Day Late Due to Memorial Day....

Sorry this is a late email. Sister Davidson and I didn't realize til Sunday night that Memorial Day was yesterday and the library was closed :( We actually had a family in the ward, the Peterson's, invite us over for a BBQ yesterday afternoon and they set up two computers for us to use to write you but I didn't have my notes so I just read the emails you sent me. But we decided today that we would come to the library and write.

Ok, so we got a new Zone Leader this week. Well... he's a former ZL in this area that got transfered four weeks ago but there was another Emergency Transfer with Elder Thorstead so Elder McKee is back here.

Then on Wednesday the 23rd, we had service at City Hall again. It's actually kind of fun stuff. This week we did a lot of stuffing envelopes for a community thing called National Night Out. It's a national thing but the city does their own little thing for it. It has something to do with keeping the city safe and drug free and a lot of other things. And then we did some shredding of old documents. It maybe wasn't the funnest thing I've ever done but it all reminded me of being at home and helping mom out with some of her work stuff. I actually enjoyed it though. And it's been good to do service there because the lady incharge of the Emergency Preparedness department is a member of the church. Sadly she's been inactive for many years though :( But we met her about a month ago and it's been fun getting to work with her and hopefully will in the end help her in coming back to church..

Then on Thursday the 24th, we had District Meeting. This was the most spiritual District Meeting I've had so far. Elder Martinez told us before it started that we were going to make this DM about Elder McKee since he was back in the area. So he had each of us stand up and give an example of a time that we have felt the spirit the most or when we have felt the Atonement working in our lives. I think it was such an inspired meeting because the spirit was so strong the whole time. And then E. McKee got up and we each had to tell him what we loved about him and since some of us don't know him that well, we had to rely a lot on the Holy Ghost. There is this one Elder, Elder Bucholz, who met E. McKee five minutes earlier for the first time and everything he said really was from the Holy Ghost. It was just a very cool experience.

I think one of the best parts of the meeting was when Elder Durfey asked Elder Martinez if he could get a blessing and then E. Martinez asked if anyone else wanted a blessing. It was cool because Sister Davidson and I felt like we both needed blessings but we didn't want to ask for one everytime we're having troubles. But when E. Martinez asked us that, we said we needed them. And both of our blessing were what we needed. There was so much said that we needed to hear. It's just amazing how the Holy Ghost works.

Having been able to get that blessing really made me think of how lucky I am to have so many worthy priesthood holders around me for the next 16 months. And that got me to thinking even more about how lucky I have been my whole life to have a father and brothers who have been worthy of the priesthood. It's such an important thing to have in each of our lives. I don't know what I would do if I couldn't rely on someone to help me when I needed it. So I just wanted to say thank you to Dad, Durrell, Daniel and Sam for being worthy of such a great thing!

During the week while we were tracting, we met a lady who didn't want to talk to us but we said hi and asked if she needed help with anything. Then she said, "I'm blessed with heavens best and no stress." I really liked that little saying. I really am blessed with heavens best at this time in my life, and all the time! I just feel so lucky to be apart of the true church of Jesus Christ restored back on the earth again.

On Saturday the 26th, Sister Davidson and I "hosted" a finding activity for all of our district. Elder Martinez had told us a couple weeks ago that he wanted us to start in the finding activity and we needed to find something that eight missionaries could do to help the work in our area. Sister Davidson and I had been thinking and praying so hard to know what we could do but everything that we came up with just wasn't working. So on Tuesday night we were going to give up and tell E. Martinez that we couldn't do it. But right before Sister Davidson sent off the text message, I came out and told her to wait until the next morning at 10am. I have no clue why I told her to do that because we had been trying so hard to come up with something for several days. But that night as I was laying in bed the idea came to me to have each companionship take three Books of Mormon each and write our testimonies in them and then we would go to four of the main streets in our area and just give them out to whoever we saw and felt like we should give them to. Well during the week we had come in contact with a guy named John and he told us that he wanted his children (ages 4, 3 and 2) to choose which church they wanted to go to. Well, Sister Davidson felt realy strongly like we should go back to their home and give them a Book of Mormon, so we did. As we pulled up to their home, they were leaving and we almost turned around to leave but we got out of the car and walked toward them. The mom, Julia, got out of the van and so we were able to talk to her. She was very appreciative of the Book of Mormon and we bore our testimonies to her and she took the Book of Mormon. We haven't checked back on them yet but plan on going this week! I don't know what will come of it but we just have to pray and trust in God that He will help them to know that the Book of Mormon is true. And hope that we can get them to come on a tour of the church this week as well.

On Sunday the 27th, my two months!!! (Can you believe it?!?!) Anyway, on Sunday we gave a tour to a 17 year old, Gordon, who we met last month. He was very willing to come on the tour which was cool. We haven't been able  to get together with him for about 3 weeks so it was good to have him free and come to the tour. We had a young man in the ward come and be his fellowshipper, along with the Young Men's president and his wife, and it was pretty good. It didn't go as planned because there ended up being a lot of distractions that kept coming our way but I think it went pretty good. We just pray that we can get him to come to church this coming Sunday and have another lesson this week.

Well, not a lot happened this week so I'm almost done but I have been reading out of the May 2008 Ensign that talks all about Jesus Christ and His Atonement. It's been very good to read out of because I have gained a greater testimony of my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ and everything He has done for me. I have enjoyed also reading the testimonies of members around the world that are in the Ensign. I have just loved learning each and every day about my Savior. I have learned so much just in the last two months that I have been out here. It's just so wonderful!

That's about all that happened this week. So Happy Birthday to Jonathan Wheatley on the 31st! And also congratulations on his graduation, right??? And to anyone else I'm missing on birthdays and graduation.

Until next week,

Sister Rachel Wheatley