My First Week in Hendricks

It was so hard to say bye to Pete and Amy and also Karen Jones in Arlington.  I
will miss them all!  But there are new great things ahead!

Sister Gillman and I are great at cooking!  mmm... burnt toast!  Haha,
but we do make yummy green smoothies for breakfast every day!

I can already tell this transfer is going to go way to fast!  Sister Gillman and I don’t think we will stay together longer than a transfer-we get along too well already!  We have been having so much fun and laughing a lot... maybe too much (if that is even possible!).  We cover 8 sets of sisters so we are going to be busy staying in touch with them and going on about two trade offs every week.  But it will be fun.  

The work is going great in Hendricks!  We have the cutest 80 year old man getting baptized on Easter.  His name is Brother Zielinski.  His wife joined the church years ago, but it has taken him 30 years or more to decide to join.  Now he is so excited! Just know that it is never too late to accept the gospel!  I was reading in 3 Nephi 24:7 and was reminded that no matter how far we go Christ is always willing to let us come into his open arms.  If i learn one thing on my mission it would be that the power of the Atonement is real.  It is so real that anyone with a true desire can change!  Sometimes we listen to Satan and think we can't, but it isn't true!

We did service for the Zielinski family this week.  Now whenever I see a fern I want to go rip it out of the ground!  We had both sets of Elders in our ward and Elder and Sister Winter.  (Elder and Sister Winter are a senior couple.  Sister Winter is over the medical side of the mission and Elder Winter covers cars and iPads).

There are a lot of fun connections in this ward to the Arlington ward.  That has been great!  Our ward mission leader is the best!  His name is Brother Cano.  Sister Chappell and Sister DeSpain actually reactivated him and his wife last year!  I heard a lot about them from her and even met them a couple times.  We came with Sister Chappell to a baptism of someone she had taught here named LeAnn and now I get to see LeAnn every Sunday!  (LeAnn lives with the Cano's).  I love this ward!  And the Bishop is amazing!  He set up a time to give me a Bishop's blessing (we normally get a blessing when transferred to a new ward) I didn't even have to ask!  And I got asked to speak next Sunday!  I am excited to get involved so soon!  

I am looking forward to meeting with a woman named Brittany this week.  Sister McCook and I met her in  WalMart  on a P day and gave her a Book of Mormon.  We reassigned her to the Hendricks sisters so now I get to go see her!  I am so excited!

It was a fun and good week, but there's not a whole lot to share.  Oh, I guess y'all will want to know more about Sister Gillman!

Sister Gillman is from Myton, UT.  She has two sisters and a brother (who married Krista Whittle).  She will be starting school at USU this fall.  She has been on her mission for 14 months and served in St. Johns, Ft. Caroline, and Hendricks.  We have a lot of fun together--making up songs, taking pictures, making...or burning... food, and doing great missionary work!  It's going to be crazy covering 8 sets of sisters, but I am excited for this transfer!  

I love all y'all!!!

Sister Murray

No Unhallowed Hand Can Stop the Work from Progressing

 After an amazing MLC Sister McCook and I were talking to President. All of a sudden he told us, "with that being said, I'm closing down your area." I wish someone would have been in the office with us to take a picture of the shocked looks on our faces. I’m sure they were hilarious! President didn't even crack a smile though. He then went on to tell us he was calling Sister McCook as a Sister Training Coordinator- she will be in Mandarin 1st with Sister Kloepfer! He then told me I would still be a sister training leader, but I would be going to Hendricks Ave ward.  There are fewer sisters in our mission now so rather than having STL's in both zones my new companion and I will be over the sisters in both the Mandarin Zone and the Jax East Zone. It was so hard to wait until the transfer call Monday to tell anyone.

Reasons I'm excited for this transfer:

1- I still get to work with all the sisters in the Jax East zone, and now I get even more amazing sisters to

     work with and serve.

2- I love the Mandarin Zone! Also, This will be my third ward in the Jax East Stake! (Arlington, YSA, and

     Hendricks) 

3- Sister Gillman is a super sweet sister! We got to know each other a little bit at the Book of Mormon

    Musical. Fun fact: her brother was in my home YSA ward, and I never got to know him very well, but

    he married a girl I grew up with--Krista Whittle. So that was a fun connection.

4- Whenever I go on trade offs with the sister coordinators I will be going with one of my past

    companions. (Sister Kloepfer and McCook).

5- I will get to go on trade-offs in two of my past areas--YSA and Arlington (which will be taken over by

   Sister Bowers and a trainee)

I could go on, but unfortunately packing has taking much of my time and I don't have long to write. I am so excited to work in Hendricks though and so grateful to be able to stay close to my Jax East Sisters. 

Here's my new mailing address:

1564 Arcadia Dr 

Apt 517

Jacksonville, Florida 

32207

This past week was super busy--but I'm not really sure what we did! Here's a couple updates for y'all though.

We decided we needed to hand Marc off to the Elders. He was getting creepy... So the Elders get him!

We did get to teach this amazing part member family--the Cooks. The parents just decided to come back to church after 15 years of inactivity. Their fourteen year old daughter wants to be baptized so this week we went to their house and taught them! They told us the 25 year old son was baptized... At age 5... So we will do some detective work on that. We believe he will be getting baptized with his sister, which is so exciting!!!

We had some wonderful time with our recent converts. We taught Thelma a lesson then she came out teaching with us. We even got to go out to dinner with Thelma and Veronica which was the best! 

MLC was great! All of the district leaders came this time. We talked about using our digital tools effectively, and we also established mission rules. It was so great! This Wednesday we had our zone meeting where we gave trainings off of MLC. President and Sister Craig came and did an extra training for us after the meeting about allowing our mission experience to change us for the rest of our lives. I am so grateful for all I am learning and becoming on my mission. I truly do have a front row seat to the Atonement working in people's lives. That is an opportunity I will not have in the same way again. I also see the Atonement working in me. 

After zone meeting we received our new iPads. They are beautiful! I am so grateful for the tools we have been given to help the hastening of God's work progress. I've been thinking this week for my training about how my purpose: "to invite others to come unto Christ..." Ties into God's purpose which is explained in the following verse: "This is my work and my glory to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man." ( Moses 1:39) It truly is amazing that God allows us to take part in his great work. And as Joseph Smith so perfectly stated, "no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing." I will miss my dear Arlington, but the work goes on and I know I have been called to Hendricks by my Heavenly Father! The work continues, and I am excited to see what miracles are in store! 

I love all y'all! Have a blessed day!

Sister Murray

PS   Our area isn't completely closed.   It's just not a STL area anymore. Sister Bowers will be there training!

Ipads and Miracles

How many dogs are there?

RS Activity Thelma, me, Veronica, Karen, Sister McCook

Sister McCook, Thelma, me 

I Love Karen!

Sisters at the beach

Sister McIsaac's Hula

Sister Thomas the RS Pres

 

Sister McCook, Sister Fasick, Thelma, Sister Garlitz, Veronica, Me,
and Sister Pennington on the front.

      

Last Monday after Family Home Evening at the church we took Summer with us to teach Brandon.  Brandon just recently converted to Catholicism. We taught him the restoration and he isn't certain about it yet, but he is open.  He really wants to attend church with us! 

Tuesday morning we attended the Ft. Caroline district meeting before beginning our trade off with the ft. Caroline sisters.  Sister Case came to Arlington with me.  It was a bit of a different day, but good.  We cleaned Sister Beverly's floors. She is a sweet elderly lady and she had a nurse there when we came.  She started telling him all about the church. I love it!  That evening we were able to visit Sister McNeal with Veronica!  Sister McNeal was recently diagnosed with Breast Cancer and it was a tender mercy that we brought Veronica along because they found out they only live a block away from each other so Sister McNeal always has someone close by to call if she needs anything as she goes into surgery this week. 

Wednesday morning we swapped back companions and headed to Dunn Ave for our own district meeting.  We were also able to teach Jojo one more time.  She is not willing to come to church at this time and she is not progressing so we told her she can call us when she is ready to learn more.  She is so sweet we will miss seeing her.  We were also able to teach Karen that night with Sister Nuttal!  She loves Sister Nuttal!  

Thursday was amazing!  Sisters from Waycross, Georgia had spent the night with us for the big meeting.  Elder Zwick of the 70 came with Brother Hemmingway who is over the technology side of the missionary department.  There are some new changes coming out and we were the very first mission to get them!!!  We learned a lot about using iPads and Facebook, but what I mostly remember is the strong spirit as they spoke about the work we were doing.  We learned about obedience and that we should continually be improving in a "spiritual trajectory."  At the beginning of the meeting we were told to ask, "Am I willing to change?"  We have to be willing to change so we can grow from what we learn. This week every missionary will be getting a new iPad mini.  Those who will be here after August will be required to pay for their own. Those going home before will be able to turn them back into the church when they depart.  These iPads hold more storage and will be faster.  We will also be going off Facebook for approximately two months to restart the Facebook work completely.  We received drafts of two new books for missionaries about using technology effectively and safely.  We also saw a sneak preview of the Church's Easter initiative which will come out next month.  Get excited y'all!  It's going to be beautiful!  Oh, and I got to play piano for the meeting so that was fun!  I played while everyone walked up to shake Elder Zwick and Brother Hemmingway's hands too.  

We were able to teach Pete that evening before heading to the Relief Society activity: "A Trip to Hawaii."  It was super cute.  They had made invitations like a plane ticket and you turned those in at the door to the RS room.  The room was set up like the inside of an airplane and a member of the ward was dressed up as a pilot.  They had stewardess passing out treats and masks taped onto the back of the seats!  So cute!  On the "flight" we watched a short movie about visiting teaching.  Then we exited the plane and went into the gym which was set up like Hawaii.  Two girls put leis around our necks and there were treats and decorations and the Bishop's wife was dancing the hula. They had some short thoughts about visiting teaching and we enjoyed one another's company.  It was Sister Thomas's sneaky way of having a visiting teaching activity--she didn't think people would come if they knew that was the topic!  it was super fun and cute!  Karen even came and she was so welcomed!  She LOVED it!

After weekly planning on Friday we started another trade off!  I went to Atlantic Beach with Sister Bowers this time.  Sister Bowers came out with me and the first day we met we both thought the other looked familiar but we could never figure out why we knew each other... so we decided we were just best friends in the premortal life!  We had so much fun!  And we saw miracles!  Her trade off goal was to better work with members.  We decided that night we would visit a member who gave a referral to the previous sisters--Sister Goode.  Sister Goode actually served her mission here in Jacksonville!  She invited us right in for hot chocolate and girl scout cookies (and that was the night it was about 34 degrees so it was appreciated!)  We shared a message with her and it really touched her.  She said she would allow us to come back the following day and do service for her, even though she doesn't like to let others serve her.  

Saturday we went back to the Goodes and helped with pinning and cutting a sewing project she had going on.  Then the neighbor she had referred, Cheryl, came over!  We were able to teach her a lesson in the Goode's home and Sister Goode bore testimony!  It was so great!

Sunday was amazing!  Kurtis Williams spoke in church and he invited his neighbors, and they came!!!  There was also a part member family that just moved here and decided they needed to start coming back to church after 15 years--the Cooks.  They want us to teach their two children who were not baptized!  Such a miracle!  That evening we had dinner with the Nuttals.  Sister Nuttal told us she takes Mormon.org cards with her everywhere and hands them out-grocery stores, on campus, etc.  She is such an example!

Well, I hope y'all are having a great week!  Remember Transfers are this week! Talk to y'all next Tuesday!

Love,

Sister Murray