08/04/14 - Week 77-Final Week! {Week 6 of Transfer 13} "Goodbyes"

Hi family and friends :D

I am overwhelmed with feelings about thinking that this week is my last week as a full-time missionary here in the Ohio Cincinnati mission. Time has gone by so quickly, but also slowly. I think that time is pleated. It looks short from behind, but when you think of all that has happened, it opens up and you realize how long it has been. I have changed and grown so much on my mission. My mission president says that I really have been "born again." I have relied so much on my Savior through every day and hour. He has truly become my best friend. I call out to Him each day so many times, that I can't number it. I know He loves me and all of you so much.

This week we pushed and pushed. We didn't have some crazy numbers to end my mission, but we worked as hard as we could. We had some really neat things happen through God's grace. There was one evening that we needed to find another new investigator to reach our goals. We were going to contact a referral, and were walking down the street. I saw a lady outside smoking, (as missionaries, you talk to everyone) so I said a little prayer and told Heavenly Father that I would talk to her if he kept her outside. And sure enough, she stayed out. We went up and started a conversation that turned out really good. We are going back to teach her this week! {well...the sisters who will be here....}.

Then last night, we again needed one more new investigator to meet our weekly goal of 7 new investigators. It was 8:48pm and we didn't have any idea where to go. We had the thought to go see a family, so we drove over to the area. As we were driving by, I saw a few people outside that we had talked to briefly before, but never had much of a gospel conversation. We drove past the house of the family we were going to see, and all of the cars were gone. So we thought, "Okay Heavenly Father, you sent us over here to find someone, but who is it?" I thought again of the people I saw outside, so we decided to park and walk over. It was a really good conversation! It flowed really well, and it wasn't awkward!! How awesome is that?? [It doesn't happen too often as a missionary]. We have an appointment to see them this week too! God blessed us with 2 new investigators instead of just 1 new. He is amazing. I have learned that He is always in control. If you will just follow what He asks you to do, then He will provide the way to do it. Just like it says in 1 Nephi 3:7. The Lord doesn't give you a commandment without providing a way that you can accomplish it.

Deanna is doing great! She came to church last week with her two little boys and we were nervous she didn't like it because it was hectic with all of the kids. But she told us that she really enjoyed it! We invited her to be baptized at the end of this month and she is working to quit smoking. She got a priesthood blessing last night, so it shouldn't be a problem :) She is such an amazing lady! She went to brunch by herself to a members home with some other members. {again, that doesn't happen very often}. It was great! Then she had another lesson and dinner at the same members home last night. And we will have a lesson tonight at their home. She is so excited about everything, and so am I! :D She prayed for someone to come talk to her, and we showed up. God is amazing. That's all I can say.

Well that is all the time I have. :( But, this is my final testimony that I emailed in for our mission newsletter:

~~My mission has changed me in ways that I never thought were possible. I know that this is the Lord's work and He is in charge. I am privileged to have been able to serve Him. We are changing eternities as we share what we know with our brothers and sisters. Never give up and never look back. Move forward with your face towards the Son, and the shadows will fall behind you. This is the Lord's kingdom. We have all of the truth. We have a living prophet today and as we listen to him and our leaders, we will never go astray. I love this church and this gospel. I have become a more dedicated disciple of Jesus Christ and I will continue that discipleship the rest of my life. All that you have to do is do your best, the Lord will always take care of you. Let Him mold you and change you. Just like my Dad always told me, "Winds of adversity that snuff out a match, only make a torch burn brighter." So let your torch burn within you and we will light up the world!~~

I love you all so much! I will see you soon :D

Lots of Love,

Sister Farr

07/28/14 - Week 76! {Week 5 of Transfer 13} " ~ ~ Fish~~"

Hey :D

It was a good week! It was full of obstacles to overcome (which is to be expected since we had a baptism), but we made it!! :D So we went fishing this morning...at 10am...for P-day....it was a great adventure! We caught some blue gill fish, then 2 huge bass, and a snapping turtle!!! It was quite the experience. I will have some videos to show you that are too big to email. It was tons of fun. Sister Diana Anderson has a pond in her backyard and let us come and fish in it. We had hot dogs we were using and then we used some crawdads that we caught in the stream. I thought Dad would be proud of that :) haha. It really was fun though.

 But also, for the past year and a half I have been fishing the whole time. Just being a fisher of men. I am so privileged to have been in the service of our Heavenly Father. This work is amazing. It is the most rewarding work in the world. I am excited to finish off this last week and then to continue serving him for the rest of my life. There is still so much to be done before our Savior comes again. We need to "catch" as many of our brothers and sisters as we can. Our Father in Heaven wants them to be able to return home to Him.

As you were all wondering....yes, Janet got baptized this weekend! And it was amazing. It was stressful to get everything done. We had a mix up with the interview and spent most of Thursday calling people and stressing out.  But God worked it all out, and she is a member of the Kingdom of God now! Her husband came to the baptism and it was amazing. After she was baptized she looked up, clapped her hands, and said, "Thank you Jesus!" She has been so excited all week for this day. She was beaming all day at church after her confirmation. She is so excited to be a part of this gospel. Her husband talked with us a little bit after the baptism and told us that it probably wouldn't be long before he was coming around. {And at the beginning of this journey, he told Janet he didn't want any part in it.} He came to church yesterday with her for her confirmation, and we have an appointment with them on Saturday! I am so excited for her and her husband. They will be sealed in the temple in no time.

We also had a neat experience finding a new investigator. We saw her for the first time last Sunday taking in groceries as we were talking with her neighbor. We offered to help, but she declined. She looked so tired and worn out. It stuck with me. The next day, I saw her driving down the street, and thought, "We have to go talk to her." So on Monday evening, one of our appointments fell through, and so we went to her apartment. We knocked, and she let us right in. When we explained how we felt lead to go and talk to her, she teared up. During our next appointment, she told us that she had prayed that someone would come and talk to her.....and then we showed up. God is soooooo amazing! She is a single mom of two little boys, and is so sweet. Her older boy is so sweet! And he likes me too :) I guess he likes girls with long hair, and so since the first day, he has been my bud. On Sunday morning, people were falling through to come to church. We had the thought to stop by her home. We did, and she accepted to come. We picked her up and she came! Within a week of finding her, she came!!!! Maybe that doesn't seem crazy to any of you, but in Hebron, that is a rare happening. She is amazing. It was a stressful experience in some of the meetings with her kids, but the ladies in the ward were so sweet to help her. I can definitely tell she has lots of potential in the gospel. Keep praying for her too! :D

Other than that, we had a pretty normal week. We stopped by lots of people, talked with lots of people, went on Exchanges with Sister Webb and Jenkins, mowed a lawn, made cookies for people...you know, the normal every day missionary life. There is still lots to do here before I go. We are having another mission leadership council on Friday, and I am sooo happy I get to be here for another one of them. You are just so inspired and uplifted. I again am so grateful for my mission. I am a different person because of it. I am still my quiet, quirky self, but I have a much stronger testimony and desire to follow our Savior.

Keep your faith strong! Walk forward, and don't look back.

I love you all!

 - Sister Farr

07/21/14 - Week 75! {Week 4 of Transfer 13} "FROG"

Hello :)

So I held a little frog this week! It was like those cute tree frogs that you see on all of the magazines..it was bright lime green! I loved it! We were on exchanges (I was with Sister Blackburn) and we were following up with a former investigator. As we talked, she said that there was a frog stuck to her outside brick wall! So Sister Blackburn climbed up some steps and poked it. It flew right off! And we caught it :D It was slimy and so cute! Her kids came out and we got to let it go in their garden. I have never held a frog like that before. Her family was so sweet, they aren't interested in learning more right now, but one day they will be, I can tell! :D

The OTHER reason why Frog was the title was because the other week we met "Brother FROG" But as he put it, F.R.O.G = Fully Rely on God. That is exactly what we have had to do all week this week! But we are seeing so many blessings come. We found 12 new investigators and had 3 people at church. It has been hard to get people to come to church in this area, but God is helping us to change that pattern. Slowly, but surely!

We are so excited for this upcoming weekend. Our investigator, Janet, is getting baptized! She moved in the day I got here 2.5 months ago and she is so prepared. We met her when she was moving in and offered to help her. We had some brief chats with her for a few weeks and then one week she stopped us. She talked about how she has noticed that the people in our congregation are very much different than any other she has met. She had been to lots of different churches, but since moving here she has had a lot of contact with our church and noticed a difference. SHE asked US if she could learn. (!!) Within 6 weeks of starting to teach her, she is getting baptized! Her husband was very against it at first. He said he would never get baptized or convert. He told her she better not convert either. But this past week at church she talked to us about how his heart is softening. She talked to him about wanting to get baptized, and he was actually okay with it! He has been asking her questions about church and things. He said, as long as they don't worship that prophet guy, then I am okay with it. She then asked him if he would like to watch a movie about Joseph Smith so he could understand him better. So she showed him the "Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration" movie on YouTube. He is being prepared. We have been praying for him and we are excited to see how he starts to progress. He is going to come to her baptism and confirmation next week also! God has softened his heart in amazing ways! So.......... he should be joining the church soon too. :) The Lord worked miracles for her and her family. She told us at church yesterday that she has complete peace about the whole thing. No matter what we teach or she learns, she accepts it. She said that this church is the missing piece she has needed her whole life. She loves the Book of Mormon and all it teaches. She is the most prepared person I have ever taught. I feel so privileged to be able to teach her more and be a part of her conversion process. :D

We had a crazy cool thing happen on Friday of this last week. It was the day I was with Sister Blackburn and we were trying to reach our goal to find a new investigator that day. The night before, when I was going to sleep, a name popped into my head of a lady we met earlier in the week that we should see the next day. As we were driving around I remembered her, so we headed over. She had offered to cut our hair (since she is going through hair school) and we decided to take her up on it. We went by, and she just pulled up from school. We talked with her for a while and set up an appointment for next Monday to come and get our hair trimmed, but I wasn't sure how to bring up the church again in a smooth way. So I said a prayer and asked Heavenly Father for something to come up. As we talked with her, her daughter came up and started chatting with us too. She had at T-shirt on....and there was just something about it that kept drawing my eye. the top of it said "Need Answers? Ask God!" So we commented on the shirt, and she said "I don't even know where I got it. I just threw it on today." As I kept reading, the scripture reference at the bottom was...........................James 1:5. (<---no way!!). Heavenly Father is so amazing! So it was an easy transition into the restoration of the gospel. We explained that it was because of that scripture that our church was started. We went on to explain the first vision, and it was an incredible experience! Both her and her daughter were glued. She is excited to learn more and so is her daughter! I am really excited about their family :)

We are also really excited about Camill and Alyssa and their Dad. They are the two girls who got baptized a month or so ago. Their dad was learning for a while, but then messaged us and said he didn't want to learn anymore. Well, this week, he saw us outside and stopped us. He said that he has noticed the difference since he hasn't been praying and reading. Everything has gotten hectic for them. He told us that he wants to learn again, because he knows it is what he needs :) We are beyond excited! He is such a sweet dad to them and he is prepared to hear the gospel. Keep praying for them! And for their mom's heart to be softened :)

This work is incredible! I love being able to share this gospel with people each day. My mission has taught me so many amazing lessons. Things that would have taken me years to learn, you learn in 6 weeks out here. I am so thankful to my Heavenly Father for allowing me to serve for him at this time. This is not just a church. This is the Kingdom of God on earth. And He is the King. I love this church. I know that it is true. No matter what doubts I have, He clears them up, every time. I hope you all have a wonderful week full of joy and happiness! 

I LOVE YOU!!

Sister Farr 

p.s. We ran out of paper plates...so we took our goodies to people in old pizza boxes :) When you are a missionary, sometimes you have to be creative ;)

07/14/14 - Week 74! {Week 3 of Transfer 13} "People Can Change!"

Hi :D

So today it hit me that I will be home in about 3 weeks. I don't even know what has happened to this transfer. It has just flown by! Time is running out. I just want to shove everyone in our car and make them all get baptized and take them to the temple! haha just kidding. I know I can't do that. I just love this gospel and I know how much it is going to change people's lives!

We are working with our neighbor to be baptized on the 26th of this month! She is so prepared! She has been to church 3 times, has read up to 1 Nephi 17, has a testimony of the prophet Joseph Smith... :D Each time that we come over to teach her, she is just so open. She came to church yesterday and we had a really deep lesson on the priesthood in Relief Society. I was really nervous about it and if she would understand. A lot of deep doctrine came up and I wasn't sure how she would take it. But I kept reminding myself that God knew she would be there that day and he would take care of it. And sure enough, when we followed up, she was just fine with it all. She loves coming to church and all of the people there. She is just so prepared. She has such an open mind and heart. She has gone through so much in her life, and it has all prepared her to accept the gospel. We just have to teach her everything and she is ready! We are so excited for her. We just have to win the heart of her husband. He isn't as excited about it all. But she has talked about how the more that she has learned and come to church, he has been getting curious about it and has asked her questions. So hopefully we can slowly win him over!

We saw a crazy change in this father that we are teaching. The first time that we went over, he was pretty argumentative about the Book of Mormon. He had read some of it before and had some missionaries over...which he pretty much scared off. He asked questions about why certain things were the way they were in the Book of Mormon. For example why it says "the lamanites had a skin of blackness" verses a skin of darkness. He backed up his opinion with lots of things and when you would try to explain that it could mean different things, he wouldn't accept it. So we were worried to go back and teach him more. We rescheduled appointments for multiple weeks, and were about to give up. But this past week, we finally got in. We had been doing a lot of research on the word black and everything, and so we tried to have a simple, non-argumentative answer. When we went in, we started to explain that black would be representative because black means "no light" and Christ is the light of the world, so they had no Christ in them. We talked about how the word black in Hebrew means confusion. And some more. But he still was having a hard time. So I decided to say a prayer and ask God to help us out. I knew nothing would happen if the spirit was driven away. I thought of the scripture where it said that you shall not be confounded before men...and I felt pretty confounded. And as we sat there, I had ideas start coming into my head. Eventually it lead to a discussion about how the people knew Hebrew, but wrote in Egyptian because it was more condensed. And for some reason, that just clicked...and his whole demeanor changed. The spirit touched him and he knew that was true. It was so crazy! We saw them again this week and in his prayer at the end he thanked God for sending us and helping his family come closer to Him. Sister Bowers and I have been blown away from how it has changed. Just like it says in Preach My Gospel, "when the Spirit touches hearts, hearts are changed." God has changed Him. :)

This week has been a wonderful one. We have met a lot of neat people and seen many miracles as always. We met some drunk people, held an adorable little dog, got caught in the rain again (but not as bad), crawled through fences...you know, the usual missionary stuff. It was lots of fun. We are working hard and expecting miracles! God has been blessing us so much and all we can do is follow what he asks us to do. We were able to meet almost every single one of our goals this week! Every one!! It was so neat. His grace is sufficient, and he will deliver you. I love the people here in Kentucky and Indiana. I love my mission! I am eternally grateful to God for allowing me to serve. I will see you all so soon. I can't believe I am almost done, but I am going to work as hard as I can.

This gospel is so true, I can't even handle it! :D

I send my love,

Sister Emilee Farr

07/07/14 - Week 73! {Week 2 of Transfer 13} "Chalk!"

Hello :)

This week was the 4th of July just as you all know....and we did something super cool as a mission!! We went to a local park on the 4th and drew out the Plan of Salvation IN CHALK. And as we drew it, people would walk by and look at it and we would snatch them and teach them all about the Plan of Salvation. It was so neat! There were TONS of people there. We were with half of our zone in Cincinnati, Ohio. We did it at two different parks and we had a great turn out. They kicked us out of the first park after we had lunch...but I guess God had to get us to the other park too somehow! But we talked with some really neat people. We also had a crazy experience when we were sitting down eating lunch. (Which we got at a suuuper sketchy Kroger downtown. There were cops there to supervise and everything p.s.)  [[but we were safe, the Elders literally created a circle around us wherever we walked]]. This little girl, who was maybe...4, came up to us and handed us temple pass-along-cards. And no, she wasn't member.... Uh...?? She had gotten them somehow and was walking around the park handing them out to everyone. And of course, no one could resist a cute little 4 year old! We should give pass along cards to little kids to hand out more often! But we took a picture of some of us with the cards in our hands.

We also had another CRAZY rainstorm this week! We were luckily in the car when it was really bad, but there was some intense lightening. I took some videos, so I will have to show you..but it split some trees in our apartment complex! When the storm passed, we could still see the lightening, and it was literally like war of the worlds. Were it was silent but there was lightening coming down in the same spot over and over again. We took a video of that too. I really haven't seen anything like it. We had our power out for about an hour that night. It was quite the adventure, but really fun too :D But no worries, no one got hurt or anything.

THANK YOU FOR YOU PRAYERS!! We finally got 2 people at church! We have been working so hard to get 2 people to come to church for the past 4 weeks, and have been unsuccessful. But I know that your prayers to help us, sent us God's grace. We had two cute little boys come to church with us and our neighbor. The boys absolutely loved it. And the younger one (who is 7) was asking me all about baptism and the sacrament during sacrament meeting. At the end he said "I want to go to this church until I am 8." I said, "Why??" He said, "Because then I can get baptized!!!" It was the cutest thing! They are 7 and 10 and absolutely adorable. They are so interested in learning about church and always ask questions. We are trying to get their grand parents involved because they aren't really church goers, but with more prayers and with God's help, we can get them there!

I don't have a ton of time, but I hope you all know that the Lord loves you! Keep doing the little thing

s every single day. They really do matter. We meet so many people each day who just "fell out of the habit" of coming to church. It is through small and simple things that great things are brought to pass. But the great thing doesn't just have to be salvation, it can be destruction. Satan usually works by small means. But we can overcome him! We did once. In the pre-earth life, we all overcame him. In Revelations 12, it talks about the war in heaven. And how we overcame him. We can do those same things today to fight him off. We are the valiant of the valiant and we have power given to us that will always overcome evil if we choose. I love you all so so much!

I love you all!!! Have a week of happiness!!

Sister Emilee Farr

06/30/14- Week 72! {Week 1 of Transfer 13} "Just Keep Swimming..."

Hey!

First of all, the title has two reasons behind it. The first is because we had a HUGE rain storm this week! It was crazy. I have never seen one like it. And Sister Bowers and I were out caught in it :) It was 8:40PM and we don't go in until 9:00PM so we decided to go and contact a potential investigator. It had been raining off and on all day long, but it really hit as we pulled up to their house. We said our prayer and it just started pouring like none other. We had an umbrella....but it wasn't going to do anything. The rain would have crushed it. And we didn't want to get struck by lightening. So, we decided it couldn't be that bad and we just ran to their door. To our surprise, stepping out of the car was more like stepping into a shower! It was crazy! We ran as fast as we could, to realize that it was actually the wrong house...so we ran next door....and it was still the wrong house number. hah....so we ran back to the car. We were absolutely drenched! Our hair was dripping and it was running down our arms. Goodness gracious. I can't even explain it. But hopefully you can see it in some of the pictures.

The other reason why it was titled to keep swimming is because we had another week full of opposition. The devil is working so hard! We had an awesome Tuesday and Wednesday and then Thursday hit...and man....it was like everyone left Kentucky and no one was home or available!! It was insane. We had no members out with us and even when they came, none of our investigators would be home. We still saw little miracles in finding new people, but we are struggling to get them to come to church. We have been trying so hard to get at least 2 people to come to church here, but it has been crazy hard! We have consistently had 1 at church, but we are technically supposed to have two as leaders. No need to fear though, we will get them! Just say extra prayers that people will come to church! :D

 

We had a less-active we have been working with kind of....tell us to leave and say she didn't want to hear any more. :( We had a member with us and it wasn't a very good experience for her. She gave us back the Book of Mormon too. We have been working with her for a long time and she was progressing so well! But then all of the sudden the past few times she has been having lots of doubts and has slid back. It was so sad. The good thing though is that she called us the next day and apologized for getting so worked up. She LOVES Sister Bowers like her own daughter. But we aren't so sure where it will go from here.

We had a really great experience with our investigator, Angelica. She has recently had some surgeries and has been hard to get in with. Usually we just stand on her porch. But on Tuesday we went over there, and we had set up to do a church tour. When we came over, she said she wasn't feeling good enough to go. She said she wasn't really in the mood too. We started talking with her, and it started to rain pretty hard. So she let us step inside. {And we weren't gonna let her not come}. So we were bold with her and told her how much it would help. After a few minutes, she decided to come, and her friend's mom came with her too! [she is a less-active]. It was an amazing church tour! The spirit was so strong. We showed them all around and when we got into the chapel, the spirit just took over. She told the member who was with us that she felt so good she could cry. While we were in the chapel, we started to talk about church and they both really opened up. We learned more about their past and everything. It was something that we really needed to have happen to teach them more to their needs.

Oh....hahaha..I just remembered this lesson we had with a cute old lady who is less-active in our ward. She is country! She grew up in a town where a DOG was the mayor...yes a dog...an animal....it is called Rabbit Hash, Kentucky. Anyways, they have pictures lining their walls all over. And none of the frames match :) It is sooo cute! She shows us the same pictures every time. But this time she was especially talkative. She showed us all of her things in another room..her blankets, pictures, souvenirs, trinkets, stuffed animals...everything. We couldn't get out the door without her telling us what all of her plants were and wind chimes and flowers. "This is a picture of four generations, me, my daughter, her daughter, and her little girl. This is a picture of me and Josh Hutchinson, did you know he is from Kentucky?? This is my Lamb chops, have you ever seen lamb chops? And my Raggedy Anne and Andy. This is my gorilla named ____. And my doll, Rachel; I crocheted all of her! I found this brown bear, brownie, on the play ground at the elementary school where I used to work. This is my cactus from ____. I got this flower from _____. I have had this bush for _____." And on it went :) hahaha. It was so cute. We were trying so hard not to just laugh because of how funny it was. She is just adorable. She is stubborn, but she sure loves her family and her little things.

We are excited to have a new week to start fresh. We are working hard and keeping our faith in Jesus Christ strong. We have Mission Leadership Council tomorrow, so you can expect some more pictures on the mission Facebook page :) I might even get to see Alyson Porter!! Crazy :D I love my mission. I have learned so much from being out here and meeting so many people. I have been challenged and stretched, and I have so much more to grow. But I am always grateful to my Father in Heaven for the opportunity he gave me to serve. It will change who I am forever.

I hope you all have a wonderful week! :D

Love you!!

Sister Emilee Farr

06/23/14 - Week 71! {Week 6 of Transfer 12} "Faith Precedes Miracles"

Family!! Friends!! Everyone :)

First off, I am STAYING in HEBRON, KY :) For my last part of my mission! So my address remains the same:

Sister Emilee Farr

2260 Flicker Dr #195

Hebron, KY 41048

I hope you all have a wonderful week! I sure did. It was...super hard...we really had to pay the price for miracles to come. Lots of things fell through, and some people were just rude. We had one of our greatest investigators drop us and it was devastating, but wait until you hear the miracles that we were able to witness!! :D

We found a really amazingly prepared dad of 3 yesterday afternoon when we were out with our member. We were at our investigators house for an appointment, but he wasn't home. As we were knocking on his door, his neighbor came home and started bringing in groceries. We said "Hi" from the other door and offered to help, he thanked us but said no. After no response from our appointment, we went down the street to see if another investigator was home, and they weren't either. As we walked back up the road towards our car, we thought maybe we should knock on the guys door and talk to him. But we battled it. "It would be awkward.... We just saw him...he would think we were weird..." But we decided to follow the prompting and go knock on his door. We knocked and there was no response for a long time. But then he walked out and said, "I want to know what you girls are doing. I have seen you around here walking around for a while and I am interested in what you share. I knew you were going to knock on my door. And if you didn't, I was going to come outside and find you and ask you to talk to me." We were blown away! He went on to tell us his whole life story from when he was about 16 to now. He has been through so much in his life. But he has been so prepared for the message of the restoration. He is a father of 3 kids and we are stoked to go and teach all of them.

God has just been blessing us. We had an amazing investigator come to church yesterday. She is our neighbor and told us she wanted to learn more because of our examples and the members of the church she has met. She is soaking it all up. Yesterday at church she absolutely loved it. She commented in Relief Society and was reading the scriptures that people shared...she was just so involved. We are so excited for her. She is strong and has received a testimony of Joseph Smith already. She prayed about it and told us, "The Holy Spirit has revealed to me that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God." We can't even express our excitement! Patterns are changing here in Hebron. We have been working hard and we are so excited that we are finding some amazingly prepared people :)

We had another neat experience with our investigator that we have recently started helping. She is planning on moving to California and is getting her house ready to put up on the market. We met her knocking doors one day and offered to help her around the house if she needed it. She has been painting a lot, and we thought we could help. In the middle of us meeting her, her step-mom passed away and we lost some contact for awhile. After a couple of weeks of talking back and forth, we were able to go over there on Thursday and help her go through some of her things she was going to put out for a garage sale. She fed us a delicious lunch of Ziti and we had a good chat. Then after, we were walking down to her garage and she started to tell us that everyone was telling her that she shouldn't let us come back because we were going to "try to convert her". She then said "You aren't going to try to convert me, right??" Awkward pause....and right at that moment someone pulled up and she walked over to talk to them. phew...we avoided that awkward conversation. But now we knew not to push her too hard. After going through a bunch of things, we went inside to make some signs. While we were in there, I was just praying that Heavenly Father would lead the conversation. And He sure did! She started asking US questions. She said "So what is the difference between Mormons and say, the Catholics?" (<-since she is Catholic). PERFECT QUESTION!! And from there it lead to some really great discussions. We talked about Joseph Smith and about how she doesn't like the church she had gone to... It lead to her crying and talking about how hard it was for her to lose her step-mom and we were able to bear testimony of the Plan of Salvation. At the end of the conversation she ended up saying, "I will have to come try out your church some time. When is it?" How neat!!?? We didn't even have to push her. SHE asked all of the questions and we just answered. I felt more like a member missionary than a normal missionary. It comforted me to know that I will be able to share the gospel when I get home. You can all do it! Just pray for missionary opportunities, and they will come up. It was so neat. I can't even explain how wonderful it was. She felt the spirit and it is doing all of the converting. We are going back this week to help her paint, and I am excited to see what else we can share with her! :D

I just love this gospel. So many miracles come. Oh! I just remembered another one from this week. We had a 19 year old kid we are teaching who was going to come to a baptism on Friday. We stopped by earlier that day and asked if he was going to come. He said he might be with his cousin, but he would try. When the time came that night, we went over, and.....no one was home. We knocked a few times..but no response. We were really bummed. So we went to talk to his neighbor and invite her to come, and as we were talking with her, he walked out of the woodsy area behind his house and went inside (since there are woods pretty much everywhere here). We decided to head back over and invite him to come. When he answered he was all wet and he told us that he had just fallen down a hill....(<-uhhh. crazy). But we invited him to come and he said sure, he just needed to change. So we waited and then headed over to the baptism.....25 minutes late. I prayed that it would have been delayed by some miracle so that he could see it. And a miracle happened...when we walked in, they were just singing the opening song. We sat down right up front and it was amazing! He was intensely listening to everything. It really was a beautiful baptism. At the end we showed him around the church and then asked him how he felt. He said, "I felt different. I have never felt that way before.." So we asked him to explain it. He explained that he felt like he was there physically...and mentally. He had never felt that way before. Most places he felt like he was there physically, but not mentally. We told him "That is the spirit!!" It was so neat. We are excited for him too!

There is so much neat potential here in Hebron. I am so excited to be able to stay here for the next little while. I love the ward, the area, and of course cute Sister Bowers. We are working hard and continue to expect miracles to come! Just have faith, and God will bless you :D

Love you all!!!

Sister Emilee Farr

P.s....I held a BABY RACOON!! Crazy..

06/16/14 - Week 70 {Week 5 of Transfer 12} "Mountains to Climb"

Hello wonderful people :D

This week has been a hard week. We have had lots of obstacles to overcome and work through, but we made it! It reminds me of the EFY song called "mountains to climb." It talks about giving you mountains to climb in your life because they just make you stronger. They are hard, but they make you better. We had lots of challenges. Obviously Satan didn't want us to do much this week, but we just tried to keep our hopes high and push through. And we almost reached every goal! We worked as hard as we could and put our trust in God. Just remember that even when there are mountains to climb in your life, you can move them with your faith. Just like it says in Jacob 4:6, as we search the words of Christ, our faith becomes unshaken and we can command in the name of Jesus and the elements of the earth obey us. We can move the mountains in our life and make it through!

Our miracle this week was with investigator Barbara! She has been learning about the church for about 4 months now, and she knows it is true. She has just been waiting and holding herself back because of her family. Her family is Quaker and her in-laws are very strong Catholic. She was really scared of what they would do when they found out she wanted to be a Mormon. They are very closed minded with things like that I guess. She has been able to overcome that though. We had her last lesson at a members home with someone she is pretty close with. That member was a convert from the Catholic church and so she is able to relate to her with family issues. She testified that God would provide. As we talked she just expressed that she knew the church was true and even if her family rejected it, she would still know it was true. Everything just made sense to her and she could understand why other people didn't see that too. {{{That is what I think all of the time!}}} So, we committed her to be baptized again, and she said..... YES!!  Not just a sure, or maybe later, or I will see, but Yes! :D We are so excited. She is an amazing lady and has done so much research! She would come to our lessons with questions that definitely tested your knowledge of the gospel..but with the Spirits help, we were able to explain them and confirm her testimony {{and our own}} of the truth. :) God is amazing. But we found out she lives right outside of our ward boundaries so we will have to pass her off to other sisters this week, but that doesn't matter. As long as she gets baptized, that is all I care about. We should be able to go to her baptism though. She is just wonderful :)

We also had Stake Conference this weekend and it was amazing! We had Elder Dunnigan come from the 70's and he talked so much about families. I just loved it. Since I have was about 8 years old {{when Dawn got married}} I have been so excited for when I could get married and have a family. And I have learned sooo much about being a good mother on my mission. He talked about how we need to focus on when we are home, be home . Leave your work at work. He also said something that I loved about doing the little things as a family. He said that reading the Book of Mormon and saying prayers with your family each day, protects families. Isn't that all we want? For our families to be protected from the world? Well, it is in doing the little things. He said, "If something is priority, we just make it happen." Whether that is reading the Book of Mormon, then you do it. No matter how late it is, how tired you are, what day it is, you do it. You make it happen. We all could make excuses, but we have to make it happen. I have learned a lot about "Making it happen" on the mission. It is called --The Accountability Ladder-- I will have to show it to all of you when I get home. Families are just so important. We need to put our BEST effort in to our family. Not the effort that is left over. I think about it even in my companionship. We need to put them first and put their happiness above our own in all things. I could go on and on about families and how to help them....so I won't bore you. But I just love families! And marriage! And together..ness...... .. ... ......anyways.

One thing that he quoted was from Elder Holland, and I love Elder Holland. He said:

"This is the Church of the happy endings"

And he also quoted another person....but I can't remember who. But they said:

"Everything will be okay in the end. If it is not okay, it is not the end."

It is so true. Not saying that the end of THIS life will be okay, but it testifies that there must be another life. We will all have the best blessings that we can have. The Lord will give them to us. I am so grateful for that knowledge. We have potential in us that is beyond what we can even imagine.

This week was just great. We are going to have a great week this week too! It is the last week of the transfer, and we are going to do amazing things through the Lord. I will most likely be staying here, but I don't know. So if you need to send anything, do it this week! Because next Monday I could be in a different place. I sure hope I stay here with Sister Bowers for my last transfer. I love her to pieces. We have lots of fun together! :)

Thank you all for what you do for me. I LOVE YOU!!!

Love,

Sister Emilee Farr

06/09/14 - Week 69 {Week 4 of Transfer 12} "Broken AC :D"

Hey there!

As you can tell from my headline...our Air Conditioning broke this week.....it has been hot.....and humid.....and we live on the top floor.......

But it will be alright! Hopefully they come and fix it this week :) We have just been keeping our windows open all of the time, especially in the morning and at night. It has been working okay. And we aren't in our apartment too much either during the day, which makes it better. But we had an interesting night last night. We were trying to fall asleep, but neither of us could. At around 11pm a car drove in with the music blasting. But not just any music...soul music. (mind you our windows are wide open to cool down our apartment). We laid there for a while and then it sounded like someone was dying outside. There was wailing and crying happening. We didn't know what was going on....so I eventually sat up and looked out the window. There was this lady outside standing next to her car and she had her hand up in the air. She was looking up and she was saying something. She was crying and...I don't even know. We were tempted to go outside on our little balcony thing and ask her if she was alright, but it was pretty late. After standing there for a few minutes she eventually walked towards the apartment. She lives on the floor beneath us.....but she never came upstairs. It was quite confusing. We decided to lay back down and say a prayer. We didn't find anyone at the bottom of the stairs this morning when we went out to exercise...so we are assuming everything is okay. We have had quite the interesting experiences :) haha.

We had a really neat experience on Saturday though! We have a neighbor that moved in the day I got here. She was carrying all of these things up and down the 3 flights of stairs and we offered to help. She quickly accepted our help and we carried a few loads up for her. She left us a note on our door a few days later thanking us for our generosity. We left her a sticky-note and didn't really think much more of it. But on Saturday we were coming in for our lunch break and she was outside with her husband working on their car, we struck up a conversation and she started talking about this video on Facebook about an LDS girl who inspired people with her hugs. As she kept talking she said that she didn't know much about our church, but because of how sweet we were helping her move in and this video, she was interested in learning more. She told us how much it really meant to her that we would help her move her things in. She said that there must be something right with our church if the people who go to it really live a Christ-like life. She pretty much asked us if we could come over to her house and share with her more about our church. I never realized how much our simple acts of service really go a long way. We simply offered to help her take some things upstairs and it made such an impact on her. Whenever we do something simple and nice for someone, it really does leave an imprint on them. We have to live what we believe! We cannot just be hearers of the word, but doers. We have to live what we teach. Not just talk the talk, but walk the walk. Just like President Monson talked about this last general conference, we need to love our neighbors and help those around us. That is going to make the biggest difference in spreading the gospel in these last days. More and more people around here are starting to believe that we don't need to go to a church. We just need to believe in God and everything else will turn out alright. It reminds me of the scripture in 2 Nephi 28:7-8 where it says:

"7 Yea, and there shall be many which shall say: Eat drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die; and it shall be well with us.

8 And there shall also be many which shall say: Eat, drink, and be merry; nevertheless, fear God -- he will justify in committing a little sin; yea, lie a little, take the advantage of one because of his words, dig a  pit for thy neighbor; there is no harm in this; and do all these things, for tomorrow we die; and if it so be that we are guilty, God will beat us with a few stripes, and at last we shall be saved in the kingdom of God."

That is false doctrine! You cannot just do whatever you want and believe that God doesn't care. There is an order to His Kingdom. There are commandments that we must keep. We do not just have to say we believe in Christ to be saved, we have to become people who would want to live with Christ again. The commandments are not here to restrict us, they are there to help us to become the people who would want to live with our Heavenly Father again. We have to use our faith to change us. Our Mission President has been focusing so much on the Doctrine of Christ and how it can change us. The doctrine of Christ is Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, Repentance, Baptism, receiving the Gift of the Holy Ghost, and Enduring to the End. How has it changed you? This is the process that each of us go through every week and every day. We are always having to have faith in our Savior and that should motivate us to change and make covenants with our Heavenly Father. That brings us the Spirit into our lives and then we start the process all over again. It should be changing us every week. We should be different people, better people, every day. Of course we will never be perfect here. Trust me, I am a total perfectionist, but I have come to accept that truth. All we can do and all we have to do is try. Create a vision for yourself. Then set goals to reach that vision. Then make plans to reach those goals. And create a way to be accountable to reaching that vision. That is something that we do individually, then for our areas, then for the people we have stewardship over, then for our zone, then for our vision. Try it out! :D It can help you change.

I don't have much more time. But this week has been great! We have seen so many miracles. We found 16 new investigators this past week! Again, we broke my past record of 12 new in a week. We are just increasing our vision and relying on the grace of Jesus Christ. As we do that, miracles happen! We just have to trust in Him and let him lead our lives. We can become and do things that we never thought were possible, because of Him. I love sharing the message of the

restored gospel. It is the greatest thing that I could be doing at this time. My mission has changed me. I am so much different, in a good way, than I was before. I am so grateful to my Heavenly Father for allowing me this privilege of serving Him.

I love you all! Keep on being strong and doing the little things every day. This church is so true sometimes I can't even handle it!! :) I hope you all have a wonderful week full of miracles :D

I send my love,

Sister Emilee Farr

06/02/14 - Week 68! {Week 3 of Transfer 12} "Cold Water"

Hi family!!

The area down here in Kentucky is great! I am loving the people and the ward! It has been a weird adjustment from the people of Indiana. It seems that people here are more..high class? I don't know how to explain it. I guess they are more like Utah people. They actually get ready for the day! Not that Indiana people didn't...but they just didn't' care as much I guess. Not in a bad way...just different. haha. But I am getting used to it. We have been having tons of miracles! Last week we found 12 new investigators, which is record for me on my mission! It was a lot of work, but it was great! We talked with everyone that we could, and the Lord blessed us.

Thank you for all of your prayers for Camill and Alyssa! They were baptized on Friday night :D :D  It was crazy to get it all worked out, but we did it! The Lord definitely blessed us. We didn't get the time confirmed until the night before. So we were trying to let everyone know. But it all worked out and we got the kinks fixed. When we went and filled up the font..we accidently filled it up with freezing cold water...like river water cold! So I had to hold up my skirt and wade into the water to pull the plug out. It was so cold!! But we drained it half way and then filled it up with hot water, so it was perfect. No one was freezing ;) After their baptism we were talking with them as we walked back to the room and they talked about how they didn't want to sit down because they just felt like they were floating :D They said they had never been that happy in their life. I am so excited for them!

We are working with their dad and he wants to get baptized too!! Actually we had a really neat experience with him the day after their baptism. We were putting hearts and sticky notes on their door...and they opened it on us <<AWKWARD.>> But after wards we were walking around the apartment complex and the dad called us over and talked with us for a few minutes. He just thanked us for all that we had done for their family. He said he has felt the spirit so much more in their home. His daughters seems so much happier. He said that the Lord really has blessed them as they have involved him more in their lives. It was so sweet! But what is even more amazing is that we taught them about Fasting the day before their baptism (Thursday). Then on Friday their dad was texting us asking questions about fasting and if you drank water or not. We thought maybe it was the girls texting us on his phone. But when he talked with us on Saturday he told us that he had thought about fasting and how we said it was a way to get extra strength from God and so he tried it! He said he said a prayer and then decided not to eat or drink. He said that as he drove to work he started to get really hungry, but he said a prayer and 5 minutes later the hunger went away. He fasted until about 2pm. Then later that day they got approved for a loan for a house and miracles just started to come!! HOW AMAZING IS THAT?? He had never heard of fasting....and the next day he decides to try it. He has SO much faith!! He is going to be baptized :D The mom hasn't been too interested. She has been supportive for the girls, but not interested herself. But she came to the baptism too and seemed really intent on everything that was said! She had to have felt the spirit :D So we will see how that softens her up :D Their family is just so sweet.

We have some more people we are working with, but the challenge with most of the people down here has been getting them to come to church! They are a little bit stubborn and have excuses every time. But we are going to focus on that a lot this upcoming week. I feel like the girl on the district when she says "Just come to church!!!" Our mission has a goal this month for every companionship to baptize a family! and for that to happen, they have to come to church EVERY week for the next 3 weeks. So we are going to pray hard and do our very best.

We met a neat Muslim girl this week! There are lots of them here actually. And you would be surprised at how similar their beliefs are to ours! They believe in prophets, and more scriptures. Just not quite the same. There are some major differences... like Jesus Christ being the Savior, not just a prophet. AS I have talked with them, I think that they are just confused by the Christians worlds concept for trinity -  three in one. But she seemed really interested! The way she talked with us and looked at us really struck me. It was neat. I felt really comfortable talking to her and you could tell that she really wanted to know what we were doing and what we believed. So we are going back! How neat !! :D I am excited.

We have seen many little miracles throughout the week. Whether it was someone talking with us, being able to reach our goals, having awkward missionary moments....(we have lots of those), or having God give us revelation for someone we are teaching that changes their progression. That is all that matters. I am so grateful for all the Lord has done for us here. We are seeing this area explode with new investigators left and right. Now we just have to do our best to take care of those people He has given us.

I love you all!! You all do so much for me :) I can't thank you enough! :D Have a wonderful week!!!

Love,

Sister Emilee Farr

05/27/14 - Week 67! {Week 2 of Transfer 12} "Miracles!!!!"

Hi Everyone!

I hope that you all had a great memorial day! We sure had a great one! Our mission switched our Preparation Day from Monday to Tuesday so that we would be able to talk to all of the people who would be outside and home for memorial day. It was a day of miracles! Here in our area we were on exchanges with Sister Webb and Sister Jenkins (the Sisters in the Zone serving in Lawrenceburg, Indiana). And we found 7 new investigators between us both!!! In just ONE day!! God is so amazing. And the neat thing is that our mission had a goal to break our record and find 100 new investigators in one day as a mission. And guess how many we found????? God's grace was with us! And his power blessed us!! We found: 234 children of God who want to learn more about His gospel! We blew 100 our of the water! How amazing. :D :D We had a mission conference call last night and we were all so so excited for the incredible work that was done. It was hard work for sure. We had to sacrifice and push ourselves. We talked with everyone outside...no matter how awkward it was. (<--and trust me, it is usually awkward...haha). We are just so excited for everything that is happening here! God's work is definitely hastening and He is the head of our Church. This is His work. There is NO way that we could have been able to reach that goal if it wasn't for Him. We prayed all day for Him to put people in our path that we could teach. We prayed for His hand in our work. We looked at our goals all day and held ourselves accountable to reaching those goals. It was so amazing. :D :D We truly can do all things through Christ, who strengthens us (Phil 4:13).

Our last week was amazing too! We have just seen the work here in Kentucky explode! We found 7 new investigators and taught 14 lessons with members present (which is tied with my highest on my mission). We worked so hard! It is starting to get really hot down here...and humid. It gets you all sticky. I know that it is probably nothing compared to other places....like the Philippines...but it is hot to me! haha. We had a fun day last Saturday though! We went to the house of the new family we are teaching and helped the mom weed her yard and mow the lawn. Right as we started though...we broke the lawn mower. The cord snapped that you use to start it...so the neighbors had to go on an adventure to find something to fix it. But they fixed it just as we finished weeding the yard. Now, mowing the lawn here is an exciting experience! They don't have bags for the grass that gets cut off, so it just flies out all over. But since the grass was so long, they had to lift up one of the flaps on the side to let the grass get out...which angled the cut grass clippings right at us. I attached a picture of me mowing...please excuse my facial expression. It was hot...and you would be doing it too if you had grass flying into your face!! just sayin. haha :D It was lots of fun though! It sure helped her a lot. She has three little kids and the youngest is just a year old. She can't set him down and walk into the other room without him starting to cry. It was just great :) Then she came to church on Sunday! It was a bit overwhelming for her with all of her kids, but the members were sooo so sweet. The member in front of us handed back books and crayons and toys for the kids. When her little boy was getting fussy, a sweet sister walked all the way around the chapel with a bag of pretzels for him and her kids to munch on. It was the sweetest thing. I just wanted to cry :) They have been so supportive for their family. She said it was a little bit different than they are used to, but that they were going to try it again next week and stay for the Primary classes! :D yay!

We have a baptism this Friday!! Of two teenage girls, Camill and Alyssa! They are 14 and 13. They are so excited. Every time that we talk about it they just light up. They want it so much! For a while Alyssa was not sure if she was ready, but we invited people in the congregation to pray for her and since then she said that she has just had such a peaceful feeling about it and she wants to get baptized. We are still praying for their parents hearts to be softened. They are such a cute and wonderful family and it will help them so much! Hopefully by them coming to the baptism, the spirit can touch their hearts and spark something inside of them. Keep them in your prayers this week! Satan is going to work hard on them! And he has already started. But God is so much more powerful than Satan. We just get to choose who we listen to.

Oh!!! AND Ashley did get baptized up in Fort Wayne :D :D Sister Parker said it was wonderful. The Shumards (members in the ward), bought her a quad with her named embossed on it :) She even paid her tithing for the first time on Sunday after her baptism :) I love her so very much!! :D

Something random...We had Zone Conference this past week and they have car inspections each time. And guess what?? Sister Bowers and I got the clean car award!! Horray!! That means that we get 50 extra miles :D It was quite exciting! I don't think I have ever won before, so we were pretty happy! And then we both got "Celestial Planners" when the assistants went through them :D And we got candy! haha. Like we need more candy...but it is okay! We have been going over to Sister Johnson's in the morning and doing Cross Fit <--it is a crazy fitness workout thing that kills you. But is lots of fun! You should try it :)

I just feel like so much is happening and happening so quickly! August is coming so fast. Too fast. But also slowly...mixed emotions. But I am just so grateful for my mission. It truly has changed me. I am so grateful that Heavenly Father has allowed me this opportunity for me to serve him. I know that the things that I have learned and will still learn here will change my future family for the better. My children, husband, and everyone around me will have such a better mother, wife, and friend to be with them. I know that I was meant to be on my mission at this time. God works in mysterious ways. I never thought I would and sometimes I still can't believe I am on a mission. It is the hardest thing I have ever done before by far. But it is also the most rewarding thing I have ever been a part of. I love this work

. The ups and the downs. I am grateful for our trials and for the bumps in the road, because that is when we grow the most. Every day when we are struggling to reach our goals and we turn to the Lord in prayer, he delivers us. This is His work. No one else could do it besides Him. Thank you for all of your support and prayers!! I love you all so very much!! :D

All my love,

Sister Emilee Farr