Week 1 of East Bay

Hello Familia,

Wednesday I picked up my new companera, Sister Mitchell!  She is 20 years old, very tan, from Arizona. I am really blessed to have her for this new area, she is a real go-getter! She is already pre-trained.

We love our new apartment and our new car! We feel spoiled. Although, it has been the craziest trying to learn so many new areas! I keep going up and down the same streets trying to figure out where I am, while my poor companion looks through binders and binders of maps. Basically, I pray to even get where I need to every hour. So far, the Lord has answered every prayer. I have seen so many mini miracles, just dealing with driving alone! He really is watching over me so much.

Ward

Sunday we got to meet most of the ward. Sure enough, it was as expected. Older, single people who are all pretty upset they are getting "kicked out"...it's kind of sad actually. But its not growing at all there and the Lord sees time for change. So we are helping visit these members to get their testimony fired up again and get them excited for the change instead of bitter (in some cases, leaving the church). However, we still had a big miracle. One of the newly called ward missionaries brought their nonmember friend to church! AND we talked with her and got a return appointment set up.  We have someone to teach this week!!!! It will be a drive to get out there, but hopefully everything goes well enough for more lessons, her coming to church, and maybe even Peter's baptism! Another miracle was one lady we visited in the ward, she said she was pretty upset at the ward change, but after we visited she was feeling much better and said she even wanted to bear positive testimony at their last testimony meeting! Yay!  Also, the ward feeds us a lot, we have had a few dinners, but also they give us groceries! That has been such a blessing. We also had some sisters sign up for splits with us this week. Even though this is not going to be a ward in two weeks, we are making sure we go out with a bang! We are still here to serve these people.

Broadcast

Did anyone see the broadcast on Sunday?! I hope you did, it was historic! Basically, several of the apostles addressed not only mission presidents, but any member. It was a re-call for member missionary work. They told stories of how the work is dramatically changing. First, that some ward had little success, missionaries teaching maybe 4 or 5 member present lessons a week. Then they changed their attitudes and every member got involved, and now the missionaries teach over 20 member present lessons a week! There are so many miracles we miss out on when the members don't help the work. So that leads to the second point. They said it is NOT very fruitful when the missionaries do all the finding. They said the days are past when knocking doors really worked. So over the next few months, missions will allow us to use facebook! Crazy huh? I am not sure how exactly, but basically if we have open time during the day, instead of knocking, we go online to facebook and blogs, and friend our investigators and keep in touch that way. We will be doing that in the church buildings, so that the buildings are open to anyone who wants a tour! Cool right?!

Well, I love you all, the gospel is true, no matter where you go!

Love,

Hermana Martin