Quick Week. Letter from January 12, 2015

We taught Voda lesson 2: The Plan of Salvation. Voda is making HUGE progress in the gospel. She's really understanding everything that's being taught in church and in our lessons. As we were teaching her about the spirit world (talking about spirit paradise and spirit prison) she really embraced everything about it. Since her son, Dustin, is in prison she really understood how spirit prison wasn't a dark and dreary place- but that it was a place of change and learning! She's come to church 3 times in a row now. She's praying on her own and reading her scriptures every day. She told us about how she quit smoking a few days after meeting us because she thought: If I want to be more like Christ... Jesus wouldn't be out here smoking! Haha! So true. She's making changes in her life- truly repenting.

George... How I love George!! We had an AMAZING lesson with him this week. In our previous lesson, we assigned him 2 Nephi 2 to read before we came back over. When we went over last night, he told us about how he had started to read it but he can't read very well (so he didn't comprehend anything he was reading). He told us that he's never even read a book before in his life. We promised him that if he prayed before he read the scriptures, that Heavenly Father would help him understand the things that he read. We offered to read the chapter to him, and he accepted. So we prayed together, and then read 2 Nephi 2 (stopping every 3 verses to explain what had happened)... he was so excited about everything that we talked about! At one point in the lesson, he read one of the verses and explained it- so happy that he could understand what he read! It was a fabulous experience- definitely our own little miracle. He committed to praying and then reading the scriptures before we came over next time. 

We've been contacting a TON of referrals and potential investigators this week! It's been AMAZING! We never run out of things to do! (May I just say, that's the best feeling ever.) But we've also run into a couple really rude guys.... And I was going to tell you about them, but never mind. haha It'll make a good story for when I get home. ;)

We're hosting a community activity at the end of February- Family Picture Day! I'm really pumped for this- it's going to turn out great. We're inviting the entire community to come to the church building to get their family picture taken and then we (the missionaries in the area) will go and deliver their framed picture along with a copy of The Family Proclamation. We're getting the entire La Grande area involved in this. There's already been a few people volunteer to take pictures, get backdrops, donate props, etc. It'll turn out great! 

We've been getting a lot of speaking assignments lately. I was asked to speak at the baptism of an 8 year old in the ward (both of his parents are converts and have a good relationship with missionaries). My companion spoke in church on Sunday, and it's my turn next Sunday. I'll be speaking on charity- and as I've been studying the topic, I've been learning so much! I'll write more about it next week.

Sister Miller, one of our ward missionaries, came out with us this past week. We've been starting to do things a little differently with our ward missionaries. In the past, they've really just gone and seen a couple semi-less active people in the ward and then called it quits for the night. Sister Broadhead and I decided that we'd try and help them (the ward missionaries) understand what it is that we do each day by taking them out TRACTING. Yes, tracting. Haha! We're so mean. But we've been taking them to their neighbors homes and having them introduce themselves (and us) and offer that we teach them and/or offer service. We've had a few people just completely hate us over that (mind you, they're the members that always tell us that we're not doing enough haha) but Sister Miller just EMBRACED the entire experience! She was nervous at first, but after 2 doors she just said, "What the heck?! What's the harm in just inviting them to learn more?!" HAHA! Exactly! We talked with her about how, if her neighbors are ever interested in the future, they'll know who they can go to to get in touch with the missionaries. She loved the entire experience.

Let me tell you about Misty. I love Misty. She's great. She's had a lot of bad things happen to her throughout her life- some because of her choices, some because of others choices. Unfortunately, some members of the ward have completely given up on her. They don't believe that she can come back or that she can progress. And she's completely aware that they feel that way. How sad! She's made goals for herself- including getting her patriarchal blessing and going to the temple by the end of the year. No matter how rude people are to her, it doesn't get her down. She's so positive and determined to move forward with her life! She deserves a clean slate- and it's too bad that she isn't receiving one from the people around her. As we visit with her twice a week, we have family home evening with her and her 3 kids and then we have a scripture study with her the other day. We assigned her to read Alma 5 before our visit- and she went above and beyond! She wrote down every. single. question. and answered each one as it pertained to her. THAT'S 41 QUESTIONS! DANG! She's just awesome, and she's making so much progress.

One awkward moment from this week:

#1. I see a familiar face at church on Sunday and, out of instinct, I just start talking to this random stranger without delay: "HI! I know you! You're Sarah's lawyer! I saw your picture on her fridge!" *he gives me a blank, scared stare* Obviously, it's illegal for him to tell me that information... awkward... So he just said, "Well... Uhhhh... You caught me. I don't know how else to answer that. Who are you?" I immediately start apologizing to this random stranger for yelling that across the foyer. I felt like an idiot.

Sister Gubler

Snow Storm. January 5, 2015 letter

The work this week has been amazing. We've been focusing a lot on finding and really trying our hardest to follow Preach My Gospel exactly. If there's one major thing that my companion has taught me it's that Preach My Gospel sounds so unnatural but it's SUPER effective! We've been practicing a ton of new door approaches and doing a lot of tracting. We've also been able to get a TON of referrals from members, and then we'll stay busy the entire day just from trying to contact all of them. It's been a faith booster for me to really take Alma's promise and "experiment upon the word" and exercise the faith that I already have.

We finally had our first lesson with Voda- lives in Elgin. She was a referral from her son, Dustin, who is in prison. He's taken advantage of the time he has to attend church while there and he wants to be baptized! So he referred his mom to us, and she has just welcomed the gospel into her life! Since we aren't able to get up to Elgin very much (it's so far away and the snow makes it terrible) the Perren's (ward missionaries) took the assignment to go knock on her door and invite her to church with them. And she accepted! She's attended church for the last two weeks! She's made so many new friends and has been listening closely to the lessons and the testimonies that have been shared. We haven't even had to do anything and she already wants to be baptized. (I LOVE when the member's get involved!) We had our first lesson with her after church yesterday. She talked a lot about how the gospel has been answering questions for her that she didn't even know that she had, that she's open to whatever God has to tell her, and she has an open heart <---all her words! She told us about how, when she walks into church, she feels like she's come home! Oh my goodness. Meeting with her has strengthened my testimony that the Lord is really preparing people for the gospel. She expressed how she's amazed how the Lord has worked in her life- it took her son going to prison for the two of them to realize just how much they need God in their lives. We taught her The Restoration and set another appointment for Wednesday morning in Sister Perren's home. :) 

We had our first lesson with George as well! I don't know if I've mentioned him before. He lives next to a part-member family, and we tracted into him. After bringing him cookies several times, sharing scriptures with him, inviting him to activities- he finally decided that he'd like to take the lessons! :) His mom was actually LDS, but married a non-member that didn't want her talking about the gospel. So he never learned anything about the church. He's had 2 brothers pass away, and his main question to us was why God allowed suffering. He asked us a TON of questions while we were there- it was an amazing spiritual experience as he listened, not just to us, but to the spirit! We left him with a Plan of Salvation pamphlet and a Book of Mormon and encouraged him to read 2 Nephi 2. 

Along with all of the exciting things that have happened this week, there has to be some tough challenges, right?! haha! How are we supposed to grow without tribulation? We lost our phone. For those that have served missions, your phone is one of the most important tools you use! Sister Broadhead had it in her pocket... or something... But we got home from Elgin and it was gone. So, after I was done panicking, we set off to Elgin to look for it. (FYI, there was a crazy snow storm going on. The road was impossible to see.) We walked all around Elgin, in a snow storm, looking for the phone... but even if we did drop it, it would have been covered by 6 inches of snow by that point in time. We tried calling our phone, but it was off. Sooo... Yeah. We're without a phone now- yippee. 

Oh, and it's my 11 month mark today. Yay! :)

Sister Gubler

Merry Christmas! Letter from December 29, 2014

It was great to be able to talk to the family this week! It's always a rejuvenating experience! 

This week was Joseph Smith's birthday! So, me being me, I decided to celebrate! haha! I went and bought a cake from Dairy Queen (cause those things are delicious) and we had a grand party. :)

Christmas Eve we didn't have any plans... so we got together with some of the Elder's in our district and went caroling to a few investigators and less actives. It was so much fun! And the spirit was really strong as we sang hymns to those that we having a hard time during the holidays.

Christmas was fun. We had a couple of families invite us over to their homes for meals. It was nice of them. :) Overall, it was a humble Christmas and a GREAT Christmas. 

I had a cool experience this week. We have been teaching this couple- Ellen is a less active member and Vern is a non-member. We're trying to focus on Vern, but as we talk with them, Ellen participates a TON and Vern doesn't say anything at all. But that's besides the point. We had invited them to church and then they didn't come, so we decided to drop by their house on Sunday evening. As we were talking to Ellen, I began to share the story of the 10 Virgins. (It's one of my favorite parables to share with those that are on the fence of activity. Encouraging them to get prepared for when the Savior comes again, because others are not going to be able to share their oil.) As I was sharing the message, I told Ellen that "now is the time to choose a side because there isn't any fence sitting in the kingdom of God". When she just stared at me really weird.... She told me that an old, frail woman had approached her at the store the day before and had told her, "You need to figure out whose side you're on." And then walked away. Ellen then told me that what I had told her had confirmed to her that this was a sign from God- she needed to pick a side! 

I'm not exactly sure why, but the topic of grace, mercy, and justice has been on my mind a lot this week. Probably because there are some people that I've been talking to that think that if they just pray really hard that grace and the Atonement will go to work and that they'll become perfected. Elder Christofferson says: "...salvation is certainly not the result of divine whim, but neither does it happen by divine will alone." People put so much stress on knowing the "WHAT" of the gospel but they don't focus enough on the "WHY" and the "HOW" of the gospel. The question at judgement will not be "What do you know about the Savior?". It will be "How well do you know your Savior?". 

I love Elder D. Todd Christofferson's talk from conference ("Free Forever, to Act for Themselves"). I've been reading it a lot this week. And I've been being caught each time by the phrase: "Misunderstanding God's justice and mercy... will result in our achieving less- sometimes far less- than our full , divine potential." So, it's obviously a big deal to understand these things. And our Savior didn't die for us to save us indiscriminately but to offer us repentance! And repentance takes a great deal of WORK on our part.

Sister Gubler

EMAILLLL. Ta-Da. Letter from Dec. 22, 2014

We're really not sure what we're going to be doing on Christmas day... I'm honestly not looking forward to it. It's going to be like Thanksgiving all over again... we're going to have to wander from house to house finding somewhere to go. And no one is going to really want us at their house, so we'll just awkwardly sit there for a few minutes and then leave. hahaha

Okay, I shouldn't complain too much. We've been invited over by a few families (granted, they're families that are super OLD and that we haven't even met before!)... The Bishop of one of the wards invited us to have breakfast with his family. And there's another family that invited us over for the entire day (they have a son on a mission). That's probably the house that we will skype at. I'm assuming that we will probably skype later in the afternoon... Not sure what time. Be looking for a call/text from me (to Mom's phone- I can't remember dad's number haha) on Christmas Eve to confirm a time. But we'll probably skype around 1 or 2ish (my time). 

This week was super productive, although it didn't show in our numbers AT ALL. We got a total of 9 lessons this week (my mind is pulling me back to my Kuna, ID days). BUT! I think I talked about this last week, but our area book was filled with all of these names, numbers, and addresses... but no other teaching information. So we did a lot of contacting over the phone. I felt super weird about it... Mostly just because I wasn't outside of the house. I even joked with my companion about how I'd probably just feel better if we even called people from the front step of the apartment. haha! 

But, point is, we were able to narrow down our list of names and figure out who was really prepared to hear the gospel! We set a couple of lessons for next week. It's been pretty tricky with Christmas coming up, mostly everyone wants to wait until after Christmas to meet with us. So our schedule is pretty empty for the next week. Hopefully it'll pick back up after the holidays.

Another problem (man, I seriously can't remember what I wrote about last week) is that there are so many people that the other missionaries were seeing, but none of them were really progressing. And no one that they were seeing has attended church in about 6 months! So we're going to really focus on church attendance for the next couple of transfers. 

We did a lot of work in Elgin this week. We met a lady named Voda- she was actually a referral from our zone leaders. Her son, Dustin, wanted the missionaries to contact her. So when we went to her door, we were assuming that Dustin was a member of the church and that Voda was just his mom.... As we were talking to her, she seemed AMAZED that we "know" Dustin and she just had a look of disbelief on her face. Turns out, Dustin is in prison (gets out in February) and he has found the gospel since being there! Voda immediately accepted our invitation to learn about the gospel! We have an appointment with her on Christmas Eve. :)

We also met Billy and Jody- two brothers that live in Elgin. They had been taught by the missionaries before, but we're thinking that they had missed an appointment with them and then had gotten lost in a transfer. (That unfortunately happens when people shotgun an area.) We invited both of them to church, and Billy came! He said it's been about 3-4 years since he last attended a church service. After church, we had a lesson with Billy and Jody- focusing on the godhead. The boys have absolutely no knowledge of the gospel, so we're having to start from the very beginning. And they also have learning disabilities, so teaching them (even though they are 22 and 14) is more like teaching two 8 year olds about the gospel.

The ward in Elgin is soooo small. We counted 80 people at church! TINY. 
We attended 2 Christmas parties this week and our Mission Christmas Conference. We had to wake up at 3 am so that we could drive up to Caldwell, ID on Wednesday morning. Yeahhh. That was no fun. I didn't enjoy that part. But the conference was great. We watched some Christmas movies (Mr. Kreugar's Christmas), had lunch, a white elephant gift exchange (I brought a Despicable Me light up watch and mustache stickers), and a lot of time for pictures. It was a good day. I love Christmas time!

This starts week 3 of the transfer (it's almost halfway over! CRAZY) and I still feel like we don't really have a set routine yet for this area. Hopefully we find it soon. It's pretty stressful to shotgun an area. Luckily though, the ward members and ward councils have been extremely supportive! That makes a HUGE difference! We couldn't ask for better wards to be serving in.

I can't think of much else to say... This week went by really quickly and it was really just us trying to wrap our heads around how we're going to work in this area!! We need prayers. haha. It'll all come together eventually.

Sister Gubler

December 15, 2014 letter

Hey familia!

I haven't gotten the letter from Ryan- but S. Miller probably has it for me back in Parma. She'll bring it to me on Wednesday at Zone Conference.
Sorry I didn't send Dad a birthday card- because of transfers the day was pretty hectic. But tell him that I love him and happy birthday!

We did a lot of tracting this week. We've been trying to get our area book organized because it's just full of a ton of different names, addresses, random information, blank teaching records, etc. By the time we're done with this area, the next missionaries are going to be so grateful for us. haha! But it's been keeping us super busy.

We tracted into this guy named George the other day. He lives right next to a part member family in the ward. Anyways, we were just chatting with him (I was cracking jokes like I always do haha) and he said that he'd love to attend church with us! SWEET. We gave him the address and the time, got his number, and hopefully we'll be going back this week to see him. That was pretty cool.

I'm loving Oregon. No one has really heard about the church here- which is actually kind of nice. They don't have all of these already-formed opinions about the church and the people there. So they get to learn THE TRUTH about who we are and what we believe. It's AWESOME. I love it! And the people here are SO receptive! Most of the time on my mission, we've just had to stop by peoples houses and hope that they're home. But HERE.... MY GOODNESS! I'm thoroughly convinced that this is Zion!... we end up calling a whole list of people that we need to contact and they ALL CALLED US BACK and set up appointments!! We literally had our entire day full on Saturday- no breaks in between appointments. It was AMAZING. I just crashed at the end of the day! YES! La Grande has brought a whole new level of stress- GOOD stress. :)

Being all the way in outer darkness (aka La Grande) has proven quite difficult. We had a zone meeting this week (just the missionaries in the zone got together) and we had to drive AN HOUR to get there. My goodness. And we have a Christmas Zone Conference this week in Caldwell, ID... which will probably take about 3 hours to get to. We'll probably have to drive up the night before and then stay the night with some other missionaries. But yeah, we're super far away from ANYTHING. The furthest away Sisters in the ENTIRE mission.

We traveled to Elgin this week and BOY it is ALL mountains. It's so beautiful. I worry about traveling up there when it's snowing though... Me+driving in the snow= SCARED COMPANION. hahaha! (Don't worry, I actually drive pretty okay. We just don't have a 4 wheel drive vehicle.)

A little about my companion:
 She's totally awesome. A super obedient and diligent missionary. The one thing she's taught me is that there's always a "better and best way" to do things. So I've been working on being my best self.
A little about the wards:
 Everyone here is SO friendly! They've made us feel so welcome since day one. We get calls all the time from ward members just wanting to introduce themselves and offer service to us. It's so nice. I love it here!

Sister Gubler

La Grande 3,4, and Elgin. December 8, 2014

This last week was amazing and yet it was a test of our faith- that's for sure. 

Well, my birthday happened. Thanks for the birthday wishes and for the gifts. I really appreciate it! It was nice to know that I was being thought of. That night, the ward had their Relief Society Christmas party where they sang to one of the ladies in the ward who also had a birthday that day. Halfway through the dinner, I had gotten up to get something when Kristey yelled out, "It's her birthday! It's her birthday!" After which everyone sang to me... (Most uncomfortable thing ever.) Everyone started asking me, "Why didn't you tell me it was your birthday?! I would have made you a cake or something! You should have came over today!" yeahhhh... Cause I'm going to wear a big neon sign on my face that says "birthday girl" on it. :P I was content with just skipping the entire celebration. haha! Anywayyyyy...  21. This year will be good.

We got followed and chased by some goats this week. That was pretty exciting..

We had walked over to Mariah and Dallas's trailer (Dallas's parents, who live next door, own 2 BIG goats) and when we were walking back to our car the goats decided to follow us the ENTIRE way. Man, that was a battle! And one of them had just one horn that he decided that he liked to hit me with. Grrr. I will NEVER get goats. NEVER. Haha! We tried everything- throwing rocks and sticks near them, honking our car horn, chasing them, waving our arms at them, yelling... They were determined to come home with us!! But once we just decided to get in the car and drive away, they ended up meandering on back home. Yeah. We wasted a good hour dealing with those goats. haha

Mariah and Dallas have moved to Spokane. Sad to see them go. I'm praying that they stay active while they're there. Angel just told us that she's moving to Nampa on January 3rd, so we'll be losing her. Hansen (another recent convert) also said that she was moving to Nampa this week. So, there so goes all of our recent converts from Parma 2nd Ward... And we had to drop all of our investigators pretty much... Richard and Rocky just weren't progressing. Anna pretty much just told us off. Penny told us to stop asking her to come to church- so we'll just continue to read scriptures with her. Elsie hasn't come to church in 3 months, and yet wants to be baptized in December, so that'll obviously be postponed. So... Yeah. That was a huge bummer. Why did everyone have to move/drop us/be dropped in the same week?! And all the last week of the transfer?! The Lord is apparently opening up the teaching pool for other things. Then we found out that our area is going to be combined with the other Parma Ward for the next transfer. So now the missionaries will be covering both the Parma 1st and 2nd Wards. The Lord was preparing us for the change. The work should pick up more now. (Why do we question the Lord's plans? haha! He knows what he's doing.)

When I told Penny I was leaving, she started to bawl. My heart went out to her. Sometimes I forget how our investigators and the members must feel when we need to leave. Normally I just pack up my things, say a quick goodbye, and then leave. But not everyone is as good with goodbye's as I am.  She started apologizing for not coming to church and not doing the things that I wanted her to do and just cried and cried. I gave her a big hug and told her (quite sternly), "You do NOT do things because I ask you to. You do them because you KNOW that's what the LORD asks of you. And you KNOW that it's what YOU want to do to become closer to Him." I hope that she will return to church one day and be baptized.

My poor Patti (a ward missionary) bore her testimony in church on my last Sunday. She is such a sweetheart. I will miss her so much. 

I'll miss everyone- I've loved hearing their conversion stories and hearing about their missionary work. I hope to be able to keep in touch with everyone.

Sister Miller, Patti and I

With Patti Barch

With Liz Rohrbacher 

With Lloyce- from Mississippi

With Carol Howard

The day before transfers, we opened up President Hinckley's book "Stand for Something" (I think that's what it's called- oh well) and read what he had to say for December 8th (Transfer Day).... "DO NOT DESPAIR" with the scripture D&C 122:7. GGRRRRREAT. haha! 

Sister Gubler celebrated her 10th month mark on her birthday!

We were freaking out. haha! The book is like a fortune cookie. And my birthday was also my 10 month mark

(yup, double digits)- but we were so busy that I wasn't able to get a picture until the end of the day. Surprise, surprise. haha

Jessica is leaving on her mission TODAY for Spain

Yummy brownie as my going away dessert

Today is transfer day! I've been transferred to La Grande, OR and, oh boy, am I feeling overwhelmed! We're shotgunning this area- which means that we're both coming in fresh and new to the area. We're covering the La Grande 3rd and 4th Wards and the Elgin Ward. Soo... that's 2 more wards than what I'm used to. And we're also living in the city- well, as city as the Idaho Nampa Mission gets. My companion is Sister Broadhead and she's from AZ. She's been out for 13 months. She is super chatty when it comes to talking to members and non-members alike, so this will be interesting to have 2 talkative people working together. haha! I have a good feeling about this transfer. Well, once I get myself settled in of course. The first week is always rough... Why could transfers be on Saturday! Then I could just go to church and meet everyone the next day! AH! Oh well. I'll work with what I have.

We're living in a duplex (in an apartment by ourselves) and next door is a lady who introduced herself to us as "Grandma Pam". She's Christian through and through- a very kind woman- always reminding us to "give our thanks to God during [our] ministry". I like her. She's got some spunk! She sat outside waiting for us to show up and then proceeded to tell us her entire life story. It felt nice to be welcomed. "And if you ever need anything, I'm right next door. I'm a woman of wisdom!" Nice! She told us that she has a Book of Mormon and that she's met each of the missionaries and the Bishop before... We're wondering what the rest of the story is... Why isn't she baptized?! I'll ask her tonight.

It'll be an adjustment for me to be living in the city and in our own place... It always makes me feel better to know that there's an older couple there to protect us. But, I guess I'll get used to it. And whelp, there's a time change over here, which is totally strange for me. I feel like I'm so far away from everything. We're a good 4 hours away from Nampa- at least. And the only Sister Missionaries in... who knows how far. LONELYYY!!! 

Tonight will be full of unpacking and getting ourselves organized for this week. This area used to be covered by the Sister Training Leaders, but we're guessing that they moved them somewhere else. Needless to say, they already have some appointments set for us! Thank goodness! That gives us something to start out with. Hopefully I can find my way around as I drive in the mess of cars and traffic. (Man. The city is stressing me out. I need to move to the country for the rest of my life. haha) I'm going to need lots of prayers for this first week. 

 Just send my mail to the mission office. That might just be easier for the rest of my mission. I'll get to me eventually. I'll only take 2-3 days more than usual. 

Sister Gubler

Do you like my new haircut?

Letter from December 1, 2014: Thanksgiving Week

What a rough morning... I've been sick since Thanksgiving, so I woke up sounding like a man. During our companion study we saw that it was snowing. I slipped on the snow on the way out of the house and hurt my ankle. We got to the church to email and only one computer is connected to the internet, so now we're taking turns. Man... it's going to be a rough day. haha! A rough day FULL OF ADVENTURE! We still have to drive to Ontario to go grocery shopping. *sigh*

Thank you for the turkey thing! (I don't know what it's called... haha) Unfortunately, it was broken by the time it got here... but we just taped it to the dashboard of our car. So it's still fulfilling it's purpose! :) And I got the letters :) Thanks so much for those! Feelin' the love, feelin' the love. :)

I got the CD's too! Thanks SO MUCH! I'm loving them! I got them this morning before I read your emails.... soooo... sorry I didn't save them for my birthday. haha! But I love them :)

And I SO appreciate the gifts that Paige and Shannon brought! I'm sorry that I wasn't there to meet them! But we've already been devouring the snacks they sent. :) It was so nice of them to do that for us!

Thanksgiving was good. We were invited to spend it with the Montague's. They have 2 missionaries out right now, so we pretty much just took their places at the table. :) But yeah, it was just the 3 of them and us. It was AWESOME. 

Brother Montague reminds me of Dad SO MUCH... haha The humor and the clothes and everything. Needless to say, I felt at home there. :) They were supposed to have a lot of family over to join us, but as soon as they found out that the missionaries were coming over and that they would have to live under "missionary rules" for the day, they decided not to come.... Sister Miller and I felt so bad about that. But the Montague's seemed happy to have a small Thanksgiving dinner with just us.





After eating with them, we spent the rest of the day wandering around Parma trying to find other families to see. This proved more difficult than we thought... Every house had their tv's on and a ton of family over... And, well, we really only walked in, said hello, felt a lack of welcome, and then left. hahaha! I'm just praying that we'll get a few more invitations to come over on Christmas. XD

The Thueson's set up a little Christmas tree in our basement for us to decorate. So, it's feeling a little more Christmas-y in our little dark apartment space. :) 

With me being sick, we didn't get to do much this week- unfortunately. But we had to drop a lot of our investigators (Richard, Rocky, and Anna- and Matthew is gone to job core) because they just weren't progressing. We're still teaching Elsie and Penny, although they really aren't progressing much either. Elsie is supposed to get baptized December 13, but she hasn't attended church for the last 3 months... sooo... Yeah. We'll probably postpone that one. And Penny had a goal of coming to church on December 7th, but she told us the other day that she wasn't going to come. Sooooo... I was a little mad about that. Ohh, people's agency!!! I'm CONFIDENT that the Lord will fill our teaching pool back up again.

I went on splits for the first time ever this week! That was pretty sweet. We took Jessica and Keilee Spencer. Jessica reports to the MTC in Spain next Monday and her sister is a Senior in high school (she also wants to serve a mission). I took Keilee with me and we went TRACTING. Whoohoo! (I seriously love tracting. It's the best.) And, guess what! WE FOUND 2 NEW INVESTIGATORS!!! YUS. *party dance* Evidence that the Lord IS preparing people. Right there. We go back to see one of them tomorrow, so hopefully that lesson works out.

Have you seen the December Ensign?? And the 10 PASS ALONG CARDS inside?! YES, FRIEND! Those are for YOU! Welcome to missionary life! 

We've started tracting every day and passing those cards out. We have 250 to pass out by Christmas day. Think we can do it? I think YES! (Seeing as there's probably only 250 non-member families in our area...) 




I love this gospel. I feel like I don't share my testimony enough in these emails I send each week... But I hope that you all can feel that as you read what I write. This gospel has changed my life. Through Jesus Christ is the ONLY way that we can all receive true and everlasting happiness! I love you all!    

Sister Gubler