Hola! Somos Misioneras de la Iglesia de Jesucristo de los Santos de los Ultimos Días!

Try that in Google Translate! (Disclaimer: I can't use Google Translate out here, so I don't know how it'll show up.)

Miss Millie

We met Miss Millie in a somewhat round-about way. There was this kid with a baby in a stroller who was standing on the corner of the street.

Me: "Hi! How are you?"

Kid: *shocked look* "Good."

Me: "Is that your baby?"

Kid: *shakes head*

Me: "Oh, are you babysitting?"

Kid: *nod*

Me: "Oh, okay. Well, we're missionaries from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We go around sharing a message about Jesus Christ and how we can come closer to Him. Would you like to hear a message like that?"

Kid: *nod*

Sister Wagner: "What's your name?"

Kid: "Tyrique."

Sister Wagner: "How old are you?"

Tyrique: "15."

Me: "Do you think your parents would want to hear a message about Jesus Christ?"

Tyrique: *nod*

Me: "Okay. Do they live around here?"

Tyrique: "My gramma and my auntie do."

Me (not wanting to ask a shy 15-year-old boy, "Where do you live?"): "Doooo you know your address? We could go visit them."

Tyrique (said so quickly I blinked): "123-Clementine-Lane." (Note: address has been changed.)

Me (after a second of processing the inhumanly fast response): "Okay! We'll go talk to them."

Turns out, only Miss Millie was home. She ended up telling us her life story and how her grandkids were living with her because 7 or her 13 children had died. We taught her the Plan of Salvation, and her grandkids started filing in as we finished. They came in by twos and threes! Like, what?

At the end, we asked Miss Millie if her grandkids wanted to pray with us. She gave us a "look" and said, "We can axe 'em... Hey! Tylen!" A 6-year-old boy jumps up. "Go tell 'em to come out hee-ya an' pray wid us!"

Tylen (in the distance): "Hey! All y'all come out hee-ya an' pray!"

The grandkids slowly filed in. There must have been a dozen of them in the kitchen all at once. We all got in a circle and held hands, and I prayed. I've never said more heartfelt prayers than when I've been out on my mission.

If Miss Millie doesn't get baptized, maybe one of her grandkids will. Her family is amazing. All of them deserve the gospel, because we're all children of God!

A parody quote from Incredibles: "You are a CHILD OF GOD! Pull! Yourself! Togetha!!"

Love y'all!

#gogiveemheaven

Sister McKay

Greenie Busted

Same Area, New Comp

Oh man. Sister Wagner is incredible! She's 5'5" and from Duluth, Minnesota. (Not Utah?! *gasp*) She's 23 and loves Chick-fil-a just like me! We hit it off right away. On the way home from Macon, which is a 3.5 hour drive, we talked nonstop. I felt kinda bad for Brother and Sister Hammond, the members who drove us. But apparently they didn't mind! Sister Hammond called one of the sisters in our ward that we usually visit (Sister Keaton) and told her all about it, so when we visited Sister Keaton, she already knew all about Sister Wagner! It was kinda funny.

I have apparently been doing awesome at taking over the area. The hardest part is organizing everything so we don't use way too many miles! But we've had so many incredible experiences this week:

We taught one lady named Iris who says she "needs Jesus in her life" about the Plan of Salvation.

We taught another lady, named Nikki, about the Book of Mormon and asked her to read it. She said she would!

We got return appointments for both of them. And the Spirit was SO there!

We also met a lady named Rachel Daniels, who said she was baptized into our church a long time ago and stopped coming because one of the members accused her of stealing his wallet.

We talked to one of our potentials, a lady named Angel, who had asked for a Book of Mormon, and she said she'd been reading it. We're working on getting ourselves in to teach her!

We had a short chat with a guy named Heath who the elders met and gave a Book of Mormon to. He was surprised I remembered his name! Hopefully we'll run into him again.

And we got a return appointment with a potential named Shavette, and a lady named Brandy, and a lady named Rhonda who said she'll probably come to bible study!

So yeah. It's amazing.

Love y'all! Don't forget who you are! You are children of a heavenly King.

Go give 'em heaven!

Sister McKay

Transfers! And One New

One New

When we do call-ins with the district leader on Sunday, he asks for our numbers for the week. Lately it sounds like this:

"Zero baptized and confirmed, zero on date, one at church, one new."

"New" stands for "new investigator." That's actually the number that fluctuates the most. We've gotten 4 before, but they drop us, or they don't keep commitments, so we have to drop them. You just can't try to teach them the gospel if they don't want to accept it. You save that for later, when they'll be ready.

We have a couple progressing investigators that we're waiting on to get back in town. They're the ones coming to church. It's a small family. The dad's name is Eric and the mom's name is Tram. They have two boys under 8 named Ethan and Dylan. Brother Gleason, our ward clerk, is Eric's coworker. Eric started asking him why he didn't drink coffee, and it all happened from there! We haven't been able to meet with them much because Eric has been out of town a lot, but they come to church every week that they can, which is most weeks, so that is totally awesome! We're working on helping Tram gain a testimony. Eric says he probably would have been baptized already except that he's waiting on Tram. They want it to be a family thing. Prayers!

Our "one new" this week is a black lady named Sabria. She's 22 and lives in a trailer near our place with her 4 brothers. We had a good lesson with her and talked to her about coming to church. She said she could come if she had a ride, so we're working on getting a member to drive her and hopefully come to our appointment with her Saturday evening. Umm, more prayers!

Transfers

Ahh!! Sister Hale is leaving me!

I do believe I included a definition in one of my "Language" sections for the phrase "greenie busted," but I'll explain again anyway. When you get "greenie busted," you leave your trainer and get a new comp. This companion is then called your "greenie buster."

I'm gettin' greenie busted, baby!

(I know, that was so cheesy.)

Tomorrow we drive to mission headquarters to find out where Sister Hale is going and to find out who my new companion is and pick her up. I'm so nervous and so excited! I'm taking over the area here in Aiken, so that'll be an adventure.

#Miracle

Speaking of driving to Macon... So, it's 3.5 hours away. That's a 300 mile round trip. And we only have 1200 miles a month, which we use. We can make due if it's absolutely necessary. But really we have to find a ride. So, Sunday afternoon on Mothers' Day looked like this:

We talked to some ward members at church who said they could maybe give us a ride.

We visited a whole bunch of people so Sister Hale could say bye.

We skyped!!

We visited some more people and called some more ward members between visits.

All said ward members were unable to drive.

Sister Hale and I start to get juuust a liiiittle stressed.

Then Monday morning goes like this:

We call the ward member who might be able to drive us. Turns out, there was a misunderstanding, and we can't get a ride with him because his wife can't be there. We end up setting him up to drive the elders in our district. It worked out!

One of the sisters from our ward calls us back and we figure out that she can't give us a ride because it's really far and she wouldn't quite be comfortable without her husband, who has to work. But then she calls us later.

"Hi, so I was praying that I could help y'all out, because I felt bad about not being able to drive, and then I thought to ask my husband if he could get off work. I never ask him that, but he sent me one word back: 'Yes.' So I can drive you!"

We were so relieved! Prayer works, y'all. Don't forget it.

Love you appropriately (as the missionaries say)!

Sister McKay

Look up! Open your mouth! DRINK IT!

If you watched Conference back in April, you probably heard the talk by Elder Choi. It has become the elders' favorite thing. Every time it rains, the elders tell us, "Look up! Open your mouth! Drrrink it!" Click to see the talk HERE.

And it rains all the time.

All in all, it's been a pretty legit week. We've been trying really hard to find lots of people and get in the habit of talking to literally everyone and their dog! We're working on getting some solid investigators, though, so for now it's funny stories.

Yesterday we knocked on someone's door. There was a kind of garbage can thing near the door and I bumped into it, but I didn't know it had an open can of beer sitting precariously on it, and I knocked it over. It splattered on the concrete next to us and got on our ankles. Fun experiences!

We were out eating dinner with some members. They're a bit older, and the husband has been affectionately nicknamed Santa Claus by the whole ward. His wife is naturally Mrs. Claus. They really fit their roles, too. He's a hilarious, jovial old guy, and she's really sweet. So when theis happened, Sister Hale and I laughed really hard. Santa splattered lime juice in his eye at the restaurant. He was whimpering and Mrs. Claus offered him something to help. He said, "No, no, I'm okay." Mrs. Claus sarcastically said, "Fine, suffer!" Sister Hale and I had a good laugh over that.

Language

Trunkie. What you try not to be. Trunkie means you wish you were somewhere else. If you miss home a lot, you're probably trunkie for home. If something makes you trunkie, you say, "Stop, that's making me trunkie," and you change the subject. Fun times!

I love all y'all, and you're in my prayers!

Until next time!

Sister McKay

Do you smoke weed?

No, I do not smoke weed.

It was hilarious. Sister Hale and I were doing some walking before heading in so we could see if there was anyone out that we could talk to. Well, there was one guy.

This guy was across the street from us, but there were a bunch of cars, so we called out to him while we waited for the cars to pass so we could cross.

"Hi!! How are you?"

"I'm good, thanks!" He keeps walking, then turns around. "Hey, do you smoke weed?"

Sister Hale: "Nope!"

Me (according to Sister Hale): "No!...?" (With a tone that sounded like I was thinking, "Why are you asking me this?")

Guy across the street: "Oh, nevermind then!"

Sister Hale looked at me and asked, "That was the first time anyone's ever asked you that, wasn't it."

Me: "Yep."

We burst out laughing. It's a joke between us that I grew up under a rock (because I did) and that Sister Hale has "ruined me" (because she has). And that whole story really showed our personalities.

People

Well, Mary and Joseph have agreed to meet with us after a bump in the road called the Word of Wisdom almost shook them off course. Hopefully we'll get 'em back up and going. Prayers are appreciated!

That's all I have time for! Love y'all!

Sister McKay