Yo Ho a Bikers Life... I'm not going to finish that sentence. ;-)

Hey everyone!

I hope you all are doing well! Thank you for your prayers and your support; I am so grateful for all of you! Here's this week's favorites:

Favorite Quote:

Jacob 4: 11-12. This one is too long for me to take the time to type out, so you all have to go look it up. I came across this scripture during personal study the other day and seriously had this "have I ever read this before in my life" moment because it was so good. The line that I do really love that I will type out is "for why not speak of the atonement of Christ." The Atonement of Jesus Christ is the greatest gift anyone could ever give, and our Heavenly Father gave it to us because He love us more than we can even begin to comprehend. He sent His son, because He wants us to be able to return home to Him. We have this amazing, wonderful blessing of a gift in our lives, and we are blessed to know about it. Though we don't fully understand the power of it, we know of it and we are strengthened by it. So, "why not speak of the atonement of Christ"? There are so many people out there who don't know about this amazing gift, who don't know all of the amazing ways we can be strengthened by Jesus Christ. As missionaries, we extend commitments to people all the time, so I'm going to right now. Will you all find the opportunity to share with someone about the Atonement of Christ? It doesn't have to be big or obvious or preachy. Just find an opportunity to help people to find strength through this amazing gift. I know with all my heart that my Savior lives and that He loves us. I will Always speak of the atonement of Jesus Christ.

Favorite Spiritual Moments:

Okay, the Book of Mormon is absolutely amazing. We got to do this awesome thing this week called the Book of Mormon Experiment. It's a trial thing that the Church's missionary department is testing to see if it's effective in sharing the gospel. In a whole bunch of area throughout the mission, some of us got to go out, dressed like normal people, without nametags, calling each other by our first names, to introduce people to the Book of Mormon. We presented it as a sort of social experiment, asking people to "read through a page of religious text" and mark anything that is a reference to God or to Jesus Christ or that relates to them in any way. Or honestly, anything that they like that helps them to think about God. From there, we asked them what they thought about it and how they felt, and led into missionary questions, finding out if they were interested in learning more. As a mission, we got to talk to over 1500 people today, and of those, about 450 became referrals, interested in learning more and receiving a copy of the Book of Mormon! Holy crap! The thing that was so amazing about it was that it was the Book of Mormon (the words of God) and the Spirit doing all the work, because these people were the ones who felt it. We may have been there to help direct the Spirit a little bit, but it was super cool.

So, with that introduction, my favorite spiritual experience this week was from that. One of the places my group got to go was in front of a grocery store. We tried talking to pretty much everybody, but most people were busy and wanted to get their groceries, so they didn't have time. So at this location, we actually didn't get to talk to that many people. But the people who did talk to us were amazing. There were two college kids, Steven and Jason, who were heading to the doors, so I asked them if they would participate. They thought about it and said no, they were going to just go get their stuff, so I told them that when they were done, we would still be here if they had changed their mind. So when they came back, I approached them again, this time with an Hermana who is super awesome who helped encourage them to do it. I helped Steven, and when he was done, I asked what he thought about the page and he replied that he thought it was a little dark. I was like "what the heck do you mean, it's the Book of Mormon" in my head, but then I looked to see what page he had and it was all about death. ; ) So I didn't know what to do for a second and started talking about the plan of salvation, which he seemed to be really receptive to. But part of me still felt like he liked what he read, so after a couple of minutes of talking to him, I asked him about it. He said something like, "I don't know. When you asked me to read it, something made me feel like this was something that's good. Something that's true." Holy crap, that was all the Spirit! He could seriously feel the light and the peace that comes from it, and he could feel that it testifies of Christ even before (and after ; ) reading that page. I talked to him a little longer, and he was super interested in learning more. We invited him to go to the singles ward, got his information for a referral, and he wants to hear from missionaries. His friend Jason too! The Book of Mormon and its testimony of the Savior is so amazing. I am so grateful for them.

Favorite funny moment:

Okay, so I don't even know why I think this is funny, but it really was. ; )

We have this ward member who’s home sits at the top of a large hill, with a very long, very steep driveway. Well, we had a lesson there with a recent convert, and then we decided to ride our bikes down the driveway. That was a terrible idea. I crashed so hard. ; ) Like, tried to slow down, hit the curb, rolled off my bike, and my bike rolled over me type crash. So yeah, that happened. Fortunately Stephen and Naomi were still there and could drive me up the hill to have Sister Whitmore help me out. Yep. ; )

Well, I love you guys! I hope you are all super happy! Have a good week!

Missionaries in disguise (if you can't tell, we're wearing each others' nametags. ; )

Sister Reynolds learning to lasso.

Incognito for real now.

Our cool BoME displays

Christmas lights on a palm tree. Tada!

Look who I found! This is Hermana Hadley from our stake serving in the same mission!

Me sitting on the Whitmore's counter. Yep ;-)

It's bad. ; )  

I don't know if you can tell, but on my right leg there's a line of dashes. That was from the gear. ; ) So if the bike grease got under my skin, I may now have a free mission life tatoo...

We (mom and dad) are SOOO thankful that Jessica's o.k. and something worse didn't happen.  Also, an update on her companion, sister Reynolds; She has a torn muscle, not great, but not as bad as it could be as well, so we are thankful that things weren't worse for her as well!  Keep up the prayers for Jessica and her companion, we thank you for your thoughts and prayers for her!!!