D&C 123:17

Okay I did not use my time very wisely this week so I'm super sorry about that. This will be brief!

Here are a few semi-important things we did this week:
1. TEMPLE TRIP and sister Howell and I actually took a picture together!

2. We had to do a zone training because #STLduties. This was incredibly stressful, but ended up not being that horrible! It's weird for me training missionaries on how to be missionaries when I've only been out 5 months and don't even know myself how to be a missionary. But oh well.

3. We had our first exchange with the Conyers sisters! Exchanges are different now... both companionship's work the same area, rather than splitting up and it is SO STRESSFUL to plan for. Basically you are planning for two days in one. Planning has been my biggest weakness but thankfully the Lord has been blessing me to get things done!

4. John and Erika are progressing BEAUTIFULLY. Erika loves to read the Book of Mormon and prays every night! (Reminder: she's 11 and is a Less-active's foster child). She's also been super interested in temples lately... we found her a picture of the El Salvador temple (her homeland!) and she LOVES it--She said she wants to get married there one day! :) CUTE

5. We saw Sister C and Franklin this week (12 hairless cats lady) and Franklin has A CAT LANGUAGE. Yep, he was speaking to his cats in this language the other day. Probably the highlight of my whole mission.

Okay, I'm going to be brutally honest for a second. This week was HARD. One of the harder weeks I've had on my mission. Lots of tears shed, but also lots of answered prayers. 

It has been a huge struggle to be working hard following up with people in an effort to build up the teaching pool and seeing ZERO results. (You know how I am--I'm a bit of a perfectionist, and i like to be the best). I know that's how missionary work goes, but that doesn't make it any easier. The longer this goes on, the more Satan has been working on me. It's been difficult to feel like I'm using the Lord's time wisely when the "numbers" are low, and there aren't any results happening on the surface. I've been having a lot of negative thoughts about the impact I'm actually making as a missionary, and at times have questioned my decision to serve (as I'm sure many past missionaries can relate), so the motivation to go out and work hard has been extremely low.

One thought that has kept me going however came from my dear  companion Sister Howell and it literally changed my whole perspective. During a hard, tear filled companion study we had this week, she shared D&C 123:17 with me (somehow I've never heard this one), and it's become my new favorite scripture!

"Therefore, dearly beloved brethren, let us cheerfully do all things that lie in our power; and then may we stand still with the utmost assurance to see the salvation of God and for His arm to be revealed."

This verse has been going through my head all week long. It's hard for me to put my thoughts into words so I hope this comes out the way I want it to.

Sometimes in life, we go through really hard things. Sometimes life doesn't really turn out the way we want it to and we have to change our game plan. Sometimes what we want isn't always what God wants. But no matter what, He is always going to do what is best for us, and our efforts really do matter. As long as we keep pressing forward with a happy attitude and do everything we possibly can, God will make up for the rest. 

It's really hard to see what's going on "behind the scenes" when all we can see is our own movie screen, but if we take a step back, we are able to refocus our perspective and see the big picture. Heavenly Father truly does have His hand in our lives every step of the way and He knows what is best for us! This life is short but we are going to succeed! Our efforts DO matter and we ARE doing a lot of good. I've learned a lot about gratitude this week and it's really helped me to focus on the positives of the work we are doing, despite the lack of results we've seen: The faith of our less-actives is increasing ENORMOUSLY, our investigators are progressing at a faster rate now that we have more time to focus on them, and we are definitely planting a lot of seeds. I know that my efforts matter and that Sister Howell and i are doing a lot more for this area that we realize. 

I'm thankful that God is mindful of me and my situation, and I know that He's mindful of YOURS too. Keep your chin up, it's going to all work out in the end. :)

I LOVE YOU ALL and have definitely felt your prayers this week! i appreciate you.  Also you were all my Valentines this week.

Song of the week: Never Gone--Colton Dixon. (Lots of head-banging in a spiritual way to this one)

BYE

Sister Lawson

 

Temple fo daaaayyyzz

Matching. On purpose. (Me and Sister Howell

 

 

 

I AM HAPPY

Why am I so happy, you ask?

HAPPY BECAUSE I love my companion Sister Howell and I found out this week she's the funniest person I've ever met AND she has wonderful taste in TV shows and music.

HAPPY BECAUSE we came up with a new hashtag this week--#YOSMO (you only serve a mission once)

HAPPY BECAUSE we are going to the temple this week and I've missed it so so soooooooooo much.

HAPPY BECAUSE I'm super stressed to the max with STL responsibilities like training and exchanges. But stressed in the best possible way. :)

HAPPY BECAUSE we are seeing major success and miracles from practicing teaching the five lessons to the members of the ward.

HAPPY BECAUSE there are a lot of former investigators we are going to follow up with this week and may see success from that.

HAPPY BECAUSE we saw Frank this week and he didn't yell at us.

HAPPY BECAUSE we ate Steak N Shake this week <3

HAPPY BECAUSE we got to see Sister C and her 12 cats and teach Franklin!
HAPPY BECAUSE Franklin came to church yesterday!

HAPPY BECAUSE all of our lessons with investigators fell through this week but that's okay.

HAPPY BECAUSE it was Fast Sunday yesterday!

HAPPY BECAUSE John has been reading the Book of Mormon!

HAPPY BECAUSE missionary work is hard. 

HAPPY BECAUSE the weather has been beautiful.

HAPPY BECAUSE I'm actually understanding the war chapters in the Book of Mormon.

HAPPY BECAUSE I miss my family but that's okay.

HAPPY BECAUSE I have bags under my eyes because I'm tired.

HAPPY BECAUSE we didn't die on our way home from Peach Tree City in Atlanta traffic.

HAPPY BECAUSE we are so busy finding new people to share the restored gospel with!

HAPPY BECAUSE I love Jesus Christ.

HAPPY BECAUSE I love being a missionary. 

HAPPY BECAUSE my testimony is stronger than it's ever been.

HAPPY BECAUSE I know who I am--a daughter of a loving Heavenly Father.

HAPPY BECAUSE I can see my conversion deepen every day and can see my progression from week to week.

HAPPY BECAUSE I have finally started to understand the magnitude of love the Savior had for us all when we performed the Atonement. 

HAPPY BECAUSE I can use the Atonement every single day to help me get through the hard times and sad times and bad times.

HAPPY BECAUSE God loves me no matter what.

HAPPY BECAUSE He has a perfect and divine plan of happiness for all of his children, no matter their physical, emotional, mental or financial state.

HAPPY BECAUSE I have the privilege of sharing that knowledge with His children in Georgia every single day.

I know that this email is super cliche.

I don't know how to close it up so i'll leave it at that haha.

LOVE YOU ALL.

Love Sister Lawson

Songs of the week:
"Touchdown Jesus"--Tim McGraw

"That Old King James"--Scotty McCreary

(Sister Howell has converted me to Christian Country music. D*NG IT)

Some favorite quotes of the week from Sister Howell:
"TOTES DEF." x1000000 every day.... #whitegirlinATL

"I don't really like boxed nuggets so you can just make some dino nuggets for yourself, i just want some for the pictures i'm gonna take."

*reads Numbers 13:33 to me in comp study* "Moral of the story is we are not grasshoppers."

"I'm going to convert Scotty McCreary so we can get married."

Mucho Miracles

Oh my heck, I'm still dying because my new companion is Sister Howell who was actually in my YSA ward at USU! SMALL WORLD! It's mostly hilarious because we talked on Facebook before coming out and joked around about us becoming companions and now here we are!

Fun facts about Sister Howell:

1. She LOVES the weirdest things: Vinegar, black licorice and chocolate covered raisins. She says she could drink vinegar, she loves it so much.

2. She has a beautiful singing voice! mostly she loves to sing Italian arias if that gives you a clue of her skill level. :)

3. She is basically a Disney princess I decided.

4. She's been out 8 months and served the entirety of that time in Tucker/Norcross area.

This week in Snellville was BUSY.

Most of the time was spent going to see members and getting Sister Howell introduced to everyone. We have been running around everywhere! But she's a champ and is handling it well. :) It's been fun to watch her get to know everyone and it's funny because i'm starting to realize how unique our ward actually is hahaha.

The amount of people we are teaching is really small. When i say really small, I mean it's about the size of 1. Being the one taking the lead in the area, I decided to completely scrap most of those we were teaching because there was very little progress being made and I couldn't figure out why we had held onto them for so long in the first place. So Sister Howell and I will be starting almost entirely from scratch which I am pumped about! It's good to get some new blood in the area... it was feeling pretty dry. But yeah, I've got this whole new fire for missionary work. I mean Ive always had "greenie fire" but this is something different. It's exciting to just get a change sometimes!

We've had a ton of success with seeing less actives in the ward lately... that has become one of my favorite things about missionary work. Getting to work with people who haven't been for a while and befriending them and helping them come back into activity. :) One person we've been working with hasn't come for almost 20 years, so he remembers very little about the doctrine. We pretty much just teach him like an investigator. But this week, he told us HE KNOWS THE CHURCH IS TRUE! this is a huge step for him so we were so excited! :)

We also have been working with an older woman in the ward who is like 78 and is still fostering children for a living. Right now, she has an 11 year old girl named Erica and a baby boy who are THE CUTEST. Sister Howell and I have really connected with her. Hanging out with her kind of reminds me of those Oakcrest days :) So this week, we were reading scriptures together and Erica wanted her own Book of Mormon because she gets bored sitting around the house and she also wanted to come to church this week! WHICH SHE DID! We had to do this mad-treasure hunt to find her a dress, but mission accomplished. She totally came to church! We really love Erica. Since she's a foster child, there are all these complications with actually being able to teach her, so right now we are just loving her and giving her some friendship and trying to plant some seeds for further down the road. 

The best part of the week by far was introducing Sister Howell to my FAVE sis C (the one with 12 hairless cats). Man, she's a trip! I'll attach a picture she was showing us this week that was the highlight of my life that i asked her to email me.

MOM--WE SAW LUNJUA THIS WEEK

We were driving down the road, and all of a sudden BOOM! I got hit with the Spirit so hard that we needed to go see her and she was right down the road. So we go and SHE WAS HOME. Oh my heck, it was crazy. And such a happy reunion! I haven't seen her since my 2nd day out here...it was nuts. But yeah, she's doing great and we are gonna try to see her again later this week. :) THE SPIRIT IS SO COOL.

There were so many other miracles this week that it's almost impossible to count them, and some of them are too sacred to share. One thing that was many very apparent to me as we went about working this week was that God truly is mindful of ALL of His children, no matter the circumstances. He cares about us individually and knows exactly what we need, exactly when we need it. If we are doing the work, God will put us into the paths of those who truly need to feel of His love. I have a strong testimony of the power of prayer, and following the promptings of the spirit and I know that He is ALWAYS there.

Welp, that's all folks.

Stay sassy.

LOVE YOU

Sister Lawson

 

1. The classiest and the sassiest District.

2. Us, Kate and Kangaroo scrotum coin pouch (don't ask)

(sorry no pics of me and Sis Howell because I stink)

3. The 12 hairless cats of Sister C

 

 

 

 

MUCH JOY

Hello friends and family!
The transfer news is in... I will be staying here in Snellville and Sister Russell will be heading out to go bless some lives somewhere else! Also funny story: I have been called to be a Sister Training Leader so that adds a whole lot more stress and puke into my life, but it's fine. I didn't find out through the traditional way of getting a phone call but rather through an email i recieved this morning with instructions hahahaha. NO BUENO

The happiest news of it all is that SHENELLE WAS BAPTIZED THIS WEEK. 

Sister Russell and I both spoke (her on Baptism, me on Holy Ghost) and IT WAS AWESOME. Sister Russell shared some cute thoughts about how baptism is the first step on our "path back home to our Father" and i shared a little analogy of someone going through a cave with a broken flashlight--when she stayed on the path, it worked continuously, and when she got distracted by the sparkly things on the walls, it would stop working. But yeah, she did awesome! Shenelle is super super SUPER shy, so she was terrified of being in front of everyone for the baptism, and also in church the next day when she had to go in front of people to get the Holy Ghost. So we went up with her and everything to make her less scared haha. But yeah, it was good! It's really hard to put into words the spirit that was felt there, but just know that it was SO STRONG. And the house was packed with support from the Youth so that was AWESOME. 

Okay here is some hilarious fun facts about the South:

Earlier this week, we received a "severe storm warning" saying that there would be an ice storm and major snow. Whenever this happens, the South goes nuts and on lock-down and raid the grocery stores of all their bread and milk to prepare for said-lock down. LITERALLY ALL THE BREAD AND MILK. Nothing else. This is something I don't understand because if you get stuck in your house, who wants to eat bread and milk all day erry day? Not me. But here's the most hilarious part... the storm came annddd.....1 INCH OF SNOW FOR 3 HOURS. Hahahaha Georgians be cray.

Other exciting news is that our car got SUPER stuck in the mud. Like so so stuck. So we had to be towed out by a nice man who pulled over named Bradford. 

On Sunday, us and the Elders sang "Abide with me, 'tis even tide" in sacrament meeting.. that was........a train wreck to say the least. Favorite quotes afterwards..."Oh that was a mess, it's okay though, the spirit was there. He fills in the gaps." YIKES.

MIRACLE OF THE WEEK:

Okay this is the coolest thing. Our investigator John called us this week and relayed the following:
"Sisters, i just wanted to tell you that I've been doing what you said--trying to pray more often myself and together with my family. And i read some more of the Book of Mormon like you asked me to. But mostly i called to tell you about something cool that happened that let me know that God loves me. My wife came home with a check for $1000 from her boss because the boss just wanted to help us out and felt inspired to give us this money. So we should be able to save up enough for the next few months so we don't lose our house." 

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?? It was so cool, we got to bear our testimonies to him that God is blessing him because he's trying to change his life around and making the best choices!! JOHN IS SO COOL.  Sorry, that's the sweetened condensed version of that story... but still, so cool.

Awkward moment of the week:

*Going to see an Inactive member of the ward in her 70s who hasn't been to church since the 80s when she was baptized*

*Chewing and spitting tobacco the entirety of our visit*

*Doesn't "do" the Book of Mormon*

*Denchers (Dentures) fall out*

*Cries*

*We leave*

Okay that's about all...sorry i ran out of time!
I LOVE YOU ALL

STAY SASSYYYY 

Love,

Sister Lawson

1. It was a bit windy, but that's how much snow we got hahahaha

2. Cake in the face from Shenelle last week.

3. Photos with our fave elders (Far left, DL and comp, middle guys are Zone leaders)

 

 

Writing weekly emails. . . .

I am really sorry but I honestly just don't have the energy to write a huge email this week haha. Also I don't really have too much time.... but ill try.

Not much happened, but we did have to make a last minute trip to Conyers to fix our car because it was recalled this week. So I guess that was exciting. But it was really unproductive and kind of threw off the rest of the week.

Most exciting things:

-SHENELLE IS GETTING BAPTIZED THIS WEEKEND! Shes all ready to go and we are so pumped for her.

-We had an awesome awesome AWESOME lesson with john this week! Teaching John has been very slow.. we just teach him simply, almost like a primary lesson haha. But this week we had a BREAKTHROUGH. We brought over our awesome, go-to team up Sister Austin and the spirit was just so so so strong. We didn't know it at the time, but our team-up has a son who really struggles to read, just like John and so they got to have a tender moment talking about how reading the scriptures came easier to him as he read more and more. And it was so cool because John has officially started to understand how much God loves him and how the scriptures are helping him. Sorry this isn't explained very well but just know that it was awesome and John is my best friend.

-Got to eat Chick-Fil-A TWICE this week. Georgia Chick-Fil-A is the best Chick-Fil-A.

-I lived my Georgia dream of driving on Highway 20, just like that one Zac Brown Band song. SO EXCITING

-Shenelle threw cake in my face for her birthday. It made me feel like I was back at Oakcrest haha.

-Sister Russell and I will be singing in church next sunday. Send major prayers my way please.

-One of the members gave me a Mockingjay pin so I've been rocking that all week.

Despite the lack of emotion in this email, I just feel so overwhelmed with love and gratitude for what my mission has given me. In just 4 months, I've seen myself progress in ways I never thought I would, my family has grown closer, their testimonies have been strengthened, and I have just an overall understanding of the love God has for me, the people of Georgia and the people of the world in general. He really is so mindful of each of us and our situations and wants to bless us so much! Its so hard for me to put into words but just know that my heart is so full today. I LOVE YOU ALL!

 

Love,

Sister Lawson

$4months$wag$$$$$$

Yep, i've been out 4 months! IT'S FLOWN BYYyyyyyyy.........

I also learned some new Southern slang...

Purple Drank (n): "purple" flavored Koolaid. A classic beverage served alongside fried chicken, grits, baked beans, and canned green beans.

Also something i just noticed this week... literally everyone who feeds us ALWAYS gives us green beans from a can that have been cooked in water filled with bacon fat and bits. Yep, it's strange. 

To be completely honest, this week was insanely eventful, but for reasons i can't explain through email because ward/member confidentiality rules haha... So other than that, it was pretty uneventful. Sister Russell may say otherwise, but i thought it was relatively boring.

Updates on current investigators:

Shenelle: She's getting baptized January 23rd!!! :) super pumped about that.

Barbara: fell off the face of the earth...

Lunjua: still off the face of the earth....

John: AWESOME. Definitely progressing!

This week we picked up a lot of new people that we are hoping to follow up with next week! For whatever reason, the whole world decided to be nice and talk to us. it was strange. One day, almost every door we knocked at opened and they were all really nice and really "I love Jesus"-y so that's good news. But yeah, hopefully something good comes out of that so i'll keep ya posted. :) 

Other miracles:

-At the EXACT moment when Sister Russell and i were about to die from starvation, the DL and comp came in clutch with some Taco Bell for us. Shout out to Elder Solomon and Elder Roper!

-One night we had planned to go see a less-active family in the ward and at the exact same time, the Snellville Elders felt inspired to go see them both as well! So we pull up, the elders pull up, we have some awkward conversation about who gets to go talk to them, and then the family pulls up in the driveway as well! CRAZY. For whatever reason, someone needed to go see this family and the spirit guided us both to go. :) Heavenly Father is awesome!

-Within the course of 2 days, we had 4 team-ups with members scheduled and they all came through. this is huge because we can almost NEVER find people from the ward to come out with us.

-We met the Regional Manager for Krispy Kreme donuts this week and he had the COOLEST dreads. Also he wanted to meet with us again! #DonutsfromHeaven

-One of the recent converts we've been working with a TON got her temple recommend for baptisms on sunday! She's also planning on going through the temple for her endowment in March and we are possibly going to get to go to that. :) we are so excited!!!!!

 

Other than that, that's about all that happened... It's been so so SO rainy and cold. Literally the humidity makes it 109435x worse than Utah cold... i haven't felt warm once in 3 days!

Despite the quiet week, this week i just felt so so grateful that I get to be a missionary. As hard as it sometimes is to set apart these 18 months from life back at home, there really is nothing more rewarding to me. I get to bless a few lives along the way, but more than anything my OWN life is being blessed--present and future. I'm so so thankful for everything God has given me and for the testimony I have that Jesus Christ's full gospel has been restored back onto the earth. The gospel of Jesus Christ truly does fix anything. 

My wise friend Kimber wrote me a letter this week about how understanding the gospel has increased her "spiritual recovery" time. I think that's so cool! Understanding the doctrine of Christ really does change everything--we understand that we must have faith in the plan God has for us, repent so we can become better every day, and remember the covenants we've made and the things we are promised from our Heavenly Father when we hold up our end of the deal. When we understand this, we are able to get back onto our feet faster when something hard comes into our path. I know that to be so true! I feel myself getting stronger and stronger everyday. Things that once bothered me or upset me no longer have the power to tear me down, and getting back on my feet is easier now that I understand how the gospel truly works. I have a purpose in this life, I know who I am, I know the potential I have, and nothing will ever stop me from progressing! I am so thankful for the gospel of Jesus Christ and for the membership I have in His church!

Be good, be safe, don't do dumb things and REMEMBER WHO YOU ARE!

Sistah Lawson

 

1. our matching christmas shirts <3

2. chowin'

3. Taco Bell (lifesaver) Crunchwrappppppp

4. Sister Coble! The cutest old lady of all time. Eatin' some Cheeseburger pringles.

 

Oxtails and Google Cardboard

It's freakin' chilly!

Pretty much I'm going to just skip to Thursday because that's where all the important stuff happens. 

First off, rewind:

Probably in my first month here in Georgia, Sister Russell and I were out tracting and we ran into this lady named Barbara. She was the coolest! She instantly accepted the apostasy and restoration of the gospel and we actually put her on date for baptism November 7th the day we met her. Literally she is so golden. The only thing is that she's been incredibly hard to meet with because she is ALWAYS working. Like always. So whenever we were in her neighborhood, we would drop by to see if she was there and we had either just missed her, or caught her as she was leaving. So yeah, she's a busy lady. But every time we talked to her she said "yeah I've been reading the Book of Mormon!" SO COOL. Then for a while we kind of stopped trying to pursue her because it wasn't going anywhere. 

Okay so fast forward to now:

Wednesday night, we are planning for Thursday and we get this HUGE impression that we needed to go drop by Barbara's house. So we did. BARBARA HAD THE DAY OFF. this is huge. We actually got in to have a real life lesson with Barbara and it was probably one of the most powerful lessons we've had yet here in Snellville! She told us that all of her life, she's felt spiritually empty. She's always read the bible but just has never felt like she's going anywhere or that she's getting her fix, especially when she goes to church. Her exact words: "I've been to a lot of churches and I don't mean to sound rude but none of them feel right. There's a lot of foolishness going on in those churches and i never feel like i come out having learned something or come out wanting to be better. I come out feeling just as empty as i did when i entered. I want to go somewhere where my questions about life get answered and where i feel like my relationship with God is being strengthened every time i go. I want something that makes me feel whole and i just haven't found it yet. What is your advice about how i can feel whole?" DING DING DING DING!!!!!! I'm tellin ya, she's golden. So we got to just sit and listen to her talk to us about all these things she has going on in her life and how she feels like if she had a better relationship with God, she would feel happier, but she just didn't know how to make it happen. We got to testify to her boldly that she has found what she's looking for! That the gospel of Jesus Christ is the thing that can help her to progress and become truly happy in this life, amidst all the struggles she is going through. We relayed the story of planning the night before to her and testified to her that the Spirit led us to her at that exact moment for a reason! She was so pumped, and so were we! The spirit was so strong and I know that God was so mindful of Barbara at that very moment. We put her on date for baptism on January 30th!!!!!!! WOOOOO BLESSIN'S. Such a miracle! Man, i love being a missionary.

Thursday we were also talking to a man who was originally very scaryish and rough around the edges at the park--i'll call him B. B has been involved in some crazy stuff throughout his life. While we were talking to him, B told us that he doesn't think there's a purpose to life, and that's why he lives life to it's fullest everyday--doing drugs, drinking, immorality, breaking the law, the whole 9 yards. (He was very open and honest haha.) But it was cool to be able to talk to him about the Plan of Salvation! When we first started talking to him, he was very standoffish and closed off, but the more we talked to him, we saw his whole countenance change and he became very interested. it was the coolest thing! He was totally floored when he found out we didn't do drugs or anything that he does and we were STILL so happy! Seriously, he couldn't figure it out. We talked together for 45 minutes about the purpose of life and how we are here to prepare to meet God. He told us he was going to come to church (he didn't). Although nothing really came of it, it was cool to be able to put some new questions into his head about why we are here and where we are going when we die. Woo!

Thursday night also involved an appointment with Rainy and her family. I'm still confused about what happened... An Indian man opened the door, we explained we were there to see Rainy and her family, he allowed us in, sat us on the couch and left us there for 45 minutes while we tried to avoid watching Indian soap operas with an older Indian woman on the other couch. It's Monday and I'm still really confused about what happened. #LanguageBarriers

As for the title of this email, my new favorite food is Jamaican oxtails. Also, Dad--I need you to buy me 12 Google Cardboards for when I come home because they are the coolest and I just found out what those were this week. 

My goals for this year/for the end of my mission (cliche but oh well):

1. Finish Personal Progress!

2. Begin reading the bible from the beginning daily.

3. Write my testimony down every fast Sunday. (life long goal actually)

So yeah, in case you can't tell already, this week was AWESOME. everything is awesome. Life is awesome, missionary work is awesome, the gospel is awesome and YOU are awesome.

Love y'all.

BYE

-Sistah Lawson

Real life quotes from this week:

"You know, Bob Marley was a prophet."

*us talking to B about how weed doesn't help us focus on Jesus* B-"No actually, have you ever tried weed? It helps me to focus MORE."

 

1. Us with Shenelle and family!

2. Objects that we stole from the zone leaders ... don't ask

3. Selfie of the week

4. Us with cute sister McWilliams (also rockin' the new skirt)