Week 4 August 4, 2014 Trusting in the Lord

Week 4      August 4, 2014

This week has been so great! I am soo tired, we have been working so hard! It's great. :) (but really)

COLORADO-ISMS:

Everyone has a dog here (more like several dogs). It's crazy! I'm not a huge dog person...I mean, I like dogs if they're calm and not jumping all over you...but yeah. It's been a challenge to not hide behind my companion every time huge dogs come running to the door but I'm getting better :) (One house we went to literally had 8 dogs! And 3 birds. I thought I was going to die (mainly because of the birds)).

Street Names:  All the streets here are named after states....Mississippi Avenue, Utah Parkway, Wyoming Way, Florida Place--I'm pretty sure they all have 50. So, funny story: I didn't know about this whole street name thing going on until this week...I guess I'm not very observant. (I don't pay attention to street names, hence my bad navigation skills) Well, someone at church was giving us a referral and said "oh you should go visit the Jones. They just live over in Florida." I was so confused...my companion was like, "Okay, great! We'll go swing by." She laughed so hard when I asked her for the church referral number to give these names for other missionaries in Florida to visit...I felt pretty dumb.

PEOPLE

The Littles: LOVE this family. They're in our ward and are SO great about missionary work. They have a friend from work named Iris who has a lot of questions about our church. She's come to church with them for the past 3 weeks. They have been answering a lot of her questions and this last week they invited us over to have dinner with her. We shared the first lesson with her and gave her a Book of Mormon and later the Littles told us that she said she wanted to learn more from us. The Littles have been so instrumental in our work with her.

Brother Russell:  Another amazing ward member who took us out for lunch this week! He is such a genuine guy...he connects with everyone he meets. He's awesome. He's an MMA fighter and taught me how to properly throw some punches so watch out.... :)

Sister Nutall: She is also in the ward and she is AWESOME! She has so much FAITH. She shared a lot of miracles with us that she's seen in her life because of her faith in Christ. Incredible lady...she is also beautician and has offered to spoil my companion and I so, we are going over to her house later for some manicures.

INVESTIGATORS:

Toni: Toni is older and has cancer. She has a lot of faith in Christ though. In the past we've just come and prayed with her but this week she let us share a lesson. We taught her the restoration and gave her a book of Mormon. She was so excited... "I've been wanting to read this forever!" She was so grateful.

Lisa and Connie: Lisa is in her 50's and has fibromyalgia. She's had a rough life. Her mom abandoned her when she was a kid, so Connie took her in as her own and became her second mother. We usually see them smoking outside as we visit a less-active, but this past week we just decided to stop by and see them! They were in the middle of a painting project, which was a challenge for Lisa since she's in a wheelchair. We offered to help and went home real fast to change into some painting clothes and hurried back on over :) We talked with them and painted for an hour or so and then we had to run to another appt. Lisa said, "sorry I don't have much money...I don't know if I can pay you because of all my medical bills and everything. Were you expecting some type of donation for your church or something?" When I told her we weren't expecting anything at all, that we were just there to help her, she started bawling. She was so grateful for our service. Later that week we came by again and shared the first lesson with them and gave them Book of Mormons, as well. They are super interested about the gospel, so I am excited to go back and teach them more!

Big John and Momz: Hilarious family with 2 little girls. We taught them about prayer this week and they are all praying as family now :) YAY!

RANDOM:

OUR MISSION IS GETTING IPADS IN THE FALL.

There was a plane in the sky..my companion looked over at me and said, "Sister Bracey...how far away do you think that plane is?"

"Uh....I have no idea...."

"Eh....it's about 17 months from you."

"......."

hahaha I can't believe that nearly a MONTH has already gone by...WHAT?! I seriously am so grateful to be a missionary and I can't believe it's already flying by this fast...there is honestly no where I'd rather be right now though. I feel so blessed to be here.

The elders pranked our car…..

We are plotting our revenge.

Sister Hall and I wake up at 5:30 to do Insanity in the mornings. Most mornings, it's a struggle getting out of bed. So...we went to Wal-Mart and bought a nerf gun. We lay it in the middle of the room. The first person to get the nerf gun in the morning and nails the other person wins...the person who's still in bed has to make the other person breakfast. It's been a great system :)

Thought of the Day:

Provberbs 3:5-6

5 ¶Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.

6 In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.

I know that if we trust in the Lord, everything will work out. No doubt about it. If we have Christ on our side, what could ever go permanently wrong?

I know that if we have faith and trust in the Lord, He will lead us and guide us to where we need to go. He is with us every step of the way. He loves you more than you can ever imagine. He will never leave you alone.

(to the tune of Dory's "just keep swimming:" "Trust in me, Proverbs 3...trust in me, Proverbs 3" :))

LOVE YOU ALL! Thanks for your letters.

Have a great week!

Sister Bracey

A few pictures from the past few weeks----

My companion, Sister Hall.       Haha!  We match

Missionaries (friends from Lone Peak) at the Marriott Center

Awkward tracking moment

 DENVER, COLORADO!  Here we come!  My MTC companion

 Preaching the gospel.  We like quoting the apostles.

 MTC District

Wanting to get out of the MTC---but don't worry, I didn't actually escape.  It was just for the picture.

Got to see Ashley Eyring from DYW!

MTC sisters--Our feet hurt sooooo bad        #blisters

When the truck with all our luggage arrived LATE to the airport!!!  Yea!!!

Week 3 July 27, 2014 We are all stumbling and falling, but we are LEARNING!

July 27, 2014     Week 3

This week has been AMAZING!

PEOPLE/INVESTIAGTORS:

The Lee Family: Love them! They're in the ward and invited us over to dinner this past week. (They live on the army base (so cool)) They wanted to pull a prank on me since it was my first week here...but my companion warned me about it beforehand. The dad wanted to pretend to be a dry mormon (aka--someone who lives a Mormon lifestyle and is pretty much Mormon but hasn't been baptized yet) and say that the only thing holding him back from getting baptized is drinking caffeine. He knows it's not against the word of wisdom, but he is addicted to it...he goes to church, conducts the primary, does fhe with his family, everything...just was addicted to caffeine. so he wanted to pull this prank on me the entire time I was here in the Buckley ward and then the day before I got transferred tell me he wanted to get baptized. My companion and I turned the tables though. We played a long at dinner and then I said an inside joke that Sister Hall told me to say--and then he knew that I knew it was a joke. haha, I promised him that if I get a new companion I'll let him mess with her, though.

Julie: Julie is a less active we got to visit this week. We are working with her on scripture reading right now so we text her a scripture to read every day. We are also making a list of our favorite scriptures for her. Send me some of your favorite scriptures and I'll add them to the list :)

Erica: We went tracting and met Erica! She said she's been looking for a church. We invited her to church, but...she didn't come. We're going over to her house later this week to see her though!

Iris: Iris is a friend of the Little's, who are in our ward! The Littles invited her to church with them and then to dinner at their house later. They also invited us over to dinner the same night! (we get invited over to dinner every night here. it's awesome!) She is in her late 20's and has been married and divorced twice already. She's gone through some rough times and the Littles have helped her through A LOT! During dinner we asked her what she thought about church. "It was fine...I don't know why people were crying though." After dinner we talked about God's love for her and told her she was a child of God. After our lesson, she said, "that really hit home. I know why people cry in church now." We are going to start teaching her the lessons now! Sweet!

Toni: I met Toni this week! She has cancer and is struggling with a ton of pain right now. We taught her about prayer this week on her porch and my companion and I sang "A Child's Prayer" again. (love that song) We are going to start teaching her next week now. Sweet!

Hector, Karen, and Christina: This family was a referral from a less active we visited! They just moved into the neighborhood and are so sweet. (they told us their aunt is Mormon) We taught them the first lesson and gave them a Book of Mormon. They said they are going to start reading it. We are going to follow up with them later this week, as well.

Karen: Karen is in the ward and took us out to Noodles and Company this week. She has ran like a billion marathons and looks like Shakira. She's from Ecuador (I think) and also taught us a Spanish approach for when we run into Hispanics. "Hola! Somos missionaras de la iglesia de Jesu Christo de los santos de los ultimos dias...my nombre es Hermana Bracey!" It's a work in progress :) She is amazing though and I'm determined to run a Ragnar with her when I get home.

Jessie: Remember Jessie from last week?! Well, she is getting her temple recommend this week! She just has to meet with the stake president now. She's still struggling with some hard trials, but she has so much faith!! She's amazing. My favorite quote from her, "it feels good to be lost in the right direction."

She also went on a date this past week...my companion and I helped her choose an outfit and we did her hair and makeup (and then we shared a message) It was one of the highlights of my week. She is having us over for dinner and FHE tonight. Her 5 year old daughter said she wants to learn about why Jesus is always there for us. We can help with that :)

And one more...I don't remember her name :( But we were visiting a less active--who wasn't home. But as we were standing by her door, a girl walked out of the apartment next to us. "Are you the sister missionaries?" ....Yes. "AH, it's a miracle! I'm a member of the church, but I haven't been to church in a year. Can I come to church with you next Sunday?" Uh, YES! Of course! :)

TENDER MERCY:

On Sunday my companion and I lost the #2 things you do NOT want to lose. 1. our phone and 2. our keys. (at least we still had our planners though haha) We were looking ALL over the church and couldn't find them anywhere! We were soo hungry, too. All we wanted to do was to go home and get lunch. We looked for about an hour...and then my companion was like, "Sister Bracey! Why have we not prayed about this yet?!" (You'd think we would know better) so we said a prayer and then went to see if they were in the lost and found...which we couldn't find. So we asked the next guy we passed if he knew where the lost and found was. "No, but I know where your phone and keys are." WHAT?! Miracle!! (I also got a package at the church during that time from my lovely madre which included my favorite candy ever! I'm pretty sure we would have starved if we didn't have peach-o's and Swedish fish to tie us over until lunch. thanks mom!)

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK: As told by my amazing companion, Sister Hall.

"I was in Relief Society and a young mom was holding up her son's hands as he tried to walk. He kept stumbling and falling, so in my cute little baby voice I said, "aww, are you struggling?" the mom sweetly said, "no, he's just learning."

There is no such thing as failure in life...only lessons. We are all stumbling and falling, but we are LEARNING. And Heavenly Father is right behind us, holding us up, picking us up every time. You are his child and He loves you.

Hebrews 11:38 :) You are His masterpiece.

LOVE YOU ALL!! Thanks for your letters and prayers :)

Sister Bracey