he totally got it. The spirit really helped I'm sure! Man it was just one of the best lessons ever! Also we invited him to be baptized and he said yes and then he was like, "yeah I wasn't sure if you were going to like bring a preacher guy or something with you if I wanted to be baptized but I was just confused because my sink's pretty small...." What? Haha and he said it so seriously and it took us a second or two to register what he was saying haha. I guess baptism was already on his mind!! We set up a return appointment for Saturday at the church but he didn't show up but we think he just forgot. He got a phone and texted us on Sunday saying he was sorry and we set up a new appointment! :)

We had stake conference yesterday in the Nashville Stake. It was really good! Elder Wilford W. Anderson (the guy that gave the Music of the Gospel talk a couple conference ago) came and spoke to us and wow I just love how he speaks! He just speaks with the spirit so much and he teaches so simply and clearly! It was so cool! And guess what? Charlotte came on the Saturday night and Sunday morning session! And we didn't even invite her! And Elder Anderson talked about the gospel of Jesus Christ in the Saturday night session and it was just so perfect for her. Also one of my favorite parts was when some primary kids (4 of them) went up and bore testimonies of the Book of Mormon. It was so cool and so powerful! Then Elder Anderson called one of them up and asked him questions about FHE and reading the scriptures as a family and stuff and oh my goodness it was so funny. The kid looked SO nervous. I mean imagine being 9 and a member of the seventy calls you up and questions you on a bunch of things. It was so great haha

Carlos is just doing as great as ever! We had a lesson with him last night and it was such a good lesson! We talked about the restoration but we like focused on missionary work in helping others know about the restoration and it was just cool. Carlos is so awesome! He's already sharing the gospel and was even trying to get his friend to come to the lesson that vey night but his friend couldn't! But yeah he's just so awesome! We set a member date with him though so in two weeks we will have a referral from him! :)

Well here's some random side notes. It was like 74 degrees yesterday so that's cool. Snow will be a big adjustment! Also it's been finals and finals continues into next week so everyone and their dog is studying. Then they are all going home for Christmas. Good. This is going to be an interesting few weeks coming up here! haha #tractingfordayzzzz

Well that's actually all I have for you today! I have to get pictures together that the mission office is asking for so I've got to get working on that :)

My ponderizing scripture for the week is more like just a pondering scripture because I've already memorized it! It's 1 Corinthians 16:14 "Let all your things be done with charity." It reminded of the scripture in 1 Corinthians 13:3 where it says if you do things without charity then its basically worth nothing. We must be doing things out of pure love! That's when they will really count and when us and those we serve gain the most happiness!

I love being a missionary and I love y'all lots! Have a great week!

Love,

Sister Myers

1. Just a tracting selfie :)

2. Mr. and Mr. Claus...aka Pres and Sister Andersen - love them! :)

3. THE best white elephant gift ever!!!

4. "Honey where's the steering wheel?" "Oh I think we left it on the porch!" "Oh okay let me just go grab it!" hahaha so funny 

 

 

BAPTISMO!! :)

Well everyone, Carlos got baptized!!! Oh I am just so excited for him! It was seriously the most baptism ever! It couldn't have gone more smoothly and the Spirit was SO strong! And Carlos, man he is just so happy. He couldn't stop smiling! And after he got the Holy Ghost yesterday he was just glowing even more!! Haha he told us on the phone Saturday night, "I try not to smile too much but it's really hard." Haha oh you can just tell how happy he is! He was so ready! I wish y'all could know how incredible Carlos and his testimony is! You would be ASTOUNDED!!! You know what he said on the phone that I just loved?! "I know that it won't be easy but it won't be as hard as it used to be." Amen!!!

The rest of Saturday was pretty LAME in comparison to Carlos's baptism! Oh but hey a pretty cool thing happened on Friday. So okay, it was the weirdest day of our entire lives. Like seriously. There was quite a bit of opposition but it was cool because Heavenly Father like, used it to do his work! That sounds odd but this is what happened! So we had finished weekly planning and we were leaving the church with the other sisters and the sisters got a call from a former (they had been calling formers in weekly planning). Well we ended up being on that phone call because it was this guy who just bashed us for like 30 minutes. It was awful. He wasn't like rude, he was "nice" about it (if that's even a thing). Well, he was being nice enough that we didn't just want to hang up with him but every time we tried to end the call he just kept on going. But finally we got him off the phone. But now we were leaving later than we wanted too. So we caught the next bus to go out to this place that we were going to knock and on a connecting bus that we were on this guy sat next to me and I started talking to him and long story short, by the end he had a Book of Mormon and a pamphlet, and we had an address and return appointment! (Btw, I just have to say that he LOVED Moroni's promise. He got SO excited when I read that to him and he was just so happy to have us come talk to him!) Miracle!! And we wouldn't have met him if that former hadn't called the sisters and been talking forever! Do you see how God just used the opposition to fulfill his work?! God is so good!! HIs name is Kyle, btw.

Okay so we met with Charlotte this week! Here's the update on her family. So her dad is supportive and so is her mom! Although, her mom just wants her to make an informed decision and wants her to keep going to church and institute for a couple of months to make sure it's what she wants to do. Yeah she's been watching conference for like 3 years, I think she knows!! But yeah she said she would get baptized tomorrow if she could! She really wants it! But hey, it'll make it that much more worth it when she does get to the font!

Oh and here's another awesome thing about Charlotte. So yesterday in relief society they were talking about visiting teaching and they split off into groups where everyone met with their visiting teaching supervisor and they talked about who was visiting teaching who and who their partners were and whatnot. Well, Annemarie, the RS President was talking to Charlotte and she's like, "We need to get you some visiting teachers!" And Charlotte was like, "yeah that would be great!" and then Annemarie was like, "And someone for YOU to visit teach!" And Charlotte said, "Yeah! I would do that!" Well, she's just a dry Mormon now...already about to get a calling basically haha so funny. I love Charlotte!

So the Christmas devotional last night was AWESOME!!! I loved it!!! I especially loved Elder Bednar's talk! It's so interesting to hear the story of Christmas from the point of view of the Book of Mormon because usually we are so focused on the New Testament point! Don't get me wrong I love Luke 2 but it was just a really great talk!! And I loved how he talked about how Christ is the light and that all the beautiful lights at Christmas time should remind us of our Savior! And then I was thinking about Christmas lights and how they shine so bright when it gets dark. This is just like our Savior, He brings light in the darkness - beautiful light that gives us happiness and hope!

Well that's all I got for you today! We aren't emailing as long because we are praciticing for a zone conference talent show! I am in 3 acts! I'm playing the piano for 2 and us and the other sisters are doing a rap together. Yes, I said a rap. It's pretty awesome not gonna lie haha. Speaking of raps we met this guy who calls himself King James on the bus who rapped his whole story about coming to know Christ. It was SO cool! Nashy is the best....just sayin!

Well I hope y'all are having a blessed week and that this week brings lots of Christmas happiness!!! :)

Love,

Sister Myers

Pictures:

1. So this Asian girl gave us this soy milk drink and we took a video of us trying it...that is a screenshot. Just so you know I'm actually covering my mouth because I'm laughing...it wasn't THAT bad...haha

2. Carlos with us, President and Sister Andersen, President Johnson and Sister Case (sister Dillon's previous comp)

3. This is the picture we took after our very weird day on Friday....haha classic

4-5 More pictures from the baptism! The guy in the suit is Ivan, he is also a recent convert and introduced us to Carlos! :)