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