December 10, 2012 letter

Hello from Georgia! 

Well, I have officially left Tallahassee and I am now in Thomasville GA.... which is a pretty small town just over the state line. (which you can tell that you are crossing the stateline because the roads go from being really nice to not as nice as soon as you see the welcome to GA line haha) It is really really great here, I already love it so much! 

It's been an awesome week. Transfers were crazy, sister Pulsipher and I moved out of our apartment so we had to deep clean everything and throw away all the junk that was left there. Said goodbye to the ward at FHE and to our investigators that we had. :( I really hate goodbyes, I am the worst at them. Sometimes I would rather just leave without it as to avoid the awkward "well, see ya never... have a great life" that you know accompanies some people on a mission. But, we did it anyway and it was good. I have really come to love the people in 5th ward, and because they are my own age they have become really good friends. 

I dont know what it is about being on a mission but you seem to accumulate so much stuff in such a short period of time. I thought i would be good with the suitcases I had because a member who is heading out to UT took a couple post office boxes home for me.... NOT SO! I think one of my suitcases had to weigh at least 100lbs, it was really entertaining to watch the elders try and haul it around for me. 

So anywho, Wednesday morning we headed to transfer spots and the zone leaders took us up to Thomasville to our new apartment. We met the Sr couple (the Larsens) and the elders over there to meet them and have them give us our keys. The Housing couple had already furnished everything and bought us some groceries cause they knew we'd be starving. I love the older couples. Every older couple should serve missions. They bring such a great dynamic to the work. So we spent the day unpacking and going and some food and cleaning supplies for our apt. We went over to the church that night to have dinner with the bishop and to help set up the Christmas Chreshe (some french word that means nativity or something like that) It was really cool. Its a christmas event that they have done the last 4 years and they set up the cultural hall with 100's of nativity scenes on display and they have a live one (without animals) and then they have people from the ward performing christmas music and then they had the mo-tab christmas performance playing in the chapel and they invited the whole community to come and see it. Its a great way to get people in the church and to see what our church looks like. So we helped set up for that and then we were over there saturday night meeting people. 

Thursday we planned in the morning and started finding, meeting members, and working with less actives. around 7ish we got a call from sister Jensen asking us how things were, how our apartment was, if it was pretty big etc. We told her it was great and that it was pretty big and she asked if it was big enough for 3. We were a little confused and told her we only had 1 shower but other than that it was. (oh side story, SO after morning exercises thursday we went to go get ready and I turned on the shower and it was nothing more than a trickle. There was a piece mission from the shower head so there was no way to shower. So we ended up having to wash out hair by just sticking our heads under the faucet and washing it that way. It reminded me of girls camp trying to wash it in the freezing water pumps they had) anywho, SO she told us that we were getting a new sister Friday night that was coming from a different mission that got sent home because of issues with terrible companions and a fall out with the mission president. She was home for about a month but wanted to finish her mission, so the first presidency decided to reassign her to the FTM. They found out she was coming about an hour before they called us to tell us that president chose sister Thompson and I to be her first companions here.  

So friday we had a normal day, we went and did some service for a member, met the knudsons at our apt and rearranged everything so that we had a bed and chairs and desk and what not for the new sister coming in. That night we headed down in the Tallahassee to go with president and sister Jensen to the airport to pick sister Schoppman up. She is a cute girl from Page AZ that has the greenie fire and love for the work even though she was in her other mission for about 10 months. Among her favorite missionary things she really loves to tract, teach, and back out the car. She is really timid but loves the work and loves being a missionary. We went to dinner with the Jensens and then went to their house for 'orientation'  or whatever you want to call it when you come in and they tell you all about the mission, then we headed back to Thomasville. 

Saturday we found an awesome new investigator named Kandace. She let us right in and we taught her all about the restoration and she was really receptive. She is trying to get right with God again and said she'd come to church with us this following sunday, we are teaching her again tonight. 

Saturday night we got a call from the 2nd counselor in the bishopric and he said that there was a death of one of the members of the ward and that the speakers for sunday were all related to her and wouldnt be at church sunday, SO to welcome us into the ward he wanted us 3 to speak in church the following morning.... I felt like I was back in Troy getting called out of the congregation to speak, but it went really good! 

The ward here is AWESOME! I love being in the south and the people are so nice and love the missionaries and I think they realize how lucky they are to have 7 full time missionaries serving in their ward because they all keep talking about how its time to start finding people for us to teach. It is a great area and has incredible people. 

Yesterday night we got to go down to Tally to be the ushers for the messiah performance that the stake put on, which was fun cause I got to see a bunch of people from `1st and 5th ward. There were alot of non members that came and really enjoyed it. 

Its been a fabulous week! Hope yall are enjoying yours! 

 

Love, 

Sister Webb

December 3, 2012 letter

Hey Family! 

Well. Its transfer week and I'M GOING TO GEORGIA FOR MY LAST TRANSFER!!! I AM SO EXCITED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That barely shows my excitement. I am not making it up into the heart of the Tifton zone, just on the outskirts (Thomasville).. but still I am leaving FL and heading into another southern state and I am really excited. I am going to be serving with Sister Thompson who is a stellar missionary and works really hard. If I cant be with sister Hirst again, She is the next best thing :) We have been on trade offs a couple times and get along great. She laughs alot and has great stories and she is going to be a fun companion. We are white washing the area and its going to be GREAT! The two elders that are there are two that I served in the MTC with and they are alot of fun. Its gonna be AWESOME! 

This week has been great. I wish I could accurately explain the craziness of church yesterday... its going to be a long story, so it might be the only one I tell. We will see. 

So yesterday started off a normal Sunday morning. We got up did our studies, went to campus and then to missionary coordination. We had a less active FINALLY come to church with us and one of our investigators came. This was her first Testimony meeting that she had been to, so we sat down and I began to explain how it all worked. 

One of the sweetest ward members, Jayne, started it off with an awesome testimony about blessings and how obedience brings blessings into our lives. Then this 70 year old lady who walked in 1/2 way through sacrament (keep in mind we are in a singles ward) gets up and she looks like she is going to give a talk. She has her scriptures, binders, a notebook, a framed picture and the George Albert Smith manual. She started off her testimony like this: "una momentee. Noticed I added an E to momentee, thats my special touch. Well, today is my birthday and I knew I wanted to bear my testimony for my birthday..." she then started to talk all sorts of nonsense that had nothing to do with a testimony. She whipped out her scriptures and said she was going to read to us from Isaiah 63 "everyone told me that I was never going to understand him... So I am going to just start reading until the Lord tells me to stop reading" So she did, starting with the chapter heading really emphasizing a couple times that the second coming is going to be a day of VENGEANCE for the wicked... VENGEANCE, and stopped when it talked about the red garment to point out that she had worn red that day. She read pretty much the whole chapter stopping a couple times to look up at the celing and to tell God to tell her to stop reading when she needs to stop. In between all of this she had paused to tell us how much she loves josh groban and in case we didnt know, she spelled it for us yelling G-R-O-B-A-N. she went on a tangent about him for a while, saying that she wanted to play one of his songs for us if the bishop would allow it. She talked for a long time about how Josh Groban needs to be LDS because he is teaching us... he takes the left side of the brain and the right side of the brain and merge them together."I want you to hear a song of his, maybe I can sing it for you, no - you don't want me to sing it for you, well maybe yo do" she just decided to quote it for us. She finally stopped reading Isaiah when she pulled out a framed picture that she "got at big lots the other day for 6 dollars... it says Familys are forever. I just want to read to you what this says. Treat your family like friends, and friends like family.... FRIENDS LIKE FAMILY" then she turned around and gave bishop an ornament that she got at big lots to show him that he is her friend/family. Were like 20 minutes in at this point, but then she pulled out her family history chart and started to read us her grandparents names and where they lived etc. She told us her whole life story and how she got her degree at New mexico state university and she has 29 extra credits so shes 1/2 to a PHD. The rest of the craziness I will present in bullet points because this is already really long: 

- she at one point pulled out a magnifying glass to see us. 

-I don't know when she was talking about this but she said something to the effect that "People told me that it was impossible to fall asleep while walking but Ive dont it TWICE." 

-She loves public radio international and we should all listen to it.

-she read some stuff from the George albert smith manual to us

-Something about the Russian leader and a student group is trying to kick the mormon missionaries out of the country. She yelled that one at us too.

- She is going to buy 7 Josh Groban T-shirts and wear one every day of the week because he is the best. 

SO this took the entire time, about 30-40 minutes, and while this is all happening the bishopric is trying to handle the situation. 5 minutes in, they start talking about what to do, bro smith asks if bishop wants him to get up and say something, bishop said that he will try a note. So he spent 2 minutes trying to find a piece of paper and he writes a note and gives it to her and she looks at it and says "I know I know, I dont want to take a second of your time, I will be done in a minute" so a couple more minutes go by and this whole time members of the ward have been getting up and going onto the stand trying to show her that others want to talk. But she kept going, so Brother Smith just turned off the mic and she wasn't even phased - she said "What happened? this thing broke, what is going on, how do we fix it (she was swatting it around) someone fix this... oh well, I WILL JUST TALK REALLY LOUD" So half the ward is on the stand and Brother Johnsons  wife gets up and tries to tell her its time to be finished and thats when she went crazy! 4 or 5 people are dragging her off the stand and she is yelling about how she is contacting the 1st presidency and that the relief society has already asked her to stop coming and how she is going to get a restraining order. 

Despite all of this craziness it was cool to see the ward just jump in and take control and help with the situation. As soon as they started to escort her out, one of the kids jumped up and put the organ player back on and we sang because I have been give much and I am a child of god  to drown out all the things she was yelling at us. Everyone that was on the stand helped and after it was all over the bishop decided to cancel sunday school and have a normal testimony meeting. If nothing else was learned from the whole experience, I think everyone at least learned a little about the spirit and the feelings that accompany truth and testimony. As soon as the situation was over and people started to testify again the spirit flooded the room. It was crazy. All the missionaries had to do damage control for the 8 non members that were there and tell them that testimony meetings are not usually that way. 

Other than that, the other exciting news for this week is that Diane Dickey (one of the ladies that I taught in 1st ward with sister Hirst) got baptized so we got to go to that. It was incredible to see her faith and to see how much she has grown. She finally gave up smoking and she was so excited to join the church. Her testimony was awesome, she just said ":I have spent my whole life looking for the right church, and now I have found it" Which is incredible because the first lesson we had with her she told us that she had been studying with the Jehovahs witnesses for 40 years and how the only thing that kept her from joining was that she was never ever ever going to give up smoking, but she did it for us because she felt the spirit and gained her testimony of the book of mormon. I was so happy! 

Well, I think this letter is long enough-

I love you all so much and hope you have a great week~ 

Dont send any more mail to my current address, send anything to the mission home! 

Sister Webb

November 26, 2012 letter

Hey everyone! 

Hope everyone had a great thanksgiving and a great week! 

Thanksgiving for us this week was really weird, but it was great. Last year I was in Troy and we went to 4 different peoples houses and we stuffed ourselves four different times. This year we had just one, but we got to go spend it with President and Sister Jensen. They invited the campus missionaries over because we are in a singles ward and don't have families to spend it with. It was a lot of fun to spend it with them and their daughters family was there too. Something about missionaries make little kids go crazy, cause their grand kids were SUPER hyper. I think it made them a little flustered, but it turned out to be great. 

There were no people on campus for 1/2 the week but we found ways to be productive still. We went and chalked 'Mormon.org' and Book of Mormon scriptures all over campus and went and did service for the salvation army. The rest of the time we walked all over campus and talked to the 10 people that happened to be there. 

Yesterday was probably the best day this week. We were at church and there were a couple visitors that were in town for the Florida, FSU game from lakeland and they brought a friend with them that goes to school here, her name is Emilee. She stayed for all 3 meeting and then afterwards we went to talk to her and see how she felt and she kept saying things like "I dont get why people dont think you are christian, you clearly believe in christ" and "I feel the spirit here that I feel other places" and "I really loved it, I feel like I was called to come here. I really just feel like this is where I am suppose to be right now.. maybe not to join, but to help other people have a better understanding" haha she things its not to join, but i am pretty sure it is. :) She said that when her friend converted (about a year ago) that she started asking questions and people were really rude to her for even being curious about it and that she wants to put a stop to that by helping people better understand us... SO we are teaching her on friday. I am really excited. Then after church we went to campus and only had 1/2 hour or so, but sis Pulspiher and I both felt a prompting to talk to this one girl, Ricki, and she said she was actually looking for a church to go to, so we are meeting with her Tuesday. Then we had dinner with the Johnsons and at the end of dinner I stepped out to use the restroom and when i came back they were all saying it was my turn and I was in the spotlight, I had no idea what was going on SO I grabbed my scriptures cause I thought they were all saying it was my turn to give the thought, but instead they were having those of us that will be leaving soon bare our testimonies and talk about what being on a mission has meant to us.... So that was unexpected. Elder Faulkner is leaving this transfer and so he went first and even though I still have one more they decided I should bare mine too. It was really nerve racking to talk about it. It doesnt matter how often you bare your testimony to people everyday, it still is scary to do it in front of lots of people. but honestly, being out here has meant everything to me. I have grown in so many ways and feel so blessed to have been called and given the opportunity to serve. I feel so lucky. Then the Johnsons bore theirs because they are leaving right after transfers (they are the institute couple here that have come to be another set of grandparents to us all) and they are so sweet. Sister Johnson said that her biggest worry was that she was going to be remembered for her food and not for her testimony of Christ. I want to be just like them when I am old, they are such an incredible couple. Then right after that, one of the girls from the ward came in and said that there were two girls that wanted to talk to someone about the church, so since they were girls and we are the sisters we got to talk to them. Turns out they were just writing a paper for a class so they had a bunch of questions but even still, when we were teaching them about all the different things we believe one of the girls kept saying stuff like "I love that" or "that just makes so much sense" They go to FAMU so we gave them the FAMU elders number and so hopefully FAMU will get to teach them more. 

Gerrit is doing great, we had a good lesson on following the prophet and praying always last week. He is having a hard time accepting the answers he is getting cause he says he still doesnt know if there is a God, but he has recieved answers to his prayers so tonight we are going to revisit the restoration and help him to recognize what he has been feeling. He came to church yesterday and the Elders said that he participated in the discussion a lot in Elders quorum, which was awesome! I'd love to see him get baptized, he is one of my favorite investigators that I have gotten to teach on my mission. 

I have been thinking lots about reaching our full potential this week and how God gives us guidelines and commandments to help us reach that potential. Our potential is to become Christlike and to achieve perfection and to live with God again. All of the commandments that are given to us are pointing us towards that goal. When we chose to only follow a select few of the commandments then we will never reach that full potential. It takes a power beyond ourselves to be able to reach it and that is why we have the atonement to help us go just a little further and make up the difference. The closer we come to that goal, the closer we come to God and to the spirit and through those things we find happiness. There are so many things that can distract us from finding that happiness, but I know that when we put God first and fulfill our purpose here on earth that we will be able to be with him again. If you feel like you are not reaching your potential, evaluate your life and find ways to bring it closer in harmony with Gods commandments and you will have a greater amount of happiness in your life. 

I love you all! have a great week! 

Sister Webb

November 19, 2012 letter

"Every saint has a past and every sinner has a future" -Oscar Wilde

Alright alright. Hello again. It's been another week, and its been great! 

I'll start with an update on Gerrit, cause I am sure you are all DYING to hear how things are with him... haha probably not, but He is our one solid progressing investigator who is so great to teach and his lessons are always awesome. So I am going to tell you about this weeks lesson. :) 

So last week we committed him to living the word of wisdom and he is doing so good with it. So we asked him how its been this week and he said its been great. He still hasn't done any drugs or drank or anything that he usually does and when we asked if anyone has noticed that he is off everything he said no, but then after thinking about it he said there was one time. It was when he went to church with his family (cause he went home for the weekend) and between their 'sacrament' meeting and their Sunday school class they have tea and cookies. They always have it all set up so you just have to come in and grab a glass and sit down. well, they usually only have a couple glasses of water there and he said no one EVER takes the water, so when he went for the water he got a lot of really strange looks, but no one asked why so he didnt have to tell them the reason he wasn't drinking tea. 

So then the lesson got even better when we started to talk about his praying, because he knows its true, but I dont think he feels ready to accept it, so he keeps trying to deny it -- without success. So he said he prayed a couple times. The first was after he had a migraine. He got it and the first day he thought "hmm, I should pray about this" but he didnt. and the next day it was still there and he thought "I should pray about this" and he still didnt. So then the third day he finally decided to pray about it, and within the hour his migraine was gone. His friend did come over and give him some meds, so he tried to tell us that it was the meds, but he knows that it wasn't. Then the second story was even better. I told yall last week that he threw out his back -- and so he needed to go see the doctor but he hasnt found one here in tallahassee, so he was just going to go to the medical center and I guess it doesnt have a very good reputation when students come in cause they just assume that they have an STD, test them and send them on their way. SO he was worried about that, and he couldnt find anyone to take him cause he could drive with the way his back felt. SO he decided to pray and he prayed for 2 things: #1- that he would get a ride there, and #2- That when he got there they would take his seriously and be able to do something for him (he also said that whenever he goes to a doctor they never take him seriously because he is just a 20 yr old kid complaining of back problems) So right after he prayed some girl that he use to be roommates with (that he hasnt talked to in forever because their friendship ended on really bad terms) called and said she could take him (he had posted it on facebook) and when he got to the doctors office he got right in to see the doctor who figured everything out, gave him a steroid shot, took x-rays, gave him a better medication, etc. He said that she did more for him that the specialist he has been going to go see for years, even more than the doctor did when he initially broke his back. He tried to figure out how it all happened, but he knows that it was God. Haha  yep, he knows it. He said he keeps trying to deny the feelings hes had when he prayed and he cant. So its just a matter of time. :) I get so excited for Mondays to go and to teach him. 

We also had Zone conference this week, and I just want to say how SAD I am to be coming home soon because missionary work is going to explode and I want so badly to be a part of it. President Jensen talked alot about what the new announcement is going to do to our mission and we all got so excited! Right now we have 165-ish young missionaries. 13 of those are sisters. then we have another 16 or so couple missionaries. He started writing numbers up on the board. and I dont have my notes with me, but it went something like this (im just throwing out numbers): by February we are going to have 24 sisters, by April we are going to have 36, by May we are going to have 60, by July we are going to have 84 and by next august we are going to have 100 sisters and 150 elders with 32 seniors. ONE HUNDRED SISTERS! he said he almost had a heart attack and then he called the Jacksonville mission president and the Birmingham mission president and they are going to be at 112ish and 130ish sister missionaries. I AM SO EXCITED! i guess those numbers are pretty consistent across missions. The lord is hastening the work and its so incredible. I want so badly to be a part of it. The work is going to go forth at an incredible rate! Also, we dont watch the news but there have been rumors started to be talked about china.... One of the girls here (who is preparing to serve) said that china got a new leader and that it was all over the news? I feel like that piece of news means alot more to LDS people than to others because we are all just waiting for china to be opened. I also have heard a couple people talk about friends who received their calls that said they were called to another Asian country until china opens. That is all just hearsay so dont take it for fact, but either way the work is being hastened and I am so ecstatic about it I can hardly contain myself! 

We went to the doctor Friday for sis Pulsiphers foot and he couldn't find anything wrong with it, so its been a hard week as far as getting other work done goes, but president had the sisters who were using the mission bikes bring them to us so we can ride to campus to keep her off her foot as much as possible. That's been alot of fun! Hopefully her foot heals soon, cause if not president said she'll have to go home for recovery. :(. 

Here is a random fun fact: So back when I first got to the mission sister Horan and I decided that we were going to sing all the songs in order and sing all of the hymns in the hymn book. Its taken me my whole mission to get through them (some of my companions havent wanted to do it with me) but sister pulsipher and I sang "god save the king" this morning for our studies and I finished the last song in the book today. It feels like quite the accomplishment to me :) 

Well, I just want to end talking about gratitude because it is thanksgiving this week and we have so much to be grateful for, especially because we have the gospel in our lives. I overlook so often the blessings that I receive but when i take the time to look back on my life and especially the last 15 months being out here on a mission I feel so overwhelmed with gratitude for the blessings given to me from my Heavenly father. I truly can see his hand in my everyday life and more than anything this year I am so grateful for the opportunity that I have had to spend a part of my life in complete service to God. I wouldn't trade this experience for anything in the world. I have grown and stretched more than I thought was possible. I have such deep gratitude for the gospel and for Jesus Christ. I am grateful for my testimony and for the companions Ive gotten to serve with. I am grateful for faithful friends and family at home that consistently take time out of their busy lives to write me. I am grateful for ward members here that treat us like their own kids. I am grateful for people that say hi back when we smile and say hello, or the people that sit and listen to us even when they aren't interested. I am grateful for the spirit and his working in my own life and the chance I get to see first hand the change he can make it others lives. I am grateful for my personality and talents and abilities to go out and to do the things that the Lord has asked me to do. I am grateful for the scriptures and the words of the prophets and for singing. I am grateful for our freedom to worship God how we want. I am grateful that its like 105 degrees anymore and the humidity has died down. I am grateful for a mission president and his wife who loves and cares so much about 165 of us. I could go on and on, but above all I am grateful for the atonement and the chance that I have to access its powers and to become a little better each day than I was the previous day. 

Enjoy thanksgiving everyone! 
Love you all! 
Sister Webb

November 12, 2012 letter

"Cant nobody fix it but Jesus" -Sign help up by a lady on the side of the road.

 

Hello everyone! 

I dont know if I have ever expressed how much I love southern people before. But its driving past/talking with people like the lady with the sign that makes being down here so great! 

Its been an interesting week to say the least. We had some really great things happen and we also had to stay inside alot of this week but as always I learn lots from every situation we I am in. 

So the week started off with a great lesson with Gerrit, who right now is my favorite investigator, probably because he is progressing and his lessons are so great! We talked about the word of wisdom and baptism with him this week. We had talked about the word of widsom a little bit in the first couple lessons we taught him, but we were just answering questions that he had and werent really teaching the whole principle or committing him to live it. So we taught him again and asked him to live it and he was really funny. He said "ya know, I knew we were going to talk about this today and this morning I bought two cans of arizona iced tea and I drank one on the way over here and then I got here and realized that we were probably going to talk about this again and so I have one more in my car.... how about I start tomorrow?" and I said "how about you start today?" and he said "alright, I will just give it away to my roommate and start today". He was pretty excited to live it because he said he always wanted to go clean of EVERYTHING hes ever been on. He goes off different drugs at different times, but never all at the same time. So after the lesson he was talking to a kid in the ward that goes and watches the sunrise everymore and he asked him where the best place was to go watch it and at the end he said something like "thanks, I just need a way to wake up now cause I cant have coffee because of THESE TWO...(pointing to us)" haha hes been testing us throughout the week telling us how its been a hard week to live it because everyone keeps offering him free stuff and he threw out his back and usually he smokes weed when he does that but that hes been good. Then he tested us yesterday to tell us how he never realized how much tea he drank until he stopped drinking it, but that he still hasnt done anything against the word of wisdom. He is so great! 

Like I said, we also talked to him about baptism. He said hes not ready to set a date yet, and probably wont for a while because he wants to make sure that he is going to be clean and stay clean for a long time before he decides to get baptized. We talked about the answer that he received and he said that his "logical" side keeps telling him to forget how he felt, but that as hard as he tries to forget that he got an answer to his prayer, he cant forget it. I think its only a matter of time before he decides to get baptized. He is going to start coming to more activities and getting more involved. I am really excited! 

The other really great thing that happened this week was teaching Jonathans friends that he brought to church. We taught them on Wednesday and on our way there they texted us and asked if they could bring a friend with them. So we ended up picking up ANOTHER investigator (kyle) and teaching him as well. He came to church on sunday with us and seemed to enjoy it. Being on a college campus is so interesting because people are very willing to listen and to read and they keep commitments very well, but you can have one REALLY spirit filled lesson and then at the end they say that they just wants to some to read and pray on their own and that they will call us when they are ready for another lesson. I have never had so many powerful lessons end with them not wanting to keep learning. They seemed to love it all and to feel the spirit and at the end of their lesson they were so excited to learn to pray. OH that was a really cool part as well... usually at the end of the first lesson we invite whoever were teaching to say the prayer, but since there were 3 of them we didnt know who to ask... none of them had prayed before so we didnt know who to ask but then a stroke of inspiration came and we decided to have everyone say a prayer. So we knelt down and sis pulsipher said one, then me, then a member that was with us (nick), then each of them said their first prayers in their lives. It was SO great to hear their humility and to feel the spirit that was there. 

The down side to the week was that sister Pulsipher did something to her foot and so when we called the mission doctor he said to only walk on it when she had to... and to wear tennis shoes when she did have to walk haha since we are a walking area that means all the time, but he said to only walk to our lessons and to stay off of it the rest of the time. SO we had to stay in alot this week, but when we went out she rocked the tennis shoes and skirt look :). It finally felt good enough friday night and we were pumped to get back out and work Saturday, then she woke up with the flu (or something) that made it so she had to sleep most of the day saturday.. So we had to stay in again. I think Heavenly Father is trying to teach me patience and long suffering? That is the conclusion I came to because I was going stir crazy this whole week not being able to work. Im hoping this week we get to go back out and start talking to people again! I have a bit of the beginning symptoms of a cold, so I am trying to battle that as best as possible so that there is no reason that we have to stay in this week. 

So that was our week! Hope yall's was eventful :)

Love you lots! 

Sister Webb

November 5, 2012 letter

Oh hello November.

Hello again! 

This week was such a good one! I have so many stories to tell, I don't even know where to begin. I feel like there was something awesome every day... So I think I will take this one day by day. 

Monday: We had an INCREDIBLE lesson with Gerrit. Its been a great routine with him now, we finish our P-day then go teach him at 630 and then go to the ward FHE. He usually stays and we help him fellowship with the ward and such. We sat down in our lesson and started with a prayer and he immediately said " SO, I prayed this week, cause I know that you are going to ask me about it, (haha if you constantly follow-up, they finally start keeping commitments)... well, I guess I prayed kind of. I started out and I was like hey big man... but then I more so just started to think about everything rather than actually praying. I was thinking about our lessons and about the people here and how nice they are and how I want to be friends with them, and then I started to think about the book of Mormon and if it was true and I had this feeling come over me that I cant describe in any other way than it felt like I was on psychedelic drugs but it was completely natural and the walls weren't breathing. (we then had to ask what he meant when he said the walls weren't breathing because neither of us have been on drugs before and didnt have any idea what that meant). 15 months in and I have never heard the spirit described as being the same sensation as being on drugs. BUT he knew that it was his answer and that is the only way he could describe it to us. THEN we had an awesome lesson about being obedient and started to teach him the commandments and at the end of the lesson he said the closing prayer (which is something we've been trying to get him to do for like 6 weeks) and it was SO GOOD! So I wanted to leave extending the baptismal commitment up to sister pulsipher because its such a great experience and i want her to have it... So we didn't invite him last week (cause she didn't know I was waiting for her) but she is going to invite him today and I cant wait!!!!

Tuesday: We went on trade-offs Tuesday and I got to go back to 1st ward and be with sister Hirst again. I LOVE SISTER HIRST SO MUCH! I have never had a companion that I just get along with so well, the way we teach, our excitement level, everything is just so similar the work just gets done and its so great! We clicked right back into the way it was when I left laughing and having a good time and working at 1000 mph. we went home for lunch and a guy they had taught like a month ago that dropped off the face of the planet called and wanted to meet, so we went to meet with him right then and we had a great lesson on the book of Mormon with him. He lost his job and his house so he was living with friends and had gone through like 3 phones and was all over the place looking for work but he really wanted to keep meeting with them and he lost his book of Mormon at one of the houses that he was staying at so we gave him another one and it was great. Then later that night they had the 1st ward trunk or treat, so I got to see all the families from 1st ward that I miss so much and talk with them. They all did double takes when they said hi and realized that I wasn't suppose to be there. It was the perfect day to do trade offs in 1st ward. We got home and hit our pillows exhausted which was such a great feeling.

Wednesday: Halloween! There is a man named Dan, who is the landlord for a bunch of the elders and he LOVES missionaries. He wants to be a Mormon, but his hardcore baptist wife said she'd divorce him if he did. So he just keeps missionaries around all the time and keeps learning till she softens. He decided it would be a great proselyting tool for the sisters to come over and dress up as angels and pass out his candy for him (he lives in a really nice neighborhood and so all the kids in Tallahassee come there to trick or treat) He bought us all costumes and it was a lot of fun! He had us play heavenly music (aka mo-tab) and he had dry ice going to give it a 'cloud' effect. He invited a bunch of the elders over too for dinner which was alot of fun. There was a mom who asked him if we were from a church and he said yes and she asked which one and he said they're the Mormons and she just said "tell them thank you so much for being out and witnessing, we appreciate it so much" it was awesome! 

Friday: We have a new investigator who sister pulsipher and sister Goodman taught the first lesson to Tuesday while I was gone on trade offs and he was really excited about it all that he set up another appointment in the same week. We got to teach him about the plan of salvation and he said he'd come to church and he was just really excited about everything. 

Friday morning was really awesome too because I was trying really hard to be guided when we went out on campus. Sometimes its easy to forget to really try to follow promptings of where to go because there are so many people everywhere that you just start talking to people but we got on campus and started going and I felt like we needed to go to the stadium, so we talked to a couple people and the prompting came again and so we headed over to the stadium where there are a couple benches. I didn't see anyone when we came around the corner but then off to the side was this guy so we went and started to talk to him and he was really open and really interested in what we were saying. We asked him if he had ever heard about the church and he said that his uncle was a Mormon. so we talked for a bit and told him why the message of the restoration is so important and then gave him a book of Mormon and he said "I can have this?" we said yes and he got really excited and said "my brother was just telling me a couple days ago that I should look into getting a book of Mormon  So that was really cool. He goes to FAMU so we gave it to the Elders over there, but he seemed really legit! 

Sunday: Sunday was the best day. We had ridiculous goals on Sunday that we didn't have any idea how we were going to meet, but we prayed hard and things turned out so good. We started out on campus and talked to a bunch of people. We had a goal to give away 4 book of Mormons to meet our goal for the week and we were only on campus for like a hour and we had given away all 4 of the ones we had. (usually we give away 6-7 a week) then we went to coordination and we texted Jonathan to see if he was still planning to come to church and he said "yeah, and I am bringing a couple friends too" So he showed up with 2 friends and they all LOVED church. Sometimes I get a little worried on testimony sundays because of some of the things people say, and the first testimony started out "I have a testimony of the law of chastity" but it turned out to be really great and they loved that we did that. They stayed all 3 hours and we had a break the fast after that they stayed for and this ward is so great at fellowshipping that they made a whole bunch of friends and we are going to start to teach his two friends this week! 

It was just a really awesome week full of blessings and tender mercies and i am so grateful for it and to get the chance to be serving at this time. The lord is hastening his work and I get to be a part of it. I love the gospel so much and truly feel like our testimonies and being truly converted is one of the most important things we can have and strive for in this life. I love you all! Have a great week :) 

Sister Webb

October 29, 2012 Letter

Hello Everyone! 
I would just have y'all know that this morning it hit 50 degrees here in Tallahassee and I am wearing a coat. I think my body has acclimatized to being in the warmth because in Utah 50 degrees is nothing!... Ill be honest, I'm a little worried to come home in the dead of winter. I am going to Freeze! 

This week has been really great, we have done some fun things! Wednesday was transfer day (I am still with sister Pulsipher on FSU campus) Nothing much has changed here, we got 3 new elders in our ward (each companionship got a new one) and so that is always exciting. We got to go and teach a geography class over at FSU about the church. The professor is LDS and they talk alot about how environment and culture has effects on us, so he invited us to do a Q and A about how our religion has impacted our lives. We went with the FSU elders and Elder Rowan (who us assigned to FAMU but his new companion wasn't in tally yet) It was really cool to be able to teach like 40-50 freshman about why our faith is so important to us.

The week was normal, lots of campus time trying to find new investigators and getting the ones we have to progress. We had an incredible lesson with Alicia about why faith in Christ is so important. We watched the testimonies of some of the apostles on the "special witnesses of Christ" DVD and when we asked her what she thought and felt while watching it she just said that each one we watched seemed to talk about Christ as if he was in their lives in a very real way, not just as someone that came and died so that we can go to heaven, which is the way that she views Christ. I think it was powerful for her. We got to think about our own experiences and testify of how Christ CAN be in your everyday life as someone that cares and loves about each of us and not just about forgiving us of our sins, but he cares about our heartaches and sorrows and the things we go through on a daily basis. I hope that she can feel that way about Christ one day... She has such great desires and she wants to know the truth. It was good for me too just to be able to reflect on my own life and what experiences that I have had that have helped me to come to allow Christ to play a very active role in what I am doing and in my life. Its something great to think about. That is probably one of the greatest blessings of being on a mission, being able to teach principles that are to help other people come to Christ but in turn seeing my own life and coming closer to him myself. 

The Lord keeps blessing us with things to do with our weekends, which is great. It was homecoming this week, which means even more alcohol that usual so we didnt want to go out onto campus at all. So Friday the 2nd ward sisters texted us and asked us if we wanted to go help with some service out in Monticello (which is a tiny town out in the sticks of Tallahassee) so Saturday night we went out there and helped with the ghost tours. Every year they have some legit ghost hunters come in and take you on a tour of the town and all the "haunted" houses and they tell you all about the ghosts that live in the different old houses. So we got to be the crossing guards haha we got giant reflector vests to wear and made sure that all the people crossed safely. It was great. Mostly we just laughed and had fun because it sounded like everything she said was made up, but it was really cool to see all the old building and architecture. The other crossing guard that was with us would tell us the real history of the town and stuff. She was a really nice lady and asked us some questions about our missions and the church. 

Yesterday we had a "bring a friend to church" day, which was SO great! We had like 20-25 non members come and all the meetings taught really basic gospel principles. The 4 talks in sacrament were about "who we are", the atonement, how the book of mormon relates to the bible, and the restoration. Then we had 2 musical numbers that were INCREDIBLE there is a kid in the ward that is getting a masters in violin performance and he arranged 'be still my soul' for the piano and cello and it was AMAZING! he is really talented and the spirit was about to burst the walls I swear! I got to give the talk on the bible and the book of mormon, which was really cool. Before my mission I didnt know how to talk about anything more that 5 minutes. Yesterday when I finalized my talk and practiced it once, It was about 18 minutes.... So I had to cut out alot of what I wanted to say, but I think it turned our alright. Turns out I really like to speak! :) 

Ive been thinking alot this week about "the ideal situation" and how rarely in our lives are we ever in the ideal situations. There is always something in life that makes what we are going through less than ideal, whether it be sickness, family issues, career, money, motivation there is always something that could be better in life. There are a thousand cliche sayings about being positive in situations that are less than ideal. "look at the glass half full", "the power of positive thinking" "attitude is 100% of how things turn out" "count your blessings" "look for tender mercies" etc. and they become cliche because they are true. For anyone that has been on a mission, they know that its not easy. Its usually a year and a half or two years of being in a less than ideal situation: Hard areas, hard companions, Hard leaders, Hard wards to work with, low numbers, rejection; but when we look at all of these less than ideal situations with a positive outlook, we find the silver lining. Often times that silver lining brings a heightened spiritual sense or brings us closer to God because we realize that he is the one that can help us through it. He asked us to be perfect, which is something that we will never achieve in this life and never on our own but by trying our best and relying on him we are able to allow him to make our weaknesses strong and have joy and peace and happiness in all our many less than ideal situations. I want to just end with a quote by President Hinckley that my friend Claire sent to me a couple months ago that has really just helped me to stay positive and know that everything is for our good. "In my ninety plus years, I have learned a secret. I have learned that when good men and good women face challenges with optimism, things will always work out! Truly,  things always work out! Despite how difficult circumstances may look at the moment, those who have faith and move forward with a happy spirit will find that things always work out." I have found that to be true. When I look at things with optimism, and try and help people around me that are also in less than ideal situations, my problems get smaller and I am give the capacity to reach out, lift, and help others. I love this gospel and the joy it brings to my life! 

I love yall so much! 
Sister Webb