Lauren really loves cats.

Ya think!

Sister Kimball and cats, cats, cats

Sister Kimball and her companion, Sister Eaton, were helping a lady move. The lady has huge cats and Lauren loves cats!

This week, the thing that really was impressed upon my mind ...

was the importance of modern day prophets. My testimony was strengthened of the great importance of having a solid testimony in the reality of our living day prophet. I know that Thomas S. Monson is a Prophet of God and that he does receive direct revelation from God to help us in these perilous times. I know that Joseph Smith was a Prophet of God. I know that through him the keys of the Lord's Kingdom has been restored to the earth today. I know that we can receive revelation for ourselves. In Doctrine and Covenants 8:2-3," Yeah, I will tell you in your mind and in your heart by the Holy Ghost which shall come upon you and which shall dwell in your heart. Now, behold, this is the spirit of revelation; behold, this is the spirit by which Mose brought the children of Israel through the Red Sea on dry ground." We are entitled to receive the same personal revelation as the prophets of old. Let us be faithful, listen and tune into the spiritual promptings we receive. We will know what to do.

Saturday

Saturday we had Presidents interviews and President and Sister Wilson came and instructed us and it was amazing ! " HAVING THE SPIRIT IS THE KEY ! We need to have faith in the Spirit, faith in the Gospel of Jesus Christ and faith that it will touch the hearts of the people as we do our part." Afterwards we had an appointment with a potential investigator. We couldn't go inside his home so we sat outside to talk and because of that his neighbor over heard us talking and joined us. We taught them about God and that He is a loving God and because of that great love He provided a Savior to save us and to help us overcome sin. Zuir (20 yrs. old) felt that when he sins he'll go to Hell. He was baptized into one of the Christian churches and he had a lot of anxiety attacks because he was so afraid that he would go to Hell for his sins. The message we gave brought peace to his heart. The message that if we have faith in Christ and repent of our sins, He will forgive us and remember our sins no more. We then taught them about the Restoration of Christ's Church to the earth and invited them to be baptized. They both accepted.

Lake Forest Ward BBQ

The BBQ was a lot of fun and good food too. There were some less active members that came to the BBQ also and it was way nice to see them there.

Prepared People

I hope you had as great a week as we had. I don't know if that is possible !!
Tuesday we started teaching Sarah, 16 years old, she is the friend of the less active girl in our ward. She is wonderful; she doesn't have a big religious background, but she is seeking. She wants to know.She wants to draw closer to Christ and to have a closer relationship with her Heavenly Father. We knelt with her to pray and she offered the prayer. The spirit was son strong. It was a humble prayer...seriously I just love to hear someone pray that hasn't prayed much or has never prayed before. Her prayer was so simple and from the HEART.
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Wednesday We we had a wonderful lesson with Jessica. We watched the movie,Touch of the Masters Hand", it puts the poem into real life. I gave her the letter that Uncle Stan wrote for her. She was very appreciative. We also read 2Nephi 4:15-35 with her. It is one of my favorite scripture passages, especially verses 34-35. Jessica said that she just needs to continue to put her trust in the Lord and press forward. She will be baptized August 20th.

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Later that evening we taught Balen Love, fiance of Wendy Tinker, They are getting married August 6. Balen has such strong faith in Christ. He is a great guy and is very devoted to a life of service and following in our Savior's footsteps. ( We challenged him to read the Book of Mormon and find out for himself if it is true) he has complete faith that he will receive an answer to his prayers to know if the Book of Mormon is true.We invited him to be baptized on August 4th, 2 days before his wedding, and he accepted. Yea !!! We are very excited for the two of them. We had an awesome member with us who talked about the importance and the blessings of eternal marriage. He wants to have an eternal marriage.

Talk to Everyone-in sign language

In the deaf branch Sister Eaton and I gave talks. I signed the first part and the last part of my talk but the rest I had an interpreter, Sister Knox. I just love sign language and I am excited to take classes when I return home. It is so beautiful and so fun! There is just such a sweet spirit in the deaf branch. Maybe one day I'll be an interpreter.

July 18,2011 continued...

Another miracle-we have two new investigators both are from Africa. Luchica is from Eitriea, the same place as Merhawi. She is a referral from members in our ward. We went to her house and taught her and we plan on teaching her again this week. Our other new investigator is Selam. She is a member referral as well. She has been coming to church the past couple of weeks. The members that are her friends are awesome. Both are returned missionaries.Selam came to church this Sunday. Out of all are investigators she was the only one that came. It was quite disappointing, especially when we invited so many to come. However, seeing Salem was great and it made me feel happy!!
As I was sitting in sacrament meeting, I kept thinking about all are investigators,(everyone was invited) tears just filled my eyes...this charity and love filled my heart. I won't give up on them. It's just so hard when we know how important church is to their conversion and important to the members. To the renewing our baptismal covenants and to strengthen our faith and our testimonies in Jesus Christ.

TALK TO EVERYONE

...after we tried to visit an inactive, but he wasn't home so as we were walking back out of his driveway, we noticed a man, across the street throwing something away in the garbage can and as he walked back to his house and was almost at his door, I had a brief thought ( as I was considering talking to him ) nah, I will have to call after him to stop him before I could reach him in time to talk with him...but WORDS JUST CAME OUT OF MY MOUTH. I yelled," Hello, how are you?" He stopped and turned to us and we met him and started to talk with him. He said," This is crazy...I've been thinking of going to church the last couple of weeks. My neighbor has been inviting me to go, but I haven't yet." I shared with him a scripture in 3Nephi18 of how Christ told us to go to church, repent and be baptized and pray unto the Father in His name. He asked about prayer.He said," How do you pray?" We taught him how to pray. He mentioned he hasn't been baptized yet," but I am just making baby steps right now." We talked with him about "small and simple things" with him. It was really cool !

P-Day preparation day

These are pictures of us at the BEACH!!! We have been a couple of times.

What's funny is....these are the beaches in WASHINGTON. It is actually the PACIFIC OCEAN. It looks like a lake, ha ha, and with the cold weather and rain it definitely doesn't feel like the California beaches! There were no waves but it was still fun and you can smell the ocean breeze which is nice and it felt a little like home.