God is Good

Hello hello! 🍑

This week I have learned how much our Heavenly Father just needs us to put forth a little effort and he will pour down is blessings so abundantly upon us.

We have really been needing to do more community service. So we scheduled in our plans one morning to go service hunting. We went everywhere, the library, City Hall, the Courthouse, and the fire station, asking everyone if they knew of community service opportunities. There was a lot going on, but it was all out of our area.. Of course. As soon as we thought we were done, we get a phone call from one of our members asking us to help with this huge project. We were able to find our service! It was just funny to us, because nothing actually came from our efforts, but Heavenly Father saw we were trying the best we could and was able to place this project in

our hands.

Also, we have been praying to be able to find new people to teach. We have put in a lot of time for finding this past week and didn't see very many results from our efforts. But once again, Heavenly Father keeps His promises and He was able to give us two solid referrals that we are beginning to teach. God is good.

My testimony has grown on HTBT (how to begin teaching) this week, specifically the very last point. "How to begin Teaching" is a guide for missionaries to begin their lessons so the investigator/less-active knows our purpose for being there and what we are expecting from them. The last point says:

 •      As you accept our message, you will learn how to make covenants, or promises, with God. You will learn how to make changes to bring your lives in closer harmony with His teachings. You will want to follow the teachings of Jesus Christ and be baptized by proper authority

We had a potential investigator named Bill who we had gotten into contact with and set up an appointment. We met him at a park and started HTBT ending with the last point stating that eventually he will WANT to be baptized. The lesson went really well and he had some really good questions! At the end we committed him to read the Book of Mormon and pray to know if it's true, and completely forgot to invite him to be baptized! But he was the one who reminded us, as he asked "do you have baptism classes that I need to take? I'm thinking I want to be baptized in your church." It was so amazing to see that the promise in that last bullet point was true. He WANTED to be baptized, if we wouldn't have brought it up in HTBT he probably wouldn't have ever asked about it. I'm so grateful for the tools that our Heavenly Father has given us to truly succeed in His work.

That's all for me this week! I love y'all!

Love, Sister Merritt

#TheSouth

CHURCH

Hello 🍑 

How are yall? I can't believe how fast time has flown by. I have 9 weeks left 😳  NINE.  I haven't been counting down, but my lovely companion likes to remind me. 

Speaking of companion. I have a new one! Yep. There has been an ET in the mission and I am now companions with Sister Kinser. She is the cutest little thing and a hard worker. I'm lucky to be with her! Can y'all believe I have had 5 companions the last two transfers? Hopefully I don't get any more. I'll stick with Sister Kinser. I do miss my Sister Gifford though. Goodness, why do I have to love my companions so much! It makes it hard when they leave me.

So, the summer here in Georgia has been incredibly hot and humid. They're saying that it has been a record of 60 consecutive days that it has been over 90 degrees. But I think it's starting to cool down! We just have to stick it out till September (: 

We have been doing service for a lady named Miss Jane. She's the cutest old lady and we love her a lot. In fact, we love her so much that we want her to be a member of the church! BUT, she loves her church so much! It's one of those mega churches, called 12 Stone. Everyone goes to this church. And when I say everyone, I mean everyone! So we decided we would go with her to see what it's like. We actually loved it a lot! But it was a lot different. 

Differences: 

- They had a rock band. We have an organ. 

- Everyone came in street clothes. We wear our church clothes.

- They gave away doughnuts. We take the sacrament.

- The children are in a separate class the whole service. We like the children with us.

- They accept Christ publicly to be saved. We know we are already saved.

- They have lots of truth. We have the whole truth.

Those are just a couple I thought of. Haha we had lots of fun though. And because we went with her this week, she is coming with us next Sunday! #hallelujah. 

Being in the Bible Belt I have been able to attend lots of different churches! It's really interesting, and really fun to learn what other people believe. But there is something that I have noticed is missing from them all. The Spirit isn't as strong as it should be at church. I love coming to church each Sunday and feeling recharged. Feeling as though I have received direction and inspiration for the next thing I need to do in my life, or that week, or even that day. And of course, partaking of the sacrament each Sunday. It's so important to do this, to renew our covenants, and remember our Savior and His Atonement. How grateful I am to be in His true church and to help other people find their way home too. 

Love y'all! 

Love, Sister Merritt 

Sisters P-Day

The Mormon-Do

Hey y'all!

Monday? Already? I swear I was just typing this email. Time just seems to be going faster and faster and sometimes I just wish I would stop and we could all breathe for a second. But I know time flies when you're on the Lords errand.

We have had such a successful week. A little stressful, not going to lie. But also a lot of fun. We had two zone trainings this week all on finding! Something the zone has been struggling with. Like I said last week, our mission president wants us to be more creative in our finding so we brainstormed some ideas as a zone, tried to build each other's faith, went to work and then came back the next day to share success stories. It was so fun, and goodness, some people are creative! We tried a lot of things!! But the lemonade stand is still the most successful 🍋

Mike, Nadia, and Ben are doing so well!! We are just so proud of them. Mike had some shaggy hair the first time we met him and this week as we went over to shave a lesson he had cut it!! He called it the "Mormon do!" Lol. They all came to church again this week and the ward members were all inviting them to dinners (:

The other week we met Steve, a neighbor of Mike, Nadia and Ben. We started talking to him about who we are and what we teach. He was really curious, but didn't really have a solid belief in God or Jesus Christ. He was so nice though and always told us to come back because he was busy whenever we would go over. Well, he finally let us set up a solid return appointment for Saturday night. We went over, and his wife, who we had never met, opened the door. She saw our name tags and hurriedly invited us into her home, gave us big hugs, pulled up a couple of chairs and sat down to listen to us. She told us that Steve has been talking a lot about us and she has been talking to Mike, Nadia and Ben about us as well. She even went to Mormon.org and watched the videos AND started reading the Book of Mormon. She wants to get her family into church and she knows that her and her husband need to be the examples. We taught a brief lesson and invited her to come to church which both Steve and Vicki said "Of course!" Sunday morning, they all show up to church and absolutely love it! They were only able to stay for sacrament meeting but told us they wanted so badly to see how the other meetings were like. I know it is so important to talk to everyone we see. Just open your mouth and God will place what needs to be said in them. If we wouldn't have done that, we would never had met Steve and his wonderful family! We are so excited to start teaching this family and watch them progress in the gospel!

I'm so grateful for the gospel of Jesus Christ and the love he has for each of us. I'm grateful to be teaching Gods children here in Georgia. And I absolutely know, without a doubt, that because of our Savior, Jesus Christ, we can all be better. We can all change and have a better life. And that's what the gospel is all about. Becoming better. I've seen it in those Ive taught and I've seen it in myself. Nothing is better (:

Stay good. Love y'all!

Love, Sister Merritt

Oh! We moved again. We switched apartments with the elders because our old apartment was a lot closer to civilization than they were, and they're on bikes. So we thought we would be nice to them.

New address is:

1809 Franklin Circle

Dacula, GA 30019