Miracles and tears. Oshkosh 6/12/17

Hey all!

This week Wisconsin decided to slowly boil everyone. So that's been fun haha. But this week was crazy! Sister Kowallis and I ran around Tuesday like "chickens with our head cut off" (as sister Wright would've said). Then Wednesday brought transfers...and I've been trying to adjust to a new area ever since. I saw so many miracles this week though, or at least I've had time to reflect on all the miracles I've seen in Waukesha. I've seen how I have come to sincerely love the ward there--they are amazing people! And I've seen how the Lord really does bless you when you are diligent and hard working. So highlights!

-First off JEROME. So Tuesday we had a lesson with Jerome in the morning at a sweet members home. We had an awesome lesson on Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon. First he told us how some of his friends confronted him about meeting with the Mormons. But he explained that every step people take to try to dissuade him, will only make him more set on finding out the truth for himself. Yeah, he is so amazing! We were able to answer his questions about "Mr Smith." So near the end of the lesson he said that he was going to pray about this--he had questions answered so now he could pray. We didn't even ask him to! Then I asked him to be baptized...the long and short of his answer was he would as long as he got an answer to his prayer. And we set a date with him for July 15. Talking with him and seeing his real intent filled with so much joy. After he prayed I dropped and sad news--that I was leaving. His response: What? Well, I guess I understand, but...yuck! Aw, Jerome! He asked me my first name then started calling me Bre--man! My heart just melted. He is an amazing man and I feel privileged to have met and taught him.

-The sister that hosted our lesson with Jerome learned that I love Indian food...sooo she took us out for some. Bless her! It was sooo good. :) Almost as good as yours, mom! (not quite though:)

-Also on Tuesday we got to take out a brand new sister for a couple of hours. It was so fun! It was crazy to see how much I have learned in only 3 months. 

-Wednesday I had to say bye to sister Kowallis...it was sad. But it has been fun getting to know sister Webb. Oshkosh is very different--well, the scenery isn't but the people are. :) I am excited to get to know the people in Oshkosh better and love them as much as I love the people in Waukesha. 

-SO funny story of the week. Once upon a time we thought that we had to die of heat in our apartment because we had no AC. Then all of the sudden I realized where it was! Praise the Lord we DO have AC. Moral of the story: always check out the big box behind the couch. :P

-Also we have a pet gorilla in our apartment and his job is to guard the door while we sleep. His name is Enrique. :)

So yeah, this week has been hopping. I have looooved Waukesha and am excited for Oshkosh (plus it's fun to say). I have realized coming to a new area how weak I really am. I don't know how to help these people or where to go to find those that are prepared. But I do know that the Lord knows. And He will bless us with success when He sees fit. All we need to do is our very best--and keep trying. I love the Scripture on Doctrine and Covenants 123:17:

17 Therefore, dearly beloved brethren, let us cheerfully do all things that lie in our power; and then may we stand still, with the utmost assurance, to see the salvation of God, and for his arm to be revealed.

So don't give up on whatever  your are working toward. He knows you and loves you. You just might have to endure a little until the sun comes out. Anyways, love you all!! Have a blessed week and don't forget to laugh. :)

Sister Brianna Johns

TRANSFERRED. Waukesha 6/5/17

Dear all,

I'M GETTING TRANSFERRED! It didn't seem real until I found out where I'm going. I'm going to Oshkosh and my comp is sister Webb--we came out together, but not in the same district. I didn't know her super well, but it should be good! I will be the senior companion, which is weird. And nerve-racking! So that's the news. Other-wise it was a really good week, but very long for some reason. I can't believe a week ago it was Memorial Day haha. High-lights!

-Have I told you about our new ward mission leader? Brother Larson is awesome. He is super new to his calling and wants to magnify it to the best of his ability. He is going to be an amazing ward mission leader. We had a good correlation with him and the elders in our ward Wednesday night. Also on Sunday no one told the missionaries there wasn't any ward council...so we all set up chairs and waited until church started. Brother Larson was sad that a couple of us were leaving. He's so nice! 

-We had an awesome lesson with Jerome--the black guy we tracted into on Memorial Day. He seems like an honest seeker of truth, so he is totally open to learning more. He gave the opening prayer in our lesson Thursday--which has never happened before. He started to read the Book of Mormon we left him and had questions about Joseph Smith. We brought an awesome sister from the ward with us who bore her powerful testimony at the end of our lesson. She used to be a Catholic so she related to him well. I really felt the urge to invite him to be baptized, so I did at the end. He was really thoughtful then said, I want to do what's right. So he didn't agree to a date, but maybe soon he will! We are super pumped about him. My favorite line he said was what he told his friend about his actions, "was God taking a nap?" Haha, he is just wonderful. 

-We've been doing our best to talk to everyone and the result was several surprise encounters haha. We think people realize we are walking up to them, but when we start talking a couple people jumped a mile! Hahaha! We even made a poor lady scream as we walked up to help her unload her groceries. Welp, we are trying!

-We discovered several people in the ward have moved in, so we decided to go visit them. But one lady said they moved a long time ago and please take her off our list! "The 'guys' stopped by last night and scared the living daylights out of us." Haha, so apparently scaring people is a thing haha.

-We are working with a recent convert, Sandy. She is super nice and loves our visits. She is struggling with her testimony though, it's still a tiny sapling, just a sprout (movie anyone?). She's been getting bombarded with anti-material too, so it's been hard for her. We are trying to help her. It just reminded me of the need, as missionaries, to baptize converts. We are here to help people come closer to Christ and develop a testimony of the Book of Mormon. She is wonderful though, sad to say goodbye.

-We had dinner with the Hassells on Sunday--they're so awesome! She is a Disney princess sister Wright decided. I love their family and girls (and the one little boy of course). It was so fun to go over for dinner. :)

So yeah, this week was good! There was one point during the week that I felt super happy. I realized that there is no other place I'd rather be than on a mission. So I guess when I feel comfortable enough to finally feel like that I know I will get transferred. I've been thinking a lot about Ether 12:4 lately, and it seems to sum up what I've learned recently. 

4 Wherefore, whoso believeth in God might with surety hope for a better world, yea, even a place at the right hand of God, which hope cometh of faith, maketh an anchor to the souls of men, which would make them sure and steadfast, always abounding in good works, being led to glorify God.

I've learned that faith in Christ is a deep abiding trust, which I may have mentioned already (sorry for the repeat). But as I've felt myself really trusting in Christ's power and strength, I see that I can do things I never could've done other wise. And as I have tried to turn outward and really loose myself in this work, I develop that trust. I am led to do good works and glorify God. So make sure you are leading with the faith you do have. :) I am excited for my next adventure in Oshkosh!

Have a blessed week and don't forget to be grateful. Love you all!

Sister Brianna Johns

sun, rain, and snakes. Waukesha 5/29/17

Dear lovely people,

Happy late Memorial Day! It isa bit strange to have P-day on a Tuesday haha. I have neglected to write my words of the week for a while, so today it's sleepy. Wisconsin seemed sleepy this week. But we saw a lot of little miracles this week, so it was a wonderful week.

-I got to go an exchanges with sister Giles finally! We didn't get to go last transfer, so it was so nice to go this week. She is so wonderful. I learned how to dance in the rain properly while tracting and met the nice new office missionaries (a cute older couple from Cali).

-I learned again that sister Kowallis has no fear. We were park contacting and saw this big black guy on a bench and I might've been very tempted to pass by him. But sister Kowallis went right up and introduced herself. He was well built, covered in tatoos, smoking a massive cigar, and had a beer can....but looks can be deceiving. He basically vented his frustrations about religion and church and God to us while we patiently listened and tried to understand his concerns. Sister Kowallis then introduced the Book of Mormon and answered some of his questions. As he was spouting off his concerns I felt the strongest urge to give him the Book of Mormon--it really does answer all of the doubts he had. He accepted it! So moral of the story...don't let looks deceive you and never doubt the power of the Book of Mormon.

-We met another black guy--this time a super sweet older gentlemen--named Jerome. He looooves his family and gladly told us all about them. He accepted a Book of Mormon and said he actually would read it. :)

-We finally had a lesson with this lady named Meaghan. She is agnostic, but we had a pretty neat lesson where she really opened up. We talked about faith and how we all need to experiment on the word in order to know if it is true. She is awesome, but super busy.

-For all of you who hate snakes you may want to just skip this part haha. We met a guy who had a 15 ft long python in his apartment. Yeah. It was in this huge display case under his TV. It was crazy! He also breeds snakes...so we got to see little baby pythons! Not gunna lie, they were pretty cute.

So all in all it was a really good week. This week I was trying to focus on recognizing promptings from the Spirit. By the end of the week I recognized that I often argue with myself on whether or not to do things--talk to big black guys or not haha. I realized that I, more often than not, am arguing with the Spirit. Never do that. Always be a "first responder" as talked about in General Conference. Anyways, God is good. I hope you all have a blessed week!

love,

Sister Johns

Three months down! Waukesha 5/22/17

Dear all,

So Wisconsin went through a hot flash this week...it was pretty hot and humid for a couple of days. But now the rain is back, so who knows what we will have tomorrow! I still think that I like dry heat better, I'm not into this stifling humidity stuff. But anyways, this week was really good! We are actually finding people to teach, so that is super exciting. Highlights:

-Fun fact about Sister Kowallis, she hates the rain...a lot. So Monday when it started pouring...she wasn't a happy camper. And we were planning on tracting after dinner. Thankfully the rain subsided after dinner--tender mercies from the Lord!

-So this week we decided to get to know everyone in the ward...and there are a lot of people we don't know. SO we ran around kingdom come trying to meet a ton of people. A lot didn't answer their phones or weren't home. But we did meet some pretty awesome people. While contacting people on Tuesday we ran into several people walking by and taught them about the Book of Mormon. It was neat to see how the Lord can plant people in our path that are ready or willing to listen to our message.

-Wednesday we stopped by Alyssa's apartment. She is a lady that seemed interested but hadn't gotten a set appointment with yet. We met her fiancé and talked to him about the first vision and the Book of Mormon. It was amazing how strong the Spirit was when we testified of that Joseph Smith was a prophet and the Book of Mormon is true. Later this week she said she wasn't interested in learning more...but her fiancé does have a Book of Mormon, so...

-Thursday we had mission tour! We got to listen to Elder Wilford W. Anderson of the seventy and his wife, along with President and sister Williams. It was amazing. The primary subject was faith, and I learned a lot about what faith is and how we can strengthen our faith. To strengthen our faith, we need to center it on Christ, align our will with God's will, and get to work. I am learning about how faith is a deep abiding trust in Christ. This trust and love should lead and motivate us to follow Him.

-We had an awesome lesson with a wonderful less active member named Scott. He is a talker, but he was focused when we talked to him about the temple. He was baptized when he was young and hasn't really had any contact with the church other than that. So he is learning a lot. He agreed that he wanted to work towards going to the temple and said he would talk to his non-member wife about coming to church. It was so neat to see him desire something and commit to act on it.

-We ran into one of the Elders' investigators Saturday! He is really into history, and basically gave us a history lesson on the early church. Then he proceeded to explain how our church is established on a nonsense. That didn't go down well with sister Kowallis. But she politely explained it otherwise and talked to him about how he could experiment on the word (Alma 32:28). He actually liked that, which was saying something because he is almost atheist.

-So in our quest to get to know our ward, we invited a less active family to church on Saturday. The girl we talked to actually showed up at church with her non-member friend! We don't know if she has been baptized (we don't have her records), so we are so excited to start teach her.

I felt like I saw a lot of miracles this week. We are starting to find people to teach and get to know other people in the ward. I realized that desire is everything. We are commanded to seek the Kingdom of God first and then (and only then) will the things we seek be added unto us (3 Nephi 13:33). We need to desire this and then God will bless us. Just something that I've been thinking about this past week.

Anyways, I hope you all have a great week! Find something to laugh about. :)

Love you!!

Sister Johns

Happy Mother's Day! Waukesha 5/15/17

Hello all!

Oh, it was so lovely to see all you wonderful faces yesterday!! Best part of the week. :) It was way to short, but I must be obedient, right? So, I'm nearly half way into my second transfer! That's exciting! This week we did more finding than normal, which is so good. We didn't necessarily get a sheave full by the end of the week...but we did find a few souls who might actually listen to us. Highlights:

-We made contact with a former investigator and her brother (who was taught by missionaries in Utah, but not Wisconsin YET). She is a nice old lady who loves her dog. She did warn us that he has bit someone in the rear before...so he stayed locked up in the back room haha. We also heard a story about her husband who passed away. Long story short...he was buried in the Philippines. Because he was so tall and ground was short he had to get folded in half...she was laughing hysterically about the whole story. We weren't sure what to say after that!

-We tracted into an Indian man! His house smelled like Indian food and I just wanted to keep talking to him. He was super nice and agreed to taking a Book of Mormon and possibly coming to church next week. He was raised Hindu, but doesn't really practice it. Ah, it made me so happy. :)

-We talked to a less active member about the temple this week. It was so wonderful to see how interested he got in our lesson. He had so many questions (he usually does) and we could see how much he wanted to go with his wife (who isn't a member yet).

-We had exchanges this week! I stayed in Waukesha with sister Smith while sister Kowallis went to Brookfield with sister Giles. Sister Smith is awesome.

So yeah! The work continues. We are trying to find the people in our area that are being prepared by the Lord. This, I am learning, requires a lot of work, patience, and obedience. But we are enjoying it! Happy late Mothers Day, mom!

Love you all!!

Sister Johns

See this video of Brianna and Sister Kowallis making slush

https://youtu.be/M5qFpAE4Mwo 

Mother's Day 2017

Slowly but surely. Waukesha, May 8, 2017

Hey all!

So this week went decidedly better than last week. Wisconsin this week has been more cheery. I have realized that the sunshine has a pretty big effect on my mood...so the sunshine this week was much needed. :) Highlights from the week!

-We had interviews with President Williams on Wednesday. I love President! He is so kind and encouraging. I got to ask about some of my concerns which was nice. In the closing prayer, President prayed that I would know that my sacrifice was acceptable before the Lord. This was interesting because I had been pondering on that and had read some talks which asked the same question. Immediately I felt an overwhelming sense of peace and love.

-We met a schizophrenic Thursday! We were volunteering at the Hope Center and this older gentleman comes up with his clothes. So we are checking his items out and folding them up for him. Sister Kowallis cheerily addressed him with some saying and he angrily said don't talk to me! You don't make any sense. He then continued to mutter to himself. When we folded up his clothes he took them and waded them up. As we tried to help him he just got more angry and said that he would do it himself. Right before he left he got right up into my face and told me he didn't need any help thank you very much (without the thank you however). It was startling to me and I felt like I could smell beer and smoke for a long time after he left. The lady working there came up after and explained that we had just met her neighborhood schizophrenic...lovely haha.

-So I finally met someone who is just as much (if not more) obsessed with organization as I am! Sister Kowallis enjoys (I think) going through all our closets and cupboards getting rid of old things and organizing them. You wouldn't believe some of the things we've found here...it used to be an elders apartment so....yeah. Weird random things--like reeeealy old canned food and a ginormous bright blue coat. So that was exciting.

-I got a hug from a Great Dane puppy! Needless to say it was taller than me when standing up on it's hind legs. It was so weird to get a hug--literally it wrapped it's paws around me--from a dog!

-We got to usher at the Living Legends performance (BYU dancers). It was fun to talk to people there--almost everyone there was a member of course haha. And we didn't get to stay for the performance..but it was cool. I was thinking how the number of people would double if it was in Twin Falls haha.

-So we as missionaries get tailed a lot for going the speed limit. We have a box (Teewee) that yells at us if we don't log in or if we go over the speed limit (okay, it doesn't really yell). Yesterday we were trying to drive to visit some people and Teewee was freaking out--it wouldn't let us log in. So finally we just pulled over to the side of the road and decided all we could do was knock some doors. So we we did. Interestingly enough the people we met had already had some contact with the church and one already had a Book of Mormon. He said that he knew it was true, so we asked him to be baptized...he declined though. I don't know if anything will come of it, but it was neat. After a while we went back to see if Teewee would behave, and lo and behold! He did. The Lord will put us where He wants us.

-This week an elder in our mission passed away. It was shocking and very sad. Our Zone Leaders called us to give us the news on Saturday. Sister Kowallis knew the elder, he was in her district in the MTC. We don't know any specifics. President asked us to fast for his family Sunday however. So everyone in the mission fasted for their family. It was neat to be a part of that.

This week was busy, but somehow we didn't get a lot of finding time in. So hopefully this week sister Kowallis and I will be able to talk to more people. I am really hoping that the work here will start progressing this transfer. I am seeing progression in myself, but very slowly. Yesterday I was thinking a lot about the Character of Christ (a talk by Elder Bednar we watched in the MTC). He talks about how we need to turn outwards, especially during our missions, if we want to become converted to the Lord. Mark 8:34-35 talks about the same thing. We are blessed as we truly turn outward in service and love.

I hope that your week is wonderful and full of adventures!

Love you all!!

Bre

Transfer numero dos! Waukesha, May 1, 2017

Hello dear people,

Wisconsin has been pretty dreary this week...just a lot of rain and black clouds. We did have a thunder storm last night! I slept through most of it though haha. This week has been CRAZY. Or at least it feels like it because of transfers. Tuesday was spent packing and saying good bye to members (sister Wright wanted to see people before she left). Wednesday I met sister Kowallis! Funny coincidence though...she's also from Pocatello. Weird that both my comps so far have been from the SAME town! Sooo highlights!

Car selfie! Everyone has to, right?

Sister Kowallis and I

-Wednesday we had dinner with the cutest family! She is part Japanese, so their kids are all dark and soo cute. One girl and then twins (a boy and a girl).

-Driving home Wednesday it was darker than normal...or later, something like that. And we are coming around this corner...when suddenly...(drum roll...) a possum pops out of NOWHERE! I screamed but we couldn't slow down because there was a car tailing us. Soo...we hit it. It was rather nasty sounding...but no harm to the car. Possums really do look like ROUSs...just saying. It was pretty funny.

-Friday I had 3-6 week training in Oshkosh. So we drove down and had a reunion with all the elders and sisters I came out with. It was so fun! When we were walking up to the church I saw sister KoFord my mtc comp. She came running up to me, we were so excited! She even picked me up haha, because she's so tall. It was sooo good to see her again! It was a really good training too, just what I needed.

Spring and her girls! "The rick-rawling house of sass"

MTC district reunion!

-Friday night (Lydia, you'll like this story) we were driving home trying to get to a dinner appointment. Well, long story short we were an hour and a half late for the appointment. On the free way they took the three lanes down to one. There were a bunch of police directing us off the free way. We had to take a very long detour to get home. The worst part it though, we don't know what happened! The couple that we had dinner with were so nice and still let us come over and take some food. Bless them!

-Blonde moment of the week: we were filling up the car with gas. We pulled up and realized that we pulled in on the wrong side, so sister Kowallis pulls around to the other side. when she got to the other side we just paused...realizing that we were on  the same side. DUH! haha, we figured it out eventually. I love backing haha.

So yeah, it was an eventful week! Sister Kowallis is a lot more outgoing and bold than I am, so I think that we will balance each other out. She does things a lot differently from sister Wright, which isn't bad thing...but I just have to get used to a lot of changes. Hopefully we will get the work rolling while we are companions here in Waukesha. The scripture of the week is 1 Nephi 3:7, "I will go and do the things which the Lord God hath commanded. For I know the Lord giveth no commandment unto the children of men save He shall prepare a way for them to accomplish the thing which the Lord commandeth them." I love this scripture. The Lord has provided a way for me and sister Kowallis to accomplish His work. We just need to be diligent and obedient. Hopefully we can have fun while doing it. :)

I love you all!! Don't forget to laugh at yourself this week. :)

Bre

The trees here are so beautiful!

We found peter rabbit and his brothers and sisters!

Former District