FIRST MONTH of the ADVENTURE COMPLETED!!

 I have been in Oregon for ONE MONTH!!!!!! We had the most amazing week! We have taught 19 lessons and we had 4 investigators at church on Sunday and one of our investigators said he wants to be baptized! He has to check his schedule. And another one of our investigators said he will be baptized when his ex-wife gives permission for his 2 kids to be baptized!

I met Sister Jessica Allen, she was going to be my trainer last Februrary before I tore my ACL. She trained Sister Kinneard instead. 

I took a strengths test when I got here and these are my top five strengths: Achiever, Intellection, Restorative, Competition (I'm not surprised at this one, Kelly! ~Stacy), and Input. Sister Allen has all of those strengths except for competition. What a match we would have been! I am so grateful to have Sister Kinneard as my companion and it feels as if I am being trained by Sister Allen as well.

We also had our TIWI (car spy installation) malfunction. It had fallen down and was hanging by the cord in the car and every time we touched it and tried to stick it back on to the windshield it would say aggressive driving comments from TIWI. (I can see why TIWI stands for The Incredibly Wicked Instrument now! ;) ~Stacy) 

I had a sore throat and I was congested this last week, which wasn't very fun. I seem to be doing much better and so does Sister Kinneard! The flu is going around so we're hoping that we don't catch that either. 

This scripture is in the bathroom above our toilet. It was there when we moved in. It's from Alma chapter 60. "Can you think to sit upon your thrones in a state of thoughtless stupor, while your enemies are spreading the work of death around you?"

We had zone conference on Friday! It was amazing! Right before lunch, President Samuelian was deciding who was going to say the closing prayer. He was looking at all of us missionaries. I had the distinct impression that he was going to call upon me to say the prayer and I was nervous and didn't really want to say it in front of all of the missionaries so I figured he won't call on me if I don't make eye contact. I looked down and when I did, I had the impression again that I was going to say the prayer, so I gave in and looked up at my mission president and he looked at me and asked me to say the prayer. I agreed, stood up and allowed the spirit to tell me what I needed to say in my prayer. It was a really amazing experience. The spirit was so strong in the Newberg building! It was also Sister Kinneard's birthday on Friday!

One of my favorite prophecies in the Book of Mormon is found in 2Nephi. Jesus Christ is telling Nephi what it will be like 2600 years from then when the people have the Book of Mormon. Chapter 29 verses 3-6 say: 

"And because my words shall hiss forth —many of the Gentiles shall say: A Bible! A Bible! We have got a Bible, and there cannot be any more Bible.

But thus saith the Lord God: O fools, they shall have a Bible; and it shall proceed forth from the Jews, mine ancient covenant people. And what thank they the Jews for the Bible which they receive from them? Yea, what do the Gentiles mean? Do they remember the travails, and the labors, and the pains of the Jews, and their diligence unto me, in bringing forth salvation unto the Gentiles?  

O ye Gentiles, have ye remembered the Jews, mine ancient covenant people? Nay; but ye have cursed them, and have hated them, and have sought to recover them. But behold, I will return all these things upon your own heads; for I the Lord have not forgotten my people.

Thou fool, that shall say: A Bible, we have got a Bible, and we need no more Bible. Have ye obtained a Bible save it were by the Jews?"

I see this prophecy being fulfilled every day on my mission. We offer people a copy of the Book of Mormon, and they say, "No thanks, we have the Bible and we believe in the Bible and we don't need your Mormon book." I know that the Book of Mormon is the Word of God in addition to the Bible. We cannot define God and tell Him what he can and can't do. If He wants to add to the Bible and provide additional resources that uplift and edify people, then He can! I love the scriptures and I am grateful every time I read them! I know that they have been provided by the power of God!

Cruella de Missionary

Jesus Christ, the greatest valentine to walk the earth!

W33K 3!!!

So I have been looking for rainbows after the rain stops and I haven't found any yet. Sister Kinneard got a cold this week and I had a kink in my neck. Not a lot of fun. But we pushed forward anyway! We went on splits this last Thursday. I took our investigator to the temple visitors's center with Bro and Sis Ellis and Sister Kinneard took a member to our dinner appointment. It was so different not having my companion with me and it was a little intimidating taking our investigator to the temple without sister Kinneard, but it turned out well! He was really impressed by the temple. It was one of the most beautiful places he had ever seen. He thought it was a really neat place to get married at. It rained the whole time we were there and I left my coat and umbrella at the temple. Still haven't gotten it back yet, but we're working on it. We couldn't go to the Atrium because the temple is closed for cleaning. It was a great experience!!

I don't have time to say anything else so here are some pictures!

MORE TO COME SOON!!!!

Week 2!

2 weeks down 76 weeks left!!!! 

Wow, so much has happened since I got to Oregon! We have been so busy! It feels as if I've been out for over a month but it's only been 10 days. We had six lessons scheduled in one day last week and every single lesson canceled on us. Then we knocked on this lady's door and she let us in!!! She speaks spanish, but so does sister Kinneard. Well, we were talking to her and she said she will believe everything we tell her if we can show her where in the Bible; Thomas S. Monson is called to be a prophet.  :(   She is a Jehovah Witness. 

We had a busy week. Apparently, part of our ward is outside of our mission boundaries. I don't know how that happened but it did. 

Did i mention that my district consists of me and my companion and our district leader: Elder Munoz and his companion Elder Eyring and the 2 APs: Elder McGlothin and Elder McKinlay. It is such a great district. There is a lot that I can learn from them. We are the only sister missionaries in all of Newberg, So I have only one other sister missionary and she is training sister Summers who came from the MTC. 

I was going to be trained by Sister Allen in February last year. She was called by President Samuelian to be a trainer and she was super nervous having been out for only 6 weeks. Well when the new missionaries came in, i wasn't there so she didn't have to train. The next transfer she was asked to train and her new companion was Sister Kinneard! Now Sister Kinneard is training me! So in a way sister Allen did get to train me after all. Pretty neat huh? :)

Sister Martin and Sister Kinneard!