Instrument in His Hands

Happy Summer!!!

Wow what a week of July! Full of Milagros!!!!! :) But since today was
transfer day I am happy to report that Sister Stirland and I are
staying together for another transfer!!! Woohoooo!!! I'm so grateful!
And it's unheard of that a Mormon Battalion Sister stays out for
3 transfers in a row! I'm a lucky Sister! And a very grateful one as
well. :) Crazy how time flies though.... BUT miracles happened left
and right this week! 

And so let me begin... KATIE!!!! We have a new investigator!!! Her
name is Katie and she is AMAZING!!!!!!!! She is the one that we street
contacted at the farmers market. :) We had an appointment Tuesday
night with her and she just let us right on in! Katie is a champ she
lost her fiancé a while ago and has really been able to deal with it
quite well. BUT it was sort of a rough restoration because she just
needs a totally different teaching style that we hadn't developed yet.
BUT HAVE NO FEAR! Companionship study and role play are real! And
Katie is being baptized on August 27th. :) She already got the day off
from work and everything. :) She also got Monday and Tuesday's nights
off so she can go to FHE and Institute. But not Sunday's yet. ;) She
is very good at feeling and identifying the spirit, we showed her the
chapel and just right away she was blown away, she loved it! And she
had a dream telling her this church is true and she should stick with
it. WOW!!!! Plus she's the most social person I've ever met, just
walking up to people and introducing herself, playing paint twister
with the YSA like no big deal. She has a lot of faith and a lot of
love. I have that same love for her. :)

AND MIA MOORE IS A MORMON NOW!!!! Oh my gosh. What a baptism! So
spiritual and it was packed with YSA and it was at 10 am!!! Impressive
right? ;) But seriously, the talks, the musical numbers, and Mia's
testimony was just so awesome! And when we presented the restoration
the spirit was so strong. We had a couple members bear testimonies
during it and man. Powerful. Jaden, Mia's friend from Nevada who
introduced her to the the gospel, came, and we had her help us with our
presentation. She bore her testimony of The Book of Mormon and talked
about how she and her friends left one in Mia's car and Mia left it
there. So cool! And later in Mia's testimony she mentioned how having
interest helped because when the cops would pull her over she wouldn't
get a ticket. Nice Mia. ;) But what a strong lady. She mentioned how
she was amazed at how much love missionaries can have for someone
right away. And it's true, it is amazing. I'm glad she could feel it.
:) I love Mia. And I love how their were 3 nonmembers at her baptism,
the spirit of God stuck them. :)

And then exchanges! I got to be with Sister Essymba from Africa!!!!!!
She is companions with the wonderful Sister Carlson and the cute
Sister Davis. I got to stay with Sister Essymba in Poway!!!! She is
just so awesome, what a strong testifier. I seriously learned so much,
especially about the importance of testifying. She is a rock. Love
her! And love our members! Grace Wooley is literally the best because
from 4:30 pm to 9 pm she drove us around and helped us teach! That's
the kind of member missionary I want to be like. BUT GUESS WHAT THIS
UPCOMING MIRACLE MADE MY WHOLE LIFE!!!! I'm still shaking from it....
So do you remember in El Cajon when I was teaching Elder Mahaffeys
grandson, Josh Mahaffey? We had a lesson with him where Tippy the cat
killed a bunny? Josh is awesome and he kind of got less motivated. But
as we were street contacting in Ramona all of a sudden I hear, "Hey
Stranger!" AND THERE WAS JOSH MAHAFFEY!!!!!! He remembered me! And my
name! IT WAS THE COOLEST THING EVER!! I wish I could of seen my face
because I'm pretty sure my jaw dropped. El Cajon to Ramona? Who knew!
And right exactly when I was serving there and I just so happened to
be in his apartment complex when he was! WOW!!! He said he would love
to meet with us again! And he has a girl friend that would too! But
he's going on a religious retreat for an undetermined amount of time
but I'm really excited to teach his girlfriend Sabrina, she seemed
really excited too! MILAGROS FOR DAYS!!!!! :):):):):)
I also love being the mouthpiece for our loving Heavenly Father. Their
was one street contact where we just approached this man. Found out he
was homeless, his ex wife lost all his money, and many other awful
things. We sat down with him and told him how much God loves him. We
read from the Book of Mormon with him. And words were coming out of my
mouth that I knew weren't mine. One of the coolest moments on my
mission and one I will never forget, I'm excited for the Elders to
teach him! :)
Then during a power hour we street contacted this man from Bulgaria.
He invited us to eat with him, so we did, don't worry it was outside.
It was interesting! But we came back the next night because the Elders
couldn't and ate dinner again and taught 3 men the Restoration. It was
hard, sarcastic jokes from them and not entirely the best audience.
BUT it was worth it because the quietest one had the most sincere
questions and accepted a copy of The Book of Mormon. He didn't want
missionaries to find him in La Mesa, but he said he'd read it. I'll
take it! And we will send the Elders back!
Sunday. WAS A FUN DAY!!! This whole weekend all of the YSAs over San
Diego, 13 wards/branches, had a regional conference. SO Sacrament meeting was
combined and we got permission to go! And since I have served in 3 YSA
wards now I had many friends to hug and shake hands with! AND TENDER
MERCY!! 3 of my recent converts passed the sacrament, Marco, Eddie,
and Anthony!!! Ahhhh so awesome! And Marco said the opening prayer and
I was just beaming!! I just busted with joy that day! BURSTED!!! And
Mia was just glowing, truly was. And I got a lot of revelation that
day. The Lord reassuring me once again that I've gotten my answer many
times to my prayers and that I just need to trust him. Have faith. I
will Heavenly Father, I will! :)

A fun P-Day at Poway Park

AND THEN MIRACLE MONDAY! Wow, that Sacrament really boosted us up!
Because guess what!  We got a phone call from Elder Woods, the Mormon
Battalion director, he told us that a youth church group of 40 High
School kids want to learn more of what we believe. Wait what?
Seriously. The pastor of a Box Church called the Mormon Battalion and
said just teach us like you would any person. So we did! And we got to
come help because some of them live in Poway!   Wow. I was so
impressed by those kids! So respectful, so kind, a light truly was in
there eyes and then when we opened it up for questions at the end, they were so
intelligent! A lot of them came up to us afterward and asked us more
about our missionary trip and the plan of salvation! Wow! It was
awesome! And I don't know if I'll ever get to do that again so what an
honor! To teach 40 people who were all intently listening! Some of
them were minors so we couldn't of gotten any appointments
with them, but we gave them a folder with all this information and
pamphlets and a card to request The Book of Mormon. It was awesome!
And when we were talking about Joseph Smith, boom spirit! This was a
HUGE seed planter for a lot of them. Wow. And then the day just kept
on getting better and better! Every night we always have dinner with
the Bishop and his wife so that was a treat! And then FHE, paint
twister! Mia was there, Katie was there, and then our friend Roland
showed up! So background on Roland, Sister Stirland and I street
contacted he and his friend Ronnie and taught them the Restoration.
They had a ton of questions, and we gave them both a Book of Mormon.
They didn't know of a time to meet so we just got their phone numbers.
And yesterday we were driving and I look to my left and there was
Roland! We waved to eachother and had to drive off because of the
green light. We tried to find him but were unsuccessful. But he texted
us and said sorry he kept missing us!! So we invited him to FHE!!
Wonderful Rodrigo gave him a ride, they did show up an hour late but
they came! We were planning on teaching Katie as well but we knew we
had to teach him too so we had to act fast! So we went on splits with
our wonderful members! Sister Stirland went with Valissa and Katie and
I heard it went beautifully! I had the privilege of giving Roland a
church tour and teach the restoration with Rodrigo, Miranda, and
Jordan Hood. Wow, powerful experience. Roland was just so attentive
and engaged. Such a spiritual experience, the members did an awesome
job at testifying and Roland related to all of them! We taught him how
to pray and he said the sweetest prayer! I'm so excited to teach him
and he loves the members already! Who wouldn't! AHHH!! Oh and he said
he would be baptized!! WOOHOOOO!!!
I'm so lucky. I'm the luckiest Sister missionary out there. I'm lucky
to have all of you! I truly do love you and want to give you all hugs!
I'm cheering for you! :)

Love, Sister Whitcomb

More P-Day Fun!