Week 79 Pictures

Cookies Sister Urie made

That is the funniest hat ever

Sister Barely has any time left on her mission.

This is a southern Thanksgiving Dinner

Cornbread Stuffing

Week 79: Happy Thanks giving, Jackson branch and the suit coat.‏

Dear Family!

 

Wow oh wow what a week! Can you even believe how fast time is flying? ... I sure cannot. I am officially 18 months old ( in missionary "years") ..can I tell you I feel old too! ha Things are going great in our area. The work is going very well and yes..it was another great week in Flowood, MS.
Honestly I do not know what day it is or what even happened last week.. ( time..what a funny thing it is) So bear with me as I try to recall all the awesome happenings of our last week!...

 

First Monday we had a great lesson with Noah and his dad at the Presidents House. We made them dinner ( enchiladas..only thing that would've made it better would've been some salsa..ha..*cough*dad*cough*) and then had a little Family home evening. Our focus on the lesson was Joseph Smith and the sacrifices he made, relating it to the opposition we face as members of the church and  sacrifices we make to help others know about the Gospel. One thing I loved that Noah said was..he was telling us about what he had watched of the Joseph Smith : the prophet of the restoration movie and said about the end of the movie when the prophet is killed.. " that was just horrible that they shot him. He was just bring people closer to Christ. Just think of how many more temples could've been built if they hadn't shot him." To that we told him How sad we agreed it was. I love how Joseph in his history 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 I could not deny it..."(JSH 1:25) ..He did so much good and The work did not stop with him. It kept going and there will forever be more temples dotting the earth.

 

Speaking of Joseph Smith... we were 5-5-5ing some members and ran into the cutest older couple..She let us right in and invited us to sit and visit with them before offering the blessing ( which we never left..just a normal prayer for obvious reasons..) He is a..was a baptist preacher. It was so sad to me...He wouldn't let us even tell what we believed because he already knew what we believed ( which was a lie). The one topic he kept going off about was the "As Man is God once was and as God is man can become".. he told us that someone higher up then us told him..well why not! Why cant we become like them..well the first sin ( so he said was when Satan temped eve and told them they could become as gods knowing good from evil..) which is not true..the sin or transgression was when the actually partook of the fruit... yeah so as I am typing this it just hurts my heart all over again..spirit was gone..no room to teach. he didn't even think we believed in Jesus Christ and that our sins were cleansed through Joseph..blaspheme! ..also they had a problem with polygamy..anyways.. long story short..the spirit was so gone and we were just trying to get out of there. so we said a prayer and left. ...poor sweet man. If only people knew the truth about our church.

 

So thanksgiving was amazing! We had such a fun time..we ate with a wonderful family in the ward..Sister Johnson and I made some cute turkeys that I took a picture of . Also we got to go to another awesome members house who shared with us some real southern thanksgiving food. I took small portions but it was so good and a new favorite.pecan pie! mmmM M mm..

 

Oh! This was fun too.. We were invited to go to the Jackson Branch yesterday for sacrament meeting. I played the violin accompanied by sister Lefgren to "ill go where you want me to go". it was the best experience being able to be among those wonderful people. Of all the wards I have been able to be in on my mission..that is by far the least judgmental. I loved it! Just good people. If only all wards in the church were as humble and as sweet as this ward. It was just real and not so much of the mormon"culture" that we all tend to fall into out west. It was interesting..The Jackson Branch was so loving and excepting of who you are that it just made you want to be so much better and try to much harder to repent and come unto Christ. I'm not saying that we " do it wrong out west" or anything like that.. but it is amazing what happens when you take the culture aspect out of our church.. It is Christ church restored again to the earth!

 

Well... We have two people with a date for baptism, our awesome single older ladies.. Jane ( sweet Jane who is in her 70's) She loves the book of mormon and is so excited to come to church and be baptized. Her health is not the greatest and she is having trouble making it to church and keeping appointments. its really sad. I'm sure we'll have to push her baptism date back. I pray not though because it is set for before I leave.

The second one is Ruby ( another sweet lady in her 70's) She loves taking the lessons from us and visiting with us... She reads her pamphlets and stuff to prepare for the "quiz" we give her each time we come over to visit. This last week we "quizzed her" on the introduction of the book of mormon and she loved it and got 100% ha. next week its on the plan of salvation pamphlet. Her date for baptism is December 15th. I sure hope she makes it. She said it would be great if her whole family could get baptized on that date..one can only hope..and first it starts with coming to church! Just come to church and then you'll love it...

 

Did I mention it is getting really really cold here?... :( We had ice on the car Sunday morning.. crazy..

 

 

Well I think that is all for this week. just trying to visit the less active and bring them back still..same work..different week. I am excited to tell you all about the adventures we'll have next week.

I just love yall so much. I hope you know how much I love our Heavenly father. he lives! I know that His son, Jesus Christ, is our savior. it is through him and his atoning sacrifice that we are able to be clean from sin and return to live with our loving Heavenly father again. How Glorious and what a glad message this is! Salvation is possible to all who will keep his commandments and Follow Christ. I love him and know that he lives also. There is a way.

I hope that yall have a wonderful week!

Love, Sister Urie

P.s: bah! time is getting so short

 

Tracting Tips: 2 cents

Southernism: Cute little girl when we were waiting for church to start leans over and says " I got some mart Lu king ( Luke but it sounded like Lu) pants and I like to dance!" She told me to look up the Fresh beat band- tap dance .. Also it was so cute..one lady got up to give a talk and said " they asked me to talk for 12-14 minutes..no American woman can stand and talk up here for just 12-14 minutes" haha it was awesome.

Scripture: Alma 37:37 and Alma 7:23

Tracting Tips:0

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hey look at my hat!!

Week 78 - Pictures

Helped a member make cookies

Sooo we went to the fire station with play group on Wednesday.. a bunch of women in the ward do a play group and this week they went to tour the fire station so we went. We also got to teach the firemen about the gospel. it was awesome..

We had a finding activity..its speaks for itself. ha. Set up a booth on the corner of a busy street in Brandon and had a sign that said " honk if you love Jesus" also we gave away free "bibles". Too much fun to be called a finding activity. Handed out over 40 copies of the book

Our Baptism from Saturday

Christmas lights already!

Week 78-That's one more for Team Jesus!‏

Dear Family!

 

How I miss you all so much. Can you believe that time is going so fast and we only have three weeks left? Crazy..

It was, yet again another great week in Flowood, MS...So much has happened this week and I will try to paint you a picture ( figuratively) of all that's gone down....

 

First awesome thing that happened this week is we were able to go with the play group ( a bunch of ladies in the ward that have kids) to the fire station to tour it. It was a lot of fun. We took some awesome pictures and were able to talk with the firemen. Also! its was neat because we were talking to one of the moms that was going the night before..when she found out that we were coming too she was really excited and said " this is perfect! The one week I invite one of my non-member friends to come and yall are gonna be there!". We had some great missionary moments. We were also able to give the firemen a copy of the book of mormon to have in their fire house. Don't know how much they truly appreciated it..but hey! planting seeds right? lol

Following our fire station tour/ playgroup finding activity we were able have interviews with President McDonough for district meeting. It was a great meeting and ..to be honest it was really weird. My very last interview. I can feel that I am about ready..My heart if full of gratitude that I didn't go home last transfer..I know i was supposed to stay here, learn a few more things..and also to take part in Noah's Baptism!

 

..Did I tell ya'll Noah got baptized on Saturday evening!!! It was an amazing service. ( that almost didn't happen! Satan is a creeper.)

The night before the baptism we got a phone call from Noah saying that he wanted to postpone his baptism. He had been talking with his neighbors who are youth pastors at his old church and they really wanted him to talk with more people besides the people he had and get more opinions also to talk with the pastor at their church. They also shared with him a lot of anti information about the church and confused him. We told him we respected his decision to wait..but that we knew he was ready and that also he can talk to as many people as he wants about what is true and to receive more opinions about truth, but the ultimate source of all truth is God. That night we prayed so hard and we fasted for him.

Well...Long story short.. That night Him and his dad and his grandparents ( who are not members..they came to support him and see the baptism) talked and sorted things out until 2 in the morning!.. He realized that he had had so many witnesses ( ether 12:6) and that if he kept asking eventually God would tell him to just do what ever he wanted. (hmm..doesn't this story sound familiar? lol..) He received 3 hours of sleep that night and said he slept so peacefully..They woke up so early the next day because his dad took him with him to help work on the roof of a member in the ward..the bishop and elders quorum president was there and several other members of the ward. they basically had a testimony meeting on the roof and Noah was back in the game ready to be baptized and more excited for his baptism then ever.

The service went beautiful and Noah was able to be baptized by his dad who was just baptized two weeks ago and received the Aaronic priesthood last week. The Gospel has been restored again to the earth. This is Jesus Christ Church. How can it not be?!

 

Noah was also confirmed on Sunday. We were able to meet with him later that day and asked him how he felt as he received the Gift of the Holy Ghost..he told us that it felt "Like someone stuck a funnel in my heart and shoved everything into it. and i can still feel it.".. what an awesome analogy! lol.. He also testified to us how before his baptism his neighbors were asking him why he needed to be baptized to receive the power of the holy ghost in his life when he already had it.. Noah said that He knew he had felt it before in his life but now he has the gift of the holy ghost that can be with him always as he lives worthy though keeping the commandments. amazing remarkable young man.

As I was talking with Sister McDonough she brought a great point to mind that I just loved that I want to share with you...She said that because she knows Noah she feels that she knows just a little bit better what the young boy Joseph smith was like. I find this to be so true and cannot wait to see his progression as him and his father come to learn more things. A continual progression..one thing Noah s dad pointed out to us that he loves...did I mention he cant wait to go to the temple? :)

 

Another success story of the week is Jane..have I told yall about her yet? She was a media referral that wanted a large print copy of the book of mormon. So we brought it to her..and found out that she had been attending the Madison ward with her friend and his family and that her sister was a member. Jane loves to tell us how shes been, for years, trying to pray her sister out of "that cult" and now she wants to join! She called us this week and told us she read a chapter in Alma ( a book in the book of mormon.) that just spoke to her heart. Also, she knows the book of mormon is the word of God and wants to be baptized again into our church. We are meeting with her again tomorrow to teach her the plan of salvation. Currently she has a baptism date for December 8th. .. Jane was able to come to Noah's baptism and also to church on Sunday. She has met with Bishop and he is also very excited for her progress... There are elect people out there and when the Lord is ready for us to find them he just sends them our way..we didn't even do anything with her.. She called us! Praise Jesus!

 

Sooo...my last awesome story for this week is ( as you probably noticed from the pictures) our other awesome finding activity. We made a sign that said  "honk if you love Jesus" and "free Bibles" and set up a booth at the corner of a busy intersection in Brandon. There were so many cars honking and we Handed out over 40 copies of the Book of Mormon. ( not bad for only an hour or so!) It was a lot of fun and what a sight.. 6 missionaries holding these signs and handing out "bibles" Gotta love it. Oh the things we do for the Lord. Mormons can have fun too! Didn't cha know?

Happy Thanks giving BTW!.. Did I mention I am going to be 18 months old on Sunday the 25th! Whodathunk Id make it this far..time is going by so quickly.

Well..That is all for me this week. Hope you enjoyed the stories.. Words cannot put into words how I have felt this week and the things I have learned. So much is happening and I know that God, our Heavenly Father, Has his hand in every aspect of all of our lives. HE LIVES and so does his son, Jesus Christ. I know they love me because of how mindful they are of all the people around us. Please read the Book of Mormon..I know this is evidence of Gods love for us. How grateful I am for this work and everything Joseph Smith did to bring forth this restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and his Church again to the earth. I know Joseph Smith is a true prophet of God.

 

Love yall so much! and..yikes..see ya soon!

Sister Urie.

 

Southernism: my favorite.. Fixin. Yes it is a word and its in the dictionary. " Were fixin to go make some grosheries"

Scripture: Alma 25:12-16 This is exactly how I feel right now..thank you Alma! ha

Tracting Tips: 2 cents.

Week 77 - Pictures

pictures of  the Jackson branch building

They meet in a business building and have made it into a chapel. its is dedicated and everything. this is the Relief Society room.

the chapel

Baptism Font

Sister and Elder Lefgren

Week 77 - Less Actives and Blessings

Dear Family!

 

It was another great day in Flowood, MS! I absolutely love it here and am loving all the experiences that God is blessing me with to have. There is such an amazing thing that happens when one applies the restored gospel into their lives.

For example.. We visited with Cody the other day.. He is amazing! Just recently baptized he received the Aaronic priesthood on Sunday..on top of that he loves serving in the church and is involved in everything he possibly can be. Came and helped us help someone move!.. But! During our visit with him the other day he told us that he lived the gospel before and a lot of people said that he was peculiar..but he said he realizes now how miserable he was without it in his life. There really are people prepared and they are hungering for something more. The gospel is that something more! We NEED to reach out to those friends who are self-relent and love to serve..their are so many who the message we have to share will fill a void in their lives..who are we to say who is ready and who is not..I hope that we can all pray about the friends we know and let God be the judge of if their window of accepting the gospel is open or not.

Cody's son is getting baptized on Saturday.. His mom and dad are not married and when Cody's son went home this weekend to visit his mom she was less then supportive at his decision to be baptized in the church. It is so sad to me how many people are so hard to the church.. while on the other hand there are so many people who are ready..take Cody's Mom for instance..she was able to come to his baptism.. is reading the book of mormon currently and she also has his true to the faith book. The gospel just makes sense! Share it! I cant wait to tell you how the baptism goes. we are very excited for him and the decision hes making.. he came on Wednesday to young men's and while there he shared with us how he was in the shower and just got the prompting to read a scripture in 3rd Nephi that he had never heard of before..an exact prompting to a specific verse. This answered many of his questions. I love it.. whenever we try to answer some peoples questions the words we say just don't touch their hearts to answer their questions..but most of the time when they are praying and pondering and doing the things we ask them to do..that's when their questions are answered. this has happened time and time again and I know the same pattern is true in my own life. Just ready, ponder and pray..God will work through the venues he has in the past with you to answer your prayers. so simple.

 

We also had some other awesome experiences this week... first we had a wonderful Book of Mormon Study class on Wednesday night.. as we have continued to text message reminder upwards of 80 people each week we have had a steady consistent turn out of about 8 people that come! Investigators, members and less actives. There are more and more tables that we have to set up each week. Its great. This last week we talked about the tree of life. it is amazing to see how when people actually stop and take time for the scriptures that God helps them more in their lives. I have seen this as we stop..slow down and say prayers before going to each appointment and before we go out each day to leave the apartment. It really helps you slow down..something we have always done my whole mission..but now I am seeing how important it really is. Prayer works!

 

Another miracle is we were able to visit this sweet less active family. Sister Johnson and I are really focusing a lot of time on the less actives and helping them come back active. We made a visit to this one less actives house one evening last week and a man comes to the door. Upon opening the door he says " hey sisters." turns around and to a lady sitting in the chair says.."the sisters are here" she reply's.." oh great..tell them to come in!".. It turns out that this sweet 70 year old woman who has been very ill and cant come to church hasn't been visited by anyone in the church for quite some time. Also her son is handicapped  and has had difficulties making it around also. We were able to have a spirit filled visit with them and they are excited for us to come back and read the book of mormon with them. They both want to be a church so bad. What was really neat is the son is an amazing comic book artist! .. When I say amazing I mean .. great! He is going to draw a picture for us. They might start coming to our book of mormon class.

I have noticed this with most of the ladies we have been visiting .. all are so lonely and just need a visit or two to lift their spirits and they will start coming back. Success story this week..4 less actives we visited were at church on Sunday! woo hoo!

 

Also fun this week we were able to visit with the Lefgrens. They are the sweetest couple and are over apartments in our mission. Elder Lefgren wanted to make a you tube video of him playing his juice harp and asked if id accompany him on my fiddle..so i did! It was fun. You should see the videos soon. Nothin to fancy..but its cute..ha! so be on the look out.  

 

We are really working hard right now to find more people to teach. It is true in every instance that when we go the extra mile, that's when we find those who the lord has prepared to receive this message. we just have to hit the pavement and work really hard! Find..teach..and have the elders perform the ordinance of baptism. hehe.

 

I know with all my heart that this work is good and true. Please share it. I feel so blessed that I get to share it in this way as a full time missionary for the church. God and Jesus live. The atonement of Jesus Christ is for all who choose to follow him. I have seen how doing so blesses individuals and families. The atonement is for all.  Christ and our father in heaven love us so much and want us to return to them. There is a wonderful plan in place for this that I know is true because I have prayed about. its truthfulness has been confirmed to my heart.

I hope yall have a wonderful week! Stay strong and carry on.

 

love, Sister Urie.

working on finding new. Getting chilly

 

 

Southerism:In the south you can say anything about anybody as long as you end it in " Bless their heart".. ex: " He is such a jerk..bless his heart!"

Scripture: Alma 16:5-8

Tracting Tips:..zero

 

also.. I will just add this one note.. if I only had a quarter for the number of times people tried to talk with us able the election.. that is all..

Week 76 Pictures

Week 76 - Hallowwen and Baptism

Dear Family!

 

It was again another great week in Flowood, MS. Words cannot begin to express how much joy I felt this weekend. You would have been able to tell by the huge smile that was on my face..ha..but anyways. We had some amazing, strange and exciting experiences this week...

 

First, It finally happened... Cody was baptized! November 3rd, 2012 at 7pm. it was a rush because we weren't sure if everyone would make it back from the temple trip. They did though, prayers were answered and you won't believe it but there were more people that attended this baptism then I have seen attend any other baptism in this ward. We held the service in the relief society room..( which is pretty small) and we ended up having standing room with people standing in the hallways. Also what was even better is that his mom and step dad were able to be there. It was so great and so exciting. There was such a strong spirit that was felt also. This man loves the gospel and is so excited to share it with everyone.

It was just a blessing to me also because I found him!... I have never been a reaper always a sewer and to be able to be there from beginning to end of this teaching experience was a blessing for me. Starting off with his concern being that we didn't celebrate birthdays..to the concern of not knowing if Joseph smith had the priesthood restored to him by john the baptist..then having the concern that we weren't able to announce it in church, to getting baptized. The lord really does have people prepared and I cannot wait to get back out there ( after emailing this letter..) and find more people who are ready.

He was confirmed a member of the church on Sunday..About half the ward got up when it was time to confirm him and went to be in his circle it was awesome! :)

 

This week was Halloween. Sister Johnson and I were each other ( the classic name tag switchero) It was so fun we had a truck-or-treat ( trick or trunk..lol) at the church. It was fun to see all the kids dressed up. Cody and his son came. Also we were able to judge the costume contest..too fun. ha

 

Last really awesome story this week..was a slightly weird experience we almost had. We got a call from the mission office this week about a lady and her boyfriend that wanted to learn more about the gospel. There story was they had been living with his aunt and her husband

 because they are disabled and they were helping take care of them. Well after staying with them a month they kicked them out and charged them two months rent and wouldn't let them live here also because they didn't want them to join the church. Both the lady and her boyfriend are on disability and we met them. They had just been dropped off in flowood and living in their tent. From where they lived before they had known people who had introduced them to the church and were members. They wanted to join and wanted to know more. We  begin to taught them and told them that our purpose as missionaries was to teach the gospel. We could not offer any thing else and would refer them to the bishop for that..other wise if they wanted to learn about the church we could teach them the lessons to prepare them to make more covenants with god. They excepted and we had a great lesson..almost in a tent. ha. Sad to say we have not heard from them as of late..but I pray that they are doing well.  Welfare is always a concern in these instances..yet I did not feel that from them. Which is good.

 

Well that is all on the week from me! I love the Lord. I love this work and I love the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Christ is my savior and redeemer and because of him I can return to live with my father someday. Share the good news with your friends. Help the work hasten and be the good christian examples that we covenanted we would be at baptism. I love yall and am praying for you!

enjoy the pictures. :)

love, Sister Urie.

 

Southernism:Someone told us this week that we need to eat cheese grits with shrimp!

Tracting Tips: 2 cents

Scripture: 2 Nephi 29: 1-10 that is exactly what it is like down here :) its getting better though!