Hello my loved ones,
My last night in the MTC Sister Pinter and I decided that we should have a photo shoot when we should have been packing. I wanted to do one of those pictures where you put your name tag in a cute place and then get a picture of it. Well I picked a flowerbed and set my name tag by a beautiful flower. I took an amazing picture and promptly knocked my name tag down a crack in the sidewalk!!! Sister Pinter and I looked everywhere for a stick to try and get my name tag out, but the MTC lawn is way too well kept. We finally found two small sticks and had to chop stick my name tag out of the crack! We got the attention of some sisters by us and they videod the whole thing!! I am proud to say that I learned my lesson and won't be having any more photo shoots when I should be packing...
We woke up at 2:00am to get to the travel office by 3:30am and were on a bus to the Salt Lake Airport! We got through security just fine and called our families; then we boarded the plane around 8:amish. I was super nervous because it was my first time getting on an airplane! I looked at my ticket and guess who had a window seat!!! Sister Howard did! Heavenly Father gave me a window seat! I felt so blessed! The plane start moving and I got really excited and start bouncing in my seat and poor Elder Harris sitting next to me was like.. well I guess your first time on a airplane would be exciting... he's such a good sport! Flying was so amazing! The towns looks like little doll houses and tiny toy cars.. It was so beautiful. I loved every minute of it. I also got to eat pretzels in the clouds! We landed in Burbank at the Bob Hope airport. As we walked off the plane we got to walk past the elders and sister that were leaving our mission. It was so inspiring to see the Light of Christ shining from their eyes and hearing the words of encouragement they shouted as we walked past. I knew that they were truly disciples of Christ by the spirit they carried.
President Henrie and Sister Henrie welcomed us and helped all 18 of us get our luggage. They took us to the Mc Bean church house, feed us waffles and ice cream and we got to leave with our trainers!! Sister Trujillo is my trainer and she is so amazing! I was worried I would get a mean trainer and I was blessed with a compassionate and patient trainer. We are over two wards: the Santa Clarita YSA Valencia ward, and the Copper Hills Ward. I am pretty sure I am a missionary of a YSA Ward because I avoided the YSA ward at home all summer....
We have an investigator named Jesse!! He is fifty, married, and has two kids. He has committed to be baptized!!! He's getting baptized the 21 of October! He is the biggest blessing of my mission. The first lesson that I taught him in, he asked us about Joseph Smith and multiple wives... We didn't have the best answer for him but he said the most amazing thing. I may not understand it, but I have the faith that its no big deal. Jesse is truly one of God's elect. I feel so blessed to be able to teach him. I have never felt the spirit stronger then when I first meet him. I can not wait to watch him be baptized!
Every Tuesday through Sunday we do something called a K. O. (Knock Out) is when all the missionaries go knocking from 4-6pm on doors in their area. Our goal is to share messages of peace, teach by the pamphlets, and find new investigators. At 3:55pm every missionary in the Santa Clarita Valley and the San Fernando Valley say a prayer. The prayer is that while we are knocking we can find the people that God prepared for us, and that all the missionaries can be safe. Every time we prepare to pray at this time its like a hush goes over the valley and I just imagine all of the misisoanries kneeling and praying. You can feel the power of God all over the valleys. K.O. is one of my favorite things. You never know who will be behind the next door. Some of the people are really nice and some kinda aren't....I have been asked to leave people's properties, I have been bible bashed, and chased by a dog... but the only thing that actually hurt was when a lady yelled at us and said that Mormons harm people... our hearts were hurt so I said a prayer. A couple doors down a lady ( non-member) said she loved us and prayed that we would be safe while we continued to knock doors. She gave me the courage I needed to keep going and I know she was the answer to my prayer.
There are a lot of Christian people who treat the LDS missionaries with respect. They give us water bottles, share their favorite things about God and bless us when we leave. The members here are awesome! I have been fed dinner every night and they are all so willing to let us come over for a MI (member inspire). A MI is when the missionaries go to a member family, share a message, and invite the members to join in on the missionary work! I love meeting the new members! For conference I was able to watch the Sunday morning session with Jesse! His favorite part was how they talked about service and the Book of Mormon. Jesse loves to serve people and he set the goal to get his wife more involved with service! Jesse has what he calls his Mormon hot line. Its a group on his phone titled "Mormon" and anyone who's Mormon goes in the group. He makes me laugh. His wife is not a huge fan of him wanting to join the church but that hasn't stopped him. I just love the people here so much! It is just such a blessing to be here. We went heart attacking the in-actives and part-member families last night! Hopefully it will help us build closer relationships with those families and maybe we can get them to come back to church or join the church! The videos that we have been sharing with the members are the Principles of Peace, its on lds.org and if you don't have anything planned for family home evening then watch them and think of someone who you would like to share them with:)
I love you all so much! Thank you for the prayers! have the best week ever! Love, Sister Howard
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