#BLESSED. Racine 3/26

Hey fam!

SO I'm staying to Racine with sister Gorder! Woot WOOT! We are so glad. President just couldn't break our comp unity yet haha. We are kinda the same person and sometimes It's weird. But I love it! Racine is kinda a sister trap, you stay here a long time, I'm going on 5 transfers! It's a good place. :) 

SO this week has been pretty eventful..we started off by getting a new car this week! Who knows why..I just work here. But we are taking good car of it.  And yes. It's a 2018 Nissan Rouge.

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​So because the Elders were so sad to miss March madness..we had to create our own. Guess I'm not too good at rock, paper, scissors either!​

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​So this sweet lady in our ward invited us over for breakfast this week! She told us that she really appreciated our service and sacrifice. She realized that no one was serving us. So she decided to give us some things. So nice! She is from South Africa and has quite the conversion story.​

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​One of the things she gave us was face masks...kinda yikes haha​

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​Oh hey! I hit my 13th month mark!! I can't believe I am so old haha. Sometimes I wonder where the times goes! ​

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​We went to our ward's Easter fish fry this week! It was the first time sister Gorder and I had fried fish, apparently it's a big thing here in the midwest. It was really good!​

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​So I mentioned that we are kinda twins haha. We had to get these shirts...because we're missionaries and it just fit.  ​

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A miracle that happened this week though, there have been several. We teach this lady named Monica. And she came to church several weeks ago and didn't have the best experience. But I had the though on Saturday to have a lady in the ward (who came to our lesson) invite her to church. So we asked her to. So this lady invited Monica to hear her talk she was giving on Sunday. It was so perfect! Because I don't think Monica would've come if it wasn't to support her member in giving a talk. We had our Easter program and the Spirit definitely was there. Miracles! 

Another cool thing this week. We were on exchanges, I was in Racine with sister Smith. And we had plenty of time to tract. So off we went. Often when we go knocking doors we just pick a street. But we were driving to this one place and we passed a street that I had seen earlier in the week and wanted to track for some reason. So we decided to go there instead. So we are knocking and people are actually home! We ended up talking to 3 or 4 people and setting up appointments to see them this week. Miracles in Racine! 

This Sunday our meetings were very centered on Christ and His Atoning Sacrifice. It made me think of all that is now possible because of Him. Because of Jesus Christ we all are given the opportunity to be forgiven and made clean of our sins--mistakes that we made every single day. We are able to repent and because more like Him. This is only possible with His help. We are completely indebted to Him. As King Benjamin has said, Mosiah 2

23 And now, in the first place, he hath created you, and granted unto you your lives, for which ye are indebted unto him.

24 And secondly, he doth require that ye should do as he hath commanded you; for which if ye do, he doth immediately bless you; and therefore he hath paid you. And ye are still indebted unto him, and are, and will be, forever and ever; therefore, of what have ye to boast?

I know that if we follow Christ and center our lives oh Him that we will find peace, joy, and a richer abundance of life. This week leading up to Easter I could challenge you to ponder how you can center your lives more on Jesus Christ. 

Have a blessed week!

Sister Johns 

https://www.lds.org/media-library/video/2014-00-1420-because-of-him?lang=eng

"I'm wet". Racine 3/19/18

Hello fam!

This week was really good! I can't believe that it is already the end of another transfer. Man, time is picking up! So crazy. Miracle of the week:

SO we went to go visit our investigator Wanda this week. Man, Wanda is such as amazing lady. She is this sweet black lady. She is the one who is battling cancer right now. So we try and visit her when we can. On a side note we went into her apartment and found out her dog had gone to the bathroom on her couch....soooo we thought we'd be kind and pick it upfor her. Oh Camilo haha. But afterwards we were in our car and sister Gorder saw a street called Sidney. She had to take a picture of it to send to a previous comp who's name is Sidney. So I drive closer and low and behold we found duplexes!! A lot of them! Sister Gorder get SOOOO excited to when we find duplexes. So we decided to tract them of course. The first door we knocked on a lady answered. She was in her bathrobe. We got to talk to her and she said he would love to hear our message! So we taught her on the doorstep about Joseph Smith and the first vision. She agreed to have us come back! As we left she said, yeah you never know what someone is going through. Miracles. 

Random things...

We got invited to Diena's birthday party! She is this crazy little girl in our ward. She loves it when the missionaries come over haha. She just turned 9 so that was exciting.

Oh, we finally met with Mike this week! Craziness happened...but we finally met with him. He is the guy we met at McDonalds a while ago and gave a Book of Mormon to. He has been reading it! And is going to finish it..by August he said. He is planning on reading 4 pages a day. Wow haha. But we are excited for him!

It was a week of birthdays I guess cause we also went to the Relief Society birthday party! It was really nice. Relief Society is truly an inspired group. I love that I get to be a part of it.

Another Miracle, we are meeting with a lady named MOnica. And she struggles with understanding the language in the scriptures. But we gave her a specific chapter to read this week. And she understood it!! She got so excited telling us all about it and what she learned. I love that!

Funny thing that happened. We took sister Bruette out with us to a lesson. As we were walking to his door I asked her how she was doing. Sidenote, she is this cute grandma-looking lady. So she turns to us and says, "I'm wet." Haha! It was just so funny. She had just gotten out of the shower I guess. Ya had to be there, but it was funny. 

We also had dinner with this awesome sassy lady and her kids. Sister Gorder was having fun teasing the 16 year old haha. I'm the nice one and she's the mean one I guess haha. We got to make cookies with her 4 year old, Shylee. She is SO cute. She started dancing for us! I wish we could play with her more often ha. 

Life is good! This week I have been pondering the Savior's Atoning sacrifice and what that means for me. With Easter coming up I have been trying to center my mind and thoughts on Christ. In my personal study this week I read this verse (Ether 12:27):

"And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them."

I've read this many times before, but reading it this week I understood it differently. We have been given weakness. We fall short of who we are trying to become like (more like our Savior), we give in to temptation, and sometimes turn away from Heavenly Father. But Jesus Christ has promised that if we come to Him that He will make weak things become strong. He will help us become more like Him. What a glorious promise! Coming to Him requires humility. I know that I have been humbled as a missionary--a representative of Jesus Christ. I am learning to turn to my Savior when I fall short--which is on a daily basis. As I humbly and gratefully acknowledge Him in my life, He promises to guide me and make me strong. I now that that promise is for everyone who turns to Him! It is only through Him that we can do good and receive peace and joy.

Have a blessed week!

Sister Johns

I'm finna go craaaazy! Racine 3/12/18

Hey fam!

This week has just been a blur. Seriously I am trying to remember what happened haha. 

Monday: We went up to the stake center again and found a puppy place! Sister Gorder really wanted to pet puppies, so we found the cutest rottweiler. We had a zone training meeting that night which was so spirit-filled. Since we don't have a zone conference this week our leaders decided we needed to have a zone training meeting. Oh and it was also sister Gorder's 11th month mark! Shout out to her!

Tuesday: We had district meeting. It was all about weekly planning and I thought it was going to be soooo boring. But it was actually super uplifting. I love all the resources we have as missionaries! We also had a really good lesson with Michael. Sister Gorder and I are trying to be more bold and loving. So since we haven't seen him in a while we were bold. It brought the Spirit in as we testified more and helped him realize that doing little things like prayer and reading the scriptures will help him to improve the quality of his life. He has a desire to change, but change can also be hard. 

Tender mercy of the day: we went to Subway for dinner real quick inbetween appointments and met a guy named Mike that we were planning on meeting on Saturday! So cool! We also met with Alex and Katelyn that night. 

Wednesday: We went on exchanges with our sister training leaders! I stayed in Racine--they always seem to want me in Racine! But everything fell through...so we got to do some finding! Haha, it was good.

Thursday: We found out tracting that if you knock on a no soliciting door that you may or may not get a ticket. One lady threatened to call the cops on us. So much for spreading the love, right? We met witha sweet lady (a new move into the ward) for dinner at Applebee's! Then we had a really good lesson with Monica. She has been struggling to understand the Restoration, so we taught it to her again using a visual aid. She was able to understand more. She also really connected with the member we brought. I love it when that happens!! She turned to us in the middle of the lesson and was like, "okay I like her" haha! So funny.

Friday: We had a lesson with Gloria! She is so cute. But she also has a lot of medical issues, so she said she couldn't make it to church this week (she was planning on it this Sunday). She also doesn't quite understand why she would have to be baptized AGAIN. But she said that she would pray about the Book of Mormon. That is one things I love as a missionary. You can teach and testify all day long, but in the end you can ask them to test the Book of Mormon out themselves. Read it, and pray to know if it is true. If you do so with faith, a sincere heart, and real intent you will know the truth by the Holy Ghost. Never fails. :) Oh we also had a lesson with Ethia and her kids. They are so funny. They love it when we come and really want to be baptized. Their cat also had kittens, and they were soooo cute!!

Saturday: Honestly I don't know what happened Saturday. It was all plan B (not plan A) haha. But we did feel like we needed a break half way through the day and so we got Culvers ice cream. :) Oh we went to go visit Wanda and while we were waiting to get buzzed in this black little girl and boy came up. She was trying to get in but no one was buzzing her in, so she said "if they don't open this door soon, I'm finna go crazy!" Oh it was so funny. She also told us that she was 9, and the little boy was all like naw you're only 7! So she took him and threw him in the snow. All that sass! 

Sunday: I love church!! Always the best day of the week. We had a linger longer after church and the theme was pie. So we had a lot of pie! Fun stuff!

So at the zone training meeting they began by bringing to the front a tray of cupcakes (one of the senior couples made them). They asked one elder if he wanted one, and of course he said yes. So they asked for another elder, elder Thacker, to come up. They asked if he'd so 10 pushups so the other elder could have a cupcake. And he said yes. Then they asked someone else if they wanted a cupcake. The same thing happened. This continued until you could tell Elder Thacker was getting tired...so people started saying no. But their reply was okay, elder Thacker will you do 10 push ups so that sister so and so can have the cupcake that she doesn't want. You have to realize that our zone isn't small, it's the largest in the mission. So Elder Thacker did 360 push ups that night. Everyone was silent by the end. Of course elder Thacker represented the Savior. It was amazing how that put into perspective the Savior's atoning sacrifice. He suffered for me and he suffered for you. He did that for every single person. And it is an individual thing--he coulded to 10 push ups for everyone, he was to do them for each person individually. And all he replied was yes every time. I know that Jesus Christ willingly sacrificed for each one of us. He knows us and our struggles. He wants us to always remember Him. That is part of the reason I am on a mission. I want everyone to feel that peace and comfort and strength that comes from Him. 

Have a blessed week!

Sister Johns​

B^2 episode 3. Racine 3/5/18

Hello lovely people!

We had a great week this week! We decided that videos are more fun to send than typing up everything SO you have to watch another one haha. Do you all like videos? Cause we don't have to do them...popular vote? 

So the first video is of brother Briggs' life rules...every sister has to know them that has lived in his house. SO we had to send them to you haha. 

We made blue waffles this morning! We thought it would be fun...we haven't turned into smurfs yet!

Oh I also found a road this week that said Kimberly on it! Yay for little Kimberly! 

But anyways, as a missionary I love to testify of The Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith. The first vision is a sacred event that I am learning to speak of with reverence. Whenever I testify of that I feel the Spirit reconfirming the reality of it to my heart. I know that Joseph Smith is a prophet of God and he restored Jesus Christ's church on the earth in it's fullness. The Book of Mormon is true. And if we study, ponder, and apply it's teachings then we will become closer to the Spirit as President Monson has said. That's a promise from a prophet of God! You can hold him to that. I challenge all of you to take that promise to heart. Please, read the Book of Mormon! Even a little! It will bless your life. I promise. 

Have a wonderful week!

Love,

Sister Johns

BTW Wisconsin is brown...

Ya have to take the good and the bad, you can't just have dessert! Racine 2/26

Dear lovely people,

Hopefully the video works! That's basically our week. A couple funny things I left out...

So we sat by the Briggs during sacrament meeting. He leans next to sister Gorder and says pick a finger. So she does. Then he licks it and proceeds to stick it into a little boy's ear! He had fallen asleep with his head on the back wood of the pew...he is only like 5 or 6. Haha, sister Briggs stopped him though. It was pretty funny. 

Also during sacrament meeting the brother that was speaking mentioned baptism..."Become baptized, that always helps." Haha we were looking over at our investigators, it was pretty funny.

It was my year mark this week! Crazy right?! So weird to think that a year ago I was just going into the MTC. I know that I've learned a LOT since then. Best year I could have. :) 

I was reading a General Conference talk this week and it led me to read Doctrine and Covenants section 112. There is one verse that stood out to me:

"13 And after their temptations, and much tribulation, behold, I, the Lord, will feel after them, and if they harden not their hearts, and stiffen not their necks against me, they shall be converted, and I will heal them."

The Lord puts us through difficult times to strengthen us. When we go through trials and it feels like there is no where else to turn, we can turn to the Lord. He strengthens us as we turn towards Him. I know there have been times when I feel alone and helpless. But as I keep turning to the Lord in prayer, scripture study, and service to others I find the peace and strength that comes from the Holy Ghost. So if you are struggling, hope on journey on! The Lord knows you and is very aware of you and your situation. And be understanding of others who may be struggling. We all need to feel loved. Anyways, sorry for the rant. But those were some thoughts that I had this week. 

Hope you all have a great week! Dont forget to smile. :)

Love, 

Sister Johns

We went to Culvers for my year mark...gotta celebrate somehow!

I can't get enough of Katelyn's baby!! 

Sister Gorder in her natural habitat (during studies:)

Sister Gorder and I were bored after one night...