Sister Stephani Rodriguez: The Trio

What a weird week. Haha I love the trio!!! Sister Moore and Sister Johnson and I had a BLAST this week, it was so much fun!!! It was a crazy week though going back and forth working between Corning and Horseheads the whole week. It was really stressful not being in my area but it forced me to put my trust in the Lord and know that He would take care of these people and help me this upcoming week with more appointments and getting things back into the normal schedule.

It was kind of a bummer week because Sister Moore got really sick. But since we were in a trio we would just drop her off at members houses so she could sleep while Sister Johnson and I went out and worked hah it was weird, but it worked!

Lots of fun things happened this week though!:

-Jennifer was super prepared and willing to pay her tithing after she gets baptized.

-We had a ward party in Horseheads which was super fun and a member from Corning brought his investigator girlfriend that lives in Horseheads so it was cool!

Now for Brittany. This girl is my favorite. She is amazing. On Wednesday we took her to the YW Christmas party and she had so much fun! Friday we were able to read from the Book of Mormon with her over a Facebook skype lesson while we were in Horseheads. Then last night we went over and taught her the Word of Wisdom. She knew that it would be hard to live because of the people she hangs out with. But she committed to live it and at the end she prayed for Heavenly Father to help her live this commandment so she can get baptized! She's so solid and still preparing for baptism next month. I'm pumped for her! Also we were talking about the YW and I asked if she noticed anything different about them. She said "yeah. They're all SO happy." We pointed out that they're all so happy because they live the commandments of God and because they have the gift of the Holy Ghost. I know that I wouldn't be who I am today and how happy I am today if it weren't for the gift of the Holy Ghost and following the commandments of God.

I love this gospel so much!! I've been working on reading the New Testament and I'm almost done! It's so good and I often find so many "pearls" (as President Rogers would say ha) in there! Then yesterday in church (I admit, I was having a pretty rough day yesterday morning just really unsure of a lot of things so I was not in the right mood to be at church or to learn from the speakers. I honestly just sat there trying to tune them out. It was one of those days where if I wasn't a missionary, I wouldn't have been to church. I was pretty bummed.) But luckily the Holy Ghost was working on me. I swallowed my pride and really tried to listen and have a better attitude. One of the speakers talked about her 22 year old daughter that had cancer 3 times and it eventually took her life. This is the scripture that she went back to: 2 Timothy 4:7 "I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith." my pity party was immediately over. I know I'm so grateful to be a missionary and have this precious time to serve the Lord. So one day I can look back and say that I fought the good fight, finished the course, and kept the faith. That's what enduring to the end is all about. That's why Heavenly Father put it in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, for all of us to endure to the end. Sometimes it's easier than others but with faith in Jesus Christ we can endure all things with JOY!

Love y'all and hope you have a good week!!

xoxo

Sister Rodriguez

P.S. I have so many funny quotes from the trio but my favorite thing that happened this week was the elders printed a picture of Elder Vorkink last week and put it on our car. So we took it home and made a shrine for him in our apartment, took a picture of it, printed it out and put it on their car... hahaha good times!

Pics:

1. Bill (Recent Convert) had a shirt on a couple of weeks ago that said "My parents said I could be anything so I became a (bad word)" so I kept teasing him about it and telling him it wasn't appropriate so he said he was going to make a new shirt. So last night we went over and he had this on!! Hahaha the people spelled Mormon wrong so he's going today to get a new one but it was soooo funny.