Natalie's Mission Blog: The Joy of Missionary Work

General Conference was this weekend, and let me tell you, it was such a spiritual feast! I appreciate it so much more as a missionary than I did before. As I watched, I wrote down things that they said that I wanted to share with specific people we are teaching, or things for myself that I really needed to hear. There is always so much to learn and so much to work on!

One of my favorite talks was by President Nelson. He spoke about how the main purpose of the Gospel, is to bring us JOY. That is what we are doing as missionaries, bringing people joy. Go watch it here:

Joy - President Nelson

There were also two BOMB talks about member missionary work. They just made my heart sing! It was all the things I wish I could tell members about being missionaries, but I'm sure that coming from the mouths of Apostles of the Lord will make these things have a much bigger impact.

Member Missionary Work - Elder Andersen

Member Missionary Work - Elder Oaks

We had a super busy week. That is always great because it makes the time fly by and you really feel like the Lord's work is moving forward. We got a referral from a member in the Golden Hills ward for her friend Mary. She told us that Mary was ready to take the missionary lessons and learn more about the Gospel! We met with her and she is SO PREPARED AND AWESOME! She has such a strong desire to learn and to grow closer to the Savior. Right now we are praying for a miracle because she has to work on Sundays a lot so she won't be able to come to church right away. But we have seen so many miracles this transfer, I have faith that anything is possible through the Lord.

Another really cool member referral was for a woman named Anne. Anne had a son that was killed several years ago, but his spirit has been doing things to show his mom that he's still there. Not only has he been doing things to get his mom's attention, but has also been appearing in dreams to his mom's friend Naomi, the member who referred us to Anne. Apparently he has been telling Naomi that he has accepted the Gospel in the Spirit World and wants to be baptized in the temple. I was not aware that you could take names to the temple if they weren't related to you, but apparently permission can be given in rare circumstances and Naomi has been working the past several months to get that figured out so that the son's temple work can be performed. She also has a daughter that lives in Santa Clarita who is currently taking the missionary lessons and planning to join the church. So, we got to meet Anne this week. She is super busy right now because her other daughter is getting married and her mom just passed away, but hopefully we will be able to teach her after things calm down a little. What a crazy story that is?!

Hong and Mike are doing well. They watched conference from their house and apparently really enjoyed it. They are making slow but steady progress. It is a joy to watch them make small realizations in the middle of lessons about things that we teach. You can see on their face when the Spirit suddenly tells them something or makes something clear to their minds. :)

Last Monday we went with some of the other missionaries to an ostrich farm that is here in Tehachapi. It was super random and really fun.