Change is good!?!?!

Sister Lacey and Sister Bishop

District

Elder Martin

Hey y'all!!!

Soooo... I have some big news! Guess who's being transferred!!! That's right! This Sister missionary! I've been kinda freaking out since I found out last night haha! I'm excited for change but also pretty nervous! I bet you are all wondering where I am going... *drumroll please.... REXBURG YSA!!!!! I'm finally gonna serve in a "big city"! I'm staying in the north half of the mission! But it's crazy to think that I'll be in a different zone now! I've been in the Rigby Zone my whole mission and now I'll be in the Rexburg Zone. I am going to be companions with Sister Barreto. She came out with Sister Hurst in July!

Because of transfer and sister Hurst leaving today, this is probably going to be a little shorter. I want to do a quick appreciation for Sister Hurst! She is such an amazing missionary! I have been so blessed to be companions with her the past 3 months! I have learned a lot from her and she has grown so much and I am so grateful that she gets to come back to the IF Mission!!!

This week was an amazing week as well! It is kind of funny because I think I secretly knew I was leaving because of how comfortable I have become here. I feel like I finally have a grasp on a lot of the members and I know the area pretty well (well I hope I would, I have been here for 6 months haha)! It's been a blessing to serve here! I've learned a lot that is going to effect me for the rest of my life! Rigby has become another home to me and I am so grateful for all the amazing people I was able to meet and now they are like my family! It's going to be hard for me to say bye to everyone but I know that it's God's will for me to move! 

We were able to see something pretty amazing this week! Sister Hurst wasn't feeling good so we had to go on splits and I taught a lesson to our 8 and 9 year old investigator. We just asked them the baptismal interview questions and they knew so much! Their answers were so tender and loving! We asked them why we need to be baptized and the 8 year old said, "so we can follow Jesus and keep His commandments"! The member we were with taught him that its also a way we can be clean from sin and he said, "what! I want to be baptized every week then!" it was the cutest thing ever! 

I want to leave y'all with one of my favorite scriptures! Mosiah 3:19

"19 For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father.

I love y'all! I hope y'all have a great week!

Love,

Sister Lacey

Hello!

Hey y'all!

So this is going to be a shorter email today but I feel impressed too tell y'all what I have learned this week. We all know that life is hard, very hard and sometimes I think we get too caught up in life to realize the Eternal perspective of things. My dad has always taught me to look at situations in life with an eternal perspective, and for that, I'm very grateful for him (and also for all the other things he does for me!)

Anyways, I feel like this week I have been able to have a tiny tiny tiny glimpse of what our Savior feels for other people. I thought I kind of already knew, but this week has opened my eyes. I think I found the secret to life. We tend to get too caught up in life and trying to do the best we can in life that I think we forget the main focus of life. We are here to become like God. And the way we can do that is following the perfect example, our Savior, Jesus Christ.

If that is the only thing that we focus on, is becoming like our Savior, we literally cannot fail. He has showed us the perfect path to follow. Just like the scriptures teach us in Helman 5:12, if He is our rock and our foundation, the devil can have no power over us!

I've started to understand that is why I'm on a mission. There are so many people who are hurting and who are in very very dark places and they don't know how to find relief. WE HAVE THE RELIEF!! We need to be sharing it at any chance we get! The Savior is hastening His work. People are ready to receive the gospel. Satan is doing his best to try and convince us otherwise. He wants us to be miserable like him (2 Nephi 2:27).

Not only are people ready to receive the gospel but we need to make sure that our testimonies are firm and those around us know how to have a firm testimony! I think there are more people than we realize who are struggling that we think should know the way to have relief but they don't! Never assume! We need to help them! 

Anyways, I'll get off my soap box now haha! I have just been thinking and pondering about this a lot and I hope that we can all be more committed this week to stand with Mormon when he said, "Behold, I am a disciple of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. I have been called of him to declare his word among his people, that they might have everlasting life." I love you all so much! I hope you have a fantastic week! 

Love, 

Sister Lacey 

Longest Week of My Mission!

Hey Y'all!

I hope y'all had a wonderful week! Ours was sooo good but super long! I'm not 100% sure why but I have some ideas! So I think the main one of why it took so long was because of yesterday... SISTER HURST GOT HER MISSION CALL!!!!! We found out on Thursday that it was ready to be opened and then we had to wait till Sunday! Ugh... I'm not a patient person haha! Good thing the call was with our mission President or I might have peeked ;) but I am sure y'all are dying to know where she got called... She got called to serve as a missionary in the.... (drum roll please) in the best mission on earth!!! That's right!!! The Idaho Idaho Falls mission!!! Ahhh!!!!! I'm so excited she gets to stay!! She's stuck with me! Haha she reports to the MTC Septemper 26th! It was amazing being able to be there with her as she opened it! She is such an amazing missionary! 

So on to what happened this week! I first want to share something that's pretty cool about our mission. So as most of you know, we are a technology mission and because of that, we are able to do missionary work online and through Facebook! Well I have 2 stories to share with you about being a technology missionary. The first one happened a couple weeks ago. Almost everyday we do something called "online proselyting" and we try and find people to share the gospel with. Well I ended up finding this lady who was going through a really hard time from Illinois. I talked with her a little bit through Facebook and then asked her if people could stop by and give her a Book of Mormon and she said yes! We then contacted the missionaries out there and to make a long story short, they are teaching her now! But what is really cool about this is that the elder that we referred her to, came out with me in my mission!! So last year, he was a 2 transfer missionary like Sister Hurst and then got his call to Illinois! Funny how things like that happen! 

The second story has to do with my Brother-in-law, Jason! So we were teaching one of the people we are teaching about agency last Tuesday afternoon. The person we are teaching is getting sooo close to entering the waters of baptism. He already considers himself a member and he basically is. He just had one more hurtle to overcome and he will be there! Anyways, during the lesson. This man mentioned that sometimes it takes him a little bit to grasp things because of how it is different from how he was raised in his past religion. When he said that, I feel like the Spirit hit me with a truck and told me, "Have Jason talk to him!" (Jason and this man have the same religious background). I was able to to contact Jason that day through Facebook and asked him if he would be willing to call him and share with him his conversion story :) I'm not sure if they have been able to talk yet but, I think it is so amazing how blessed we are to be technology missionaries!

I want to share with y'all a little about what I learned this week from experiences, studying and my mission President. So in life I know that we all beat ourselves up because we feel like we are not living up to our full potential. We get frustrated with our weaknesses and don't understand why God trusts us when He knows that we are going to make mistakes. Well this is what I learned this week from that. I decided to study weakness and so I turned to Ether 12:27 which reads, 

"27 And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them."

On my mission, I have tried my hardest to be more like the Savior and that is why more and more of my weaknesses are showing up! Just like it says it the first sentence, "And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness."

Then the next sentence stuck out to me, "I give unto men weakness that they may be humble" and from there I found this scripture in Mosiah 4:11-12, (I shortened it)

"ye have come to the knowledge of the glory of God, or if ye have known of his goodness and have tasted of his love... ALWAYS retain in remembrance, the greatness of God, and your own nothingness, and his goodness and long-suffering towards you, unworthy creatures, and humble yourselves even in the depths of humility, calling on the name of the Lord DAILY, and standing steadfastly in the faith...

...I say unto you that if ye do this ye shall ALWAYS rejoice, and be FILLED with the love of God, and always retain a remission of your sins; and ye shall grow in the knowledge of the glory of him that created you, or in the knowledge of that which is just and true"

We need to be humble and call on the Lord daily. Knowing that without Him, we are nothing! 

I talked about this some with my mission President and he gave me some good advice. He told me to stay positive! I really like that. I find myself slipping into a "negative nelly" mood and it's no fun for me or for those around me. God wants us to be positive and learn from our weakness so that they can become strengths! 

I am sorry this email is kinda long but I have to make up for no email from last week haha! Anyways, I hope y'all know of how much I love the Savior. I am so grateful I get to partake of the Sacrament every week and feel of His love. This upcoming Sunday, I want to challenge all of you to MAKE Sacrament a spiritual experience. Let the Savior take away your burdens and then tell me about it next week :D (if you wanna share) I love y'all do much and hope y'all have a great, safe week!

Love,

Sister Lacey