Hermana Garner - Now a Texan!: 9/26/16

helloooo from Texas!

I AM TRAINING! I am going to be a trainer!! We have transfers today so I will meet my new trainee later today! I feel suuuper lucky to have this special calling, and also a little inadequate but I know this is what I need and know the Lord needs me to do this!

this week was a good week but our investigators aren't doing too awesome. it is sad so keep the prayers coming! we will be trying to find a lot more people this week! we just want someone to have a real desire to progress in the gospel!

so for Kayla. We are trying to bring people from the branch that know her parents, not just her, to help know that they are still loved here in the church. so on Monday, we went over with the sweetest little Hermana and her and Hna. Ortiz (Kayla's mom) just had a blast together. Cooking, laughing, talking (all through the lesson....aheemm...) and catching up. It was so good to see that. And then on Wednesday, we went over again just to see Kayla and she said she was super excited to be baptized and her mom wanted us to come over to eat with them next week! so that is a good sign! slowly but surely. they also committed to come to church but they didn't. we are just pushing Kayla's baptismal date farther and farther back. any ideas to help with them would be greatly appreciated!

Tomasa is doing good!! She accepted a date to be baptized on Oct. 29! she was a little hesitant, but she is ready to prepare. She also needs to get married which hopefully won't be too hard, considering she has lived with this guy for 17 years. prayers for her with that! we went over this week and she fed us pupusas and horchata! (pupusas are from El Salvador, like a tortilla filled with beans and cheese, sometimes meat and horchata is an aaaamazing drink) my favorite things in the world. she is a super good cook because she cooks for her job! so you can imagine how good it was.

I had lunch with Sis. Stutznegger (Her Mexico mission president’s wife. She was in Houston for a few weeks and made time to see Megan and her companion) and it was the highlight of my week. It was crazy how we were able to set that up but it made me soo happy! I needed her sunshine and the huge hug she gave me. It was so good to talk about Mexico and my people there and how they are doing. It was cool to realize that I am a completely different person since the last time I saw her. I have learned A TON since then. I am already looking forward to the mission reunion in Oct. next year! haha.

we saw a lot of little miracles this week.

-we were at Wendy's after zone conference with all of the sisters in our district and their was an Hispanic cashier. so I start talking to her and she was interested in who we were and what church we go to! so we gave her our number and stuff! later that night, we got a text from her daughter saying "thank you so much for talking to my mom! I wanna learn about your church!"

-we went to an Hispanic trailer park and walked around for about 3 hours talking to people about our english class, knocking on doors, everything. we didn't have a ton of success. but we got in the car and we were leaving and we get this call from a man that said he and his wife are really interested in the English class and how it is at a church and wanted to know what they needed to bring

-we have been praying to find a family of 5 people for a long time. we went to go contact a referral with a lot of potential and it turns out that he and his wife have 3 kids and he has a ton of questions about the church and has already read a little bit of the Book of Mormon.

-we were visiting a less-active who we haven't seen in a long time and she was going on and on about Joseph Smith and how he couldn't have seen God and throwing out scriptures from the Bible and everything. I stopped and asked her "hermana, why were you baptized?" and she just kind of stopped and thought about it. She explained that she wanted to follow the example of Jesus Christ. I explained that she was baptized by the power of God, the priesthood that Joseph Smith restored! Sometimes it is crazy to think that all of the less-actives we have, at one point they went through those baptismal interview questions and understood them. After the lesson, it was quiet and she looked at me with a smile and said "I learned something today"

we are finally seeing the little results of our faith this past transfer! hopefully these people we have met will be able to progress in the gospel this transfer and will be able to enter the waters of baptism next month.

I have been studying a lot about opposition recently and yesterday the lesson in Relief Society was on the talk "opposition in all things" by Elder Oaks. We had an awesome teacher who really helped us understand that if we didn't have trials or challenges, Heavenly Father's plan would be frustrated. We would never be able to grow or become better and that is our whole entire purpose! I was thinking about how all we want is to become better people in life. But when God gives us trials and hardships, we kick and scream and aren't too happy with Him for what He did. We need to thank Heavenly Father for every hard thing that happens to us---it means He loves us! And that is the greatest thing.

Hermana Garner

p.s. prayers for the trainer and trainee!

the photo of the week....making all of the Hispanics laugh.

we had a service project before the womens conference! here are some of the wonderful hermanas in brazos (Megan’s congregation)! Hermana Regalado on the far left, Hermana Hudson, Hermana from Argentina (don't know how to spell her name, and cute little relief society president, Hermana Mederos) they are just the cutest!!!!!!!