HOLA Famila y Amigos!

Hola! So first story of the week... An hermana that is serving here got a referral for a Spanish lady in my ward, but since there is no Spanish missionaries in our ward, she is going to teach her. But I will be going with her! So I am now trying to learn a little bit of Spanish! Crazy cool right? Dad would be proud :) but I'll let you know how that goes! So super exciting! 

Dennis got baptized on Saturday! It was so awesome to see his huge smile when he came up out of the water! Dennis taught me how incredible the power of the Book of Mormon is. He read it non-stop and finished it and has started again. It's incredible to see his progress and I know it's because of his devoted reading. The Book of Mormon has so much power! It reminds me of a quote from President Hinckley. “Without reservation I promise you that if each of you will observe this simple program, regardless of how many times you previously may have read the Book of Mormon, there will come into your lives and into your homes an added measure of the Spirit of the Lord, a strengthened resolution to walk in obedience to His commandments, and a stronger testimony of the living reality of the Son of God." Dennis is proof of this!! I love being able to see people completely change their lives to be in line with God's commandments. 

We met with John again this past week and I am so impressed with his desire to do what is right. He wants to go to the temple SO BADLY! We are helping him get some names ready for the temple so we can go with him. I can't wait! He got the priesthood this week and has already been going out with the elders to lessons and what not. John seriously is going to be a leader in the church! 

We are working with a less active lady right now named Mary. We met with her on Saturday and we sat down and she was like "I want to get a temple recommend." We were like OKAY!! Haha obviously we were so happy she said that! I'm excited to start helping her reach this goal!! 

We haven't had as much time as usual because we are still in the process of entering our area books in our iPads which takes up so much time. But it is going to be so nice once all the stuff is entered! But I'm excited for tonight because we are going to contact a whole list of people our bishop asked us to see. It should be a fun experience for sure! 

I love you all so much and I am so grateful for your support. I hope you're all having a wonderful week! Happy back to school :) 

Sister Moss

Oh yeah, ALSO!  I was talking to a senior couple about BYU's football schedule and I have it written down so I know what days to wear my navy blue!  :)  I gotta support my Cougs from all the way over here in Missouri!  And when BYU plays Missouri they are doing a fireside the night before at the church my ward meets at!  So I am literally praying that I stay here until November so I can bring an investigator to go!  I may be a missionary, but I still love my BYU sports!

Sister Moss

Dennis' baptism

                                                                 

District lunch after district meeting!

                                                                        

Dearest Children, God Is Near You

This week was definitely a crazy week...I got really sick so I wasn't
able to do a whole lot. Sunday, I was laying down in bed and was really
upset because being sick as a missionary is the worst! I just want to
go out and do everything I'm supposed to, but I had to stay in to
rest, and I was SO frustrated and confused why I had to get sick when
we were the busiest in our area. Plus I was in so much pain and I just
broke down to my Father in Heaven. The hymn Dearest Children, God Is
Near You came to my head and I sang it over and over and I knew that
He was still with me and He knows the desires of my hearts. I love
hymns!!! Unfortunately, Monday night, while on exchanges, we had a
little adventure, and I spent the night at the emergency room.
Everything is fine and I'm doing a lot better!

Another part of the craziness this week has been that our mission is
entering all of our area books onto our iPads. If you've seen an area
book, you can understand how long this takes... We have to spend two
hours a day just entering people's information on our iPads. It's
super time consuming, but once we have the area books on our iPads
it's going to be SO nice.

We did get a new investigator this week though! Her name is Christina.
And she is so prepared for the gospel. She recently moved here from
Mexico and she lives here with her 5 year old daughter. She was
telling us about her life and I seriously just wanted to cry and take
away her past from her. Pretty much everything you could think of that
can happen to someone has happened to her. I've been so humbled out
here, realizing how much I take for granted in my life. She kept
saying that all the stuff her siblings have gotten into have never
appealed to her before though, and I just kept thinking how prepared
she is. We taught her the plan of salvation and she has a lot of
questions about why people have to go through hard things, but we are
just trying to build her faith back up little by little. She's awesome
and we love her already!

John is still so awesome! He wants to go out on team ups with the
missionaries already! How cool is that? And he went with the elders to
give a woman in our ward a blessing. He's seriously so awesome! I
can't wait to see how amazing of a home teacher he will be!

DENNIS GETS BAPTIZED ON SATURDAY!!! We are so excited for him! Dennis
almost left this week because he had a job come up in Wisconsin, but
he turned his job down just so he could stay to be baptized! He's the
coolest! He has been so excited to get baptized ever since I met hi,
and now he can! Dennis is living proof of the power of the Book of
Mormon. That book changes people!

We taught Joyce again and she is still so solid on her baptism date
for the 12th. Joyce is an incredible woman with lots of faith. She
accepts everything we teach so easily! We asked her to repent and she
said "well I already do that everyday but I'll keep doing it!" We are
so blessed here in Independence with amazing people to teach. God
trusts us so much to let us work with His children.

I'm so grateful to be here and to be serving the Lord. Nothing makes
me happier! I love you all, have a great week!

Do you really go to the emergency room if you don't take a selfie?
(This was about 4 AM,  please excuse the nastiness in this picture lol)

A little overnight visit to the emergency room- Aug. 18, 2015

                               

Mallory is training a "brand new" sister missionary, Sister Day.  Mallory is still "new" herself.
A trainer at 6 weeks.

           

Sister Day, Sister Moss and Sister Christiansen

Onward Christian Soldiers!

WOW...what a week!! Ps, I also hit my two month mark!!

Transfers were so crazy! I have felt so inadequate all week being a
new trainer.. My new companion's name is Sister Day and she is
straight from the MTC! (You know...kinda like how I was about 7 weeks
ago). But she's awesome and I hope I seem like I know what I'm doing!
;) Being a trainer is kind of stressful especially when I'm so new,
but I love it! I'm learning so much, especially how to rely on my
Savior.

Saturday was literally the craziest day of my life but one of the
happiest days of my life. That morning, John texted us and said he
didn't feel ready and cancelled the baptism. I was so sad... But then
about an hour later, the elders called us and said that they had
talked to John and he said its on again so they were at the church
filling up the font, so we ran over to help set everything up for the
baptism. We were all setting up, but then John texted us again and
said he really didn't feel ready and so he said not today...this
happened about 45 minutes before it was supposed to start so we texted
the ward council saying it was off. The word didn't get how fast
enough, however, and people started showing up, including president
and sister vest and our stake president, president Cato. And then John
and Brea showed up!! We were so confused. I was emotionally a wreck so
me and the sisters went into a room to pray, and we came out and heard
John was talking to president Cato. About 10 minutes later president
Cato came out of his office and said start filling the font back up!
And John followed him out with a smile on his face. I don't know what
happened, but I am so grateful, because John was baptized!!! On Sunday
he was confirmed and he told us it was super powerful and he could
feel the spirit. I am so glad he has the companionship of the Holy
Ghost now..he has already recognized it! He is so awesome, he already
wants to go on team ups with the elders!! Johns journey has been
incredible to watch. He has so much faith to go through with this
decision in his life right now, but he knows it's right for him. It
was so amazing to watch him come out of that water!

We have been meeting with this lady named Joyce for a couple weeks
now...her daughter is in our ward, but Joyce isn't a member. She just
moved in with her daughter so she has been coming to church with her
and we have been teaching her. This past week we asked her to be
baptized and she said yes! We are planning on September 12! So
exciting!!

Makenzie also told us she wants to be baptized! She just doesn't know
when yet. She leaves for college next week, so she would have to let
us know if she ever came home for a weekend, but she said its
something she wants to do! We are praying so hard that while she is
off at college, she will be able to meet with the missionaries and
find a ysa ward for her to attend. She is a awesome and has so much
faith in her Savior!

Okay something way awesome happened this week that proves how God
hears our prayers and then answers them... We had an appointment with
this girl and we were trying so hard to find a member to come with
us...but everyone was busy. So as we were leaving the visitors center,
we said a prayer that we would be able to find someone to join us. As
we walked out the door, a girl in our ward named Sophie was walking
in!!! We asked if she could join us and she said yes! I was like
"thank you Heavenly Father!!" But then! She told us something after
the lesson that made me realize how good God truly is. Sophie told us
that she was sick of being in her home so she wanted to go on a walk,
but she didn't know where to. She said a prayer before she left her
home that she would be able to do good for someone, then left and
started walking. She said the next thing she realized was that she was
at the visitors center. HOW COOL IS THAT? God is in the details of our
lives, people!

One hymn has been constantly playing in my mind this week...onward
Christian soldiers. I LOVE this song! The line that I have really been
thinking about is the line that says "we are not divided, all one body
we"... We all have the same calling! We are here to build Zion all
over the world so that one day Jesus Christ can come here to
Independence Missouri to reign. By sharing the gospel is how we truly
build Zion. By doing our Father's will and by keeping His
commandments. We are all in this together! We are not divided. We are
all children of Christ!!

I love you all so much! Keep doing good!

Sister Day and I with my favorite girl on the planet, Kaci!  She sings "I Am a Child of God" with us every time we see her...my heart melts every single time.

John's baptism!!  Sister Day, Sister Christiansen, John, his wife, Brea and their daughter, Brenna!  Love them all so much!

My new companion, sister Day from Springville, Utah

                                   

Trainer?!!!!!!!

Hello everyone!

On Friday, we had a mid training meeting for all of us missionaries
who are just finishing our first transfer, which means we are half way
done with training!!! Yay! It was such a good meeting!! President Vest
told us about how many new missionaries this mission is getting...in
the next 3 transfers, 90 missionaries are leaving, and more than 90
missionaries are coming. That means that our mission is going to be a
really young mission with lots of missionaries with very little
experience. He told us that a lot of us are going to be called on for
responsibilities a lot sooner than we thought. So I assumed that meant
that a lot of us would be trainers after we finished our 12 weeks of
training... A lot of us sisters were talking after the meeting and
sister Christiansen said "I think there will be some of you called to
train at 6 weeks" and I was like WHAT. I didn't think that was
possible. But she said the chances of that were very small. Anyway, so
later that night when we were driving to dinner, we got a call from
the assistants and my stomach dropped....they asked for me and said
"You have been called to serve as a trainer"....I started crying
instantly. HOW am I supposed to train a missionary when I haven't even
finished MY training yet?!?! Of course I accepted, though. Saturday
morning we had a trainers meeting and it got me so excited though! It
was definitely a pump up meeting! I am still so scared because I still
have no idea what I am doing but I am so excited!! And President
really stressed that it wasn't him that extended this assignment, but
Heavenly Father.

I can't believe I'm finishing my first transfer though!! Thursday is
transfer day...and I assume I'm staying here. That would be really
rude if they made me train someone at 6 weeks AND move me to a new
area. So if I do stay here, my p day will switch to Thursday! So if
you don't hear from me next Tuesday, wait until Thursday :)

There was no baptism for randy last week :( we don't know what to
do...we just keep praying for him! Hopefully he will realize how
important this is.

John is getting baptized this Saturday though!!! I am SO excited for
him! He was the first lesson I taught here and now he is my first
baptism! He keeps impressing sister Christiansen and I so much with
his faith. Every lesson we have with him, he accepts what we teach so
easily and goes home and makes his life in line with what we just
taught him. He's going through a lot of changes too, and he is rely on
the Lord so much and nothing is going to change his mind on getting
baptized. He's awesome! And we got to meet with Brea this week too,
just us and her :) it was awesome to sit down with her and to share
our testimonies with her. This family is so special to us :)

We started teaching this girl named Makenzie and we LOVE her! She just
graduated from high school and is getting ready to go to school. We
met her at the grocery store last Tuesday and we asked her if she had
heard of the Book of Mormon and she said she was reading it!! She told
us her best friend is a member and she had gone to church a couple of
times. We met with her and we found out she was raised RLDS but she is
very interested. I'm excited to keep teaching her!

We have a lot of work to do here and we are definitely working hard!
The people are so awesome though. I'm learning so much from everyone I
meet! I love you all!!!

MIRACLE OF THE WEEK: Dennis cut his hair and shaved!!!!

Dennis after his hair cut and shave!