Remember the Alamo!

Hola Familia,

This week I did a special exchange with Sister Olsen and her companion so that Sister Evans and Sister Kwan, our companions could have their very own exchange with a STL, instead of just being stuck with us all the time haha. It was great! I got to go to Alamo... Where I have never faced such rejection in my life!!! There is literally nothing but residences there, so its all talking to rich white people in their yards. We were offering a lot of service, but once we mentioned the word "missionaries" it was like jekyll and hyde. I was very proud that Sister Kwan was very diligent. I liked the exchange, but was happy to go back to East Bay for sure.
It's interesting, because the moral of the story is, MEMBERS ARE THE KEY! If you haven't caught on yet. Because the town RIGHT next to Alamo is baptizing families like crazy. Why? Because the members are finding them, and the ward mission leader literally fills their calendar for them. So while members continue to catch on, we fill our own calendars, but the areas that have figured this out are seeing the fruits.

This week was also an AMAZING leadership training. It was two days long, with all the district and zone leaders, and the sister training leaders.
I had to give a training on "dynamic leadership" with a cool science experiment. We had breakout sessions, large discussions, food, etc. It was a spiritual feast! I came away with so many more tools that I applied right away to my exchanges, and it made it 10 million times better! I learned how asking inspired questions and all the skills of teaching investigators applies well to the sisters I am over. Not that that was news, but it was good to see examples of how that is. We needed this training, because there are now more missionaries who have been out 6 months or less than older missionaries in our mission. There are district leaders who are in their 3rd transfer. We have so many new missionaries, we have to make sure we bring them up right :)

Thanksgiving is soon!!! We are teaching our ward FHE lesson tonight on gratitude, followed by a Thanksgiving dinner. We invited Brad and Alvaro to come. We are listening to Christmas music and getting ready to prepare a Christmas message in our finding efforts! The weather is getting colder and we are going hiking again today for zone activity.

Well this week is a challenge to you all to write me about how you gained a testimony of paying tithing or living word of wisdom.

Much love,

Sister Martin