"I LOVE JESUS"

Hello everyone! Another week down, and I can't believe it! 

We tract from 6-7 every night. Lately we've been getting in the car at 6 and looking at the gps or driving around trying to find somewhere to tract. By the time we would find a good place, it would be 6:20-6:30. I felt so terrible and just like we were wasting time. We decided that we should start pre picking places to tract while we do our planning and that way we will be more effective! I can't even tell you how many blessings we've seen from doing that. But I'll tell you two of them. We decided to tract 'Joy lane' one night. We get there and there are only 2 houses there (good thing we also planned for backup tracting places ) so we knock on this guys door and he's really just not interested, right before he shuts the door I do the typical "do you know anyone in the area that could use some service or any uplifting message?" (I'm pretty sure I've said that sentence more than any other phrase in my entire life, we try to ask literally EVERYONE for referrals.) Usually people respond with "ummm, everyone" or "not really" but this guy goes "actually yeah, my son would listen to you guys allll day. He loves this stuff." and he gives us his sons name and address and sent us on our way. We wrote down his information and continued tracting on our backup street. Later that night, our appointments fell through and we decided we would go contact this referral! So we knock on this guys door and he answers, he looks at my nametag and his eyes get HUGE and he goes "JESUS, I. LOVE. JESUS!!!" This guy was awesome! He's read the Bible three times and just really loves Christ. So we were able to teach him the Restoration and give him a Book of Mormon. He told us he'd love to hear more of our message and that he's gonna find out if it's true or not. It was awesome!

Then yesterday when we were tracting, we met this guy and he told us he didn't live at the house we knocked on but that he knew sisters in the past, I asked him what his name was and it turns out he's a former that we've been trying to get in contact with! He told us that we could come by and share more with him.  

This week my testimony was really strengthened that the Lord blesses us for our preparation. 

We also had an awesome fireside with the youth in our branch last night! And we got Baylie and Kylie to come with us!! (Brittni's daughter and her friend) they're both less active but we're really trying to get them to come back and the fact that they came last night was a huge step. They're the cutest girls! 

Finally I am SO excited for General Conference!! The womens session was awesome and I learned lots. I would love to encourage all of you to go into conference with a question. I truly know that if you have a question for Heavenly Father that you want answered, He WILL answer it through conference somehow. Be aware of the things being shared and the way you feel. I have my questions written down and I'm excited to see what Heavenly Father will teach me this weekend. 

Thanks for all of the love and support! Have a great week

xoxo

Sister Rodriguez

Lady outside of Resale: "are you guys doing community service?"
Sister Ferrin: "No, we just do service... around.. the ... community..." 

HAHAHA still laughin about that one.

Ed: "It's aight dawg.... okay I'm sorry I tried to be ghetto and it didn't work" 

Larry: "he had a bunch of wives.. what kind of Mormon was he?" 

Elder Baker: "an ex communicated one" 

Pictures: 

1. Simple answer: The Book of Mormon

2/3. Two of my favorite places in one day

4/5. I held little chickies TWICE this week (my fav Brittni is in the second one) 

6. Manchester

Stellaaaaa

Craziest snow storm of my life. If you haven't heard, we experienced a true Nor'Easter called 'Stella'. It was the biggest snow storm Vermont has seen since 1993. We were stuck inside our apartment for almost 2 whole days. All of our district meetings and exchanges got cancelled and on Wednesday we were told we weren't allowed to use our car at all!

So funny background story: on Monday's we usually work an extra hour so on Tuesdays we can go shopping in Bennington at Wal Mart because it's a lot cheaper! Well, Tuesday we weren't able to go to Bennington so we decided we'll just wait till next week to do all our shopping. So, Sister Ferrin and I have gotten quite good at coming up with things to eat this week! We literally are out of bread, eggs, cheese, milk, yogurt, butter and a lot of other things. Ha! At this point we told ourselves we might as well just hold out until we can go to Wal Mart tomorrow, we've made it this far! 

Anyways, Tuesday we stayed inside alllll dayyyyy. We weren't allowed to leave. We got 3 different text messages from our leaders saying all missionaries had to go home and leave their cars. If we did leave the apartment, we had to be 3 minutes away from the apartment. That night we had a phone lesson with Kathy and Wendy, and also (yes, we braved the storm and left) walked over to our neighbors who is a less active and his wife isn't a member and watched 'Finding Faith in Christ' with them. It was nice to get out of the apartment! Wednesday we weren't allowed to use our car at all. We had some service at a nursing home so we walked about a mile to get there and back. It wasn't too bad, just so much snow and really cold! It was fun though because over those two days we probably got at least 6 hours of studying in. It's awesome! We did a lot of contacting people on the phone and updating the area book, cleaning the apartment, and getting organized. Being a missionary in the NYUM is always an adventure

So last Monday, we saw my dear friend Ram. He's an investigator from Nepal and has a hard time understanding who God is. We stopped by and I asked him how his applications were going. He applied to 10 different schools for his Masters program and he told us he didn't get accepted to any of them. He was really upset and told us that he doesn't believe in God. That God doesn't have a plan for him. "no more God. No more God" He kept telling us. It seriously broke my heart. He wouldn't even let us say a prayer with him before we left. He tried telling me that in 5 years I wouldn't believe in God either. I told him that I don't know what the future holds but that I bet I would still believe in God. We made a deal that in 5 years if I still believe in God, I'll message him on Facebook and he'll let the missionaries come teach him and his whole village! So y'all best believe that in 5 years the missionaries in Nepal (if there are even missionaries there idk) are gonna get about 20 referrals from ya girl! It's sad to see Ram struggling but I definitely know that God has a plan for him and in 5 years, he's gonna get baptized.

This week I've been reading two conference talks a day from last conference in preparation for this coming conference! Something really stood out to me this time from Uchtdorf's talk "O How Great the Plan of Our God" He said: 

"Recently I had the opportunity to travel to Belfast, Northern Ireland. While there, I noticed the Belfast Coat of Arms, which includes the motto “Pro tanto quid retribuamus,” or “What shall we give in return for so much?”

I invite each of us to consider this question. What shall we give in return for the flood of light and truth God has poured out upon us?"

The phrase 'Pro tanto quid retribuamus' now sits in my Book Of Mormon as a constant reminder of what I'm going to give in return for so much. I'd like each of you to think about that this week as well! We are so lucky to have the gospel in our lives. 

Funny quotes of the week:

Janet: "you know Jason? (her boss) I always ask for Sundays off. He calls me and says 'you're on the schedule' I say 'i know. but i am at church.'" haha isn't she awesome? She goes to the Baptist church but wants to come to church with us this week so we are stoked!

Sister Ferrin while tracting: "have a good dinner!" 

Guy: "you too!.. err.. umm.." *Shuts the door* 

Pictures: 

1. When Coach is like "Hello Spring" and God's like "lol here's 3 feet of snow" 

2. So. much. snow.

3. Shamrock shakes for St. Patrick's day!

4. Ed took us out for pizza and a lesson on Monday: VT pizza isn't as good as NY's, but still better than Utahs so I'll take what I can get 

5. MORE SNOW

We're not in Utah anymore

You know you're not in Utah when you leave your apartment by 4:15 to get to a 7:00 stake meeting...

haha we're just lucky we were able to attend! The Broburgs took us to the adult session of stake conference in Albany Saturday night, it was about an hour and half there and back (we had to make some stops along the way so we left a little early) then Sunday morning the Brownlees took us and our investigator Ed there and back. Lots of traveling this weekend but Stake Conference was worth it! (And I got to see Sis Camp so of course it was a blast) It's funny because most people from the branch went to the leadership and adult sessions of stake conference and then just stayed the night in a hotel and came to the general session the next day. Definitely different than being in Utah where it's a 2 minute walk to the stake center! 

Cool experiences this week. We got to help volunteer at "the Living Library". An event that we helped people register for at the library. They had many different speakers come and tell cool stories. In between signing people up, the ladies from the library told us we could go watch some of the stories. We went and watched Stephen (he works at the library and we volunteer with him so we know him and thought it'd be cool to watch his story) and he told all about how he's a modern day witch - a Wicken! It was really interesting because that's something I've been wanting to learn about since being out here. Anyways, afterwards he came up to us and said "I was so nervous when you guys came to mine! I didn't want to offend you!!" haha it was really funny. We also listened to a guy tell us about his service in Iraq with the Marines, and a woman tell us of her experience helping refugees in Greece. It was so cool. I learned so much. 

One of my favorite parts about being a missionary is that people notice we're different. They're not sure what it is, but they like it. We had an awesome lesson with Ed this week. He always tells us that he's not sure if this is the path he's going to take, but he likes what he's learning, and his life has gotten better since meeting with us. He also always tells us he notices something different about us. It's really cool because the gospel truly answers any question we have. He's constantly saying "that makes sense. I like that" He has lots of questions but luckily, the gospel of Jesus Christ answers all of them! He really makes me want to study and understand the gospel better so I've been spending a lot of time in Preach My Gospel and the pamphlets that we hand out. I've definitely noticed a difference in my teaching as I try to understand the doctrine better. We're also going to lunch with Ed today! He wants to buy us pizza (which I haven't had in so long, like for the whole 2 months I've been in Manchester, so I'm a little nervous it's not gonna be as good as NY pizza, but we'll see) and have a lesson so I'm excited! He is seriously so genuine and sincere. He keeps his commitments and is very serious about learning. He really is a great guy! 

We also had a lesson with Shayna last night. She was telling us how her dad is giving her all of this anti stuff and saying we're a cult. She was like "But I don't know. You guys just seem to be different. I don't know what it is but you just have this light, and you're both always so happy. I want that" It's incredible to see that as we live worthy to have the gift of the Holy Ghost, it truly can be with us always, and that others really do recognize us. We stand out and we're different. So my invitation for all of you this week is to share that light with others! It truly blesses others lives. Look for little ways of doing service, compliment a stranger, invite someone to church, smile at a friend. There are so many ways to share the light we've been given. That's why we have it, so we can share it with our brothers and sisters. 

Funny stories: 

We were tracting apartments and there are two doors in each little area. We knock on this one door, no answer. We knock again, no answer. We leave a pass along card and turn and knock on the other door. Suddenly, both doors answer. I quickly turn around and start talking to the lady to the left while sister Ferrin is talking to the one on the right. Our backs are to each other and we're trying to preach in this small space and tune each other out but not wanting to say the exact same thing haha it was pretty funny!

We taught Ed the Plan of Salvation this week and he pointed to the Celestial Kingdom and goes "that's where I'm goin! See you ladies there." 

We went to a lesson with Garth and Kenneth (an older Jamaican guy) was there and simply fist bumped us and said "respect". He's true homie. 

Anyways! Love you all and hope you have a great week! Thanks for always being a good example to everyone, never forget your divine potential as a son or daughter of God. He lives and love you!

xoxo

Sister Rodriguez

1. Ed and us on our way home from stake conference

2. Sister Tesch goes home at the end of this transfer so this is the last time I'll see her :(

3. Sister Jones

4. Sisters of the Saratoga Zone (minus my comp who was in her interview and the Fonda sisters AKA Sis camp and Sister Johnson who weren't able to come) 

5. WHOO 

A Manchester Sister

Hello everyone! Thank you so much for all of the prayers this week, I really have been able to feel them. My testimony of the power of prayer has grown so much! 

So I realize I haven't told y'all too much about Vermont! So:

-Everyone uses the side doors. If you go to someones front door, it will freak them out more than if you go to their back door.

-There are Jamaicans everywhere!! I have no idea what it is, but for some reason Vermont is the gathering place of Jamaicans. We teach a lot of them and they're all somehow related to each other. For example: we teach this guy named Garth. A few weeks ago, we met this girl Oneicka and she told us she's related to Garth! We started teaching her. Then a little bit after that, we met this girl Shamoy who lives in the same trailer park as Garth and one night we went over there and Oneicka was there and was like "Shamoy is my sister! This is our dad!" It blew my mind.

- We do a lot of service here! Thursdays we volunteer at a thrift shop and then later at a food cupboard (literally my favorite place ever, it's awesome!), Fridays we volunteer at the Library! (okay the Manchester Library is so beautiful I'm obsessed), and on Saturdays we volunteer at Resale, it's part of Habitat for Humanities (a program that helps build houses for people) that sells used furniture. We also talked to this lady about helping with 'neighbor to neighbor' where we'd visit a lot of lonely people in the community, and we've talked to a nursing home about doing volunteer work there too! We can do up to 10 hours of service a week so we're trying to figure everything out, but it's awesome! Definitely something I want to continue throughout my life. Volunteering is one of my favorite parts about being a missionary. Helping the community is an incredible feeling!

Those are a few of the main things, but I'm sure I'll come up with more later.

 

This week was awesome! So we have an investigator named Kathy. I've never met her because she moved to Florida to help her mom with some family stuff but since I've been here, we've been doing lessons over the phone with her. Well a few weeks ago, we called and her mom answered and we asked if we could read a chapter from the BOM with her (Wendy) and in the middle of it, she stopped us and told us she was crying. Fast forward to Friday night, Kathy has quit smoking and coffee for almost a month, Wendy and Kathy are progressing SO well and committed to a baptism date of April 1st!! We found out that they're planning on staying in Florida and not moving back up here which we thought they were going to. So they've been meeting with the Elders in Florida and went to church yesterday! I am sooo proud of the progress they have both made! I haven't met either of them but from doing phone lessons, my love for them has grown so much. They have the strongest desires to follow God's plan! 

We also met with Brittni she's my miracle story. The one that we knocked on her door the same day that she told her mom she needed help. She's a Less Active that we visited with Sister Martin this week. We watched the Restoration video with her and her kids. Bailey is 16 and her best friend from Logan just moved up here to live with them for a while. Her friend, Kylie was baptized when she was younger but doesn't remember much. They both felt the Spirit so strong during the movie and said they'd pray to know if Joseph Smith was a prophet. We asked them how that knowledge would help them and they gave sincere answers of how it would help them be on the right path and lead and guide them in their lives. I LOVE TEACHING TEENAGERS. It's amazing because this is such a crucial time in their lives where they really need the gospel and it will help them towards an amazing future. I'm super excited to help them come back to church.

Also we met with my main man Ed this week! Ed is super cool. He's been closed off to God for years now but Sister Folkman and DeGoyler OYM'd him a while ago and Sister Folkman and I started teaching him. He always said there was something different about us. He has questions about EVERYTHING because he's such a deep thinker. It's awesome. He says he's not sure if baptism will happen or if he'll choose to go down this path, but since meeting with us, his life has gotten better and that he likes what he's learning. My favorite thing is when we teach someone something and they say "that makes sense" because yes it does! The gospel. just. makes. sense. Also last night, we were reading from the Book of Mormon and Wendy said "this is weird. But I feel like I've heard this before. It's familiar" I'm like "IT'S BECAUSE YOUR SPIRIT KNOWS THIS. YOU KNEW THIS BEFORE YOU CAME TO THIS LIFE" YOU GUYS THE GOSPEL IS INCREDIBLE. 

One of the best parts about being a teacher is when you see your student have the lightbulb go off for them, the moment when an idea makes sense to them and they understand something! Well, the best part about being a missionary is similar. When they get the confirmation that this is good, this is true, this is familiar. It's incredible. 

One last thing! There's a Less Active that sisters have been meeting with consistantly for YEARS and she hasn't come to church. I've only met her once since being here because Sister Folkman wanted to give her a break to see if she would notice the difference between when the sisters are there or not. Well, yesterday, that Less Active came to church for the first time in YEARS. Our branch president said that's the first time that he's ever seen her at church. That was a really cool experience. AND we found out that this Less Active is our investigator, Ed's aunt! They were both at church yesterday. We set up a time to go see this LA and Ed said he wants to come to that lesson with her. IT'S AMAZING HOW GOD HAS A PLAN AND PUTS PEOPLE IN EACH OTHERS LIVES AT A SPECIFIC TIME FOR A SPECIFIC REASON. GOD IS GOOD.  

Funniest story of the week: 

Sister Jones at District Meeting: "Sister Rodriguez! We got the cops called on us this week! And I was like 'I feel like a Manchester sister!'" hahahah isn't that cute? I LOVE SISTER JONES. It was really funny. We have a reputation here. ha, I really do love Vermont though. It is beautiful! The weather is about as bipolar as Utah's but we're surviving. 

Also the scriptures are truly amazing. I read Alma 26 last week and truly felt like that was my experience in Manchester. Ether 12:27 has made a huge difference in my life.  

Love you all! Have a great week, xoxo

1. I was terrible at taking pictures this week but here's a selfie with the Valentine Sister Campbell gave me. I think it's pretty funny the rest are just random VT pictures :)