When your area is so prepared that it is almost baptized by fire.....

Hey y'all!!

It has been a week! We are exhausted to say the least!! Lin is doing amazing!! She said a prayer on her own in English and in Chinese!! It was so awesome!! We also got her talking to Chinese missionaries on mormon.org finally!! Yay! 

Friday we got to meet President M Russell Ballard (acting president of the quorum of the 12 apostles). It was amazing!! He and the other 2 general authorities gave us some great counsel! On his way out of the chapel he said, "adios amigos!" We even got to shake their hands! 

On Saturday we taught one of the most spiritual lessons I have taught my entire mission!! Her name is Jessica and she is a 22 year old mom of 2! She is so cute! She just wants the best for her children. After we taught her the restoration we invited her to kneel and pray with us right then and there to ask if the Book of Mormon is true and it was amazing! I have never heard a more sincere prayer in my life!!! It brought her to tears and she just kept thanking us for coming over! 

Patrick passed his baptism interview on Sunday!!! He is the greatest! We stayed the night in Amarillo on Saturday night since we had church there in the morning. Since we would be traveling back and stopping in outlying towns on our way back we got a pizza Saturday night to eat for lunch and dinner on Sunday so we each had "pizza rations" haha! Our appointments fell through so we decided to go meet some less actives out there! It turned out great! One family was just sitting down to eat so they invited us in and we had some awesome enchiladas (my favorite!)! It is so crazy the things we do as missionaries! Who would have thought this random person's house we knocked on would invite us in and feed us-and how crazy that we didn't even have to worry about it! As we were sharing a spiritual thought they informed us that the road home was closed due to a fire. We had a couple other appointments so we were just hoping it would be reopened by the time we got there because we had no idea how else to get home haha! Luckily when we went home they had it controlled enough that we were able to go through! It was about 15 miles outside of Childress so we were joking around that Childress was just so great that God decided to baptize us by fire! haha! This week was full of crazy miracles! This is only scratching the surface! Hope y'all had a great week!!

READ AND PRAY EVERYDAY!!

Love y'all!!

Hermana Peterson

Some good thoughts from the amazing meetings we had this week!

"Obedience brings blessings but exact obedience brings miracles"

"Take home from your mission a humble heart, a burning testimony, a greater capacity to work hard, and a loyalty to the Lord" -Elder L Whitney Clayton

-We teach to change lives-hearts not heads

"It is possible to do the work in ANY condition if you remember who's church this is" -President M Russell Ballard

"We don't worship our leaders, we reverence them" -President M Russell Ballard

"Knock your investigators out with the love of the Lord" -President M Russell Ballard

"When life bumps you, what spills out of your cup?" -Sister Hales

"Do you want to be right or do you want to have peace?" -Sister Hales

"He doesn't expect us to be perfect but we do need to try" -Elder L Whitney Clayton

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What books?!?

From: Jessica May Peterson <jmpeterson@myldsmail.net>
Date: Wed, Feb 21, 2018 at 11:44 AM
Subject: What books?

Hey y'all!! It is absolutely freezing here this morning. My fingers are still trying to warm up and I'm having difficulty typing haha! We are having freezing rain and it is pretty windy too! We asked someone if it is supposed to warm up and they said it is supposed to get worse all day it is already 20 degrees...at least bike day is not until tomorrow! The ridiculous part is that Monday it was literally perfect weather...like it was 80 degrees.....

Other than the weather swings it has been another great week! We had zone conference yesterday and we get to see President Ballard Friday and have another special meeting in Amarillo on Sunday. 

Valentines was good. We made some awesome heart cookies thanks to my awesome family! 

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We got another solid investigator named Patrick. He is getting baptized March 10th!! But, he is getting in baptized in Colorado when he travels down to see family over spring break. His whole family are members and he grew up going to church and seminary but just never felt right about being baptized. He fell off the path and for 15 years he was a meth addict. He has been clean for a year next week! He lives with his cousin who is an active member in Clarendon and he has been coming to church with her and reading the Book of Mormon all the time. We asked him what he does in his free time and he said, "read" so we asked what he reads and he looked at us like we were stupid and said, "the books...the Bible and the Book of Mormon...."  It was pretty funny! He has already read the whole Book of Mormon but still reads it everyday! Right before I got here the sisters had asked him if he wanted to take the lessons and he said no but we asked him if we could come teach him about 2 weeks ago and he said yes! Things didn't work out right away but we got to see him this past week and we were very careful and cautious because we had been warned not to push him. We did some how to begin teaching and then we talked a little about our expectations and then asked what his were and he said, "to prepare me to be baptized...." so we asked him the baptismal interview questions and he knows everything and that it is true! Literally he couldn't be more prepared!! After we asked him the questions he asked us what a patriarchal blessing was and when he could go to the temple. Our next lesson he told us about his past and how far he has come. He cried as he told us that this has always been right in front of him the whole time but he finally realized it! He has such a strong testimony (probably stronger than a lot of members!!)!

You know you're area is prepared when even the bashers call you back.....that's right folks! We got a call Saturday night from a man named David. It was 10:45 at night so we didn't answer but we listened to the voicemail the next day and he just said that he needed to speak to someone. We played some phone tag the next day but finally got ahold of him and he said, "we want to come to y'alls church"........is this the same David who was a Pentecostal and was trying to bash about the gift of tongues???? He was super drunk when we were talking to him the first 2 times and we had decided never to go back but we had left him a pamphlet that we had no faith he would read! He did and then he called us!! Crazy!?!?

We saw the Hayt family this week. Brylee is soooooo prepared!! Satan is working sooooooooooooooo hard against her though :(  She was so excited to come to church on Sunday and we went by to wake them up but her mom answered the door and said that they were sick. We came back by later and she said that actually her and Ryan had got in a fight. She told us that as soon as things cooled down she immediately recognized that it was Satan trying to get her not to go to church but it was too late :(  We were able to have a lesson in a members home this week which was great! Unfortunately yesterday Brylee texted us and said that Ryan has been on a drinking binge for 2 1/2 days. He is coming up on the anniversary of his moms death (she died when he was in high school) and it is really hard for him. Please pray that they will be able to overcome these trials and addictions!! They were just telling us this week that next month they will have been clean from drugs for 2 years. We know how much they need the gospel in their lives at this point and how ready they are for it. We just have to be able to overcome Satan's strength!

That is the main points of the week! Thank you so much for all of your love and support!!

Love ya!!!

READ AND PRAY EVERYDAY

Hermana Peterson

"Perfection isn't earned. It is a gift from heaven." Elder Holland

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Teaching with the JWs!

Hey y'all!!

What a week! WE FOUND ANOTHER FAMILY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We are so pumped! The Hayt Family has accepted the invitation to be baptized on March 24th!! They are so excited for this! They just moved to Childress last week and we met them on Tuesday. We never see people in Childress on Tuesday! Total miracle!! We were in Estelline (one of our outlying towns) and we got a no bueno feeling from the spirit so we tried the person we were there to see and got out of there as quick as we could back on over to Childress. We were going to go home to finish our studies but decided to try a guy that we had already dropped (why would we do that??) and of course he wasn't home but his neighbors were!!! Brylee let us in right away and we taught the Restoration to her, Ryan, and Brylee's mom that night! Then on Thursday we brought an awesome member and we taught the Plan of Salvation and the Word of Wisdom to Brylee, Ryan, Shelly, Kaden (11), Landon (9), and Brylan (1)!! We committed them to baptism and Ryan and Shelly were hesitant but the rest of them are excited! Then Friday we taught them the Gospel of Jesus Christ and committed Brylee, Kaden, and Landon to baptism. When Ryan got home at the end of the lesson Brylee said, "I am going to teach you about what we just learned about and then will you work with us to be baptized on March 24th?" SHE COMMITTED HIM!!!!!!!!!!!!! What the what??? Shelly is still hesitant but willing to learn more (she doesn't even live here but is just here helping them move in). Brylee loves us coming over because we bring the spirit and after we committed them to a date Landon said he got the goosebumps. These people are amazing!!!! They went out of town this weekend to get the rest of their furniture so they weren't able to make it to church but they were so bummed about it! We are meeting with them again tonight! Brylee texted us Saturday and said she has been telling her sister about what she has learned and her sister wants to meet with us too!!!! (unfortunately her sister doesn't live here, she will be here for the weekend though and we will hook her and Shelly up with the missionaries where they live!)

We taught Daniel again this week.....his understanding still isn't all the way there....also, when we got there he invited us in (we usually can't go in because he lives alone), I saw a woman so we walked in and I immediately know who it is! LOL! It was the JW's. So ya, I had no idea what to do so Sister Kirchoff (we were on exchanges) asked them if they were almost done and they were close so we just sat there and waited for them to finish....mission life is great! #awkward!

Friday morning we got some pretty awesome news! Next week we will be in Amarillo twice (zone conference and a special stake meeting) and Lubbock once (another special meeting). We are making history in the TLM! The whole mission has only ever gotten together 3 times and I was there for 2 of them! Make that three once we go to Lubbock to see President M Russell Ballard!! how cool!?? He's visiting us! This will only be the third time an apostle has ever visited our mission! It will be on the 23rd!

Have a great week y'all!!

Happy Valentines day!!

READ AND PRAY EVERYDAY!!!!

Hermana Peterson

Sister Kirchoff, Walker, Allart & Peterson

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Change of Plans!

Hey y'all!

Hope you had a great week! We had a change of plans and I ended up getting a new companion on Tuesday afternoon. Her name is Sister Allart. She grew up in Indianna but came from Farmington, Utah. She is super sweet! She came from Lubbock so she is having to adjust to being in a small town again (:  we actually came out together but I am still a transfer ahead of her because of the CCM. She also graduated in 2016 so we are both 20. She is the oldest of 5. She absolutely loves being a missionary more than anyone else I have ever met!

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This week has been kind of a blur. We went to Amarillo to drop off Sister Toki and get Sister Allart on Tuesday and then we saw the Fish family on the way back. Kai still hasn't chosen a day to be baptized yet but he pinky promised that we could choose a date together this week! Other than that nothing too exciting has happened this week. It has been super cold! It looks like there is snow forecasted tomorrow and then Friday is supposed to be mid 70's again but who knows haha! We are back to having district meetings in Borger so that is fun to get to go back just not the extra driving haha!

Guess I forgot to tell you, Sue got married and baptized on January 13th in Fort Worth. Now they are back in Clarendon and will be moving back to Denton in the summer probably.

We have been asked to set a 6 month baptism goal with our branch president. We have decided on 8. It is going to require a whole ton of hard work but we know that there are prepared people here. It will be a stretch as Childress has only seen 2 baptisms in the past 2 years but we know that with the Lord anything is possible! We still have 4 people on date and Kai is pretty solid!

Hope y'all have a great week!

Love ya!!

READ AND PRAY EVERYDAY!!!

Hermana Peterson