By the way

Some news

So about an hour ago this happened


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Things never stopped being weird, so I guess it's normal now? XD I don't know. It's starting to get hot again already. Man. 

 It was a really short week. There's never enough time to see everyone, our area is just so big! But it's fun. 

 We haven't been able to see Donny in a long while, he bounces between his Mom's house over there and his friend's house here, and he really doesn't want misisonaries coming to his mom's house. But he's still as excited as ever to be baptized! He looooves the Book of Mormon and really relates to Nephi. And he's been working hard to make changes in his life, just by what he's learning and what he's feeling from the Spirit. It's always really weird (but way awesome!) when the people we teach just naturally start living the commandments without us having to teach them. It's real obvious when they're really trying to listen to what God wants from them. 

 Also, we got a new investigator named Burt. His son just got back from his mission and immediately talked to him about meeting with missionaries, and introduced him to us. Which is kinda intimidating, when I think of being entrusted with someone's father, and the fact that this was like the first thing he did when he got home, he's probably been thinking about this and looking forward to it his whole mission. But it's been way awesome, because Burt bikes all the way to the church to have a lesson with us (He doesn't feel like it's a good spiritual environment at his home) and even though he can't read very well, he's been working sooo haaard at reading the Book of Mormon, and it's crazy. The level of committment people have when they really want to know for themselves if something is true....I bet it must just be the greatest feeling for God to answer those prayers, when they want to know so badly. 

 Nessie, the woman who walked into church and told us she wanted to be baptized, has basically quit smoking cold turkey. "I was sick of it, anyway," she said, "all I needed was a reason and a little help. I'm good now." Haha! She's been really keeping herself busy to keep from smoking, too. She walked to the church like 3 hours early just for something to do, and sat outside to read the scriptures. She's so much fun, hahaha!

 Also, I received word from Laveen that Merry gave a talk yesterday in Sacrament meeting about raising kids in a Gospel-centered home!!! I wish I could've been there, I'm soooooo excited for her!! Man, I miss so many people here so much. I get so happy to hear that they're doing good!

 Before I close, quick funny story to share: So the elders text out a scripture to their struggling investigators every now and then. The one they chose was John 14:18, "I will not leave you comfortless." They sent one to Bishop by accident. It said, "Check it out! God loves you! John 4:18."

 Bishop was like, "Oh, cool, a spiritual thought from the elders!!" So he pulls out his Bible and reads, "Thou hast five husbands." And is just super confused why they sent that to him.

 I love you all!! Thank you for the letters and the prayers!! I love being a missionary and I love seeing Christ change lives!! You should serve a mission!! :)

 God bless!!

 -Sister Stratford

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Presidents' Day!

So this'll be kinda short cuz the libraries are closed and I'm on an
iPad and typing is slooppoppow and clumsy....but, it's been a really
good fun week!! It's been a bit of a blur, sooooo many people to go by
and help.

My companion and I have really been trying to refocus on making sure
the Spirit is involved in everything, and it's made a difference.
We've been receiving a ton of promptings from God, and we've just
gotten a lot more effective. God really is at the head of His work,
and He does kno His children and what they need. He loves them and
wants to help. So when you listen to Him, He tells you what they need
and how to help them. I knew that principle before, but some things
you relearn several times, haha. It's a true thing, though. It's so
true, and it's a crazy thing to experience.

We had so many really good lessons this week. One woman we taught,
she was mainly curious because her son married a Latter-day Saint. She
was impressed by her daughter in law and her family, but mainly, she
wanted to know what to do and what not to do, since we basically have
our own culture, haha. But as we testified of what we knew to be true,
and about the Restoration, the Spirit was so strong. We invited her to
be baptized, and her reaction was basically, "well, that's a silly
question, of course I'll be baptized if I ask God and He tells me it's
true. Why wouldn't i? " that was really cool.

....man, writing it just doesn't do it justice. XD

I don't know if I named her, but Nami is the teenager we taught to
pray for the first time? She's been sooooo fuuuuuuuun!! Haha. She
really loves church and invited her cousin ("it's okay, three hours
goes fast. You'll see!"), she went to the Valentine's Day dance and
loooooved it, and she loves to pray now!! It's cool whenever we ask
her, she has cool stories about God helping her in a test, or in a
heated situation with a friend, or whatever. She's very excited about
girls camp. Man, we're just so excited for her to be a missionary,
haha. She's just so great!

Also, exciting news, I finished my study journal!! Cover to cover,
it's filled with so much stuff that I'm learning and guidance I've
gotten from the Spirit. There's something exciting about finishing a
journal and starting a new one. The new one is beautiful, too <3

Happy Valentines day, and happy Presidents' Day! Also, it's George
Washington's Birthday, so happy birthday to him as well!

Thanks so much for the letters and for your prayers and support! I'm
so grateful to be out here! Sorry again for the short letter, but I
love you guys and I'm grateful for all of you! :D God bless!

-Sister Stratford


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*THWOMP!*

This has been the wierdest week of my mission. Just, wierd stuff happened. Even the miracles were weird!! XD The miracles are the best part, and I don't have a lot of time, so those are the things I'll write about. Hopefully I'll have sufficient time to record in my journal all the weird stuff that's been happening. XD

 Weird title for a weird week. Real quick, back in the MTC, they did a demonstration with a hardboiled egg and a bottle. They told us we had to get the egg in the bottle, and that we had to do it quickly. Off course, when we tried to shove it in the bottle, it just made a mess of things and there was yellow and white egg guts everywhere. Then the instructor lit a match in the bottle and set the egg on top, and because of physics, the egg was sucked right in with a very satisfying *thwomp!* sound. Our instructor jokingly told us to listen for that sound when we teach. Haha. Anyway, it demonstrated that conversion had to come from within whoever we're teaching, and we can't force or shove anything without making a total mess. It demonstrated the importance of the Spirit and a sincere desire to know truth. 

 So fast forward, Sister Morris and I have tried EVERYTHING to try and get our investigators to come to church. They love what we teach, they love the Book of Mormon, they read and pray every day, but they're not coming to church for some reason. We've gotten them rides and called them the night before and the morning of and they seemed excited about it and they never come, and it's been kind of discouraging for us. It's not about filling pews, mind you, a lot of them have been saying that they don't feel like they're getting their answer, and coming to church to feel the Spirit there is one way that they can be taught from on High and get their answer. We've constantly been feeling like we've done something wrong, but that fire is just not there.

 We were talking to a recently baptized member, and their friend walks by just as we were inviting them to church. So just kinda off hand, we say, "Hey, we'd love to see you there to, you can come if you'd like." And they were like, "Sure, whatever." And we never thought about it again

 Until he shows up at church that Sunday and tells us the next day that he feels like his life has been changed and he wants us to help him be baptized. *THWOMP!* Donny is so prepared!! It's seriously so cool, it's like he's been looking for this his whole life. He's so excited about church and Christ and his Father in Heaven and it's just the coolest thing. 

 But that was church last week. This week....um, go back about two months ago, everything had fallen through, and we didn't know who we could go see. ANd we were like, "Well, we have a list of people who used to meet with missionaries but stopped, maybe we can see them." So we knock on this door, and we hear, "Who is it?!"
"It's the missionaries!! :D"

 "Oh....uh....not interested. >:/"

"Oh..okay...well, have a nice day. :c"

So yesterday, this random woman walks in the church, and goes up to the elders (they're a little more iconic than sisters) and said, "You're the missionaries? Yes, I'd like a Bible and a Book of Mormon? I was almost baptized a year ago, and I backslid, but this time I'm going all the way. Let's see, today's the 8th...can I get baptized on the 27th?" They get her address, she's in our area, and we're like, "Huh, if she's met with missionaries before, maybe we already have a teaching record for her," so we pull it up and say, "Wait a second....." 

 Some people aren't ready right now and just need a month or two. *TWHOMP!* She struggled with some changes before, but now she's determined to change her life and give it all to God, and we're so excited for her!! 

 I love working with people so much!! It's been the best blessing to see their lives change for the better and to really see how much of a miracle the Atonement of Christ is. I've known this truth before, but it didn't really hit as hard as it does as a missionary: we really are children of God. our Father wants us to be happy and will help us make those changes that will bring us happiness. Everything He does really is for us. Especially for "the one." No one is left behind or forgotten, but God really does make a lot of stuff happen to help "the one" in need. It's so cool. 

 I love you guys so much!! Thanks for the letters and the prayers, you're all the best!! <3 

 -Sister Stratford

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Prayer and the Plan of Salvation

So apparently the super bowl was yesterday....not the most productive time for a missionary, haha. And apparently it was in Phoenix? Didn't know that. It was a little crazy.

 Also, I saw fog for the first time in my mission. That was crazy, too. I forgot fog existed. :p

 It's been kinda a slower week. Hopefully that was just because of the Super Bowl and it'll pick back up this week.

 But the Lord makes up for slow weeks!!! :D It's the quality, not the quantity.

 Man I'm so very out of time, argh, but I'm going to cram in as much as possible.

 We found a less active sister who isn't really interested in coming back, but wants her grandaughters to go. At first we didn't have a lot of hope, because telling kids to do something they know you don't want to do is not very effective, especially if the adults want the missionaries to be the one to put on the pressure (*grumpy cat face "No"*), but we had two lessons with her this week, and it was seirously the COOLEST THING EVER. She believed in God, she knew He existed, but He was just kind of this vague, foggy, abstract concept that was just kinda there as truth but didn't mean anything to her personally. So when we talked about how God is her Father and she is His daughter, and He loves her, and is aware of her, it really seemed to fascinate her. She had all sorts of questions about prayer, kinda like the other high school guy we taught, "Does He hear all of them? Does He give us whatever we ask for? Does He talk back? How do we know when He does?"  We knelt down and heard her say her very first formal prayer....it was the neatest thing. 

 THen her little niece and nephew, both younger than 7, started to get really excited about prayer and talking to God, too. So they each said a prayer. 

 Then they thought it was so great and had so much fun talking to God, they ran to the back of the house and dragged their dad out to pray with them! Haha. THey taught him everything we taught them about the nature of God and what prayer was, and wanted him to pray. It was so cute!!! He ended up not praying, sadly. Even though they were both saying, "We can help you, if you want! Do you want to repeat after us?" 

 ....families are the BEST. 

 There's another family we've been teaching, but I haven't written about them much. MOm's name is Tara. She's been pretty quiet during our lessons and has perferred to listen rather than speak, and her answers were very short and vague, so we were never really certain about her actual concerns or what she was really thinking or feeling. We kept coming though because she watned us to and appreciated us visiting her and teaching about God. But we started teaching the Plan of Salvation, and it all led into prayer again (because once you know who God is and what your true relationship with HIm is, as child and Father, prayer becomes natural and instinctive...it's all related). And as we talked about prayer and how God knows us...it was really wierd, I was saying things I wouldn't usually say, and I was like, "man, why am I saying this? What is coming out of my mouth right now?" 

 THen before we knew it, she was in tears and opening up about all this stuff that she's been holding in, all these doubts and fears and concerns and trials she's been going through. And then as she was sharing these things, she began to make connections with what we'd been teaching, and started telling us how prayer would help her, and how reading scriptures would help her. Then she committed herself to actually doing those things. It was such a cool experience.

 ...I need to be getting off, but I love you guys and I love being a missionary!! :) Thanks for all yoru prayers and support!!

 -Sister Stratford

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Maaan, this week was a blur and I don't remember any of it!! haha. I wish I had news about transfers, but we didn't get our transfer calls last night, and apparently they're not coming until Tuesday. So. Yeah, we have no idea what's happening at transfers :p I'll let you guys know after it happens.

 This'll be a short letter, I'm way running out of time :C Also I forgot to take notes this week on what to write, soooo...this'll be crazy.

 Lacey has been going through a TON. Everything just started piling on her, but it's been the coolest thing, because the light behind her face is just growing. And her family members have noticed and have been asking questions. It's so cool.

So really cool exchange miracle!! Exchanges are notorious for being perfect for miracles. There's a young man in our records who was just baptized less than a year ago, but his address was wrong, and we didn't really know what to do about it. So while we were on exchanges (trading companions for a day with another companionship), I was looking at our areaboook when my temporary companion said, "WAIT!! Go back!!!" And she looked at the name and freaked out. "I taught him!!!" She said. "Then he moved and we had no idea where!! He has some really hard trials, and wherever he is, his ward doesn't know he's there! They don't know they need to help him!!!! does he have a number?!" He did. She was soooooo excited, she called him and told him she missed him and to call us back so we could get his ward involved and help him out. It was so cool. 

 We started teaching the Spanish bishop's nephew!! He's basically been teaching himself. He has a BoM And he's read passed Alma already. ANd he's not just reading it, either, he's really studying it intensely. He looooooves studying the Bible, not just reading but studying, and so he's been trying out the same thing with the BoM. In every prayer he asks God if it's true. When we asked if he got his answer, and he said he had, and that it was true. Not every day you get to teach someone who already knows it's true, haha! He said he wants to get baptized after he's finished the book.

 ....Sorry for the short letter, I"m a little pressed. But thank you guys so much for the letters and the prayers!! I love Arizona and I'm so grateful that I get to serve here!! God is real and Christ is our Savior. There's no denying it at this point! :) Love you all!!

 -Sister Stratford

Power of prayer :)

So it's MLK day, meaning the library is closed, meaning I'm on an iPad
using the church's wifi to try and type all my emails. And I'm slow at
this touchscreen keyboard thing. It's kinda like texting entire
emails, actually, :p so this one will be pretty short. Also if there
are a thousand run on sentences, sorry, the period and coma are too
close to each other.

So we're teaching the Spanish bishop's nephew. We got a call from
him that said, "I gave him a BoM, he's already past Alma, and he's
expecting you guys now." We had a really neat lesson with him, it's
not everyday you get a first lesson where they pretty mush already
know everything you're teaching is true. He's had a lot of really neat
spiritual experiences with both the Bible and the BoM, and he's
getting really excited about God.

We had our third lesson with Aria. And she told us she was actually
already baptized. When she was eight. "But we never really went to
church and I did not know what was happening, so I'd actually really
like to do it again." Haha! So that's pretty golden, right? :p so we
explained to her that she didn't need to be baptized again and talked
about the Sacrament and she was really happy. So last time I said it
was as if she'd just been waiting for missionaries to show up; she
literally was, haha. She was excited to come to church, but hasn't
been able to make it because of some family problems. It's been really
fun to teach her about Christ and His Gospel, though. It's like a
treasure box for her.

We had a neat doorstep lesson with a teenager the hermanas used to
teach, but he totally speaks English, so we get to teach him now. We
talked about how he just takes life one day at a time, and he felt
like he'd done pretty good for himself. He didn't really feel like he
was looking for God. He didn't need the extra help or strength right
now, didn't see any reason to involve Him in his life right now. We
talked a little about prayer and how God loves us and the blessings
that come from having Him in our life. We asked him, "do you think
you'd be able to pray?"

And he said, with a smirk and a shrug, "yeah, I'm capable of it."

Okay, yeah, we know exactly what that means, and that's not an
acceptable answer! Haha. He was really hesitant to commit to praying.

So we were going to end that lesson in a prayer, like we always do,
and we invited him to pray. He was nervous to, so we offered to go
around and each of us say a prayer, if it would make him feel more
comfortable. We each said a really simple prayer, and after a little
hesitation, he said a beautiful, humble, powerful prayer. It was so
neat. At the end of it he said, "wow, that felt really good." Then he
started asking more questions. How often do I pray? Do I need to say
the words out loud? Does He hear all my prayers? How does He answer?
Before we left he said, "I think I want to try that again tonight." IT
WAS SO COOL.

That's as much as I'm able to type....love you guys, thanks so much
for your prayers and letters and notes of encouragement! I still have
the little cards I got from Christmas hanging in my desk. I still love
being a missionary! :D God is real and He loves us, and Christ is our
Savior, and it's so exciting to get to be here to tell people that!

Love you all

Sister Stratford