Dear Family and Friends,
This week we were inspired by a member Sister Barrientos. She keeps BOMs in her car so she can give them out to homeless people she meets in hopes that they will read it and change their life.... so we already had BOMs in our car but this homeless lady was asking for money... as missionaries we don't have money so we gave her a granola bar and a book of Mormon.... she then asked us if we were planning on going to the "Rainbow event".... I've been called just about everything on my mission but Lesbian was not one of them.
This week was really fun. We went to downtown little rock and rode the little trolley around and went to these fun thrift shops. We did all the sightseeing and the best thing is we didn't pay a thing. We went out teaching with a member on Tuesday night and we talked with EVERYONE. We went to this neighbor and the member we were with decided to do the next door approach on his own. It was a neat experience to see how members can be missionaries too.
That entire night the Lord put people in our path. We ended the night taking this member to a recent converts and he shared the most amazing testimony about temples and you could feel the spirit soooo strong. Yep... we are getting Luis to the temple. I am super excited this is what it is all about. I'm not just here to baptize all nations but help people prepare for the temple. The joy you feel when help someone prepare for the temple and they get there is soooo much greater than it is when you baptize someone.... I can't explain how much greater the joy is.... My very first convert I baptized on my mission passed away last year. The most exciting part isn't that she was baptized but the exciting part is that even after her death a month later her husband is preparing to be worthy so that he can take her name to the temple and see her work be done.... I can't fully express how much joy that brings to me to know that she will get her temple work done and will help her husband get to the temple in the process.
Wednesday night. We had dinner with sister Culwell again... and this time Jamie (Sister Culwell's nonmember friend that has come over for dinner every week for the past 10 years) asked the elders for a blessing.... this is the closest she has ever come to accepting the gospel and it is the first time she got a blessing.... she told us that she has back pains and had that first steroid injection and that her pains are getting worse. .... SHE HAS THE SAME THING I HAVE. When she said that I'm like "This is crazy, she is sitting right across the table from somebody who literally feels her pain." I talked to her about it for a minute and it is crazy because considering that we have the same thing wrong with our backs I KNOW that I should be in more pain and I KNOW that the Lord is helping me to do his work.
I am forever grateful for this experience to serve a mission. I get to relate with people in ways I never thought I could. I get to help people and I actually feel like I am accomplishing my purpose here on this earth... to help bring others to the celestial kingdom with me. It was one of the sweetest blessings... both sets of elders didn't have oil and fortunately one of the sister missionaries was prepared and had some... so all of you priesthood holders remember that scout motto and: "BE PREPARED" with some oil so that you can help people when they need a blessing and most importantly live your life so that you can be worthy to use that priesthood whenever someone needs it.
I am forever grateful for this experience to serve a mission. I get to relate with people in ways I never thought I could. I get to help people and I actually feel like I am accomplishing my purpose here on this earth... to help bring others to the celestial kingdom with me. It was one of the sweetest blessings... both sets of elders didn't have oil and fortunately one of the sister missionaries was prepared and had some... so all of you priesthood holders remember that scout motto and: "BE PREPARED" with some oil so that you can help people when they need a blessing and most importantly live your life so that you can be worthy to use that priesthood whenever someone needs it.
Thursday night we had an interesting experience. We were at a members house and it started raining and getting windy... like it always does in Little Rock.... we are helping this member's son do homework because the mom doesn't understand English and doesn't have higher than a 2nd grade education herself.... it broke my heart so we offered to help. As we are helping him we hear the tornado sirens go off.... keep in mind this is 8 at night and they only test them in the mornings so you knew it was a legit tornado. We got a text on our phone that there was a warning and we needed to find shelter immediately... we stayed with that member and after about 45 minutes of hearing the tornado sirens and talking with our mission leaders the weather started to calm down and it was safe to return home... they definitely make sure the missionaries are safe on the mission... we had our district leader, sister training leaders, the zone leaders, the ASL sisters, and all of our other leaders making sure everyone was safe. Although the Arkansans here think we are crazy for taking such precautions we always know that we are safe and are going to be safe if we listen to our leaders voices.
We had absolutely no people to teach for 2 days.... we were booked out completely for the past few weeks and now we had absolutely no appointments... we prayed for guidance and found some addresses we could go visit. We went and visited them and were getting in the car and we saw this black woman sitting outside... we felt like we needed to go talk to her. We talked up and introduced ourselves and you could see her head had a huge goose egg on it and although she was wearing sunglasses in the dark you could see her eye was swollen shut. She had been beaten up by her husband. We talked to her and she just started crying. She told us just moments before we walked up she was praying for guidance and help and then we walked up. She just broke down into tears and told us her story. We talked to her and she told us her and her children all want to be baptized... we're specifically Spanish missionaries but hey Elder Zwick said we can teach in English too so why not baptize an English family. It was seriously amazing. Live your life so you can always be in the right place at the right time for the Lord to work his miracles through you.
I love this work and I know that as we follow the counsel of our leaders (just like we did during the tornado) we will be kept spiritually safe from all the spiritual whirlwinds. I know that as you men always strive to be prepared and worthy to use your priesthood that you will have unplanned opportunities to help others and use that priesthood. I know that as we prepare to go to the temple or help prepare someone else to go to the temple that it is one of the most sacred responsibilities that we have on this earth. To not only work towards exaltation but helping all those we love and care about get there as well. It is not God's plan for us to just be there but to help us bring our family and friends there as well. I am so glad they talked about the temple in the women's session. It is such an incredible blessing and the Lord desires all to partake of it. In Lehi's dream of the tree of life he partakes of the fruit or exaltation and desires his family to partake as well. As we share the gospel with our friends and family they too can have part of those incredible blessings that the Lord has in store for us. I love y'all and hope y'all have a good week.
Love,
~Hermana Larissa Johnson