Investigators

Dearest Madre,

First order of business.. Next week I hope to email a little sooner then normal, because a member is taking my companion and I out to lunch and to a place called Callaway Gardens next Monday. Since it is a little further away, emailing will be cut short a little, or else we will email a little bit earlier so that we can get actual emails to family and friends. But this is just a forewarning in case my email is really short next week. Its not because I don't love you. In fact I love you lots and lots:):) there just isn't enough hours in the day.

This last week all inclusive was pretty fun. We were trying to pass on an investigator to the Rivercrest Sister's last week, and so we went to a baptism in that ward and then went out to lunch with them, and had a wonderful time! But then the appointment fell through. It was really sad.. That appointment was strange though because it looked like the girl we were trying to teach had moved. Her truck wasn't there, and instead there was a car, there was a dog that was there that hadn't been there before, and there was a basket full of empty alcohol bottles even though we know she doesn't drink. And her phone the one we had texted her on the night before was disconnected.. It was so strange because this person wasn't one that would just up and leave without telling us, and she wouldn't lead us on like that at all.. IT made me little sad though. That night however we got a text from a random number telling us that it was that particular investigator and she was sorry she missed us but she had just gotten a new phone because her old one broke. She also told us her truck was replaced with a car because her truck broke and she was dog sitting. She felt bad about all the confusion, but we were just grateful that she hadn't run away like we feared. That was pretty awesome.

Oh! and then on Sunday we were standing at the door greeting people, and I kept nudging my companion because we should go sit down. She told em we needed to wait a little longer. Well we waited for a few more people and I gestured again for us to sit. She leaned around the corner of the door and said there is someone who doesn't look familiar, who looks new and said we will wait for her to come in and then we will come in. So she comes in. We introduce ourselves. She introduces herself. She looks lost. We tell her she can sit wherever she wants. We then glance at the Elders to see if it was either of their investigator. None of them knew who she was. We felt prompted to go sit by her, but when we noticed that there wasn't a whole lot of space left over there we asked her if she wanted to some sit by us. She did. Come to find out she was not a member, this was her first time coming to church, and it also turns out that she was the referral that one of the Bishopric members had given us that we had been trying to see for about a week now. It was really cool to just see her walk through the doors. She couldn't stay much longer afterwards, but she said we could come by and see her sometime this week. I love blessings from the Lord. They really are super awesome.

I love you lots family!! And all my friends too! :)
Be happy this week and remember to look for the Lord's hand in all that you do everyday:):):):)
Love,
Sister Monica Walker

Singing to the Tune of the Holy Ghost

Dearest Mother,

Due to unplanned service this morning, I don't have too much time on emailing today, so my email will probably be on a little bit of the shorter side. There is just way too many things to do today!! It's kind of exciting though:) I learned this week the importance of having the Spirit with you all the time, and the power that the Spirit has in helping people come closer to Christ.

So... We are teaching an older lady who has a lot of health issues. She at one point had a surgery on her heart, but then recently her heart started leaking again (because I am not a doctor I know know the terminology so I might be accidentally making it sound worse then what it is) and so she has been back and forth to the hospital for high blood pressure. Her ankles are extremely swollen and so the doctors also gave her some medicine for that. We went and visited her this last week, and we were lucky to have caught her because she had just gotten back from the hospital that day. She was pretty sleep from the drugs they gave her, but she told us to come inside and talk to her anyway. We decided to teach her about the Word of Wisdom because of previous issues that she had with it, and we knew that if she'd commit to follow it that she would feel a lot better. We had also been teaching that to a lot of people because of the realization that all of us can work on it. But I will get to that part later. Anyway, we were in the middle of sharing a part of it, when she fell asleep on us. I stopped talking mid sentence, and my companion and I looked at each other. We tried a few times to wake her up by just speaking a little louder, but that didn't work. About a minute later she woke up. She felt so bad about it, but we told her it was ok, and that we would come back another time. We always end with a hymn though because she loves to hear us sing. So we decided to sing "Did You Think to Pray?" For whatever reason, my companion and I BOTH IN SYNC began to sing the words but to a completely different tune. We are looking at the little hymn book I carry with me, and we are confused as to why the notes don't match what we sing. But we go with it. We somehow transition to the actually song about halfway through, and we only do one verse. So we ended singing the right hymn. We have absolutely no idea what just happened, and we have no idea how we could not only be off, but off together that we were having a really hard time keeping our faces straight. The whole lesson just made us giggle. I've never had anyone fall asleep on me before when I was teaching them. The lady after we finished was crying and she told us we sounded like angels. She wanted us to record it so she could listen to us sing all the day long. Considering we sang the wrong song, and it isn't really supposed to work well that was funny to us. Well we said a prayer, and then we head out to leave. When we get to the car, we bust out laughing. We figured out the tune that we were using was "Israel, Israel, God is calling" and we tried to reproduce what we did and failed miserably.. I'm not sure why we ended up doing what we did, but I do know that the Spirit definitely guided both of our voices. There was no other way we could have done that, and had the Spirit touch her so strongly. Plus the fact that both of us did it and we weren't ever singing different notes was pretty amazing too. And then you add to it that neither of us have heard that tune in a few weeks and it is pretty amazing that that was the one that came out of both of our mouths. I love the way the Spirit works. :)

So the thing about the Word of Wisdom that we both realized. First we heard that President Monson spoke about the Word of Wisdom in the Priesthood session of conference. There was also quite a bit of attention given to it in the other sessions as well. So rather then say that we are perfect at the Word of Wisdom, we dug a little deeper into it. Realization #1-The Word of Wisdom is more then just Thou Shalt Nots.. There is more to it then don't do drugs, or drink tea, coffee, or alcohol. There are lots of thou shalts. The easiest way to break it down is by saying to eat healthy, get adequate sleep, and exercise daily. Too many people focus so much on the negative things of what they shouldn't be doing that they ignore the things that we should be doing. And then people get discouraged when they can't seem to stop whatever it is that God wants them to stop, and so they give up. Especially when they see other people who seem to be living it perfectly, and even though we shouldn't, they compare themselves to them. Realization #2-ALL OF US have something we could work on in the Word of Wisdom. For example, me. I hate exercising, but the Word of Wisdom says to exercise daily. So that's what I need to do. Some people have trouble with eating healthy. Eating healthy means not so much fatty foods and sugar, but more grains and fruits and veggies. Some people, like me, will either over sleep or not sleep enough. Any of those three things are important and are part of the Word of Wisdom. So we decided to teach it to everyone, and help all of them understand that there is always somewhere that we can improve. Its pretty awesome sometimes when you realize that there is so much more for us to learn. I love learning!

Love you all!! Be safe:)
-Sister Monica Walker

Testimony: Never too little, Never too small

Dearest Mother,

So its interesting how things work out sometimes.. I will of course keep Grandma (and Grandpa but specifically Grandma) in my prayers. I did however think about them all this morning, and the first thing that I did when I got on today was send them an email about how much I love and appreciate them. And then I read your email. I love the way the Spirit works sometimes:)

Patiently is usually the best way to answer questions that people have about the church. As I am sure you faced as well coming on a mission, there are a lot of people with a lot of question. Not all of them are nice. Most of the not so nice ones are only trying to get a rise out of us as missionaries and argue with us. And then when that happens, the Spirit will not be there. After all it does not stay with contention. I think that was the best response that you could have given to them, even if you physically couldn't be as strong as normal. I imagine it is very similar to the way the Quorum of the 12 and the First Presidency feels every time they get up to speak, especially those that are more advanced in age. There is a power to the Lord using us in our weaknesses. I'm sure the younger man was impressed with you even if he decided not to agree with you. I always am impressed with people's commitments when they express their beliefs here in the south. As long as they aren't trying to tear my beliefs down, I love hearing about their own. I wonder what they thought when you sat down? I wonder if they felt the power in your voice, the testimony that you had when you bore your testimony to them? I'm sure that even if they weren't in a position to hear it, you did exactly what Heavenly Father wanted you to do. I can't help but think of Abinadi. How sad it is that he died thinking that no one heeded him. Little did he know that one priest, one of the company of his accusers heard and listened, and repented. Look at the magnitude of people Abinadi was able to affect by his act? You would think that by the miracles and the signs that were shown to the people that more would have been affected by Abinadi, and maybe they were and we don't have that record, but among the rulers of that group of people, her only affected one, but that one affected so many others! No effort to further the Lord's work ever goes unused or wasted. Every small gift of a testimony, every action, every word, is recorded. Everything is used. Whether to plant seeds or to harvest, each have a part in the conversion. You have an affect in mine, and through mine, my companions, my friends, my investigators, the members here. It is never too little. It is never too small. I wish we could sometimes see the big picture so that we could understand the full scope of the decisions that we have and will make, but alas, that is a part of this life in mortality. We will never understand exactly how our choices will affect others while we are still living them out. Prophetic counsel is always a wise thing to listen to. Especially since it will always help you in ways that you would never know. They really do know what we need to hear. The Lord is clever to be helping us from all sides.

That's pretty smart to bribe Robert to stop completely.. Was it really that scary with all of us? I would have liked the whole bribery thing too. I promise I am better at driving now.. Granted we have monitors hooked up to the car, and I still get yelled at occasionally, but 98% of the time its due to incorrect speed limits in the tiwi, or ones that are really annoying, like the fact that our apartment complex has a speed limit of 5 miles an hour and there is a big hill to get up to it. That one gets me when I drive up it. MY companion always gets that one too. 

Love you lots Mother!! You are in my prayers all the time as well:):)

Love,

Sister Monica Walker

General Conference

Dearest Madre,

What a week it has been!!! I'm not even sure how it is Monday already. It has seriously just flown by. This week was a little more difficult in missionary work since it seemed like no one was home, or no one wanted to answer, but the different meetings we have had this week have been a huge boost to me. It was awesome:) I really do love being a missionary!!

Oh! Here's a story I thought was very sweet. So we have this investigator named Victoria. When we first met her, we were actually focusing on teaching her roommate. She declined sitting with us and talking and at the end when we asked her if she wanted to join us in the prayer she said no because we weren't Christian we were Mormons, and then she walked out so we weren't really able to tell her that yes we really do believe in Christ. Her roommate laughed and said she knew we were Christian, and to just ignore Victoria. Obviously we didn't. The next time we came by the roommate wasn't there, so we sat and talked to Victoria. We were able to share with her our beliefs in Christ and how everything that we teach is focused on Christ. Anyway, fast forward to a few lessons later, and we get talking about missionary work and what it is that we do all day (I may or may not have been falling asleep). We basically gave her the daily schedule of a missionary, and she was in complete shock. We saw her last week, and after the lesson she told us that we needed to make sure that we are getting the sleep we need because she is worried for us. It was super cute! We assured her we were fine, but I can honestly say it is the most tired I have been in a long time. That's why I need two weeks of sleep when I get home. Hahaha.. We joke about that all the time. However on a serious note, I honestly believe that the Lord is helping me everyday to be able to do everything that he requires of me. It is the best!

Yes we do get to watch all of conference as long as nothing else is going on that would stop us. For example, the Elders in my ward had to miss most of the Sunday Morning session because they had to go on Post and have the normal Sacrament meeting with the recruits. Since they aren't allowed to watch TV, church was like normal for them. Other then things like that though, we get to watch it. We usually go to the church to watch it, but if we don't have it being broadcast to the church, then we go to a member's home. I realized though that I really like going to the church to watch conference. There is a different kind of Spirit there when you don't have distractions, and you are sitting in the chapel watching it. BEST. THING. EVER.

It was an interesting conference this time, because I had the realization that this would be my last conference as a full-time missionary. The next time conference comes around I will be back in school!! So it was interesting the mix of things I was getting as I was listening to conference. A huge theme for me was the joy of the gospel. I seriously loved that part about how as missionaries, we teach everyone, and we are supposed to teach them in a like manner to teaching our own children. Not treating them like a child, but being careful with giving them too much before they have had time to swallow what we have already said. And then I thought about the reverse too, how as a mother, I want to teach my children the same way that I have been teaching my investigators and the less actives here on my mission. All the messages I got were a strange combination of being a missionary and also being a mother. I now have goals that I want to accomplish in my last few months of being a missionary, but I also have goals of what I want to do when I am a mother. I want to continue that tradition of making everything a gospel related event, like how you have done all my life, and how grandpa has done to you. I think that is a wonderful tradition that I want to keep for my future family. A huge thing that I learned for my life in the long term is the real fact of my mission being a prepatory time for the rest of my life. I have discovered that there are many trials that I go through not because I have done anything wrong or that other people do something wrong that affects me (although there are my fair share of those) but because I need to experience so that I can understand someone else better and be able to help them. One thing I have never lost through anything is the hope that Christ gives us. The hope of a brighter tomorrow, the hope of peace, the hope of eternal family, etc. Hope is key to happiness and joy. I can get through these hard trials not because I am strong, but because I have hope in a Savior and a wonderful glorious Plan of my Father. These two things cause me to continue to act in a way that will get me to where I want to be despite the many hardships that I might be going through at the time. Hope is wonderful. I love hope. 

Alas, time again has got the best of me. I love you so much!!

-Sister Monica Walker

Being Positive and New Mission President

Dearest Mother,

This week has been full of some amazing lessons and insights. I really do love the way that the Lord works. He knows what I need when I need it. He knows who I need when I need it. He also knows who needs me when they need me, and He makes sure that I am there so that I can help them.

Last Saturday we helped an investigator move to Atlanta. This person has been trying to get to Atlanta for the last 6 months, and every plan she had kept falling through. Time after time, either her ride or her apartment would fall through. When I first met her, she seemed to have a super strong testimony of the gospel, and of Christ as her Savior. As things began to fall through, she began to lose faith. She told me once that her situation was beyond God's help. That made me really sad, but my companion and I still trying to show her that we loved her, that God loved her, and that something would work itself out, it just might not be in her timing. She ended up moving in with some recent converts because one of them is friends with her and heard that she was being kicked out because her lease was up. Those few weeks were hard for the recent converts because of the negativity that the other lady had. I and my companion and the Elders watched, prayed, and fasted for all three of them hoping that it would all work out to each of their best. We continued to visit and to encourage them all not to lose hope. Eventually we were able to help the lady find a ride to Atlanta (another member volunteered) and she was able to get to where she needed/wanted to go. I was told later by one of the members that was with the lady when she left that she noticed two miracles-one the two recent converts had real honest happy smiles that day for the first time in weeks, and two-the lady had nothing but positive things to say the entire way up to Atlanta. That was so awesome!! It made my heart hurt because of how much negativity she spread to everyone, and how it wasn't just a few people that felt it. The next day (Sunday) Sister McCulloch and I went to the recent converts house and just wanted to check up on how they were doing. We had a super spiritual discussion that made me sympathize (as much as I am capable of) a little bit with our Heavenly Father. One of the recent converts was very concerned over the spiritual welfare of the lady that had been living with them for a while. She noted that although this lady professed to want to follow Christ, her actions did not prove it, and day after day she would hear about the unfairness that life had given the lady. We began discussing the power of agency, and that as much as we sometimes wish we could make people understand the importance of the commandments and following Christ, to do so is the Devil's plan and now our Fathers. We do not learn when we are forced, and more often then not, if we are forced, we will rebel against it, no matter if it is good for us or not. I told her that this was part of the reason why I had decided to serve a mission. I know the truth. I am happy. No not just happy but joyous! I know God's Plan! Sure there are days where I get down, but we will all have those days, the key is getting back up on our feet and continuing on, trusting the Lord to know what is best. My heart breaks to know that there are people who I love, people who I have served for months on end, who refuse to accept their Savior. Who refuse to accept His love. Who have been told time and time again by those who are supposed to be their support, their family, that they are worthless. That they aren't worthy of any love. That is NOT true. Heavenly Father loves all His children, with a love I cannot even begin to comprehend! His heart must break every time He ever sees us do something that He knows will hurt us. He suffers as we suffer. Such is the price of parenthood. But how great His joy is when we do what is right! How excited He is to tell us "Welcome Home my child". To embrace us!

This last week we said goodbye to President and Sister Cottle. As of Thursday they are released as my mission president and wife. It was so hard to say goodbye to them! I would talk to them all the time, they were always there when I needed them! How awesome it was for me to be able to give President Cottle a hug before he left. It has been hard along my mission to not give everyone a hug, and follow the counsel and rule I agreed to going on a mission to not hug any male.. That includes my Mission President. He became my father here. He loved me like his daughter. How excited I was to give him a hug. :) How much more excited I will be to give my earthly parents hugs when I see them again, and how much more exciting it will be to finally be able to give my Father a hug at the end of my mission here on earth. How happy I am that I have a wonderful family who has taught me the meaning of love. Who have loved me no matter what, and who made sure that I knew it too:) Their support is so important to me. Your support especially Mom:) Oh how I love to receive an email from you every week! So faithfully too!! I don't know what you will do when you no longer have a missionary out to email every Monday. You have been doing it so faithfully for almost 5 years. I know my brothers will agree when I say that it means the world to a missionary to hear from their mother's and loved ones. Even when it is sad news, it is wanted. 

Oh how I love my Savior! Oh how I love my God! Oh how I love my Father! I am so thankful for all three members of the Godhead. The Father for knowing and understanding me, for listening to me when I am down, and sending me the things I need to help me be happy. The Son for making it possible for these terrible feelings to not last, for making sure that I would never have to go through it alone, like He did. The Spirit for helping me feel comforted even in the randomest times of the day. I don't know if I can ever express my feelings to the extent that I feel them, but I just want you and everyone else to know that with God, ANYTHING is possible. No matter how crazy or seemingly out of His reach. No matter how small or inconsequential it seems-HE CAN DO IT. We must trust Him. Yes those around us may falter, and we should try to lift them up, but if they fall, we should not let ourselves fall with them. Their choices do not affect our own. Love them. Serve them. Forgive them. 

Remember He loves you. I love you. No matter what.

Be strong, have courage. Choose Happiness and Gratitude.

Love,

Sister Monica Walker

This Week's Happenings

Dear Mom:)

This week has been very interesting and really long and tiring. We traveled to far away places on 4 different days, and spent much of the day in each of those areas. 

On Tuesday we went to Tifton for our Zone conference meeting. We were told that there was a representative from Salt Lake coming to inspect our cars and so we needed to have our cars as clean as we could possibly get them. So last Monday Sister Danible and I went to an investigators house and she taught us how to detail our car so it would look super nice. That was fun! (really though it turned into a water fight). When we got to Tifton, we had to back our car into a parking spot, and after we finished inspecting it, and filling all the liquids it needed and whatnot, the vehicle coordinator for our mission told us that he was going to switch our car with some of the other elders in our district who ironically had just gotten the car that I started my mission with. We were a little disappointed because the car we had was a Ford Fusion with a USB port, and the car the Elders had was a Chevy Cruze that doesn't have a USB port.. So we were sad to loose all the music and talks that we had accumulated through our mission. Well not lose them, but not be able to use it for the foreseeable future.. And then the vehicle Coordinator surprised us with the keys to a brand new Toyota Corolla! They sold the car I started my mission off with. So that was pretty awesome! Also while we were there, we found out while we were in the meeting that the reason the representative from Salt Lake was there was because he was installing something called a Tiwi in all the mission vehicles. (it is commonly called a black box by other missionaries). The purpose of it is to teach us how to be better drivers. It speaks to us at real time if we are speeding, hit bumps too hard, take hard turns, stop hard, or speed up too fast (and other things I forgot). Any time you do one of these things, it will tell you what you did and then cite you for it. Those citations go to the mission office, and if we get to many then our driving privileges get revoked. We have talked to the tech people a lot about it in Utah because a lot of the speed limits are wrong and so we are trying to help them update them. We also got new phones (except they are still basic slide phones). Still no ipads though.. Maybe when the new mission president comes! haha..

Wednesday we went to Cuthbert (about an hour away) to try to track down some of the old referrals and some of the less actives that live there. Our goal in these far away areas is to try to update toe ward roster for those people that keep moving, as well as try to find out whether or not the people who we get referrals to online still want missionaries to come visit them. Unfortunately we keep finding out that there are a lot of these that say they have been contacted when they have never seen missionaries or received the things they asked for. Some of them are for over 6 months ago too.. Its been pretty crazy trying to track them all down.

Thursday we went to Blakely (which is about an hour away from us). We tried to track down some more of the people that we weren't able to see yet, and it took us a long while to find some of the houses. Some of them are seriously in the middle of nowhere, and the GPS thinks its 5 miles in a different direction. One member we found told us that he hadn't seen missionaries since he moved to Blakely and that was two years ago. He was also surprised to see us because as far as he knew, no one knew his current address and he hadn't changed his address either so he was in complete shock for about 40 mins of how he found that. And then add to that that his current address isn't found in the GPS. It was pretty awesome though, because he surprised us on Sunday and actually came to church! Which is pretty amazing considering he lives 55 miles away from where the church building is. He said he is going to try to start coming back which we think is super awesome and honestly a miracle since no one knows how his address got here and how we happened to catch him home at the exact moment that he was home on a day off that he rarely gets off. The Lord definitely works in mysterious ways. 

On Sunday our Spanish investigator came to church!! And that was a miracle in and of itself! His family was supposed to take him, but last minute changes made it impossible for them to take him to church. We ended up calling a member at 10 at night to see if he could go pick him up for church the next morning. The member said yes! It was even better because the member is a RM who speaks Spanish, and had come with us on a previous visit to meet Enrique. So they already knew each other! And then on top of that, Enrique lives about an hour away from the member and from church, and so the member drove a total of 4 hours to get this investigator to church and home! And he even stayed with him through the whole 3 hours of church to act as his translator so that he would know what was going on in church since everyone was speaking English. That was far beyond anything I expected a member to do, but it was so awesome because it allowed this investigator to go to church for the first time since he had come to America. Other circumstances (like not knowing where the church was or not having a ride) kept him from going this whole time, and it was so exciting to see him finally make it to church. :) We also went to go see his family, and taught them the Plan of Salvation. It was really awesome to try to teach them in broken Spanish and English, and it was really a testament to me of the power of the Spirit when the niece (who speaks English as her first language and Spanish as her second) said that this was clearer to her than anything else she had ever heard, and she really wants to learn more. She and her husband even promised to pray about baptism, and she is really excited for the prospect of becoming a forever family. A lot of the time when I teach about the Priesthood, especially the importance of having the correct authority and the power it has in baptisms, I compare it to marriage. In almost every other religion (as far as I know) when two people are married by the churches authority, they are married until death do they part. That is because that is all the authority they have. They cannot marry anyone further than this life because after life is God's domain and God's power. So unless they have his real authority, they can't marry for any longer then that. It is that same power by which people are baptized in other religions. So it is an awesome thing that they have done, and there is no doubt that their baptism will help them progress in this life to be closer to God. As soon as they die however, just like marriage, it will dissolve. When we explained this to Hannah (the niece) she said that she had never thought about it that way, but that it made perfect sense to her, and it also made her really want to have her marriage forever, because she doesn't like the idea that the marriage will end when one of them dies. 

I am certainly grateful for the knowledge that my family is a forever family and that my parents have been sealed in the temple for time and all eternity! I love that I have that potential as well, and that I grew up with that knowledge, and so never had to worry about any of my family being separated from me, whether by distance or death, because I know that eventually we will all be back together again! I was talking to Cassidy earlier, and we were talking about how many of our cousins are getting married, and how many cousin in laws we have. I realized that when we have a family reunion in later years with more of our cousins married, there will be (just including our cousins) close to 75 or even 100 people there. Including everyone else it will be even more!! And then I realized that that will be a lot like how the reunion in the Celestial Kingdom will be, except it will be 75 or 100 BILLION people.. It will be a wonderful experience:) 

Love you all!!

-Sister Monica Walker

Sister Dayton and I saw each other at Zone Conference!! It was so much fun to see one of my last companions:) Especially one that has become one of my best friends that I found on my mission:)

Finding People

Dearest Mother:)

This week has been super awesome! It also seems to have flown by, because of how much stuff we had going on. This week we had exchanges with the Sisters in Tifton, and I went there to Tifton. It was super fun because Sister DeMann, who I was with, had just finished being companions with one of my past companions Sister Dayton! So that was super cool to be able to talk with her about that and how they did in their previous area, and just reminisce about life in general. It was really fun:)

We went to try to visit some of the people in our ward that lived in the middle of nowhere Georgia, and we had a member come with us to help us try to track some of these people down. One of the places we went looked very secluded, and the member was afraid of getting shot (because we were in the middle of nowhere) and so she made us stop to say a prayer before we drove on their drive way. Their driveway was about a mile long and it felt like it just kept going on and on.. Finally we see a house only to discover that there are 4 houses! And none of them have numbers on them. We keep driving on the driveway, and it takes us up to the first house. We were going to get out so that we could knock on the door, but we see somebody walking back behind the house, so we follow them in the car and ask them if the member lives there. He said the guy did but that he lived in the back house and that we needed to continue down the driveway and take a left at the telephone pole and keep going until we hit his house. He told us though that he wasn't home, but his wife was. We thanked him, and then went back to go talk to the members wife. When we find her, she at first thought we were lost (they don't get very many visitors). When we explained who we were, who we were looking for, and why we were looking for him, she told us that he wasn't a member of our church. We asked if he had ever been a member of our church (because sometimes they were but because they stop going they think their records are gone) and she said he had been a member of their Baptist Church his whole life. She then told us we weren't the only people to think that that guy lived there, they get stuff for him and phone calls for him all the time. Apparently even the Sheriff called for the member guy once too. I asked her then her husbands full name, and it turns out his middle name is different than the members listed middle name, so unless it is the same guy and he changed his middle name for whatever reason, we had the wrong guy. It was pretty funny though and the lady was super nice, even though she wasn't all that interested in learning more about the Restored Gospel. 

While I was in Tifton, we traveled to a small town somewhere outside of Tifton, and it was really cool to meet all the differently people in the small little places around Georgia. It was also cool because we went to a gun shop to try to find an investigator of theirs who owns the place, and while we were there, they gave me a free pink t-shirt that has a gun on the back. Its pretty awesome:) I love being able to see how God is able to touch the lives of those who live so far away from anyone else, and how is still blesses their lives even when they don't have many of the things that I am used to in live. It is very humbling.

We also had our Zone Training Meeting, where Sister Danible and I had the opportunity to train the rest of the missionaries in our Zone. Usually we would train off the trainings we receive from our mission presidency, but we were unable to go to the last MLC because it was before transfers, and that MLC wasn't a normal MLC either because their was a general authority there who spoke the whole time instead of the mission presidency. So the Zone Leaders picked our topics and we got to plan a training off of that. My training was on Personal Revelation. I learned some interesting things about it which I wanted to share with y'all. First, it is important to understand that without personal revelation, none of us can be saved. Why? Because it is through personal revelation that all of us receive a witness that Jesus is the Christ, and that He is the Savior of all mankind. Second, personal revelation only comes through personal study. The Lord expects us to do our part before He gives us the answer. We have to ask a question before He can give us the answer. We have to try to find the answer ourselves as well. He gives us all these resources to look through and sometimes we just have to push through it all to find them. The object lesson that I did was that I had a dollar that I hid in plain sight, and had an Elder be blindfolded to try to find it where ever it was in the room. One of the sisters was the Spirit and her job was to make sure that she guided him to where it was using a soft voice, but she also couldn't touch him. Everyone else in the room was to be the distractions. One elder played the piano super loud, some of them yelled at him when he got close. Some Elders pushed chairs in his way as to make him stumble. Eventually he found the dollar. The point of it is to remind us that even when we know what we are looking for, and we know what the Spirit sounds like, we have to take the time to tune out the rest of the world in order to make the steps necessary to obtain it. The sister didn't just give him the dollar when he asked where to find it, he had to find it himself. But she did guide him to the place where he needed to go, and she even warned him of some of the dangers in his way. The same works with the Spirit. He doesn't always give us the answers. More often then not, we have to search for a long time before He will give us the place where it is.

Sunday, we met with our Spanish investigator again. We were a little worried though because the return missionary that we had previously asked to come with us to help teach couldn't come because he had family in town, and the investigator's niece who is usually the translator was out of town. We decided to go anyways, but were praying the whole way to help us be able to communicate with him. Luckily for us, earlier that day at church, we had 12 or so visitors at church that were going around selling Vivent, and most of them were return missionaries. One of them had recently returned from serving a mission in Mexico, and had told us that if we needed help that day to give him a call and he would do what he could to come help us. So we texted him and asked him if he would be willing to drive an hr away to help us with a lesson with a Spanish investigator of ours. He said yes!! That was a miracle in and of itself. Unfortunately we realized right before we left to the lesson that we were running out of gas (we had according to the car 70 miles left until the tank ran out) and the lesson was 44 miles away (in one direction). We discussed canceling the appointment, but we decided to go anyway. The whole way there we were praying that we wouldn't run out of gas, because we knew it was important for us to not go buy gas on the Sabbath, especially since it was because of our lack of preparation that caused the situation. We got there safe, and the member came with us to help us translate for our investigator. It was an awesome discussion though because we were able to figure out what was holding him back from baptism, and now that we know, we are going to try to work it out so that he can get baptized sooner than December. We are currently in contact with the missionaries there in Mexico so that we can mash out the details concerning his family. We are so excited for him though because he has such a strong testimony! We finish the lesson, and the member told us he was going to follow us home to make sure we were ok as we drove the many miles back to Albany. It was honestly a huge blessing though because we were not only able to make it home safe but we were also able to make it to the dinner appointment that we had that night about 8 miles away from our house. By the time we pulled back up to our apartment, we had 9 miles left of gas. The Lord really does bless His servants when they are doing His work, and when they show a little bit of faith:) 

As for some fun news, we were able to do some service for a member family and help them process some of the chickens they raised for food. We killed 40 or so chickens, and I participated in all stages of it. I have pictures of it to prove to y'all that I did it, but if you get queasy easy don't look at the pictures:)

We also got to go fishing for a little bit. We didn't catch anything, but we still had lots of fun! :)

Life is good:) I love you all!

Love forever and always,

Sister Monica Walker

Finding His Sheep

Dear Mom!!

Oh how I love you!! Mother's Day is this Sunday and I am so excited to be able to talk to you face to face. To think, a year ago at this time I was preparing my farewell talk and packing for my mission! I can't believe it has almost been a year. Crazy. After I talk to you on Mother's Day the next time I get to talk to you is in person!! that is so crazy to think about. Especially since that still feels like a longs ways away and that I just got out on my mission.

This week has been pretty slow, but good news!! I'm not getting transferred! So I get to stay in Albany for at least 6 more weeks. I'm super happy about that. Especially since Sister Danible gets to be my companion again for those 6 weeks as well.

It has been a pretty slow week this last week, so not much happened, but there were some really awesome moments where we were able to be in the right place at the right time for the Lord to help us find people that needed to be found.

Backstory-My trainer began her mission in Albany about 2 years ago. Of course when I remembered that, I emailed her and told her that I was here. She emailed me back and told me to go find a part member family that she had been working with, whom she loved a lot and to go tell them that I knew her, and that hopefully they would let us talk to them. Apparently somewhere along the way, the family got lost because none of the missionaries that had been here before me and was still here knew who they were. We had planned on seeing them last week, but due to other things coming up, we weren't able to make it to the city in which they lived and try to go see them. Last Saturday though we were going to the Farmer's Market because we heard about a member who grows fresh produce and sells it there, but who also gives it for free to missionaries. So we went to go see what we could get, and plus we really wanted to meet this person. We go and find him, and after talking for a while, the family that was there buying stuff too was about to leave, when the mom told us that her daughter had something to say to us.. Super shyly she told us her name, and then ran away. It was super cute. The mom then said that her husband and her daughters were members and then told us their last name. IT WAS THE SAME FAMILY THAT MY TRAINER ASKED ME TO FIND!! It was pretty awesome how random of a meeting it was. We were able to set up an appointment with them, and the member who was selling the produce was from a different stake but he volunteered to come with us to go teach them because he is good friends with them. That was so awesome!

Another crazy story. So on Wednesday, when we were on exchanges, I had to make a quick stop at Walmart to grab something, and for whatever reason, this Walmart didn't have any self checkouts, so I had to go to a regular one. While I was going through the line, the cashier lady stopped us and happily exclaimed, "Hey! They brought the ladies back!" We gave her a super confused look, and then she pointed to our badges and said, I'm a member! The missionaries used to visit her, but about two years ago for whatever reason they stopped. We were later about to go visit her, and her son who is now 8 really wants to get baptized! Super awesome!

The last thing that was super awesome was that on Sunday one of the young Women's leaders came up to us and told us that there was a young women who had been coming to church for about a year now that wasn't a member (how the missionaries didn't know this, I have no idea) but that she wanted to meet with the missionaries and have the discussions so that she could get baptized! We are so excited to begin teaching her! It seems like she already knows all that she needs to know, but that she just needs to have the discussions so that we can make sure that she knows what she needs to know. I'm stoked to see how it is going to go!

Oh! Also this one is short, but the awesome moment when a member who is less active calls you out of the blue asking for a ride to church for her and her son, actually comes to church, signs up to feed us, asks us to then visit her family (none of whom are members), and then volunteers to go teaching with us. Yep. That moment made me so happy!! She seems like a pretty fantastic person already even though I have only known her for less than 48 hrs.

There are so many people here that I don't know, and so many that are amazing people but because there are just so many people to see that are on our records and then lots of people that aren't either, we hardly get to see even part of them. (here is an idea of how many people there are- in Albany alone, there are over 200 families. In Leesburg there are about 150, and then there are a lot in the outlying areas as well.. Those are just the members. We then have a list of online referrals that people want us to come see them of about 200 people over the last 18 months.) So we can't see all these people all the time, but we are working on it!!. There is so much work to do here and I am so excited for the future!

Love you all!

-Sister Monica Walker

Love, Support and Testimonies

Dearest Mother,

Oh how I love getting your emails every week!! I was told again this week of some missionaries making the sacrifice of never once emailing their mothers or immediate families (with the families support) as a bigger sacrifice on their mission, and I am super grateful for these emails that I get. They are the highlight of my weeks:) So thank you for never forgetting to email me, even if it sometimes gets here right when I am on the computer already. ;)

This week has been full of situations that I have found myself in in which I am so thankful for the Spirit and the Lord watching over me every day to help me be in the right place at the right time to help the right people find their way closer to Christ.

For example, a few weeks ago, I told you about a new investigator we had that only speaks Spanish, but that his niece agreed to be a translator for us in our discussions. We met with them again yesterday, and we had a recently returned missionary who served in Chile come with us to help teach in Spanish, since the niece doesn't know the Spanish gospel words. This time though, her husband and his brother were also there sitting in on the lesson. All of them agreed to listen to the message we had about the Book of Mormon, and they all agreed to read and pray about it! The niece said that she hadn't done so already (we challenged her to last time) because she thought that we were like some of the other Christian denominations she has met with before, and thought we might have been giving her something that was a changed Bible. But when we explained to her what the Book of Mormon was, and its importance, and all three of us testified (plus our original Spanish investigator) of its truthfulness, in whatever language we could (Sister Danible and I in English, and everyone else in Spanish). It was one of the coolest things to be a part of because it really showed and testified to me the power of the Spirit because I knew that they didn't really understand what I was saying when I said it in English, but they could tell that I meant what I said, and even they said they could feel the Spirit as we taught them. I'm super excited to see where this goes!

Sorry this is a shorter email, next week will probably be its normal long length again. Oh, also, transfer calls are this Saturday, and transfers are next week. I don't think I or my companion are being transferred, but I wanted to let you know just in case.

Love you all!!

Thank you so much for all the Birthday wishes!!

-Sister Monica Walker

PS Mother's Day is coming up soon!!! Next week I will give you the details (if I'm not being transferred) or when and where I will be skyping home. (both in my time and in your time so there will be no confusion) Continue being the awesome people that I know you all are!! I get to talk to you soon:):):):)

Spanish

Dearest Madre,

Como esta? No hablo mucho Español, pero tangamos dos investigators de Mexico, y misionarios de español no vivan aquí. Mi compañero y yo vamos a leer El Libro de Mormon para aprender Español. Dios es Padre Celestial, El Niño es Jesucristo. Los profetas guían me. 

Yep. I'm not even sure I said that right, but there it is. My companion and I decided yesterday that we were going to read together the entire Book of Mormon in Spanish before one of us gets transferred, because as of yesterday, we have two Spanish investigators!! But due to the fact that there are no Spanish missionaries in the area, we get to teach them! It is going to be an adventure. We already taught them the Restoration, and luckily we had a Spanish book of Mormon in the car that we could give to them so they have it in a language they can read. We are super excited to teach them more about the Gospel. Fun story though, we found him through one of the dozen media referrals we received weekly, that take forever to contact due to the vastness of our area (probably two or so hours from the longest points), and it turns out that he moved here about a year ago from Mexico, where he was learning about the gospel from missionaries there. He had been taught for about a year before he came here, and his family is still being taught there in Mexico. I'm super excited to be able to help him. His niece (who is the other investigator) knows Spanish, and English is her first language, so she is acting as translator for us, when we can't figure out how to say it in Spanish, because we don't know Spanish, but she said she is willing to learn as well!! Super awesome! the only downside is that it is an hour away from where we live, so its a long drive, but the Lord willing it will all work out:)

Bro. Hawkins (from my home ward), me, Sister Danible

There is a great work to be done here, and I am so excited to see it come to fruition! Sister Danible and I are working hard to be the best missionaries we can be, and while it is true that we still have our ups and downs, we are still going strong. We had interviews with our Mission President and his wife last Friday, and it was really fun seeing them again! I loved what Sister Cottle talked to us about though, and I thought I would share some of my thoughts on it with y'all. First, a few months ago, she committed all of us to choose happiness every day. That is a lot harder than I thought it would be. But I did my best to do so. Last Friday, she checked up on us, to see how we did in choosing happiness, and then committed each of us on top of that to choose gratitude everyday. For me, the way that I am going to implement that into my life, is that any time I am feeling sad, depressed, angry, tempted, or whatever, I will begin a list of things that I am thankful for in my life. And I will continue listing until I can be happy again, and the moment of weakness is gone. I tried that over the weekend, when I was feeling particularly stressed, and I was amazing how quickly I was able to get around it, and to focus enough to get through it. The feeling of true gratitude that we can have in our lives, is akin to the feeling of happiness and love. I am so thankful for this opportunity to serve a mission and help those around me! I am thankful for my family who supports me from so many states away, and for all my friends who do so all around the world. I know that this is God's true gospel restored once again on the Earth, and that it will never again be taken from us! I know that through the gospel, and temple ordinances, that families can be sealed together forever, and I hold on to that hope and that knowledge as I go through life. I love my Savior! I know He lives! Not just as a spirit, but as a corporeal being with a perfect body of flesh and bone!

Thank you for all of everything that y'all do for me and all the missionaries in the world! Remember each one of them is a beloved child of someone else. Treat the missionaries in your own areas as you hope people around the world are treating your children, siblings, friends, etc. Love them, help them. This is your work too:)

Mucho Amor!

Hermana Walker

P.S. 9 days 23 hours and 54 mins until I have lived 20 years:)

The Love of Mothers

Dearest Mother,

It is amazing to me to see the love that people have for other people, especially their family, and what they are willing to go through to help their lives be the best. Yesterday as you are aware, was Fast Sunday, and we had a lot of less actives there that have been coming for a while, as well as some that it was their first time. One such less active of the latter sort, got up to bear her testimony. I want to tell a little of her story. I am sitting in the second to the front row, so I really don't know what is going on behind me. One of the brethren come up with a microphone, the one used for blessings and what not and begins to plug it in. I watched a little confused, as the podium was working fine, when I glanced over to my right where the Spanish Elders were helping a lady walk up to the front. They were in the process of helping her walk up the stairs because of her physical inabilities to walk, but ended up sitting down in the front pew and spoke from there once they realized there was a microphone for her. She was a middle aged woman, who walked with a walker, and honestly if she was sitting, you would never be able to tell that she had trouble walking. She starts her testimony with a little of her background, namely that when she was younger she was involved in a serious accident that left her in a coma for a few days and when she woke up, she woke up a quadriplegic. But she continued to bear a powerful testimony of the effect that God has had in her life, especially since at the time she had the accident she wasn't Mormon. She talks about how since the accident, she has been able to literally feel the Spirit more firmly and real then she did before, which was a huge help in her being converted. She went on to explain how she feels it a lot differently than most people, but even still it bears witness to her of the truthfulness of the things that she has learned in the Gospel, and what it means to her. She knows that is is true, and knows that God loves each and every one of us despite what circumstances they find themselves in. She was in the gospel Principles class with me later, as well as in Relief Society, in which she shared a little bit more of her story, which I want to share with you as well. At the time of the accident she had a baby girl, who wasn't very old (less than 6 months it sounded like), and because she could no longer even help herself, Social Services came in and tried to take her baby, which she adamantly refused to let them do, but came to the realization that she needed to place her baby for adoption because she knew she was incapable of taking care of herself, let alone a baby. So she spent 6 months looking for a family to place her in, in which time, plus 6 months after, women from Relief Society (not sure how they knew her since she wasn't a member) came every day Monday-Friday many hours a day to help her get up the stairs, take a bath, fed her, clothed her, did her dishes, cared for her child, etc, so that she could focus on getting better without the added stress of taking care of all the other things that she couldn't take care of anymore. She had always been a Christian person, and so the entire time she is looking for a family to place her daughter in, she is praying and fasting and praying and studying. Hours after countless hours she is trying to narrow down the families, when at 6 months after the accident, she is lying in bed pleading for the Lord to help her find the best family for her daughter, when the most overwhelming sense of peace and assurance came over her, and she felt someone stroke her head in comfort (she said she looked around and no one was there either). Seconds after this, she gets a call from another lady who had cut her hair for years who said that she had friends who were willing to adopt her girl if she still needed them too. Again the feeling of peace overwhelmed her, and she realized that the Lord was telling her that this was the family that her daughter was supposed to go to. Immediately plans were made, and the next day the family came up the next day and took her daughter so that she could be taken care of even while the papers still hadn't been figured out. I told her later that I was super impressed by her willingness to let her daughter go, especially in light of all she had already had to let go because of the accident she suffered. She told me it was the hardest thing she had ever done but that she is glad that she did it, because it allowed her daughter to have a wonderful full life that she might not have been able to offer her otherwise.

This whole story though makes me super grateful for the love of mothers and how similar it is to the love that Christ has for us. How willing He is to not do what will make His life easier, but to make our lives the best they can be. Stories of such selflessness are amazing and wonderful, because of man's inherent desires to be selfish, and the excuses that we make to justify it. I really do love the amazing power that the gospel brings people in their lives to make changes necessary for their eternal happiness instead of momentary pleasure. There is such a huge difference that I don't think we realize sometimes, but we really should try to figure it out, because it is awesome!

Also Mom, here's a story for you (and everyone else that knows you and/or your parents and siblings). A few weeks ago I was at a member's home and we were eating dinner when they were sharing some random funny stories of things that their children had done. As your family is prone to do, I started to relate many of the stories to gospel principles that they could tie into the stories to make them spiritual or whatever. She thought that was funny too, and so for a little bit she would make something up and I had to somehow tie it to a gospel principle. It was fun! I told them it was something that I learned from you and that you learned it from grandpa who passed it one to many (if not all) of his children. :) Anyway, we had dinner with them last week, and part way through the meal, the wife turned to me and told me that she wants to be like my mom when she grows up (it's a younger family) because she wants to tie everything that she does into a gospel principle. I told her all she needs to do is practice and eventually it will come naturally. She is super excited about that prospect. I thought it was funny and that I would share. Congrats Mom, you can affect people you don't even know! :) You too Grandpa, since you were the one to teach it to my mother:) My family is awesome! Thanks for being such a spiritual giant in my life, you and dad both:) Love you lots!

Well this email is long enough. I will have more stories to share next week:) Hope all is well, I am always praying for all of you!

Love your favorite missionary

Sister Monica Walker

A Popped Tire

Dearest Mother,

Didn't we move into our house on the 29th of February? Or is that just something I made up because I thought it would have been cool if we had moved in on that day, and so I have always thought it my whole life? Either way it is pretty cool that I can say we have only lived in our house for 4 of todays.

Tell all of our neighbors that I miss them too!! Also ask Lorraine if she could tell you how to make the beans from those Mexican restaurants. I think she said that she knew how to make them, and I want to know how so that I can make them at home instead of having to go to a Mexican restaurant anytime I want refried beans.. hahaha

This week has been pretty great though. Here's a funny story for y'all. I will send a couple of pictures to go with it, but I didn't get too many because I walked away for most of it. So yesterday, we had three meals appointments that we had to go to in the space of 4 hours. The first one was a birthday party for our 97 year old investigator. That was awesome, but I was super nervous about eating her food. It was really good though:) We were there for a little bit longer than we had originally planned, and so we had to text the member family that was feeding us lunch after and told them that we needed to push lunch about 30 mins because we were running a little late. Eventually we head out, and are on our way to the member's home to get there at the time we had told them we were going to be there, when I'm driving along, and there is a loud bang. I realized that I had run over something, and looked immediately in my rearview mirror to check to see what it was. All I could see was a tiny strip of metal that was quickly disappearing. Looking back at my dashboard, I switched to a screen that allows me to see the tire pressure, and I watched as our tire pressure went from 40 to 10 in about 5 seconds. We managed to pull over at a safe spot and out of the way of traffic, and low and behold, the tire was flat. Whatever we had run over had ripped our tire. super crazy. We call the member and tell them that we had just gotten a flat and so we were going to be even later than we had said. They asked us if we needed help, and I told them we would definitely appreciate it if they came to help. Mind you, we have all the tools, and the spare tire, and I know where all of those things are located in the car, but I didn't know how to jack the car up to actually change the tire (which I did know how to do.) Plus we are in skirts, and its Sunday. Anyway, as we were getting all the stuff out to be all the way ready when the members got there, there was a homeless guy who couldn't talk that came up and tried to tell us what to do. He used gestures and seemingly tried to tell us that we needed to change our tire, and we politely tried to tell him that we appreciated his help, but we did have people coming to help us. (Honestly, it wasn't that he was speaking with a heavy accent that we couldn't understand, it was literally that he couldn't talk to us.) He did help us figure our though that we have those car brake things that you put on tires to keep it from rolling away when you park on a hill, or you do something to the car and so it is on the back tires or whatever. So that was nice of him. When the member got there, it was the father, their son, and one of their daughters. I wanted to go find the thing that pooped [popped] our tire, so I took the daughter with my companion and went up the road to find the thing that pooped [popped] our tire, so that no one else would get their tires popped. We left the boys there to fix our tire while we left (which is why I don't have many pictures of someone actually changing the tire). When we walked up the road, we saw one of two other cars that were changing their tires too because they had hit it as well.. Essentially it was a metal strip about 8 inches long with a bolt sicking out of either side (so two bolts total). We are going to see if we can somehow cut it so that each of us can have it as a souvenir. Super funny. By the time we got back the tire was fixed and the homeless guy had left, and so we were able to quickly go to our 2nd meal appointment for the day, but much later than planned. After we got done there, we had to go on Post for our dinner appointment with a less active family that was moving (which is why we agreed to have so many meals) but we had to switch cars with the Elders because Post is kinda far, and you can only get on it through the end of the freeway (unless you want to kill a bunch of miles, and when that's limited its not really worth it), and I didn't feel comfortable going so far and so fast with a spare tire. It was weird driving a Toyota car, because my whole mission I have only been assigned to Chevy Cruses. We were super blessed though to be able to eat all the food that was given to us, even though we might have possibly gained 5 pounds in doing so. Super fun.

Also we had an investigator go to Atlanta for a Doctor's appointment, and then she never came back. She took all her money out of her bank account and closed her bank account and her phone number and is disappeared. She lived with a member family here and they haven't heard anything from her, nor has any of her family. Super crazy. Keep her in your prayers. We honestly have no idea what just happened with her.

We had to say goodbye this week to many of our friends on post because they are being moved with the army. One of them is moving to Colorado, and the other is going to Utah because they just retired from the military. It made us super sad to have to see them go, because we had been working closely with one of the families to get them baptized, and the other family was their good friend, and ours as well. The second family was also a part member family, so I hope they will get the help they need in their journey to Christ that they couldn't get here. Pictures to follow.

Love you all! And I hope all is going well with you:) I love you and I miss you, but keep moving strong. It will all work out:)

-Love Sister Walker

Book of Mormon

Dearest Mother :)

Oh how much I love to read your letters! It reminds me of the times that we would spend everyday talking about all the stuff we learned in our Sunday classes at church, or after the seminary classes, or our own person study and reflection on the scriptures. I'm so looking forward to that when we get back home too:) I am 10 or so pages away from finishing the Book of Mormon for the 3rd time on my mission, and it has been super awesome to make all sorts of connections this time! I studied this time in a little mini Book of Mormon, which when I finish I will be sending home for Robert in a package with a bunch of letters and some random knickknacks. I encourage y'all to look at it if you get the chance. It's pretty cool. It is in a tiny Book of Mormon though so you might have to have Robert read them to you. I love learning things in the Book of Mormon! There are so many connections in it that I had never put together before, even though it makes completely sense to have it the way it is. Pretty awesome. Also if you haven't yet, I also highly encourage you to read the article Mormon's Miraculous Book in the Feb 2016 edition of the Ensign. It brings new light to how important and amazing the abridging of the Book of Mormon was, and then to think of the miracle that the coming forth of it was as well, What else could it be but of God? Super awesome. I can't say it enough. :)

I was dubbed a princess at a member's home while we waited for dinner.. Super fun! (Little do they know, I really am a princess:))

There is one investigator we have, her name is MC, has had a pretty rough life with the Lord. When she was younger, her sister tragically died in a car accident, and she blamed God for taking her sister at an early age. From that moment and for a really long time, she wasn't very happy with God at all. she thought He was unfair and she didn't like Him at all. Recently she met a cousin she didn't know that she had had, or else a cousin she didn't know very well, who happened to be a Stake President over in Texas. In the last couple of years especially, without her realizing it, she was feeling something missing from her life, and so when her cousin came to meet them one day, she recognized that he had something that she wanted. There was a feeling about him that she liked. She agreed then to meet with the missionaries, and we have been teaching her since. She has a lot of hard trust issues to overcome before she can be baptized, but it is so cool to see her make those little steps that she does to get closer to her Heavenly Father. I love teaching the people here! There are so many that I could talk about, but that would take too much time. So for now that is what I will say. I will think of who I want to talk about next week, and hopefully I remember. :)

I will pray for Dad and Josh and all the rest of you in your various courses of life. All will be well I know it:)

I love you all!! Keep being you! Because you is awesome!

Love Sister Walker:)

I went bowling with an eye patch on, because my eye got super irritated and I wanted to see how hard it was to bowl with an eye patch on.. I GOT A 125! Probably the highest I ever had.. And it was with my left eye, my non-dominant eye.. super crazy.. You have a pretty strange daughter.. but then you have to remember whose daughter I am, and then it all makes sense:) 

Mircales

Dearest Mother,

I love you!! And everyone else in our family:) It's strange to not be there for all the fun things you guys do, but it's pretty cool to hear about it from all of you and also to have all the fun adventures here too. For example here's something that I told my mission president today about last week. It's a pretty crazy story, even if you don't have all the details.

So a miracle that happened this week, but it requires a bit of back story. When we were on exchanges a few weeks ago (Sister Dayton and I) Sister Dayton went to go try to visit a referral we had been given by the Elders, and happened to stop and talk to a lady named Vicky. They got talking, and at some point during the conversation it came about that this lady has great faith in the Lord. She told Sister Dayton that she had just lost her car, but it was ok because God would take care of her, and that she had enough faith that the Lord would give her another car, since she really needed one. But not any car, but a brand new one. She told Sister Dayton to come back, gave her her number, and her address on a piece of paper, and then they left. When Sister Dayton left, she handed me the piece of paper, which I then promptly lost, and freaked out about for about two weeks because I couldn't find it. So New Year's Eve rolled around and Sister Maher and I were reading our scriptures and the Ensign when we get a call from an unknown number, and it was Vicky! She had dug through her trash to find our number because she really wanted us to visit her. She also told us to guess what was sitting outside her apartment. "What?" We asked. "A new car!" Stunned silence for a few moments. It was an absolute miracle how she got it, and I don't really understand all the details, but suffice it to say that she got the car for a lot less then she should have. We went to visit her the next day and taught her the Restoration, which she loved. When we invited her to be baptized, she said as of right now, no, but if God tells her to then she will. We then told her a little bit of what we were going to teach her the next time (The Pan of Salvation), but didn't really tell her everything, just told her that it would answer a lot of the questions she had, and then told her we had to leave, she said "You can't leave now! You have to tell me what comes next!" She's so excited for our next appointment. She's pretty amazing though. And we are super stoked to teach her:)

I love that about every member being a witness. It is so true though. We actually have an investigator that is going back and forth on when she wants to be baptized, but she knows she wants to be eventually, its just the when that is iffy. We had her go over to a member's home for a lesson (the member family is really close to her already) and we basically had a testimony meeting where everyone was bearing their testimony of the things that they knew. We went through the baptismal questions (which I will list in a second) and after each question I asked them what it meant to them, or how it would change their lives, or why they thought that way. It was pretty amazing to listen to their answers, and I found out later that one of the girl's boyfriend who was there was a recent convert, which surprised me because more often than not he was the first to answer to the why. It made me wonder how often each of us asked these questions for ourselves, and not only would answer the way that was expected but really thought about WHY we answered the way we did.

1. Do you believe that God is your Heavenly Father?
2. Do you believe that Jesus Christ is your Brother and your Savior?
3. Do you believe you have repented of all of your transgressions/sins?
4. Do you believe that the Church and the gospel of Jesus Christ have been restored through the Prophet Joseph Smith?
5. Do you believe that Thomas S. Monson is a prophet of God?
6. When we are baptized, we promise our Heavenly Father that we will take upon the Name of His Son, Jesus Christ. What does that mean to you?

After each of these questions I always followed up with what does your answer mean to you? It was pretty amazing to feel the Spirit that was there as we were talking and how strongly we were each testifying of the truthfulness of everything we were talking about. It was so powerful mostly because each of us really had to think about the answers we gave, and couldn't just say yes. It's something I'd encourage each of you to do for yourselves, with or without other people it doesn't really matter, but it is amazing to see the change that can happen because of it:)

I love what I do here! It makes me so happy to see somebody making further covenants with Heavenly Father, because I know how much He loves each and every one of these people. It's crazy how blessed we are. 

Thank you for all that you have done for me and for how you have prepared me for this. I would not be here if not for you and the rest of my family. You guys show me what it is like to be in a loving family and thats the best part about you:) It makes me super sad to see all the broken families here and how most of them grew up in single parent homes. I have been blessed to have a family like you and I love you for it! Thank you for being such a great example for me:)

Love you all,

Sister Monica Walker

Christmas this Week

Dearest Mother!!

Christmas is this week!! Yay! That means I get to Skype with y'all and talk to you face to face. You will probably all sound so different from what I remember, I mean other than mom, I haven't heard any of your voices in 7 or so months. And mom's I only got to hear because a member called her while I was there.. So excited for Christmas! Also someone should measure Robert before then so I can know how tall he is now. In the pictures y'all send me it seems like he has grown about a foot, so now my head probably doesn't even reach his shoulder..

Just so you know, I am creating a list of things to talk to you about on Friday but I really don't think I will run out of things to say just because you know how I am and talking, and it will have been so long since I talked to any of your that I will probably have a million and a half things to say. Also just so you know, we can talk to a max time of 40 mins. The white handbook says 30-40 mins and President Cottle has asked us to keep as close to it as possible. So hopefully y'all can talk fast..

As I told you last week, we had transfers this week! It has been super crazy trying to get everything in order, and I realized after my new companion got here how under prepared I was to be her trainer. There are so many things that I am not the best at doing, and it is amazing to me how much the Lord has helped me and how much the Lord will help me as I strive to fulfill my calling as His representative. 

My new companion's name is Sister Maher. She is super awesome!! She is the 2nd of 5 children and she loves cats. Like a lot. Every time we see a cat she always gets so excited, whether its a stray or somebodies pet. Super funny but also really sweet. She is the first of my companions that has been significantly older than me since my trainer, and it is a little strange since I am supposed to be helping her understand what a mission is going to be like, and what is expected of her and of myself. Granted it's not like she is that much older than me, she is 20 while I am 19, but the rest of my companions have been within a month of me, so it is a little strange to be there to help her. She already knows a lot though of what to expect because of her friends at home who are return missionaries. She says she is really shy and that she doesn't talk a lot, but really she talks a lot but not usually at the first meeting. Something I have learned here is that the people who say that they are shy end up being the ones who are the loudest and who talk the most. Haha it's great fun though.

The next two transfers for us will be a little strange because of all the shifting President Cottle will have to do. First because of the no-fly time around Christmas, last transfer was only 5 weeks, and this one will be 7, but then also because of the English missionaries now being in the MTC for 3 weeks instead of two, the following transfer will also be a 7 week transfer due to the lengthening times of their stay in the MTC. So crazy stuff, which means that all of us will be on our missions one week longer than we thought. Which means I won't be home for Thanksgiving, but I will get home the following week.. One week after my Ministerial Certificate expires. Funny story about that, so the purpose of those is to show to people when they think that we don't have the legal right to be missionaries for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. But because of the extra week that is going on to all the new missionaries for the next while, all of them expire a week before we go home. I have not yet ever been asked to produce it, but I am just waiting for the moment when I have less than a week left and somebody asks me for it, but I can't show it to them because it is expired.. Haha. Haven't quite figured out how I will get past that one yet though, but I am sure it will all work out.

Oh another story you might like. So yesterday in church was the Christmas program in Sacrament Meeting. A week earlier, the person putting this on had asked the missionaries to sing at it, and one of the other missionaries to play it. but then.. Transfers! and half the missionaries left, one of them being the one who was supposed to play. whoops. Anyway she just had us sing Away in a Manger instead of the other song, and asked someone else to play it for us. So pretty much with absolutely no practice, we went up and sang. I thought we did pretty well considering there was no practice involved. Later that day we were visiting with our 96 year old investigator Willie Mae, and he cousin, who was a member was with us, and told her that we had sung at church. Of course, our investigator wanted us to sing to her since we had done in in church and she missed it, it was only fair she got to hear it too.. Sister Maher and I looked at each other, kind of shocked at the request, well demand really, so we began to sing. When we finished, she said that it was so beautiful and she had felt something special as we sang. Knowing that she goes to sleep earlier, I knew we wouldn't be able to go caroling to her when we were with our district Christmas Eve night, so I asked her if Sister Maher and I could come stop by on Christmas and sing some carols to her then. She said of course we can! So before we come skype our families, we are going to go over to her home and sing some Christmas carols to her. Should be fun! Also its nice because Sister Maher is a good singer so we can do spontaneous things like that and not be too scared to sing with each other. (Expect for the fact that she is shy when first meeting with people, and that was the first time she met with them.) Haha it was fun though:) I will probably do it again. The spirit it brought was wonderful. And it made for a good end to the lesson we had just taught. Especially in honor of the Christmas season:)

Love you all and Still super excited to talk to you on Friday!!

Sister Monica Walker

Your favorite person in the whole wide world!

Investigators

Dearest Mother,

It has been a wonderful week this week! We didn't end up having a Japanese Thanksgiving, which was both a relief and a disappointment. It was pretty delicious though. The Japanese sister that made us the food is an excellent cook and so all the food she gave us was really good, and then she sent us home with more, since our "dinner" was at 1. Funny story about that. We had called her earlier that week to ask her what time she wanted us there, so she said 3, that morning, she texted us and asked us if it would be ok if we came at 1:30, and then 20 mins later asked if we could come by at 1 instead, because she wanted us to meet her daughter, and she was going to leave at 2 to go to her boyfriends parents house for another Thanksgiving. So we agreed to be there at 1 to eat our "dinner". At 12:30 she texted us that the food was ready and that we could go over now. So we started over, and then at 12:40 she asks us where we were, that they were all waiting for us, and at 12:50 she sounded frantic as she asked us how far we were (her house is about 20 mins away from ours...) So pretty much she had wanted us there at 12:30 when she asked us to be there at 1.. even though the original time was 3. Crazy funny. It all worked out well though:)

These are some of the tanks on base that we wanted to get pictures by really quick after church.

So the baptism was of a recruit on base. He is going through training right now, and so they aren't allowed off base, so there is a branch for all the military recruits if they want to go to it or not, but since each of them have to have a battle buddy at all times (kinda like companions) there are a lot of non-members that come too, so the Senior couple teach Restoration to them every week, and if they want to learn more, the missionaries will be there to teach the rest of the lessons. This is what happened to that guy who got baptized, and now his wife is even getting the discussions back where ever she is. Super awesome! and the other guy is his battle buddy, and he wants to get baptized too, but he has only had the first lesson. Turns out he lives in Warner Robins though, which is super cool because that means that I was able to help him find the church over there so he knows where to go (because he asked us if we knew where it was) and I also know the missionaries that are in that area, so I knew who to call and what number to call to let them know that he was going to be going there in a few weeks for Christmas, and that he wants to be baptized while he is there for Christmas. Super awesome! I love going on base, and I really want to do it again, but it would mean that Sister Dayton and I don't have any investigators who go to church, because we would both have to go, as opposed to the other Elders who can go on splits with each other so one of them is at church to welcome their investigators. So its a bit of a struggle but we are trying to figure out a way for us to work this out because we want to continue to go to base if at all possible:) Because it's so cool!

Well I got to go, but I love you!

-Sister Monica Walker

The stain glass is a really awesome picture that kinda reminds me of a modern Captain Moroni. Its in the non-denomination church building where we had the baptism on base. Sorry its fuzzy, but UI thought it was cool and wanted to send it home.

The army men lining up are waiting to go into a Catholic mass, but I thought it was interesting because there hasn't been a whole lot of actual military stuff that we have seen, and this was pretty militaristic so we took a picture.