April 30, 2018 - Tripanionship👨‍👨‍👦 - Niagara Falls, NY

Hello, hello, hello! 

This week was great. First week of the transfer! My new companions are great! Elder Thornton and Elder Hershey. Both are from Northern California. Elder Hershey is my zone leader companion and has been out for a little over a year. Elder Thornton just got done being trained and is a stellar missionary. 

The past couple weeks have been a struggle with finding people who will commit to meet with us. We have been teaching Gladston and he is progressing really well, he should be baptized soon! But other than that we have had a teaching puddle. Put this week we found some solid people! A family of 5! The Mathews family... and a couple single mothers. It’s been a great week! 

The Mathews family:  first day of the transfer was pouring rain and we had no appointments.  As we continued to push through and knock and talk with everyone, we found Tony, Sister Mathews. We had a great 30 minute restoration talk. She loved it and invited us back. Our return appointment her husband was there and we taught them together for a few minutes. But mainly spoke about the power of the Holy Ghost and she recognized as she read the chapter we left behind for her! We went back Saturday and taught them the restoration again and Tony said the closing prayer and told us through prayer that she had prayed us to her door. Their family is really struggling and are excited to be baptized unto Christ's church already! Huge miracle! 

The other single mothers we found are really progressing as well. One of them is named Bobby Jo. We found her last Sunday and she expressed the desire to come closer to Christ and find her faith again. Some really cool experiences! In all we found 7 new people and they are all really solid. I’m excited for the things god has in store for this area this transfer! 

This week will be a busy week for us! We have zone meeting, stake correlation and 2 exchanges. I’m really excited! Wish me luck!

Yea, and they did obey and observe to perform every word of command with exactness; yea, and even according to their faith it was done unto them; and I did remember the words which they said unto me that their mothers had taught them.

The stripling warriors are the perfect example of obedience. I love being obedient and seeing the blessings that come from doing so. It is essential for the lord's work. It’s the first law of heaven! Miracles come from exact obedience. 

Love, 

Elder Judy 

April 23, 2018 - Stayin' in the Falls - Niagara Falls, NY

Hi, I’m a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Transfer news: Elder Mecham will be headed to Rochester to serve in the 2nd Ward and I will be staying here in Niagara Falls. I’m staying as a zone leader and will be getting Elder Hershey as my zone leader companion. I will be training him up to a zone leader! And we will have Elder Thornton as well in our companionship. He has been out on his mission 3 months. It will be great! I’m really excited for this coming transfer. 

This week was a great one! Lots of learning experiences for sure. Lol. To start off the week Elder Norr and I went on exchanges! He came to Lewiston with me. We had a good ol' time. Elder Norr is a great missionary! From all the finding we did we found a man named Joseph from Nigeria! Joseph committed to come to church right after we taught him the restoration. It was great! 

Wednesday and Thursday were very similar days... the days that you grow. We had lots of finding and for some odd reason each day we only talked to 5 people. No one would open their doors and no one was on the streets. It was nuts. I was confused! It was ticking me off to cause I didn’t feel like I was being effective and felt like I was letting the lord down. But no effort is wasted! We tried our hardest! 

Friday we drove to Rochester to have exchanges with the assistants, Elder Nelson came to Lewiston with me and we had a ton of fun! We had some funny experiences in the ghetto as well. Walked up on a guy who recently had gotten jumped basically. It was crazy. We found a few people together, lifted my spirits from the past couple days. I learned a lot from the missionaries I served with this week. I love being able to learn and grow and find new ways to do the lord's work! It’s a beautiful thing.️ 

Saturday was my 20th birthday, feels super weird. I had a great day. My companion took me to dinner and a friend of mine dropped a cake off!:) We were able to have two powerful lessons with former investigators on that day as well! Thank you all for the birthday wishes! I felt the love! one super cool thing, Saturday evening I had permission to be able to talk with Alex back home!  It was great! I love him!  it was just like any other day though, hard work and trying to spread the Good News. 

I was chastised by this scripture this week as well. Enjoy.

Doctrine & covenants 112:10

“10  Be thou humble; and the Lord thy God shall lead thee by the hand, and give thee answer to thy prayers.”

In all things we must put the lord first. That is being humble. Submitting to his will. And he will guide us by the hand and answer our prayers. 

Love,

Elder Judy

April 16, 2018 - Glory, Glory, Hallelujah - Niagara Falls, NY

Howdy friends and family!

This week was great here in Niagara Falls! Lots of things were accomplished! We had lots of lessons and saw some tender mercies. 

Greatest Tender mercy of them all, Tuesday night to Wednesday night I was able to go on exchanges with Elder Hardy. I went to his area for the day, he is serving in the YSA branch in Buffalo. We spent all day on college campuses talking to students, it was a ton of fun, young people are really receptive to the gospel. That area baptizes very frequently. It was good to be back with Elder Hardy again. It has been 6 months since we were together in Canandaigua. It was great. When I was first with him and we walked onto campus I was so overwhelmed with how many people were there. We just got to pick and choose who we spoke to. It was a nice change of the work. One of the first days of my mission that I didn’t have to knock doors. Lol. 

Also this week we had lots of lessons with our new investigator Jeff. He is solid, we have taught him a lot and are now working on getting him to live the commandments. He came to church on Sunday as well. Every time we meet with Jeff he always says how grateful he is that he car broke down the day we met him, because we wouldn’t have gotten to talk with him and help him come unto Christ. We will be passing him off to the YSA elders so he can go to the branch and be with people his age. Sad, but it’s what is best for him. 

We have been working a lot with Gladston as well. He is from Jamaica! He has a lot of passion for Jesus Christ but he has very little education. It’s hard for him to comprehend the things we teach but he is coming along really well. He’s come so far since I’ve been here. It’s been really cool to watch him repent and draw closer to the savior of the world. 

Those are the 2 main people we are working with. Other than that we are pounding the pavement and trying to build our teaching pool. We found lots of cool people recently. Defiantly good things to come in this area! 

We only had 1 hour of church this past Sunday because of  weird weather, we had about 1/2” of ice all over the roads and cars. It made for a long day walking around in and trying to stay warm in the freezing rain! Haha we still found some awesome people who we will be meeting with this evening! God is good. The elect of god are our even in the most brutal of weather.

Nichole, a girl I taught in Canandaigua this past week was also baptized! What a blessing. I still miss that place like crazy. Nichole was suppose to be baptized while elder Hardy and I were together but because of some legal things that had to be worked out she got baptized on Saturday this past week. Now everyone i taught while in Canandaigua is baptized. Well basically. 

Myself, I’m doing well. As I have taken the council of the prophet and receive revelation daily I really have seen myself grow in ways I didn’t think were possible. I’ve had questions answered. I am a strong believer that god answers our prayers. As soon as we say “Dear, Heavenly Father...” his ears are turned towards us and we have his undivided attention. I know this to be true. I hope you all have taken the council of President Nelson and have sought after answers to your questions. He gave us the directions to do so: 

1. Find a quiet spot

2. Humble yourself before the lord 

3. Pour your heart out, ask questions 

4. Listen!

5. Write down the feelings and impressions you receive! 

Something as simple as these 5 steps can change lives. 

Love,

Elder Judy 

April 9, 2018 - Niagara Falls, NY

Oh Hey, 

This week was great! Defiantly one of the better, most spiritual weeks of my mission! I’ll tell ya why. 

On Wednesday the Buffalo Zone traveled all the way out to the Peter Whitmer Farm. And we had zone conference where the church started 2 days before the 188th birthday of the year. We were able to go on a tour of the Whitmer home. Elder Mecham and I have a training in extraordinary efforts in getting people to attend church and have uplifting experiences while doing so! Everyone said it was a great training. But the highlight of it all was being able to have the whole zone in the Whitmer home and having a testimony meeting. The spirit was so strong! It was great! I love this mission. It crazy to think that I have taken for granted serving here. I’m still trying to figure why god thought I was deserving enough to serve among these sacred places where the church was restored in this last dispensation. And to be able to be where the first apostles were called, and where the sacrament was first ministered in this dispensation. It’s a very humbling experience. 

I was able to go on exchanges down to the southern tier with Elder Hershy! We had a great time. He is serving in the Gowanda Branch which I was the district leader over almost a year ago! It was cool to be back on exchanges there.  

This week we have found some really, really cool people. Sadly, Jeannie’s husband was still threatening divorce and she ended up texting us saying she didn’t want to meet anymore because of it. She knows it’s true and wants to join Heavenly Father’s true church one day. We found 10 people to teach this week and all of them are great. Saturday night at 8:40 we were knocking on doors and James let us in and we invited him to church. He came and loved it! We found Jeff, he’s a couple years older than me and looking for who he really is. We taught him and sent him some videos and he said “this is what I’ve missed out on my whole life.” On Monday we met Danielle who had met with missionaries 15 years ago and read the Book of Mormon twice. Her husband just passed away at age 32. Those are just a few of the amazing people we found this week! 

After zone conference we had stake correlation.... so we were in a meeting from 7-3:30 and then drove 2.5 hours and were in another meeting from 6-8 then drove home. We were pretty beat that day. Lol. Still trying to bounce back from that one. 

Erik Gustafson and his family are great! They took me and Elder Kelly to a very nice steak house in Lewiston. The dinner went great! They had lots of questions of things we do as missionaries. Erik knows a lot about the church and has been to a couple of the historic sites. At the end of the dinner I had a family proclamation and testified of it and how the gospel will bless their lives. And gave them the proclamation. They said they would read it! And we have an appointment with them this Friday! They are great family. There kids are the cutest. (Side note: Erik is someone Claudine met in a class I took last summer.  We have talked lots on the phone, but have never met in person.  I prayed long and hard and sent a Book of Mormon to Erik at Christmas time.  We have always talked about my son being on a mission for our church in New York and Erik has wanted to meet him and take him to dinner.  With Blake's lasts transfer he is just 10 minutes away from Erik's house which is now in his area and so they were able to meet for dinner.  My heart almost burst when I found out they agreed to have Blake come to their home for a return appointment!)

As I prepare for some conferences this week I read 19 sections of the Doctrine & Covenants that were all revealed in Fayette at the Peter Whitmer farm. My testimony was strengthen of the lord and how he accomplishes his work. I know the Book of Mormon is true. And the authority of god is found within the church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. And how grateful I am for the opportunity to serve my lord. Love you all! 

Love,

Elder Judy 

April 2, 2018 - W.O.W. - Niagara Falls, NY

Hello friends and family!

I love to hear the voice of the lord through his chosen servants! What joy it brings to my soul! It was the cherry on top of this week! 

Monday night some members from our district extended a challenge to find a new investigator with the last half hour of the night. At the last 10 minutes of being out we talked to Eric and he had already been reading the Book of Mormon and was interested in meeting with us. We set up a time for the following day, fast forward to our appointment with him, we met him on the catholic college campus. Niagara University. We were in the cafeteria. As we walked in he waved us over and we came and sat down. He has his friend with him and as I’m sitting down she says “I have some questions for you.” So she proceeded to ask questions. As we were answering them and proving our beliefs with the Old and New Testaments the catholic father of the university walks in and they wave him over... the girl starts asking questions of things we believe to the father and the father begins to bash us through her... I wasn’t too happy at this point and when the father began to talk with us I asked him if I could ask him a few questions. And proceeded to bash the catholic faith. Of course in a nice and calm manner.  I don’t like to bash, but I had to defend my beliefs and the true nature of god and his son Jesus Christ. But I guess I can now check off bashing a catholic father off of my bucket list

I had the privilege to go on exchanges with Elder Gold! My MTC companion. He covers the southern part of The Falls. We went to the falls and did some contacting there and met a few member families! Contacting at The Falls is a very humbling experience. Everything I learned the past 19 months went right out of my mind cause there were so many people and it was so overwhelming. Haha it was a good time! We had lots of lessons and it was a great opportunity to learn from each other again! 

I also had interviews with President Evans. We talked a lot about how I can center Christ in my life after my mission. As that is my biggest fear. That question was also answered through many conference talks! I love President Evans! 

As for the people we are teaching, Jeannie was gone all week to Lake Tahoe with her husband but was able to watch a session of conference! Gladston is doing amazing! He’s progressing so well! We taught him the plan of salvation and told him about temples and how he could be baptized for his ancestors to save their souls he had a very spiritual experience. He also enjoyed the priesthood session and Sunday afternoon session! Gladston will be baptized soon! He’s awesome. Those are the two main people we are working with. We found a small family. We taught the father, Phil on Tuesday and it was the most spiritual lesson I have had in a while. It was overwhelming. As we finished the lesson I was prompted to ask Phil if he felt the presence of something warm and peaceful. He smiled and laughed. And said yes, what is it? We then were able to testify of the truth and how god was witnessing to him that he lives and Jesus Christ is real and indeed the savior of the world and their gospel has been restored. 

I too add my witness of Jesus Christ, that he really is the Son of God. He is the Redeemer of all mankind. I felt really lucky to be able to testify to people that Christ lives and he is speaking to a prophet right after the sessions of conference. God is a god of miracles, and works them daily in all of our lives. This gospel is true, I no longer “believe” I know. 

Love,

Elder Judy