You can't stop time can you?

March 16, 2015

​My reaction to the news about my brother's engagement... I promise I'm excited, just angry I didn't get a picture of him proposing! ;)

I promise that I'm not lying when I say I've been out of YSA for 6 months. Just wanted to clarify that since all the members seem to think I've only been gone for 2. Missionary time versus real time gets so confusing. I feel like I'm limbo in  a way, sometimes everything goes really fast, other times it's slow and in my world holidays hardly exist because they don't really change anything for us (except when they involve chocolate, THEN I remember them:)

    It's odd to be back in my old area; so much has changed yet a lot is the same. They started teaching James again a month or so ago (the really tall Ugandan that has been investigating the church for over a year now) and so we'll see where things go with him. Jennifer, the girl we took to the Wilson's for dinner, is INCREDIBLE. She grew up in Puerto Rico but came to Utah 10 years ago. She was raised 3rd generation Pentecostal which is NOT a light thing and met her first set of missionaries 10 years ago. Her family would always feed them but when it came time for the missionaries to share a message they would have Jennifer bible bash and never really learned about what our message was. About 3 months ago Sister Tranchina talked to Jennifer outside of her apartment(who was in a major hurry to go to work) and set up an appointment. Having just separated (not divorced) from her husband after not being married for long, she was going through a hard time and her heart was ready to receive the gospel. As of now she's working on finalizing her divorce because her husband who is also Pentecostal adamantly refuses to give permission for ehr to be baptized. She's basically mormon and really wants to go to the temple. Last night we talked about the reasons for and blessings that come from trials like this and she said "as much as I'd rather not go through all of this, it's what helps me to know the gospel is true. If I wasn't sacrificing for it, it wouldn't really be worth it, right?" That's someone who is ready to be a true disciple of Jesus Christ.

   Tender mercy of the week was seeing Lansing, the chinese girl I was teaching last summer who moved to Logan. She was visiting one of her friends in the RosePark ward and heard I was going to be at church so she came and stayed all 3 hours! She told me I'm her favorite sister and that my hands work magic (I did a braid for church like usual but she loves my braids). all of this in her adorable chinese accent. I was able to give her my email so hopefully we can stay in better touch now, I know she has met the missionaries in Logan but I don't think they're teaching her. I got to hear from both stake patriarchs yesterday and woah did their talks blow me away! I love wise men. Lansing does too! You can tell she felt the spirit.

​LANSING!

  This week I learned many things, one of them being that because of modern-day revelation and the book of mormon, we have a much deeper understanding of Christ's atonement which I am ever-so grateful for. We taught a lesson to a man who is a very devout christian but when we asked him how converting to christianity has made him a better person he replied "well none of us are good at all, we're all sinners". that made me so sad. Of course we wouldn't be able to return to the presence of the father without the savior, but God loves us and has put a lot of goodness in us; we must simply choose to act on that goodness. Everyone is born with the light of christ and through the steps of faith, repentance, baptism, receiving the Holy Ghost and enduring to the end, we can become good, very good in this life! Are we perfect? Of course not. But through Christ we can be perfected after this life. "For it is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do." 2 Nephi 25:23. I invite you all to study christ's sacrificial atonement this week and ask yourself these questions:

What kind of person would I be without Jesus Christ in my life?

Where would I be?

What would my vision for my life and for all eternity be?

I know life can be hard but it can also be very joyful! focus on the good, not the bad, fo the small and simple things that keep you in tune with Heavenly Father's will, and always always always put the Lord first:) That is the key I've found to happiness!

Love,

Sister Pearson

Mas picturas:

​Calamari makes sister West sleepy I guess... remember when you tricked me into eating that dad?

​Hermana Tranchina's last transfer! I'm going to my miss my peanut-butter loving spaniard oh so much. She's training!! finally.

P.S. I don't have a picture of this but Elder Bednar came for a devotional at the U this week! I know he is an apostle of the Lord. The apostles are such down-to-earth humble men!