Choose Happiness

Well, my companion has to go home this week or next.  She is really sick and I feel so bad for her.  Somehow we still had some really AMAZING experiences!  

1) Jayleen-  We went to an investigator's home on Monday, only to find that he wasn't actually interested, but his cousin was.  So we ended up teaching her, and holy cow!  I have never in my life met a 15 year old with so many hard times. When her cousin got out of prision, he had changed and become an important part of her life again.  He was was picking her up from school one day, and his old "friends" came and stabbed him right in front of her!  Then her grandmother, who raised her, died two months later. She is now living at her aunt's house and is the only one who believes in God. Her friend in aneheim is Mormon, and took her to church on a day when they taught the plan of salvation. It touched her heart, and she is changing- she wants to come to our church!  She wants to be baptized, and she is finding happiness in the good news of the Gospel! It's incredible and I feel so blessed to be one of her missionaires. 

2) Night with Members- Tuesday was hard.  My companion was (and still is) sick, so on Tuesday night I dropped her off at a member's home and went out to work with members for the evening. It was a ton of fun.  We found new investigators and we taught many people. The member lady I went with talked the entire time about marriage and that was a bit awkward for me, but other than that it was pretty fun!  My companion got sleep and we got the work done! 

3)The Dominguez Family- This is a less active family that wants to come back to church.  We have troubles meeting with them, but we did this week, and we talked for a long time about how to get them to come to church. In the end we decided on WAFFLES!! :) So we went to their home early on Sunday morning and made waffles for the family.  THEY CAME TO CHURCH and had members fellowship them and their two kiddos the entire three hours!  It was such a blessing. 

4) Bernice- We had a neat lesson with Bernice this week.  We decided we were going to teach her HOW to read the Book of Mormon, come to church, and pray.  So our lesson was filled with many personal experiences of how we have come to do these things. At the end, I decided I would close the lesson by saying a personal prayer out loud, asking for a witness that our church is true.  Sure enough, I felt the Spirit so strong in the prayer when I asked if Joseph Smith was a prophet, and if this was God's church.  It was a neat experience as I prayed for my own life and for members of my family out loud with her.  She and I were both visibly touched by the experience. 

5) Luna new year- Saturday I went on exchanges with SISTER HICKS (I trained her) and it. was. so. much. fun. I loved all of it.  We got to talk about people we both worked with.  We found two new investigators, and it was LUNA NEW YEAR! It's like Chinese new year but for Vietnamese people.  A lady gave us one of the red envelopes with money in it and we got to drive past the Buddhist temple on the way to an appointment so we were able to see all of them celebrating. IT WAS SO COOL!

6) Worldwide Missionary Devotional!- We went to a big meeting where they changed the schedule for missionaries and numbers we report on a weekly basis.  It was SO EXCITING!  I already love the change. It has been a blessing to us.  

SOMETHING I AM LEARNING and continue to learn on my mission is that happiness is totally a choice.  There are going to be times when nothing seems right, and when everything is rough.  There are going to be times when God will test you, life will test you, and Satan will test you.  There may even be times when you test yourself! BUT happiness is still a choice.  You really can pray in hard times and receive happiness, comfort, and peace despite undesirable circumstances.  It is PART OF His grace,  It is part of His atonement.  It's healthy to cry a little, and it's healthy to be sad, but it's so much more liberating to be happy.  So may we all "fall to our knees" this week when it seems happiness is not an option and UTILIZE THE ATONEMENT in a way we may normally take it for granted. 

I LOVE YOU ALL!

Love, Jess

Sister Hicks and I on exchanges!  Great day!!