Hola

Hi family!! This was a great week! We are making some good progress with a lot of different people! S is progressing the most right now. He came to church and is living all the commandments! He believes in the Book of Mormon, but he still hasn't made the full connection of why he needs to be baptized again... but he is close! Also we have been having more contact with C again. :) We have been giving her some time again but now she is really making good progress again too. She broke up with her boyfriend and now just needs to fully commit! We met an awesome lady this week named A. She is a friend of Hermana Montecillo in our ward. She has a sound understanding and a desire to know truth! One thing that sometimes is difficult is that people are very kind but do not fully understand what we are teaching them. A lot of times they just agree with everything but don't actually commit and act. So it is always a great start when someone has good questions and shows sincere interest! We are really excited to see what happens. So far, no updates on O. We weren't able to see him, but will hopefully be seeing him tomorrow. Thank you all for the prayers, studying, and advice! On Wednesday I went on exchanges with Sister Hyland. She is so awesome! We get along really well and had a fun day. She has been out a few months more than me and is an incredible example. It was actually a good time doing English work too, although I feel like it is harder to teach in English now because certain gospel words I only use in Spanish and I couldn't remember what they were in English! Thursday we were able to go to the temple! It was so wonderful. I love the temple so much! There was a really bad snow storm later that day so we weren't able to drive which made things tricky. Overall it was a great week though!! We have some high goals for this next month of March and we are excited to work really hard to make things happen! :) Love you all! Have a great week!! Love, Hermana Pierce

Out 6 months

Hola familia! Espero que tuvieran un muy buen dia de amor y amistad! aka Valentine's Day ♥ This week, like every week, was full of ups and downs. Haha, tis the missionary life. We met a few awesome new people. R was one of them. He really opened up to us about his life and told us that he definitely is looking for something more. Although he still has lots to learn and some bad habits to get rid of, he accepted the baptismal invitation! We also got in contact with a former investigator named C. I had only met him once and had never taught him. He is a friend of a less active. Anyways, we called him and he had recently moved but gave us the new address. When we knocked on the door this girl opened. We asked for C and she called for her dad. When I saw him I knew immediately that it was not him. I was so confused! I started talking to him though and it turns out that his name is C but he also is renting his basement to the former investigator C! It was funny. So we found the right C and started teaching him but later the other C came down and started asking some really great questions about what happens after death and other questions dealing with the Plan of Salvation. He told us that he has never been baptized in any church because he wants to make sure he is doing the right thing. We are so excited to go back and hopefully be able to teach the whole family! One not so great thing about this week was the text we got from O telling us that he doesn't believe in the Book of Mormon. He was doing so good! We still haven't seen him but will be going there tomorrow. He told us that he was praying to find an answer and opened up in the Bible to Revelations at the end where it says that nothing more can be added or taken away... At first Hermana Wiggins and I both were so upset. Why would he get an answer like that? After some time, tears and lots of prayers I finally realized at least one of the reasons why that might have happened. Having knowledge and a testimony about the Book of Mormon and about the Church is a precious thing. The truths contained in the Book of Mormon are the most important things we will ever learn in our lives. Although Heavenly Father wants so much to give us this knowledge, we have to do our part. We have to be reading it, coming to church, and truly desiring to know. Knowing about that verse in Revelations does absolutely nothing to my own testimony. But it was able to destroy in an instant the 'testimony' O had. Why? Because he hadn't been diligently and consistently reading/coming to church etc. The basic things. What if he had found an answer that it was true, later got baptized, and then found that verse and didn't believe any more? Although this was so disappointing, we came to the conclusion that it actually is probably a huge blessing. Either he will be able to get up again and have a stronger testimony, even knowing the objections to the Book, or he won't at this time, but either way it will be better than him making the sacred covenant of baptism and then falling away. This experience has strengthened my testimony that really these simple things that we try to get people to do consistently- Reading, praying, and coming to church- make all the difference! And that isn't just for investigators. Each of always have to be consistently doing those three things in our own lives. A great part of this week was Zone Conference. I love love love having those meetings. They are so inspiring and so uplifting! The Lakeville Stake President spoke about how when things are hard and we endure them well blessings and miracles always follow. He said it in much better words than that, but that was the main idea. It was perfect timing. :) Love you all and hope you have a great week!!!! Love, Hermana Pierce Oh, and P.S. when I said that Karla was having her baby soon I meant Karla the lady that just got baptized before I got here, not Carla Woodson :) Haha

Pictures

Monticello Family Hermana Wiggins and Brittani

Heavenly Father is in charge

Que tal familia!? Espero que todo este bien! We started last week off on a great note by having FHE with Karla and the kids. :) Karla is going to be having her baby this week! She is doing really well. This week was great and there were a lot of successes! One thing that has been a big struggle though is getting people to come to church. I believe I have explained this before, but Lakeville Ward is an English speaking ward. It is considered a 'magnet ward' because Spanish speaking people who live in the Stake bounds come here. Sacrament is translated into Spanish, although for most people it is very difficult to understand. We have a few people that are perfectly fluent in Spanish/English but when they aren't available to translate Hermana Wiggins and I do it. It's hard to translate anything but especially when people are giving talks and speaking a billion miles per hour! Anyways, we do have a Spanish gospel principles class 2nd hour and then the last hour is just English. Getting people to church is pretty hard because they can't understand most of it very well! So we are learning a lot of patience and to have a lot of faith as we try to do our best and let the Lord take care of the rest! In the meantime there is much to be done and I'm grateful for the things the Lord is allowing me to do! We have continued to find a lot of great new people as well as try to resolve concerns of our progressing investigators. Last night we met with S, who was actually the first real investigator I ever taught on the first night I got here. We have been in and out of contact with him for quite awhile. Lately we have been able to see him a bit more consistently and yesterday we were finally able to find out some of his concerns as far as baptism goes. It was a really great moment because the Spirit was strong and finally I felt like we had some direction for how to help him. Hopefully the same thing will happen with some of these other investigators we have whose progression has been pretty slow. Good thing Heavenly Father is in charge of this work because He has a plan and knows how to make things happen! :) We have this new investigator, I, who is awesome! We've only met with her a couple of times so far, but the Spirit has been super strong and I'm so excited to see her progress! One thing I have learned as a missionary is that there is always so much more to learn and so much more to improve upon. That is the biggest reason we came to earth: to learn and progress so we could one day become like our Heavenly Father. It is impossible to improve without the Atonement of Christ. What a blessing to have the opportunity to improve every day! :) Love you all! Have a great week! Les quiero, Hermana Pierce

The gospel is True!

Buenos Dias! Today we found out about transfers... **drum roll**... Hermana Wiggins and I both are staying in Lakeville! This will be her last transfer which means I will be staying for at least one more after this!! Yay! We are both really excited to be staying and also glad that none of our district was changed. :) This week was a bit tough, but I learned so much! I realized that I was not having the best attitude ever as appointment after appointment fell through. My perspective changed a lot though as I thought about how blessed I am to know the gospel is true! What does it matter if we don't have as many lessons or we get the door shut on us a billion times if we are doing our best to share the happiest news that anyone could ever have? Here is a quote that President shared with us this week from Howard W. Hunter: "If our lives and our faith are centered upon Jesus Christ and his restored gospel, nothing can ever go permanently wrong. On the other hand, if our lives are not centered on the Savior and his teachings, no other success can ever be permanently right." President also talked about how happiness isn't the absence of adversary. We can be happy now, even when there are disappointments, if we just remember the glad message of the gospel! :) We did find some new people with potential this week and our other investigators are coming along as well. O was in California for the past week and just got back, so we should be seeing him this week. We also saw C last night and she seems like she is ready to give living the gospel another shot. Hopefully! Love you all! Hope you have a great week! :) I think about and pray for all of you! Love, Hermana Pierce