I was reading the Book of Mormon this morning for my personal studies and I am in Alma 26 (that is where I was before we read for 3 days) and I feel like this chapter describes so well how I feel on a daily basis. I was thinking back over my mission as I was writing in my Journal last night and thinking about how great missionary work is and how the new announcement is going to give even more people the chance to serve, and then this morning I read that chapter (for those that dont know exactly what it is, it is where Ammon talks about how great God is for allowing them to serve and do missionary work among the lamanites and baptize so many of them and Aaron chastises him for boasting and then ha talks for the rest of the chapter about why its ok to boast as long as you are boasting of God and not yourself.) I feel like I am so blessed to be serving at this time! That God was great enough to tell me that I needed to serve a mission and he has allowed me the chance to serve his children and to preach the gospel here in Florida/Alabama. I see miracles every day and I dont deserve them, but God being the amazing father in Heaven that he is, allows me to see them and be a part of them.
This week was great, as they all are. We had alot of random successes on campus of finding people. We talk to alot of people each week and we try to always invite them to do something whether it be to look at mormon.org or to come to church, and sadly, most of the time they say yes and dont do it. But we met this guy on saturday named Brad. We talked to him for a while and invited him to come to church with us. As they always do he said he would "check it out sometime". We were hopeful that he would be based on how often it actually happens, chances were slim. Well, half way through sacrament meeting I turned around to look for someone (I cant remember who I was looking for now) and there he was sitting on the back row. We went to go talk to him afterwards but couldnt even get to him because he had 3 other people come up and talk to him for a while. As it turns out, he has 3 friends that are members of our congregation. We were so excited! We get to teach him this week, and I cant wait to see where it goes.
The other really great story this week was Corrinne. Hopefully I've told you a little about her. She is the golden referral that we got from the 1st ward sisters. We were a little worried this week because she wasnt responding and missed her lesson and seemed to not really be caring that much anymore. I was a little worried that she was antied or something happened to cause her to not want to learn anymore but saturday night she sent us a text and said that she dropped her phone in the pool, and her car broke down so she had to go home to find a new car and then she said "I've started to read the Book of Mormon and I read the pamphlet of Gods plan and Ive been praying so much! I honestly feel amazing lately, and I feel like Gods really helping me with this and like Im going in the right direction." We are so excited for this week to teach her. She wants to be able to do it for herself and not because she is dating a member, and I feel like she is on the right path. We are hoping to set a baptism date for her this week, so we'll be praying for that!
We've been trying to keep our weekends as productive as possible because there arent many people on campus saturday and especially not sunday. So yesterday we had a great idea to go and chalk mormon.org and questions of the soul all over campus. It was alot of fun. We found a huge area and drew out the plan of salvation. As we were drawing a guy was walking with his friends and he stopped to look at it. I asked him if we could teach him about it and he said yes. He sent his friends on their way and stayed to talk with us. We told him all about the plan and read him a couple of the scriptures and he loved it. He wanted a book of mormon and was really excited to learn about it. It was really great to see that when we try out best to do what God wants us to do and we find ways to use our time the best we can, he places people in our paths that we are able to testify to.
Hope you all have a great week!
Sister Webb
Wednesday, October 24, 2012
October 15, 2012 letter
Hello again.
Another week has zoomed by and here I am sitting at a computer unsure how to start. I love the gospel SO much. I love the spirit and being on a mission. What an AMAZING experience it has been.
This week has been great. It was a little unique and different as far as normal missionary life goes but it was such an awesome week.
So the week started off with exchanges. I dont know if I have mentioned this before in my last couple emails, but because there are 6 sisters in Tallahassee, President has asked us to start doing companion exchanges with each other. It has been a really great experience to be able to work in the other areas and with all the other sisters. This week i went to 2nd ward with sister Thomson. Let me just tell you how much I MISS the experiences that come with a family ward. Crazy Less actives, Old people, Black people, rude people, funny people. You just dont have those experiences contacting on campus like you do tracting out neighborhoods. First we went to see a really nice Less active lady who lives at a Sr. Center and she was in the lunchroom eating when we showed up and so we sat and visited with her and her table mates. I LOVE old people. They are so funny and so nice and tell you the same story like 6 times in the course of 30 minutes. As we walked down the hallways we could hear a lady singing at the top of her lungs and when we finally reached this sisters room, we asked her one question and in fine southern form, she talked for a whole hour. Then we went tracting and to see a couple investigators. First was a lady named Tara who has a jehovahs witness son who kept coming in and interrupting the lessons telling her that because she puts up a christmas tree every year and has angel statue things on her wall that she worships the devil. We shared jacob 32:3 with her where it talks about how angels speak by the power of the holy ghost and that there are both good and bad angels. THEN We taught this nice black man named john, and we taught him about the gospel of jesus christ. I had a really really strong prompting to ask him to be baptized and i thought I was crazy because he wasnt my investigator and it wasnt my area, but listening I did it anyways. He talked about how he needs to go back to his church in quincy to ask God if this is the church he needs to come to haha and then I didnt feel like I needed to push it any further and so we left it at that. The next day we went out the the country into a town called Monticello where the people are cold and dont really like the missionaries but by doing service the sisters have been able to soften peoples hearts a little bit. We ate brunch with a memeber and I learned that honey is really good on biscuts and gravy. weird. Then we saw another awesome black lady who I could barely understand (its been a while since I have taught anyone with a thick southern/Ebonics accent) She was so funny! She talked and talked and talked and we barely made it through reading the introduction of the book of mormon with her because she went on so many tangents. haha I hope I get to go back to a family ward, preferably out in the country somewhere at least one more time haha :).
Wednesday we were brought a new investigator, Corrinne, by the 1st ward sisters. She is GOLDEN. She has been dating an LDS boy for about 5 months and has gone to church with him many times and feels the spirit and wants to know for herself if it is true. His family watched the Joseph Smith restoration DVD with her and when we asked her what she thought of it she said it made more sense than anything she has ever heard before. When she asked his family about what she needed to do they said that she needed to meet with the missionaries and decide for herself if she wants to get baptized. We gave her a book of mormon and she came to church Sunday. She said that when she knows that the book of mormon is true that she will be baptized, so that was really exciting!
Then Thursday, Friday and Saturday sister Pulsipher and I read the whole book of mormon in 3 days. A couple weeks back we were role playing and I told her to teach me about the book of mormon and she said something like "ah, this one is always so hard for me because I know the book of mormon is true and everything but I just dont feel like I have a really strong testimony of it, so it hard for me to teach about it" I thought about that for a couple days (knowing that this is one of the most important principles for us to teach about) and after praying about how to strengthen her testimony of the book of mormon the idea came to me to read it in a very short amount of time. Back when Hurricane Issac was suppose to hit Tallahassee, we were going to spend 3 days in the church and president Jensen said if that happened that we should try to read the whole book of mormon. So I talked with him about my concern and asked him if it would be ok if we took 3 days over a weekend, where proslyting is less productive on campus anyways, and read the whole thing to be able to strengthen her (and my) testimony. He said yes, and so this weekend we did it. We read 177 pages a day and it took about 10 hours a day. Let me just tell you how awesome of an experience that was! I thought that we would be so burnt out after reading for a couple hours but the opposite happened, the more we read and the more we got into it the less we even wanted to take breaks for lunch and for dinner. We would read together for a while, then on our own to a certain spot and then together again. Even by the second day I could see sister Pulsiphers testimony strengthen and her motivation and desires for the work go up. We finished saturday night at 9:05pm. It was AWESOME!!!!
I have a very strong testimony of the book of mormon and this experience only strengthened it. I KNOW that it is the word of god. I can feel the power of the book when I read it. I felt it stronger than ever as I read for long periods of time this weekend. I know that it is a book that can both answer our questions directly and can bring a spirit into your life that will bring you closer to the spirit to be able to gain revelation on problems we have. I know that having a testimony of the book of mormon and of Joseph smith is the foundation of knowing that this is Christs church restored again to the earth. I know that the promise in the beginning of the book "that a man will get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts than by any other book" is a true promise, because its one made by God through his chosen prophet, and I know that if there is any doubt in your mind about any principle of the gospel that reading and pondering and praying about the book of mormon is the solution. It testifies of our savior Jesus Christ, that he lives and that he did infact die for each of us. That if we look to him and follow after him, that we too will live eternally with our heavenly father. I know that that is true.
So then yesterday at church brother Johnson (in the bishopric) asked if I would be willing to speak in a couple weeks for 'bring a friend to church day' (which is a day that they pick every semester to have everyone bring a friend or two and all the talks and lessons are all geared to the basics of the gospel, then we have a potluck afterwards) and I said yes and asked what he would like me to speak on and wouldn't you know it.. I'm speakin' on the book of mormon! I am really excited :)
Its been a really great week!
Love you all!
Sister Webb
Another week has zoomed by and here I am sitting at a computer unsure how to start. I love the gospel SO much. I love the spirit and being on a mission. What an AMAZING experience it has been.
This week has been great. It was a little unique and different as far as normal missionary life goes but it was such an awesome week.
So the week started off with exchanges. I dont know if I have mentioned this before in my last couple emails, but because there are 6 sisters in Tallahassee, President has asked us to start doing companion exchanges with each other. It has been a really great experience to be able to work in the other areas and with all the other sisters. This week i went to 2nd ward with sister Thomson. Let me just tell you how much I MISS the experiences that come with a family ward. Crazy Less actives, Old people, Black people, rude people, funny people. You just dont have those experiences contacting on campus like you do tracting out neighborhoods. First we went to see a really nice Less active lady who lives at a Sr. Center and she was in the lunchroom eating when we showed up and so we sat and visited with her and her table mates. I LOVE old people. They are so funny and so nice and tell you the same story like 6 times in the course of 30 minutes. As we walked down the hallways we could hear a lady singing at the top of her lungs and when we finally reached this sisters room, we asked her one question and in fine southern form, she talked for a whole hour. Then we went tracting and to see a couple investigators. First was a lady named Tara who has a jehovahs witness son who kept coming in and interrupting the lessons telling her that because she puts up a christmas tree every year and has angel statue things on her wall that she worships the devil. We shared jacob 32:3 with her where it talks about how angels speak by the power of the holy ghost and that there are both good and bad angels. THEN We taught this nice black man named john, and we taught him about the gospel of jesus christ. I had a really really strong prompting to ask him to be baptized and i thought I was crazy because he wasnt my investigator and it wasnt my area, but listening I did it anyways. He talked about how he needs to go back to his church in quincy to ask God if this is the church he needs to come to haha and then I didnt feel like I needed to push it any further and so we left it at that. The next day we went out the the country into a town called Monticello where the people are cold and dont really like the missionaries but by doing service the sisters have been able to soften peoples hearts a little bit. We ate brunch with a memeber and I learned that honey is really good on biscuts and gravy. weird. Then we saw another awesome black lady who I could barely understand (its been a while since I have taught anyone with a thick southern/Ebonics accent) She was so funny! She talked and talked and talked and we barely made it through reading the introduction of the book of mormon with her because she went on so many tangents. haha I hope I get to go back to a family ward, preferably out in the country somewhere at least one more time haha :).
Wednesday we were brought a new investigator, Corrinne, by the 1st ward sisters. She is GOLDEN. She has been dating an LDS boy for about 5 months and has gone to church with him many times and feels the spirit and wants to know for herself if it is true. His family watched the Joseph Smith restoration DVD with her and when we asked her what she thought of it she said it made more sense than anything she has ever heard before. When she asked his family about what she needed to do they said that she needed to meet with the missionaries and decide for herself if she wants to get baptized. We gave her a book of mormon and she came to church Sunday. She said that when she knows that the book of mormon is true that she will be baptized, so that was really exciting!
Then Thursday, Friday and Saturday sister Pulsipher and I read the whole book of mormon in 3 days. A couple weeks back we were role playing and I told her to teach me about the book of mormon and she said something like "ah, this one is always so hard for me because I know the book of mormon is true and everything but I just dont feel like I have a really strong testimony of it, so it hard for me to teach about it" I thought about that for a couple days (knowing that this is one of the most important principles for us to teach about) and after praying about how to strengthen her testimony of the book of mormon the idea came to me to read it in a very short amount of time. Back when Hurricane Issac was suppose to hit Tallahassee, we were going to spend 3 days in the church and president Jensen said if that happened that we should try to read the whole book of mormon. So I talked with him about my concern and asked him if it would be ok if we took 3 days over a weekend, where proslyting is less productive on campus anyways, and read the whole thing to be able to strengthen her (and my) testimony. He said yes, and so this weekend we did it. We read 177 pages a day and it took about 10 hours a day. Let me just tell you how awesome of an experience that was! I thought that we would be so burnt out after reading for a couple hours but the opposite happened, the more we read and the more we got into it the less we even wanted to take breaks for lunch and for dinner. We would read together for a while, then on our own to a certain spot and then together again. Even by the second day I could see sister Pulsiphers testimony strengthen and her motivation and desires for the work go up. We finished saturday night at 9:05pm. It was AWESOME!!!!
I have a very strong testimony of the book of mormon and this experience only strengthened it. I KNOW that it is the word of god. I can feel the power of the book when I read it. I felt it stronger than ever as I read for long periods of time this weekend. I know that it is a book that can both answer our questions directly and can bring a spirit into your life that will bring you closer to the spirit to be able to gain revelation on problems we have. I know that having a testimony of the book of mormon and of Joseph smith is the foundation of knowing that this is Christs church restored again to the earth. I know that the promise in the beginning of the book "that a man will get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts than by any other book" is a true promise, because its one made by God through his chosen prophet, and I know that if there is any doubt in your mind about any principle of the gospel that reading and pondering and praying about the book of mormon is the solution. It testifies of our savior Jesus Christ, that he lives and that he did infact die for each of us. That if we look to him and follow after him, that we too will live eternally with our heavenly father. I know that that is true.
So then yesterday at church brother Johnson (in the bishopric) asked if I would be willing to speak in a couple weeks for 'bring a friend to church day' (which is a day that they pick every semester to have everyone bring a friend or two and all the talks and lessons are all geared to the basics of the gospel, then we have a potluck afterwards) and I said yes and asked what he would like me to speak on and wouldn't you know it.. I'm speakin' on the book of mormon! I am really excited :)
Its been a really great week!
Love you all!
Sister Webb
October 8, 2012 letter
"the crowning characteristic of LOVE is always LOYALTY" -Elder Holland
I LOVE GENERAL CONFERENCE!!!!!!! haha I cant say I have always gotten as pumped for general conference in the past as I do on my mission, but being out here, general conference is something that I look forward to the very most, and can I just say how cool it is to be a missionary when they announced something as incredible as missionaries can now go at 18 and 19! If you are a boy and you are 18... GO ON A MISSION RIGHT NOW. If you are a girl and you are 19... GO ON A MISSION RIGHT NOW! haha I am being serious. Coming on a mission is the best thing that has ever happened to me and the best decision I have ever made. I have learned so much being out here and not only that I have come to know my Savior and my Heavenly father in a very real way. My testimony has been tried tested, and strengthened and now is more immovable than ever. I have learned to love people and to help people and to become more like my Savior. I have learned to work hard and stay focused; to sacrifice things that I want to do for the things that God wants me to do. I have learned to listen to the voice of the spirit and to follow those promptings. In the end I know that ALL these things I have learned will only benefit me in the future. So if you have ever considered a mission, think you might want to serve, and are able to serve. THEN SERVE! because you wont regret it for one second... I think most of the people that read my email are married or have already served, but that's my two cents anyways!
So conference is obviously the biggest thing that happened this week. We were walking down the the institute to watch it and I was just watching the cars pass us and as we waved to each of them my missionary purpose became very real... Here we are, walking to go listen to a prophet of God and they have NO IDEA. Every 6 months we get to hear from the prophet and each of the 12 apostles and the world continues in their daily lives without any sort of recognition or even knowledge of it. That is why we have missionaries. To take that wonderful message to all the world. To let them know that there is once again a prophet on the earth who speaks to God and is his mouth piece. Who knows what is coming and warns us of danger. To let them know all the beautiful restored truths of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. To lead us back to God. How incredible is our message, and how important it is for each of us to do our part in sharing it with all those around us!
So anywho, that was a tangent.... we got to watch it over at the institute and the incredible couple missionaries here made lunch for everyone to eat between sessions. It was great to be able to see all the members come and watch it together. I was sad because most of our investigators couldn't make it :( We did have one there, Alex, but she is practically a member anyways. (Haha in our lesson this week we were talking to her about baptism and if her plans were still set to get baptized in Korea when she goes home in December and she said yes, then she told us that she is so excited that sometimes she has dreams about being baptized. She is truly converted to the gospel and she hungers after spiritual truth, I am sad that we wont get to be present for her baptism, but I am so excited for her nonetheless.) The spirit is so strong in conference and the talks were all so good!
I love that among all the talks you can find patterns and themes. That makes it very obvious to me that this is the Lord's church and that revelation from God truly does continue. How else would 45 people manage to all talk about the same themes when they dont plan their topics together? I know that these patterns and themes that stand out are different for each person, but some of the ones that really stood out to me were: The importance of acquiring spiritual knowledge; Service; Making covenants, focusing on them, and NEVER going back to our old ways; becoming Christlike and true disciples of him; and of course, as always missionary work.
I loved Elder Nelsons talks about 'Ask the missionaries". How great was that? I think that so many people have questions but they are afraid to just ask. Even when we are right there, they dont want to sound stupid or ask ignorant questions so they dont ask at all, but in reality we LOVE questions!
The rest of the week was rather uneventful. We had a rough finding week... Meaning we didn't find any new investigators this week, But we had alot of other really great things happen, so we will just try again this week!
Picture: We got a little discourage because no one was listening, so I decided that maybe the statue would be more receptive :) haha
So conference is obviously the biggest thing that happened this week. We were walking down the the institute to watch it and I was just watching the cars pass us and as we waved to each of them my missionary purpose became very real... Here we are, walking to go listen to a prophet of God and they have NO IDEA. Every 6 months we get to hear from the prophet and each of the 12 apostles and the world continues in their daily lives without any sort of recognition or even knowledge of it. That is why we have missionaries. To take that wonderful message to all the world. To let them know that there is once again a prophet on the earth who speaks to God and is his mouth piece. Who knows what is coming and warns us of danger. To let them know all the beautiful restored truths of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. To lead us back to God. How incredible is our message, and how important it is for each of us to do our part in sharing it with all those around us!
So anywho, that was a tangent.... we got to watch it over at the institute and the incredible couple missionaries here made lunch for everyone to eat between sessions. It was great to be able to see all the members come and watch it together. I was sad because most of our investigators couldn't make it :( We did have one there, Alex, but she is practically a member anyways. (Haha in our lesson this week we were talking to her about baptism and if her plans were still set to get baptized in Korea when she goes home in December and she said yes, then she told us that she is so excited that sometimes she has dreams about being baptized. She is truly converted to the gospel and she hungers after spiritual truth, I am sad that we wont get to be present for her baptism, but I am so excited for her nonetheless.) The spirit is so strong in conference and the talks were all so good!
I love that among all the talks you can find patterns and themes. That makes it very obvious to me that this is the Lord's church and that revelation from God truly does continue. How else would 45 people manage to all talk about the same themes when they dont plan their topics together? I know that these patterns and themes that stand out are different for each person, but some of the ones that really stood out to me were: The importance of acquiring spiritual knowledge; Service; Making covenants, focusing on them, and NEVER going back to our old ways; becoming Christlike and true disciples of him; and of course, as always missionary work.
I loved Elder Nelsons talks about 'Ask the missionaries". How great was that? I think that so many people have questions but they are afraid to just ask. Even when we are right there, they dont want to sound stupid or ask ignorant questions so they dont ask at all, but in reality we LOVE questions!
The rest of the week was rather uneventful. We had a rough finding week... Meaning we didn't find any new investigators this week, But we had alot of other really great things happen, so we will just try again this week!
Picture: We got a little discourage because no one was listening, so I decided that maybe the statue would be more receptive :) haha
Love you all! Hope you all had a great conference weekend, and have a good week this week!
Sister Webb
October 1, 2012 letter
Hey everyone!
Another week has flown by and now its October. I dont remember time ever going as fast as it has being on a mission, especially these last couple months. I am really grateful for each and everyday though, and the time that I get to be out here serving the Lord.
This week has brought some great experiences. Campus life has been the same as usual, we had a rough week finding people... meaning we didnt find any new investigators this week, but we were blessed in other areas of our work.
President Jensen decided that since there are 6 sisters in Tally that are so close to each other, that he would like us to start going on companion exchanges. So Tuesday Sister Pulsipher went to 1st ward and Sister Strate (from 2nd ward) came to campus with me. Sister Hirst companion went to 2nd ward. It is incredible how much you can really learn from every person you are around if you take the time to talk to them, listen to them, and observe them and what they do. Even in such a short amount of time I learned alot from Sister Strate. She is so kind and loving and focused on the work. She loves people and was so good at relating to each of them as we stopped to talk to people on campus. She was so hungry for the new ideas to improve herself and her area, it was really fun to watch and be with her. Its always weird to be away from your actual companion though, and was nice to have sister Pulsipher back.
We were also able to go to the relief society broadcast on Saturday night and listen to the new presidency speak. They did a great job. They spoke a lot about the Atonement of Jesus Christ and applying that in our lives and in our service, then President Eyring also spoke and I loved his message about working hard in the Kingdom but allowing others to help. I cant remember who it was that said it but they talked about a lady that was so willing to help and her thoughts and actions always had the attitude of "what comes next for willing hands to do?" and I just thought about how important it is to be willing to reach out and to help others. That if we are willing to help then God will use us to be able to bless his other children.
We had 3 investigators at church yesterday, which is so awesome! We rarely have that many come. Two of them it was their first time and I think they really enjoyed it. I love seeing people progress and begin to embrace the gospel in their lives. I cant wait for them to come to general conference with us next week!
There is a guy that got baptized in 4th ward this week also, his name is Rod, and he is someone that sister Siefert and I started teaching about 6 months ago. We taught him two lessons and he was amazing, and so prepared but didn't live in our boundaries, so we passed him onto 4th ward elders and saturday he finally got baptized! I was so happy to see him finally decide that the time was right to enter into the waters and make covenants with our Heavenly Father. I'm attaching a picture of him!
Lastly, this morning we had a great opportunity to go watch the sunrise with a couple members of the ward. There is an incredible man here named chase who has the strongest testimony of anyone I have met and he decided at the beginning of the year that he was going to watch the sunrise every morning for a year. So each day he wakes up and goes somewhere to watch it. Most days he tried to take someone with him and while watching the sunrise they talk about light and how symbolic it is of God. They talk about the scriptures and the atonement and the book of mormon. He has taken alot of people with him and he invited us to go with him and his fiance (Jayne) today. It was incredible. The feelings of the spirit were so strong there and we discussed the gospel and what it means to us and how God is present all around us. As I personally watched and pondered about the gospel, I thought of the love God has for each of us and how incredible each day is. I kept thinking of a scripture in Alma 30:44 that says "... Yea, and all things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme creator." We sometimes get so busy that we forget to stop and look around and remember the beauty that God has placed on this earth for us and that if we really look that we can find God in everything around us. Lastly as the sun came up over the horizon I could begin to feel the warmth coming from it, and feel the peace of the spirit and in those quiet moments I knew that God is real and that he loves each of us so much and that he has given us this incredible opportunity to live our lives to make choices that bring us closer to him or unfortunately sometimes push us farther away, but that he is always there with open arms to welcome us back when we stray even just a little bit; I know that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the only way back to live with him. We have such an incredible opportunity to be living here and now and to know what we know. There are so many around us that are just floating in their beliefs and dont have the purpose and sense of direction that we have. I am so grateful to be a missionary and to be able to show people that pathway and to see the light of Christ grow brighter and brighter in their lives until they too understand and can feel the love of a Heavenly Father that is always watching out for them.
I am so grateful for this Gospel and the joy and peace it brings in my life. I know its true and I know its through the savior of all mankind, Jesus Christ, that we can be saved in the Kingdom of God.
Love you all,
Have a great week!
Sister Webb
Rod and I
photos of the sunrise
Sister Pulsipher, me, Jayne and Chase
Another week has flown by and now its October. I dont remember time ever going as fast as it has being on a mission, especially these last couple months. I am really grateful for each and everyday though, and the time that I get to be out here serving the Lord.
This week has brought some great experiences. Campus life has been the same as usual, we had a rough week finding people... meaning we didnt find any new investigators this week, but we were blessed in other areas of our work.
President Jensen decided that since there are 6 sisters in Tally that are so close to each other, that he would like us to start going on companion exchanges. So Tuesday Sister Pulsipher went to 1st ward and Sister Strate (from 2nd ward) came to campus with me. Sister Hirst companion went to 2nd ward. It is incredible how much you can really learn from every person you are around if you take the time to talk to them, listen to them, and observe them and what they do. Even in such a short amount of time I learned alot from Sister Strate. She is so kind and loving and focused on the work. She loves people and was so good at relating to each of them as we stopped to talk to people on campus. She was so hungry for the new ideas to improve herself and her area, it was really fun to watch and be with her. Its always weird to be away from your actual companion though, and was nice to have sister Pulsipher back.
We were also able to go to the relief society broadcast on Saturday night and listen to the new presidency speak. They did a great job. They spoke a lot about the Atonement of Jesus Christ and applying that in our lives and in our service, then President Eyring also spoke and I loved his message about working hard in the Kingdom but allowing others to help. I cant remember who it was that said it but they talked about a lady that was so willing to help and her thoughts and actions always had the attitude of "what comes next for willing hands to do?" and I just thought about how important it is to be willing to reach out and to help others. That if we are willing to help then God will use us to be able to bless his other children.
We had 3 investigators at church yesterday, which is so awesome! We rarely have that many come. Two of them it was their first time and I think they really enjoyed it. I love seeing people progress and begin to embrace the gospel in their lives. I cant wait for them to come to general conference with us next week!
There is a guy that got baptized in 4th ward this week also, his name is Rod, and he is someone that sister Siefert and I started teaching about 6 months ago. We taught him two lessons and he was amazing, and so prepared but didn't live in our boundaries, so we passed him onto 4th ward elders and saturday he finally got baptized! I was so happy to see him finally decide that the time was right to enter into the waters and make covenants with our Heavenly Father. I'm attaching a picture of him!
Lastly, this morning we had a great opportunity to go watch the sunrise with a couple members of the ward. There is an incredible man here named chase who has the strongest testimony of anyone I have met and he decided at the beginning of the year that he was going to watch the sunrise every morning for a year. So each day he wakes up and goes somewhere to watch it. Most days he tried to take someone with him and while watching the sunrise they talk about light and how symbolic it is of God. They talk about the scriptures and the atonement and the book of mormon. He has taken alot of people with him and he invited us to go with him and his fiance (Jayne) today. It was incredible. The feelings of the spirit were so strong there and we discussed the gospel and what it means to us and how God is present all around us. As I personally watched and pondered about the gospel, I thought of the love God has for each of us and how incredible each day is. I kept thinking of a scripture in Alma 30:44 that says "... Yea, and all things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme creator." We sometimes get so busy that we forget to stop and look around and remember the beauty that God has placed on this earth for us and that if we really look that we can find God in everything around us. Lastly as the sun came up over the horizon I could begin to feel the warmth coming from it, and feel the peace of the spirit and in those quiet moments I knew that God is real and that he loves each of us so much and that he has given us this incredible opportunity to live our lives to make choices that bring us closer to him or unfortunately sometimes push us farther away, but that he is always there with open arms to welcome us back when we stray even just a little bit; I know that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the only way back to live with him. We have such an incredible opportunity to be living here and now and to know what we know. There are so many around us that are just floating in their beliefs and dont have the purpose and sense of direction that we have. I am so grateful to be a missionary and to be able to show people that pathway and to see the light of Christ grow brighter and brighter in their lives until they too understand and can feel the love of a Heavenly Father that is always watching out for them.
I am so grateful for this Gospel and the joy and peace it brings in my life. I know its true and I know its through the savior of all mankind, Jesus Christ, that we can be saved in the Kingdom of God.
Love you all,
Have a great week!
Sister Webb
Rod and I
photos of the sunrise
Sister Pulsipher, me, Jayne and Chase
September 24, 2012 letter
"...Men are, that they might have joy." -Lehi
Hey all!
Its been a great week here in Tallahassee. I love coming to email monday mornings and seeing all the love and support I have from family and friends. Most of the time, when a missionary gets to the end of their mission, people stop reading their emails and stop writing them because they have gotten so use to them being gone, but I feel so grateful for such amazing people in my life that still write me encouraging notes to tell me that they read my email or how their week was. It doesnt matter where you are at in life, or on a mission, its always great to know that someone was thinking about you.... and that sparks a random tangent of thought, then I will tell you about my week:
I often think about all the missionaries I have been in contact with or have been companions with and how different we all are. One of the things I love about getting to know so many people here and having so many companions is the chance I get to see different peoples personalities and how they respond to situations and how each of us are needed in gods plan to be able to bless one another. They tell you that you are called to your area, mission, to be with your companion for a reason because there are people that only YOU can touch. I believe that is true. Each of us are given our personalities as gifts from God. Spiritual gifts are talked about in all three books of scripture (which always tells me that it is REALLY important when its in the D&C, Bible, and BOM) They are one of the very last things that Moroni teaches us (along with charity, and the importance of reading and praying about the book of mormon). It is taught to us by Paul in his epistle to the Corinthians, then again by Joseph Smith in the Doctrine and Covenants. In Verse 11-12 of section 46 it says " For all have not every gift given unto them; for there are many gifts, and to every man is given a gift by the Spirit of God. To some is given one, and to some is given another, that all may be profited thereby." We are who we are to be able to bless each other. I am grateful for all times I have profited from the gifts that each of you have, and have shown me through letters and prayers. If you look to others and wish you could be what they are, stop because you are blessing others lives by being you.
Ok, so onto my week!
I love how open people are on campus. Its great to talk to so many people everyday about what they believe and how they came to believe it. Even if they arent actively searching for a church they are willing to come to church with you to see what its like at our services, or to read the book of mormon just to better understand what we believe, or even set up an appointment for us to teach they about the restoration and little by little they come to know the truth of what we are saying and they feel the spirit testify to them to know it is true. We have had some really great lessons this week. First is with a girl named Alicia, we have taught her twice and she is trying really hard to understand everything we are teaching her. She has read to Jacob and came with a list of questions for us to answer. She is awesome and really has a desire to know truth. We texted a guy, Andrew, that sister fullmer and I met about a month ago to see how his book of mormon reading is going (he said he didnt want to meet until he read the whole thing) and he said hes about 1/2 way. He said that his schedule is crazy this semester and it doesnt allow for much reading time but that he does it whenever he can. He is considering dropping a class to be able to read more, how awesome is that?! There is a girl that we met a couple weeks ago that we gave a book of mormon to, taught the first lesson and when we talked to her, she too was about 1/2 way through it. I cant wait for these incredible seeds to be harvested!
My favorite contact this week was a girl named Quxiung (pronounced chee-shawn, with a chinese accent) SHES FROM CHINA! haha I like to talk to all the chinese people on campus because it reminds me of the good old days of Troy where we would sit in the Sorrell Chapel for 6 hours and chinese investigator after chinese investigator would come to us and we would teach them. But the chinese people at FSU arent the same as the ones at troy... meaning they dont want to learn from us, but Quxiang was prepared for us! We were both discouraged after talking to people for like 4 hours with no response or interest and so we said a prayer and felt like we needed to go to the food court, so we did, and we almost missed her but being the chinese person lover that I am, saw her and turned to go talk to her. She is so cute! she has been here since summer semester and when we told her that we teach about God and Christ, she said "I have many question about Christ" and then she told us all about how in china there is no religion or belief in God but that she has always had many questions about him and about what her purpose is, but when she asked her mom her mom told her to stop thinking about it and that she didnt need to worry about silly things like that. So we told her that we have answers and that we can help her to know for herself that there is a god and what her purpose is here on earth and she was so excited! I have wanted to teach another chinese person since I left troy! I am SO EXCITED! :)
That was my week, hope everyone is doing great!
The church is true, and if your testimony is not as solid in that fact as you want it to be, work on it, because our testimony is the most important thing we can have! God is there to help with anything we need as we turn to him and rely on Jesus Christ we can not just believe but KNOW that this gospel is true.
Love Y'all!
Sister Webb
Its been a great week here in Tallahassee. I love coming to email monday mornings and seeing all the love and support I have from family and friends. Most of the time, when a missionary gets to the end of their mission, people stop reading their emails and stop writing them because they have gotten so use to them being gone, but I feel so grateful for such amazing people in my life that still write me encouraging notes to tell me that they read my email or how their week was. It doesnt matter where you are at in life, or on a mission, its always great to know that someone was thinking about you.... and that sparks a random tangent of thought, then I will tell you about my week:
I often think about all the missionaries I have been in contact with or have been companions with and how different we all are. One of the things I love about getting to know so many people here and having so many companions is the chance I get to see different peoples personalities and how they respond to situations and how each of us are needed in gods plan to be able to bless one another. They tell you that you are called to your area, mission, to be with your companion for a reason because there are people that only YOU can touch. I believe that is true. Each of us are given our personalities as gifts from God. Spiritual gifts are talked about in all three books of scripture (which always tells me that it is REALLY important when its in the D&C, Bible, and BOM) They are one of the very last things that Moroni teaches us (along with charity, and the importance of reading and praying about the book of mormon). It is taught to us by Paul in his epistle to the Corinthians, then again by Joseph Smith in the Doctrine and Covenants. In Verse 11-12 of section 46 it says " For all have not every gift given unto them; for there are many gifts, and to every man is given a gift by the Spirit of God. To some is given one, and to some is given another, that all may be profited thereby." We are who we are to be able to bless each other. I am grateful for all times I have profited from the gifts that each of you have, and have shown me through letters and prayers. If you look to others and wish you could be what they are, stop because you are blessing others lives by being you.
Ok, so onto my week!
I love how open people are on campus. Its great to talk to so many people everyday about what they believe and how they came to believe it. Even if they arent actively searching for a church they are willing to come to church with you to see what its like at our services, or to read the book of mormon just to better understand what we believe, or even set up an appointment for us to teach they about the restoration and little by little they come to know the truth of what we are saying and they feel the spirit testify to them to know it is true. We have had some really great lessons this week. First is with a girl named Alicia, we have taught her twice and she is trying really hard to understand everything we are teaching her. She has read to Jacob and came with a list of questions for us to answer. She is awesome and really has a desire to know truth. We texted a guy, Andrew, that sister fullmer and I met about a month ago to see how his book of mormon reading is going (he said he didnt want to meet until he read the whole thing) and he said hes about 1/2 way. He said that his schedule is crazy this semester and it doesnt allow for much reading time but that he does it whenever he can. He is considering dropping a class to be able to read more, how awesome is that?! There is a girl that we met a couple weeks ago that we gave a book of mormon to, taught the first lesson and when we talked to her, she too was about 1/2 way through it. I cant wait for these incredible seeds to be harvested!
My favorite contact this week was a girl named Quxiung (pronounced chee-shawn, with a chinese accent) SHES FROM CHINA! haha I like to talk to all the chinese people on campus because it reminds me of the good old days of Troy where we would sit in the Sorrell Chapel for 6 hours and chinese investigator after chinese investigator would come to us and we would teach them. But the chinese people at FSU arent the same as the ones at troy... meaning they dont want to learn from us, but Quxiang was prepared for us! We were both discouraged after talking to people for like 4 hours with no response or interest and so we said a prayer and felt like we needed to go to the food court, so we did, and we almost missed her but being the chinese person lover that I am, saw her and turned to go talk to her. She is so cute! she has been here since summer semester and when we told her that we teach about God and Christ, she said "I have many question about Christ" and then she told us all about how in china there is no religion or belief in God but that she has always had many questions about him and about what her purpose is, but when she asked her mom her mom told her to stop thinking about it and that she didnt need to worry about silly things like that. So we told her that we have answers and that we can help her to know for herself that there is a god and what her purpose is here on earth and she was so excited! I have wanted to teach another chinese person since I left troy! I am SO EXCITED! :)
That was my week, hope everyone is doing great!
The church is true, and if your testimony is not as solid in that fact as you want it to be, work on it, because our testimony is the most important thing we can have! God is there to help with anything we need as we turn to him and rely on Jesus Christ we can not just believe but KNOW that this gospel is true.
Love Y'all!
Sister Webb
September 17, 2012 letter
"You do not FIND the happy life, You MAKE it."
Oh hi there!
Well, Its been another week. A rather uneventful one at that.... kinda.
Sister Fullmer is officially home now. I have never seen a missionary leave the way she did. She was so calm and lacked the normal traits of a missionary leaving the field. She was not trunky, nervous, there was only one minor break down and she took it like a champ everytime anyone mentioned the fact that she was going home. So crazy how fast a mission goes by.
Now I am with sister Pulsipher. She is a brand new missionary fresh from the MTC. She is from Mesquite Nevada and she is a super cute girl. She loves to play volleyball and went to SUU for communications (broadcasting) and finished 3 years before coming out on a mission. Its been fun being able to train a couple times because Ive gotten to see how different personalities respond to the work and to being a missionary. She is nothing like sister Christian and nothing like sister Hirst, but i'd say she is alot like I was when I got out into the field. Its actually been a bit of a tender mercy for me to be able to be with her because I feel like its really shown me how much I have grown. Sometimes looking back I feel like I havent made that much progress from where I was when I started and I worry that people wont see a difference in me when I get home, but I can see that that is not true. I still have alot of work to do and alot of room for improvement but the mission truly has changed me to be a better person and to have more confidence in myself and in my testimony. I am so grateful for that.
So this week I dont haven much to talk about, alot if it was spent getting sister Fullmer ready to go and then getting sister Pullsipher settled, but here are some exciting things:
#1- Alexandra received the gift of the Holy Ghost, which was awesome. She is so great and doesnt even need missionaries, but we are still here none the less :) She had a great blessing that talked about how her personality was a gift from god that was given to her to be able to share the gospel with other people.
#2- We found this awesome girl named Bianca. She is from Puerto Rico and met missionaries down there alot, but was never in one place long enough to really learn from them or to be able to go to church. She said that she has a book of mormon in both spanish and english and she seemed really genuinely interested in coming to church and learning from us. We have an appointment with her this week, So im pretty excited about her.
#3- Thursday I planned a 'green breakfast' for sister pulsipher. There are a couple girl in our complex (member) that drive us everywhere whenever we need to go places so I wanted to say thanks to them, so president gave me permission to have them over into our apartment and we had pancakes and milk and eggs and grits and grapes and kiwi... that was all dyed green :). It looked super gross but turned out really great and was delicious.
hope yall have a great week!
Sister Webb
Well, Its been another week. A rather uneventful one at that.... kinda.
Sister Fullmer is officially home now. I have never seen a missionary leave the way she did. She was so calm and lacked the normal traits of a missionary leaving the field. She was not trunky, nervous, there was only one minor break down and she took it like a champ everytime anyone mentioned the fact that she was going home. So crazy how fast a mission goes by.
Now I am with sister Pulsipher. She is a brand new missionary fresh from the MTC. She is from Mesquite Nevada and she is a super cute girl. She loves to play volleyball and went to SUU for communications (broadcasting) and finished 3 years before coming out on a mission. Its been fun being able to train a couple times because Ive gotten to see how different personalities respond to the work and to being a missionary. She is nothing like sister Christian and nothing like sister Hirst, but i'd say she is alot like I was when I got out into the field. Its actually been a bit of a tender mercy for me to be able to be with her because I feel like its really shown me how much I have grown. Sometimes looking back I feel like I havent made that much progress from where I was when I started and I worry that people wont see a difference in me when I get home, but I can see that that is not true. I still have alot of work to do and alot of room for improvement but the mission truly has changed me to be a better person and to have more confidence in myself and in my testimony. I am so grateful for that.
So this week I dont haven much to talk about, alot if it was spent getting sister Fullmer ready to go and then getting sister Pullsipher settled, but here are some exciting things:
#1- Alexandra received the gift of the Holy Ghost, which was awesome. She is so great and doesnt even need missionaries, but we are still here none the less :) She had a great blessing that talked about how her personality was a gift from god that was given to her to be able to share the gospel with other people.
#2- We found this awesome girl named Bianca. She is from Puerto Rico and met missionaries down there alot, but was never in one place long enough to really learn from them or to be able to go to church. She said that she has a book of mormon in both spanish and english and she seemed really genuinely interested in coming to church and learning from us. We have an appointment with her this week, So im pretty excited about her.
#3- Thursday I planned a 'green breakfast' for sister pulsipher. There are a couple girl in our complex (member) that drive us everywhere whenever we need to go places so I wanted to say thanks to them, so president gave me permission to have them over into our apartment and we had pancakes and milk and eggs and grits and grapes and kiwi... that was all dyed green :). It looked super gross but turned out really great and was delicious.
hope yall have a great week!
Sister Webb
Sister Pulsipher, my new companion!
There is a gas station in quincy that sells gator heads. Sister Fullmer wanted one to take home with her so Kristen took us out there to get her one.
The green breakfast.
September 10, 2012 letter
"Never check your religion at the door" -Elder Holland
TRANSFER DAY!!!! So here is the news: I knew that I would be getting a new companion this transfer because sister Fullmer is going home, so I havent really worried about what was going to happen at all -- which is strange for me because I usually try and figure out what is happening with the sisters since there is so few of us. But the last few days I have been getting the 'training' feelings. They always come. So we got the transfer email today and I was right. I'm having another baby girl! There are two sisters coming in, so Im not 100% positive who it is that I am training, but the zone leaders said they thought her name is sister Pulcifer (probably spelled wrong). I am really excited to train again. I have loved both my training experiences and I am sure that this one will be great too.
This week was SO GOOD! The best part of course was that we had a baptism yesterday. Alexandra was so ready! Its funny that no matter how hard you try, baptisms never run COMPLETELY smooth. you try and fix all problems you've run into in the past but new ones arise. So here is what happened:We were in the family history center Finalizing the program when we got a text from alexandra, she had slept through her alarm.... NO! this is her 3rd time at church so she HAD to be there to get baptized after church. We called and explained that to her and went to pick her up. she hurried super fast and made it only slightly late to the meeting. PHEW. then all the people that we asked to bring refreshments for afterwards forgot, so sister johnson being the saintly woman that she is, went and whipped us up a batch of brownies over at the institute building. She had to be dunked twice because her knees came up the first time, but it was great! there were SO many people that attended, the relief society room was packed and there were people that were standing on the sides. One of our other investigators (Alex) who is in the same situation that Alexandra was in (17 and parents not allowing her to be baptized) gave the talk on baptism. She did so good. Two of the guys in the ward (both getting their masters in musical performance one in piano and one in violin) played jesus once of humble birth and it was incredible! all in all it was really good. She will get the Holy ghost next week and she is really excited for it.
Here is another funny story from the week: There is this awesome guy named dan. He is the landlord to 3 sets of the missionaries and he calls their houses "the mormon compound'. he put a sign on the house that says "gods army LDS" and he LOVES missionaries. They have been working on him for the last 8 months or so and he is reading the BOM and loves it. He knows its true the only problem is his wife is hard core baptism and wants nothing to do with it and has threatened to leave him if he joins.... so hes just biding his time while her heart gets softened. SO last week he called us with a request. She had just broken her leg and had to have surgery so he wanted the sisters to come over and make her a meal and get to know her and try working our sisterly magic on her. We agreed. Then he called a couple days later to have us bring him the book of mormon on CD and this is how the conversation went: "Ok, So I have a story to tell you. Back when the mormon compound had just gotten started, The elders over there gave me a book of mormon. So I had been reading it and I left it by my recliner and the next day it was gone. My wife had taken it and hid it. She claims that she just "put it away" but she wont tell me where. So I got another one and I just leave it in the storage over at the compound and whenever I am over there I go read a couple chapters. Well Since my wife broke her ankle, I have been home almost all the time so I have been getting behind. 4th ward elders got me some book of mormon CD's and so i need you to get them from them sunday at church and then when you come tuesday, smuggle them to me so I can listen to them in my car" haha So we got them and when we got to his house and was leaving I whispered to him that we had them for him he said he felt like we were doing a drug deal behind his wifes back but he walked us outside took them and hid them under his shirt to take them back inside.
He has such a powerful testimony already, He was talking to his friend while we were at dinner because they are going on a cruise soon and he wants to go see some ruins. His friend asked him why and he told him that hes always wanted to walk where the savior walked but that the holy land is getting to dangerous, but that there is another place where the savior walked that isnt as dangerous and that is in the ruins of america. His friend looked confused so he started to teach the book of mormon to him in the best way Ive ever heard. he started out saying "we've all heard of noah and his ark... but not very many people know that noah is not the only one god told to build a boat" and then explained the book of mormon to him so simply and clearly. It was awesome! His friend didnt accept it, but I guess thats not the only time he has tried to help them to understand because when he walked us outside to give him his CD's he said "they... my wife and my friends... think I am crazy for believing, but I know its true. It really happened" Such a great guy! I cant wait for his wifes hard to soften and for him to be able to come to church and be baptized.
We got to watch the CES fireside by elder holland yesterday and he gave yet another powerful talk on not judging and being true diciples of christ. He practically screamed the subject of my email at us, but it is true. There is no reason to ever compromise our beliefs or our standards. We promise to be witnesses of christ at all times. I loved it. He has such a powerful way of speaking and hitting you right at the core.
Well. Those were really long stories. Its been a good week.
Love you all!
Sister Webb
This week was SO GOOD! The best part of course was that we had a baptism yesterday. Alexandra was so ready! Its funny that no matter how hard you try, baptisms never run COMPLETELY smooth. you try and fix all problems you've run into in the past but new ones arise. So here is what happened:We were in the family history center Finalizing the program when we got a text from alexandra, she had slept through her alarm.... NO! this is her 3rd time at church so she HAD to be there to get baptized after church. We called and explained that to her and went to pick her up. she hurried super fast and made it only slightly late to the meeting. PHEW. then all the people that we asked to bring refreshments for afterwards forgot, so sister johnson being the saintly woman that she is, went and whipped us up a batch of brownies over at the institute building. She had to be dunked twice because her knees came up the first time, but it was great! there were SO many people that attended, the relief society room was packed and there were people that were standing on the sides. One of our other investigators (Alex) who is in the same situation that Alexandra was in (17 and parents not allowing her to be baptized) gave the talk on baptism. She did so good. Two of the guys in the ward (both getting their masters in musical performance one in piano and one in violin) played jesus once of humble birth and it was incredible! all in all it was really good. She will get the Holy ghost next week and she is really excited for it.
Here is another funny story from the week: There is this awesome guy named dan. He is the landlord to 3 sets of the missionaries and he calls their houses "the mormon compound'. he put a sign on the house that says "gods army LDS" and he LOVES missionaries. They have been working on him for the last 8 months or so and he is reading the BOM and loves it. He knows its true the only problem is his wife is hard core baptism and wants nothing to do with it and has threatened to leave him if he joins.... so hes just biding his time while her heart gets softened. SO last week he called us with a request. She had just broken her leg and had to have surgery so he wanted the sisters to come over and make her a meal and get to know her and try working our sisterly magic on her. We agreed. Then he called a couple days later to have us bring him the book of mormon on CD and this is how the conversation went: "Ok, So I have a story to tell you. Back when the mormon compound had just gotten started, The elders over there gave me a book of mormon. So I had been reading it and I left it by my recliner and the next day it was gone. My wife had taken it and hid it. She claims that she just "put it away" but she wont tell me where. So I got another one and I just leave it in the storage over at the compound and whenever I am over there I go read a couple chapters. Well Since my wife broke her ankle, I have been home almost all the time so I have been getting behind. 4th ward elders got me some book of mormon CD's and so i need you to get them from them sunday at church and then when you come tuesday, smuggle them to me so I can listen to them in my car" haha So we got them and when we got to his house and was leaving I whispered to him that we had them for him he said he felt like we were doing a drug deal behind his wifes back but he walked us outside took them and hid them under his shirt to take them back inside.
He has such a powerful testimony already, He was talking to his friend while we were at dinner because they are going on a cruise soon and he wants to go see some ruins. His friend asked him why and he told him that hes always wanted to walk where the savior walked but that the holy land is getting to dangerous, but that there is another place where the savior walked that isnt as dangerous and that is in the ruins of america. His friend looked confused so he started to teach the book of mormon to him in the best way Ive ever heard. he started out saying "we've all heard of noah and his ark... but not very many people know that noah is not the only one god told to build a boat" and then explained the book of mormon to him so simply and clearly. It was awesome! His friend didnt accept it, but I guess thats not the only time he has tried to help them to understand because when he walked us outside to give him his CD's he said "they... my wife and my friends... think I am crazy for believing, but I know its true. It really happened" Such a great guy! I cant wait for his wifes hard to soften and for him to be able to come to church and be baptized.
We got to watch the CES fireside by elder holland yesterday and he gave yet another powerful talk on not judging and being true diciples of christ. He practically screamed the subject of my email at us, but it is true. There is no reason to ever compromise our beliefs or our standards. We promise to be witnesses of christ at all times. I loved it. He has such a powerful way of speaking and hitting you right at the core.
Well. Those were really long stories. Its been a good week.
Love you all!
Sister Webb
September 3, 2012 letter
Work for God, The retirement benefits are great!
Hello Hello!
Welcome September, I am so excited that August is over and in a couple weeks its going to start to cool down, my tan lines are outa control.. ya know, just the usual missionary farmers tan. I always prepare for the worse because people say its bad, but then going through it isnt that bad at all. Summer was hot and humid, yes, but not as bad as I expected by the way people talked.
If there is anything I have come to learn while being out here is that the mission is for the missionaries, not the converts. God could easily do this work without us but he sends us out here for us to learn and to grow and become who we need to become. There is a quote that says something to the effect of 'If the church wasnt true the missionaries would have screwed it up a long time ago.' which is so true, we are all imperfect teachers that are learning things also but still the work goes on and rolls forth and continues to grow at an exponential rate. I have been thinking about this alot since yesterday, here is why:
So this transfer my companion and I again decided to exercise some greenie faith for her last transfer and start praying for a baptism. We have been working hard to find someone but things were SO slow for first month that we were here that we didnt know if it was going to happen. We both got a little discouraged and after studying the christ like attribute of humilty this week decided its time to humble ourselves and just accept gods will and if someone comes along, great! If not, thats ok too. Well, someone came along yesterday!!!!! We had a great day where we had a new investigator come to church but he could only stay for sacrament. So we were walking him out and we ran into the 4th ward elders and they were with a girl. They grabbed us and said: "this is Alexandra, she came to 4th ward today but she is going to FSU and she would like to meet with you and is ready to be baptized." HALLELUJAH! GOD IS GOOD! we were so happy. We talked to her for a bit and she said she had been meeting with missionaries for the last couple years down in south Florida. They have taught her everything multiple times and she has read the book of mormon all the way through. Her mom didnt want her going to church so she decided she would just wait until she moved up here to go to school so she could start going and get baptized. we asked her when she wanted to do it and she said "well, im free tuesday but I think thats maybe a little soon.... sometime in the next week or two though!" So She is going to be baptized next sunday, which is sister fullmers last sunday on her mission. what a way to end! Like I said, God doesnt need us for this work, but its great to be a part of it. it reminds me of a quote from elder hollands talk this last conference: "the thought I heard many years ago that surely the thing God enjoys most about being God is the thrill of being merciful, especially to those who don’t expect it and often feel they don’t deserve it." We dont feel like we deserve it, but we are SO grateful to get to be the missionaries to help her get baptized.
We had some awesome lessons this week. I love having the institute to teach in. There are no screaming children, people knocking on the doors, TV's or radios in the back room, food cooking, phones ringing, dogs barking, etc to distrurb the lesson. We go and shut ourselves in a room located in a building that is dedicated for spiritual learning and teach our lessons. The spirit has been overwhelmingly strong everytime we teach there, and there are always students hanging around so if we want a member present at our lesson, all we have to do is grab someone that is just hanging out there and ask them to come. How great is that?!
I have alot of random thoughts I want to talk about, but I will just share something that I have been thinking about alot this week, and that is the strength God gives us to acomplish that which he asks us to do. I began to think about it after watching the testimony of one of the apostles. He talked about all the feelings of joy and sadness and fear and inadequacy etc that he has been through since his calling to the holy apostleship, and how he was able to overcome them through the atonement of Jesus Christ.For me, I look at people in leadership positions and think they have it all figured out, that they know what they are doing and dont have any fears or feelings of inadequacy, but thats not true. I wonder how often the prophet feels inadequate to do his job. I thought about the different callings I have had in the church and how inadequate I felt each time I got the call. I thought about when I first got on my mission a little over a year ago and how inadequate I felt to teach people, or each time I moved areas and how uncertain I was that I could do the things that I was being asked to do, or to work with the people I was being asked to work with. But somehow I have been able to take the steps of faith relying on my father in heaven to walk into the unknown and keep working knowing that he would give me the strength I needed to acomplish it, here I am a year later much better than I was and its all because I know where to place my trust. 3 nephi 3:7 "And it came to pass that I, Nephi, said unto my father: I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded, for I know that the Lord giveth no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall prepare a way for them that they may accomplish the thing which he commandeth them." I know that no matter what we are asked to do, that we are given the strength to do it.
I love you all!
Sister Webb
August 27, 2012 letter
Hello hello!
For anyone that has been watching the news lately concerning the weather in Florida ( which I dont really know who else besides maybe my family would be watching the weather over here... but ya know, just in case), you know that hurricane Isaac that is about to hit our mission. Its a small one right, now, but they are very unpredictable so it is very up in the air as to where it will hit and how big it will be when it finally hits land. Its been a crazy week trying to get prepared for it, but its been amazing that the lord prepares us well in advance for the things that we are going to need to keep us safe.
I truly believe that preparation for this storm started months ago when president Jensen decided and felt like we needed to start having mission wide conference calls. They had a conference call system in place when they first got to the mission but havent used it much since. So one week we were going to call in and talk about the things that were happening with tropical storm debbie and what we can do to stay safe. We got so excited called in, and it didnt work. So they rescheduled the conference call, fiddled with the system and again we called in and it didnt work. They began to do some research about how to get the conference calls working and found that it was going to be quite pricy to do it the way that they had been, so they had the office elders find another way. They found a free service that allows us to be on conference calls with up to 200 people (or somewhere around that number) So for the last month or so we have been having weekly conference calls as part of our district meetings so that we could get use to using the system and being all on the same page in matters concerning the whole mission. I remember president saying in his email that he felt like it would be a good idea to have them just incase any sort of emergency happens and we need to get things done quickly. Sister Hirst and I both turned to eachother and said. "there is a hurricane coming". (secretly we were a little excited).
So fast forward to last week when the storm began down by cuba and it was predicted to hit the panhandle of florida. Things were all in place for us to get things together quickly. President Jensen sent us a warning text and we have been having mission wide conference calls twice a day at 10 and at 5 since. Each time he can get us all the information that he needs to, update us on the storm and we can ask questions for the whole mission to hear so that we can all be informed and he doesnt have to be answering the same question over and over. It has been incredible and I know that its because the lord inspired him months ago to get this system in place.
Then again yesterday on our conference call, it looked like the storm would be passing our mission completely and heading more west, and that we would all be safe and able to do our normal missionary work, but he decided last night to evacuate the mobile AL zone because there is one bridge to get them out and he was worried about an emergency evacuation taking place. when he decided this, it looked like the storm would be missing them but this morning (after all the missionaries had left) the hurricane turned and the whole city is now being evacuated and there are major traffic jams all through that area of the states.
On a more personal note there have been things that have happened this week, and decision that I have had to make that the Lord has been preparing me to make since I arrived on my mission. I have had a series of promptings that have occurred since my very first transfer in the field and I never knew what they were or why I was getting them or what they meant, but when the descisions manifested themselves this week, it didnt take me long to realize that the lord had been preparing me well in advance to make the correct decision when I would have to make it quickly.
The lord always prepares us both temporally and spiritually when we need it, but we must be prepared to listen to the voice of his spirit when those warnings come, and courageously and faithfully act on them because they usually come when there is no danger in sight. I am so grateful for the spirit and to be part of a church that is built upon and believes in personal revelation and revelation for those we are in stewardship over. We truely are so lucky.
So other than hurricane prep, we've had a rather uneventful week. We went out on campus and helped alot of the freshman move into their dorms and invited them to church and activities with us. We are really excited that all the students are back for school so we will have lots of people to talk to. We split our P-day last week and headed to wacolla springs again with the institute couple (elder and sister johnson) because sis Fullmer is heading home in a couple weeks and she had never been. We got to see some manitees this time which was pretty awesome, and that was pretty much it for our week. If the hurricane turns anymore and heads back this way we will be sleeping in the church until it passes, which sounds kinda fun to me :). I cant believe this transfer is almost over and that sister Fullmer is going home in a couple weeks. She is the least trunky missionary I have ever seen. I think she is in denial, but hey! whatever keeps the work going. haha. Love yall!
Have a great week.
Sister Webb
For anyone that has been watching the news lately concerning the weather in Florida ( which I dont really know who else besides maybe my family would be watching the weather over here... but ya know, just in case), you know that hurricane Isaac that is about to hit our mission. Its a small one right, now, but they are very unpredictable so it is very up in the air as to where it will hit and how big it will be when it finally hits land. Its been a crazy week trying to get prepared for it, but its been amazing that the lord prepares us well in advance for the things that we are going to need to keep us safe.
I truly believe that preparation for this storm started months ago when president Jensen decided and felt like we needed to start having mission wide conference calls. They had a conference call system in place when they first got to the mission but havent used it much since. So one week we were going to call in and talk about the things that were happening with tropical storm debbie and what we can do to stay safe. We got so excited called in, and it didnt work. So they rescheduled the conference call, fiddled with the system and again we called in and it didnt work. They began to do some research about how to get the conference calls working and found that it was going to be quite pricy to do it the way that they had been, so they had the office elders find another way. They found a free service that allows us to be on conference calls with up to 200 people (or somewhere around that number) So for the last month or so we have been having weekly conference calls as part of our district meetings so that we could get use to using the system and being all on the same page in matters concerning the whole mission. I remember president saying in his email that he felt like it would be a good idea to have them just incase any sort of emergency happens and we need to get things done quickly. Sister Hirst and I both turned to eachother and said. "there is a hurricane coming". (secretly we were a little excited).
So fast forward to last week when the storm began down by cuba and it was predicted to hit the panhandle of florida. Things were all in place for us to get things together quickly. President Jensen sent us a warning text and we have been having mission wide conference calls twice a day at 10 and at 5 since. Each time he can get us all the information that he needs to, update us on the storm and we can ask questions for the whole mission to hear so that we can all be informed and he doesnt have to be answering the same question over and over. It has been incredible and I know that its because the lord inspired him months ago to get this system in place.
Then again yesterday on our conference call, it looked like the storm would be passing our mission completely and heading more west, and that we would all be safe and able to do our normal missionary work, but he decided last night to evacuate the mobile AL zone because there is one bridge to get them out and he was worried about an emergency evacuation taking place. when he decided this, it looked like the storm would be missing them but this morning (after all the missionaries had left) the hurricane turned and the whole city is now being evacuated and there are major traffic jams all through that area of the states.
On a more personal note there have been things that have happened this week, and decision that I have had to make that the Lord has been preparing me to make since I arrived on my mission. I have had a series of promptings that have occurred since my very first transfer in the field and I never knew what they were or why I was getting them or what they meant, but when the descisions manifested themselves this week, it didnt take me long to realize that the lord had been preparing me well in advance to make the correct decision when I would have to make it quickly.
The lord always prepares us both temporally and spiritually when we need it, but we must be prepared to listen to the voice of his spirit when those warnings come, and courageously and faithfully act on them because they usually come when there is no danger in sight. I am so grateful for the spirit and to be part of a church that is built upon and believes in personal revelation and revelation for those we are in stewardship over. We truely are so lucky.
So other than hurricane prep, we've had a rather uneventful week. We went out on campus and helped alot of the freshman move into their dorms and invited them to church and activities with us. We are really excited that all the students are back for school so we will have lots of people to talk to. We split our P-day last week and headed to wacolla springs again with the institute couple (elder and sister johnson) because sis Fullmer is heading home in a couple weeks and she had never been. We got to see some manitees this time which was pretty awesome, and that was pretty much it for our week. If the hurricane turns anymore and heads back this way we will be sleeping in the church until it passes, which sounds kinda fun to me :). I cant believe this transfer is almost over and that sister Fullmer is going home in a couple weeks. She is the least trunky missionary I have ever seen. I think she is in denial, but hey! whatever keeps the work going. haha. Love yall!
Have a great week.
Sister Webb
August 20,2012 letter
Hello world! Just writing you from rainy Tallahassee Florida. My companion and I have been talking this last couple days about why Florida is called the sunshine state, because it rains here SO MUCH~ usually it rains twice a day and when it rains here it pours. We have the morning shower, which if we are lucky happens in our morning studies or while we are inside eating lunch. and the evening showers that we LOVE it when it happens during our dinner hour. But most of the time that doesnt happen. It puts a real cramp in the work when you are assigned to campus with no car because #1- if you go out in it for 2 seconds you look like you just jumped in a pool and #2- no one is outside on campus when it rains. So... we end up sitting inside the institute playing book of mormon baseball, reading the ensign, helping the sr couple with things, eating WAY too many of sis Johnsons baked goods and watching old cheesy proselyting movies that the church produced in the 80's. Then the rain stops about 20 minutes later and we go back to work. I have a love hate relationship with this area haha. Love it cause I love talking to students, contacting rather than tracting (its just a nice switch up of finding) and its cool to serve in the singles ward. Hate it because we all want to be out working and instead we are stuck inside. Hopefully the rain will go away soon and we can work like crazy when all the students come back to campus in a week.
So this week was a good one, as all weeks are. We did alot of service again of helping people find their way around campus and moving people in. we are considering just wearing our service clothes next week and going from one apt complex to the next soliciting our help to move people in. Even if we don't do it all the time, I am sure that the next week will be spent moving heavy boxes and beds and random furniture into peoples apartments.
We FINALLY had an investigator lesson with someone that we found this week. We have been trying to hard to find people, but most people just say that they are leaving and that they'd be interested when school gets back in, so we have a long list of potentials but havent been able to really teach anyone these last couple weeks. It was a way good lesson and the spirit was really strong. We usually teach people in the institute building, which I LOVE because the environment there is already perfect for the spirit to come and testify. The girl we taught has been christian for the last 3 years or so and is part of a campus ministry. We gave her a BOM and she said that she had a friend that was mormon and wanted to learn more about it. So we taught her about the restoration and she seemed like she really needed to go home and think about the things we taught her. After talking to Karen (a recent convert of a couple months) about her conversion and when she knew it was true, she said that she knew the first lesson but that the new feelings of the spirit were so overwhelming that it took her a long time to just accept them and realize what they were and get use to them, I think that is what happened to nastasia. We hope to get to keep teaching her because she has really strong faith and a great desire to learn.
Church yesterday was really awesome. There is a guy that is leaving the ward soon because he just turned 31 and he gave an incredible talk. He was asked to talk on the sacrament but decided to take it upon himself to change the topic to something very loosely related to the sacrament...(thats just what he does haha)... he talked about the law of chasitity. He used alot of his talk from a talk E.Holland gave in 1988 called souls, symbols and sacraments. The most interesting part to me was when he talked about the temptation of breaking the law of chastity. He quoted the scripture from alma where he is teaching his son corianton and he tells him that nothing is worse than breaking it except murder and denying the Holy Ghost. Then he talked about how if we think about it, most of us will never be faced with the temptation to murder. Its something that will probably never come up in our lives as a question if we should break that commandment or not and if it does come up we would most likely look at it with disgust. as something we would never do, but the next worse thing.... chastity.... is something that almost all of us have or will face the temptation of. Why do we not look at breaking the law of chastity, or using the divine power to create life wrongly, with such disgust as well? I thought it was a really interesting thought and an awesome talk that he gave. Tyler and Elder Holland are much alike in their boldness and eloquence.
We also had a great zone training meeting (kinda like district meeting, but with the whole zone... different than zone conferences) and the zone leaders taught us alot about being positive and the outcome of having a good attitude. They challanged us to write down list of tender mercies in our lives each day and being grateful for them. This is something I had already started to work on this transfer so I was really excited about it. I would issue the same challenge to each of you...get a notebook and each night reflect on your day and write down some way that you saw gods had in your life. It will bring happiness and a new light into your life when we realize how dependent we really are on god. Here are some good references for reading if you want them:
Mosiah 2:19-24
1 Nephi 1:20
o remember remember by president eyring in october conference 2007
So that was our week. We are SUPER excited for the students to get back. hope yall had a great week too.
Love you lots!
Sister Webb
So this week was a good one, as all weeks are. We did alot of service again of helping people find their way around campus and moving people in. we are considering just wearing our service clothes next week and going from one apt complex to the next soliciting our help to move people in. Even if we don't do it all the time, I am sure that the next week will be spent moving heavy boxes and beds and random furniture into peoples apartments.
We FINALLY had an investigator lesson with someone that we found this week. We have been trying to hard to find people, but most people just say that they are leaving and that they'd be interested when school gets back in, so we have a long list of potentials but havent been able to really teach anyone these last couple weeks. It was a way good lesson and the spirit was really strong. We usually teach people in the institute building, which I LOVE because the environment there is already perfect for the spirit to come and testify. The girl we taught has been christian for the last 3 years or so and is part of a campus ministry. We gave her a BOM and she said that she had a friend that was mormon and wanted to learn more about it. So we taught her about the restoration and she seemed like she really needed to go home and think about the things we taught her. After talking to Karen (a recent convert of a couple months) about her conversion and when she knew it was true, she said that she knew the first lesson but that the new feelings of the spirit were so overwhelming that it took her a long time to just accept them and realize what they were and get use to them, I think that is what happened to nastasia. We hope to get to keep teaching her because she has really strong faith and a great desire to learn.
Church yesterday was really awesome. There is a guy that is leaving the ward soon because he just turned 31 and he gave an incredible talk. He was asked to talk on the sacrament but decided to take it upon himself to change the topic to something very loosely related to the sacrament...(thats just what he does haha)... he talked about the law of chasitity. He used alot of his talk from a talk E.Holland gave in 1988 called souls, symbols and sacraments. The most interesting part to me was when he talked about the temptation of breaking the law of chastity. He quoted the scripture from alma where he is teaching his son corianton and he tells him that nothing is worse than breaking it except murder and denying the Holy Ghost. Then he talked about how if we think about it, most of us will never be faced with the temptation to murder. Its something that will probably never come up in our lives as a question if we should break that commandment or not and if it does come up we would most likely look at it with disgust. as something we would never do, but the next worse thing.... chastity.... is something that almost all of us have or will face the temptation of. Why do we not look at breaking the law of chastity, or using the divine power to create life wrongly, with such disgust as well? I thought it was a really interesting thought and an awesome talk that he gave. Tyler and Elder Holland are much alike in their boldness and eloquence.
We also had a great zone training meeting (kinda like district meeting, but with the whole zone... different than zone conferences) and the zone leaders taught us alot about being positive and the outcome of having a good attitude. They challanged us to write down list of tender mercies in our lives each day and being grateful for them. This is something I had already started to work on this transfer so I was really excited about it. I would issue the same challenge to each of you...get a notebook and each night reflect on your day and write down some way that you saw gods had in your life. It will bring happiness and a new light into your life when we realize how dependent we really are on god. Here are some good references for reading if you want them:
Mosiah 2:19-24
1 Nephi 1:20
o remember remember by president eyring in october conference 2007
So that was our week. We are SUPER excited for the students to get back. hope yall had a great week too.
Love you lots!
Sister Webb
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