Marco Polo

G'Day my family!

And happy early birthday to mi hermano Roger! My oh my, one year older and wiser too! Happy birthday to you! :) Hope it's a great one! And

birthday shout out to Funcle Aaron and cousin Cooper! I love you all!

And I loved this week! Very spiritual, full of miracles and I'm just

trying to sprint to get the work done everyday!

I truly am. I just have to make sure I feel effective while I do so. :)

But Tuesday night was awesome! The YW had asked us to come to one of their activities to answer any of the questions the young woman might have. So fun! It was a great time to bear testimony, share miracles, and share fun stories too! And when we asked them who wants to go on a mission, ALL OF THEIR HANDS WENT UP!!!! WOOOHOOOOO!!! That's what I'm talking about!!! :) :):) 

We were able to sit down with good ol' John Stevenson, he's a recent convert that needs some help. And I love it when we can give it to people. You truly know when you've helped through what they say in their prayer. And his prayer was golden. Love John. 

And our tracking miracle of Daniel has to be put into the Lords

hands for now. I know down the road missionaries will be able to help

him, his heart just has to soften.

Wednesday was the start of the miracle of Marco. Aka Marco Polo. ;)

Marco was the YSA we street contacted in our parking lot and he has

just really grabbed ahold of this message. Since we've met with him,

he has come to church, he loved it and he especially loved the priesthood meetings. He's been researching on Mormon.org, LDS.org, and listening to the Mormon Tabernacle choir on YouTube. AND he's downloaded every church app known to man, even the pamphlets app! I bet not all of you knew the church had one! :) Marco does! Marco is just so cool! And he wants to be BAPTIZED!!! I woke up to this amazing text, it was amazing enough to knock on the door of my companion going to the bathroom and excitedly tell her this text,

"Sorry this is so late but I've been doing some research and I would

really love for you to tell me how I can be baptized. I just felt

something as I was researching and I would love to be able to meet

with you tomorrow."  (Something to that extent)

WOW!! Marco why are you so cool? It's literally been just over a week!

And he's already been inviting people to his baptism, he's in 1 Nephi

13, he's just AWESOME!!!! And he's going to ask for Sunday's off

forever! He's a good man. :) And while one of the YSA at church was

welcoming they said they hoped to see him next week and Marco

responds, "Oh I'll be here, it'll help prepare for my baptism!" OH

he's so cool! And also the Elders had a baptism this past Sunday and

Marco came!!! He came!!! It was awesome. :)

And on the plus side we

were able to present our fancy Restoration presentation complete with

technology and powerful testimonies from members. :) So yeah, Marco.

WE also got to meet with some of our favorite recent converts, Vanessa

and Stacey! And Vanessa went to the Temple again this week! Yay!!

She's just eating it up. :) And Stacey just cracks me up! She had gone

to a Single adult activity with guest speakers, like JOHN BYETHEWAY!

Obviously super awesome. And she said she hadn't even sat down and

someone was already asking her to save him a dance. That's our Stacey!

:) And now she said when people try to hit on her in the grocery store

she has a line where she says,

"You can take me to Jamba Juice if you come to church with me."

MAN SHES AWESOME!!!! Great lady.

Afterwards we went to go see a returning less active and followed the

spirit 100%. I know if we didn't we wouldn't of been able to go to the

root of the problem. And it's interesting that when people see that

other people know heir situations, they expect them to leave. But thats

not how I work! And it's all because of this gospel that has made me

that way, no matter what anyone has done I will NEVER turn them away.

I will never be in the position to judge. Never.

Hot nights call for sleepovers in the room with the A/C

Thursday. So in San Diego they have a saying for the weather. May doom June gloom July fry. Well apparently it's already July because it's

getting pretty toasty. And have no fear, the sunscreen is on! I also

love the Bishops family very much in the Grossmont Ward. We got to go over there for dinner and just the whole time all of them were talking

about how they had given copies of The Book of Mormon away and we

committed them to do more missionary work! They are just an AWESOME family! And then we were able to teach the man that walked into YSA sacrament meeting. Turns out he is 35 and lives in Lakeside. Really cool guy though. Lucky Elders! But we brought Eddie to the lesson, and Daniel really appreciated his testimony. Eddie ROCKS! Recent convert fire!! And Eddie has 2 investigators lined up for us! Totally prepared!

They want to come to church and get a tour! We can do that! Eddie is

totally fulfilling his calling as a branch missionary! :)

And the moment of truth. Friday. Another mission tour with Elder James

J. Hamula. Wow. He is another man filled with authority. And I'll just

try to sum up what I learned.

Not only did he come to the mission but

we had a Mission Leadership Council afterwards too, and he came to

that! What really inspired me was the faith to start vs. the faith to

succeed! Our mission needs the faith to succeed! The faith needs to

keep going, keep growing. The faith to succeed focuses on others

rather then yourself. He also talked about the Doctrine of YOU. How

understanding who we are helps us to better understand the doctrine of

Christ. And now snip bits of my notes:

-When you have those hard days, you have a privilege of knowing

something about the master himself, especially when you are rejected,

PLEASE have the attitude of the Savior! "Forgive them, for they know

now what they do."

-You are BLESSED to have the Schmitts! If he were to have children to

go on missions, Elder Hamula would want them to come to a couple like

the Schmitts.

-You're not a disobedient mission! Collectively. Do you want to take

it to the next level? Listen to what we just said of letting go of

casualness.

-The Doctrine of YOU. Only when you begin to understand who you are you get the opportunity to understand the Doctrine of Christ. This

doctrine is not to take away from the Doctrine of Christ. When you

understand who you are, it's to understand your purpose more, and to

pursue your purpose with greater ENERGY!

-Who you are here now, you are among the most valiant of our sons and daughters of God. You fought valiantly for the Lord, you loved him

with all of your heart and souls. You knew the gospel and you gave

everything you had to the Great War that was had there. Because of

your exceeding love, courage, and for the Father and the great Plan of

Salvation, you were served for these last days to fight like you

fought before! What keeps you going? What keeps us going? It's the

assurance that this time it's different! Peter, James, John knew what

they were doing wouldn't last but they looked forward to this time

when it would be restored. You are them. That's the Doctrine of You.

You simply need to recover what you already know, that's the value of

the spirit to bring back everything that was already said to you.

-**ARE YOU WILLING TO PAY THE PRICE WHEN THE PRICE GOES UP?** It will always go up.

-Goals are suppose to pull more out of you, that's what we want.

Success is measured by the commitment and consecration. FOCUS ON THE STRETCH, getting that done. You set the plan to cause you to stretch. You are accountable to the Lord! These are YOUR goals.

-These visits (Elder Holland & Hamula) put you under responsibility

now, to be different. It's not just suppose to make you feel better,

you are under obligation to do something wonderful.

-You can see that the Lord loves you by placing you near people who

have a desire to strive back towards the Lord, just as you do.

Great day, it was quite draining. The spirit does that to you I guess.

And still when we sang the mission song. Powerful, every time. And we also sang Called to Serve. Powerful.

Afterwards we went on splits and I got to see Doug! I've never seen

him so excited, it was nice to hear his appreciation towards me. Love

that family!

Saturday we had the baptism with Marco and it was a very green day. In other words a day of finding! And that's why I'm grateful for this trio

because through it all they keep me happy and laughing and motivated!

All GREAT things! :)

And we got to end our night at the Nelsons, I just

love that family! Seeing Brother Nelson not remember when he prayed

last to then praying in sacrament meeting and then doing family scripture study and prayer! Small miracles are actually big miracles! I'm so honored to of been able to teach this family. And now when we go over to teach them, they teach us! They just rock. And the Plan of

Salvation is always a good lesson to teach families.

And Sunday. It was my fortunate opportunity to be able to bear

testimony in the Grossmont Ward. About my Savior and my love for him.

Spirit was strong and so were the water works. But it was really nice

to walk down and get a hug from Stacey and then to see Sister Nelson,

who we taught the night before, say how grateful she was for us and

how much change her family has experienced. Just awesome! And also

what I loved is that now we are in a trio, while Sister Miole is in

YSA sacrament meeting Sister Purcell and I go to a part of Ward

council but by the time we get out we still have an hour before the

next sacrament meeting. So we go invite people to church! I think

that's the greatest and easiest thing we could ever do, and you could

tell people appreciated it. Even if we got no one to come with us, I

know it made a difference. So someday don't be surprised if I stop on

your door one Sunday morning. ;) And fun story, every night we usually

walk into a roasting apartment, and the a/c is in the study room, not

our bedroom and it doesn't circulate too well. So we brought all our

mattresses out and had a fun actual sleepover party! Best night ever!

Monday we did have to take our car to Pepboys to change our tires but

while we were there we got to teach the restoration! An almost

referral, so close! But it was awesome how even we weren't in the

streets Heavenly Father still placed someone in our path for us! :)

And this morning for P-Day we went to the Temple. It's been forever

since I had gone last so it was SO nice to be there. I just felt so at

peace and I get so excited every time I'm in there! I literally feel

like a little girl on Christmas. I love the Temple. :):):):)

AND I LOVE ALL OF YOU!!! I really appreciate all the support you give

me, it really helps me to keep sprinting, to talk to everyone I see,

to smile more, and to teach more by the spirit! Thanks for the

constant love and support! I hope you feel it coming right back at

you! :)

Love, Sister Whitcomb