Week 35: The P’s Baptism

September 25, 2017

Hello Hello! 

The P family!

It's been yet another great week here in East Mesa! This area is just booming with teaching opportunities and it is amazing to see the Lord prepare His children to receive the restored gospel! Sister Utsch and I are definitely staying busy and the time is flying by...I can't believe it's already Monday again!

Exchange with Sis. Foster

This week I had the opportunity to go on two exchanges with two amazing sisters! This transfer Sister Utsch and I have five sisters in our stewardship, plus the mission got smartphones, PLUS our area is booming so we're crazy busy all the time! We're trying really hard to make sure we do a full-day exchange with all of the sisters in our stewardship but so far it's been really difficult. The first exchange I went on was in my area with a cute sister named Sister Foster! She was trained by my MTC companion and she's a great missionary. She's been on her mission for about six months and we had a good exchange. Not many people opened their doors and we didn't have many teaching opportunities but it was cool because she's training this transfer and as the exchange went on I could tell that she was really overwhelmed and felt under-qualified, so I was able to build her up and give her some advice on things I wish I had done differently when I trained. It was definitely inspired that their companionship was the first one we went on exchanges with this transfer. It was cool to see that the exchange was successful despite not many opportunities to teach!

House selfie in brand new car!

The second exchange was with the sisters we live with--last transfer we lived alone but this transfer another companionship of sisters whitewashed into our zone! I went with Sister Patrick into her area and we had a solid afternoon of getting lost and knocking on lots of doors without much success, but this exchange was another one that was successful, not because of the amount of proselyting we did, but because of the conversations we shared. Sister Patrick goes home at the end of this transfer and she's having a tough time knowing that her mission is coming to an end. She's also had a fairly rough mission so towards the end of the exchange she was kind of reflecting on her mission and I helped her make a plan to make her last transfer the best it could possibly be. When I was called as an STL I was really nervous because I knew that being an STL required far more charity than I possess....and charity is by far my worst Christ-like attribute haha, but every single exchange I am surprised by how much love I feel for each of these sisters! I know myself, and what I can and cannot do, and I know that the Lord blesses me with love and charity when I need it! It's absolutely incredible to be able to see how the Lord can take my imperfections and mold me and make me into exactly what He needs me to be!

This week we were biking around and we felt inspired to go stop by a recent convert family of about two years, the C’s. We got there and they let us in and we just asked if we could say a prayer with them and Brother C just broke down in tears. He expressed to us how frustrated he is with himself because he keeps making the same mistakes. He said "I wish more than anything I could be a tenth-generation Mormon...because I had 52 years of sinning before I found this truth." It was heartbreaking. We talked a lot about the Atonement of Jesus Christ and its enabling power, and we shared a conference talk with him about how we're doing better than we think and he was so grateful. He had gotten to the point where he just felt so alone, like he couldn't do it anymore! It really made me think that we all need to be doing a better job of bearing one another's burdens, and helping each other along the way. Life is hard, and there are so many people struggling around us that we don't even know about!! Brother C was so excited to receive just a simple visit from the missionaries...and no one even knew how sad he was. We need to reach out in love to those around us...we never know who might benefit from it!

Z. L.'s shirt reppin at zone sports

One of our wards had an awesome ice cream social this week! This ward has kind of been dead missionary-work-wise the past few months, but last month we had a ward fast for missionary work. We've started doing member lessons and we've started working closer with the ward council to plan better activities to invite people to...and we're finally starting to see some amazing things happen! So many ward members brought their neighbors and it was awesome!! We met so many new people and it was great because they were able to see the missionaries as real people, not just as two weirdoes in black tags that show up on their doorsteps every few months. Missionary work when done with members is night and day different from when it’s done without! My goal when I go home is to be a great member missionary, because I see now how important members are in this work!

We had another lesson with L this week! That, my friends, was a wild ride. She rolls up and first, gives us fruit snacks. We were so excited! Then she says, "Sisters, I have another present for you." and we were like better than fruit snacks?! And she was like...no...and pulls out a thick green binder. She hands it to us and says "My parents gave this to me this morning...it's been a rough day." We open the binder...and inside were 84 pages of anti-material. So fun. Sister Utsch and I were like....oh....okay... haha. In one of our wards there is a member who is an expert on anti-material. The Church used to hire him to go bible bash with people professionally haha he's awesome. But anyway, we texted him a picture of the cover and asked him what it was/what we were dealing with and he responded back "that is one of Satan's finest works." So that was just super great...not. I think we handled it pretty well though. We talked with her a little bit about how to deal with anti-material and gave her the advice to remember how she feels when she reads the Book of Mormon. We read Elder Bednar's talk "Ye Knew Me Not" with L and I honestly don't think that there could have been a better talk to have read with her! We bore powerful testimony at the end and I told her that I knew whatever was in the binder couldn't hold a candle to the Book of Mormon, because the Book of Mormon is the word of God and it is true. We'll have another lesson with her this week and we'll see how it goes! Keep her in your prayers...anti-material is the worst.

So that's what Sister Utsch and I have kind of been dealing with this week...it feels like we've had a lot of encounters with antis/anti-material recently. The missionaries in the Arizona Gilbert Mission take a lot of heat for serving in a "cushy" mission but I challenge you to find another mission outside of Utah that gets anti-d more than the Arizona Gilbert Mission. You cannot serve in this mission without a rock solid testimony of the restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ and of the prophet Joseph Smith. We've both been studying Joseph Smith and the restoration of the gospel like crazy this week...just trying to strengthen and widen our own foundations! This week I studied a lot of conference talks about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon, as well as Joseph Smith History. I know Joseph Smith was a prophet. That testimony is unshakable. As I was studying Joseph Smith History this week I read a verse where Joseph is reflecting on the first vision. He says, "Why persecute me for telling the truth? I have actually seen a vision; and who am I that I can withstand God, or why does the world think to make me deny what I have actually seen? For I had seen a vision; I knew it, and I knew that God knew it..." and as I read it, the words came to my mind "And I know it too." Most anti-material slanders the prophet Joseph Smith's character but that does not diminish the fact that he was called of God to be the prophet of the restoration. God's ways are higher than our ways, and if that means that a fourteen year old farm boy is called in all of his imperfections to be a prophet then so be it. The Lord qualifies who he calls! I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet and that the Book of Mormon is the word of God.

Anyway...enough on that, we had an amazing weekend! The P children’s baptism was absolutely amazing!! It was just as good as the H’s! I'm more at a loss for words from this one than the H’s I think.

P's baptism photo

It was a big day for the P’s! N and B (who’ve been members for about six years) were sealed for time and all eternity as husband and wife like three hours before the baptism of their children haha. The Spirit was so strong at their baptism. B, S, K, and C have been waiting for YEARS because of legal conflicts to be baptized. I think that the Spirit was strong because they wanted it so badly. They are the perfect example of people who truly understand what baptism is and how important it is to our salvation. It was so cool to see their faces as they entered the waters of baptism, and then see their faces as they came up out of the water. Afterwards they each told us that they felt different. It was so precious. Sister Utsch and I were in tears as we taught the restoration at the baptism. We're both pretty stoic missionaries; I think I've cried like four times on my mission so it was really weird for both of us but we couldn't help it...the Spirit was just working on us! And given everything that happened this week with antis and whatnot we were feeling pretty dang passionate about the restoration haha. There were so many non-members there and both N and B's ex's/the kid's co-parents were there and it was really touching to see how happy they were for their kids, and to be able to watch the Spirit touch them as well. Seeing how happy the gospel makes others just makes me happy, too! It's so rewarding to see the change that the gospel of Jesus Christ brings about in others; that's why we're missionaries! We live to see other's changed by this gospel...and it makes all the hard times worth it.

Pre-baptism selfie w/1/2 the P's

This week Sister Utsch and I have been overwhelmed with gratitude and humility; we've had nine baptisms in 35 days. That's ridiculous. Our stake president said to us this week "I served in Brazil...and that's more that I had on my entire mission...and you're doing this in just a square mile area....that's incredible." But it's all the Lord’s doing. None of this would happen without Him and His plan for each of us. The fact that the P kids were able to receive permission to be baptized in it of itself is a MIRACLE. That is evidence of the fact that the Lord softens hearts and prepares His children. Sister Utsch and I do not have the capacity it takes to be a full-time missionary and servant of the Lord by ourselves; He qualifies us every single day and makes us far more than we are on our own. It is through Him that we are able to do the things that we do every day. I am beyond grateful for my Savior Jesus Christ. I love Him. I love His gospel. I love this work and I love being a missionary.

Have an amazing week! I love you!

Sister Jacobson 

Swag selfie, dope filter, & new car