Let's see...where did I leave off?

Family <3,

I am currently sitting at zone sports. So, naturally anything with the word "sports" in the title, I refuse to be apart of, so I am sitting on the stage in comfy basketball shorts, sporting a Utah State University t-shirt, and writing to you fine people...

Let's see...where did I leave off? I told you about Sherry right? Well Sherry is doing awesome. We taught her on Tuesday (7/2/13) about the restoration. She pretty much understood everything and accepted it, except for modern day prophets. She grew up baptist so she's been taught her whole life that once Jesus came to the earth that was it...what he says goes and prophets were on longer needed. When we started teaching her about prophets, Sherry's comments were, "Why did they get prophets back then and we don't? That just doesn't seem fair..." Well Sherry, you are right. That wouldn't be fair. As we taught her about prophets she said it made sense but it was just hard for her to grasp. We left the lesson feeling pretty good. We made a return appointment for the following Wednesday (7/10/13). We invited her to read the Book of Mormon and pray to know if it is true. She promised we would see her at church on Sunday. Come Sunday (7/7/13), sure enough, she was there. We were so happy (I would compare it to...I don't know...just a really good day)! During Sacrament meeting she had her Book of Mormon open and we saw that she was in 1 Nephi 10 and she was marking up different verses. This made us even happier :) Wednesday came along and we taught her a little bit of the Plan of Salvation and reviewed the Restoration. She told us that when we had taught her about Joseph Smith and the First Vision that it gave her chills. Wednesday night our ward had Enrichment (they still call it that here...) night. It was a potluck. Sherry came and brought the most delicious chili. There is a less active member that Sherry met the first time she came to church. He name is Pearl. Pearl has not had the easiest life and a lot of that is because of things that have happened in the church. Anyway, Pearl has a  hard time going to things but Sherry always makes sure to call Pearl and see how she is doing. I swear, that woman is more of a member of the church than some of the actual members of the church. She just needs to be baptized :) I love her. We invited her to be baptized on July 27th but she said that seemed soon and she wants to know everything before committing to be baptized. We told her that as she continues to pray, read, and go to church that through her faith Heavenly Father will give her the answers she is looking for. We have another lesson with her on Wednesday (7/17/13). We are going to teach her the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Sister Tew might come along with us, so that should be fun.

We spent the 4th of July with the Goodman's.

They are like our family away from family. They really do take care of us. Anyway, there was a pancake breakfast to start off the day. We were kind of frustrated because earlier in the week a member of the ward came over to visit Betty, the sister we live with. We told this member that Betty wanted to go to the 4th of July breakfast but that we weren't allowed to give her a ride in our car so we asked him if he could find a ride for her. He said, "Sure, happy to do it." Well come July 4th, Sister Bauer and I go Betty up and told her to wait outside because her ride would be coming any minute. We hopped on our bikes and rode to the church. We got there and this member was helping make the pancakes, so we went up and asked who he'd gotten to pick up Betty. He said, "I didn't ask anyone. My wife usually does that but she is out of town..." Wait...What?!?! We were fuming mad. We hopped back on our bikes and rode back to the house to find Betty still waiting outside for someone to pick her up. The thing about Betty is that she has dementia, so she knows that she is waiting for something but she can't remember what. She would have waited there all day. We broke the rules and took her to the church. It wasn't fair to her that she miss out because a member forgot all about her ride.

After the breakfast we had District Meeting. Sister Bauer and I went and got 4th of July cookies to share with our zone. They love us...we are the only sisters in our zone...so that is cool. I don't really know any different, hahaha! Every Thursday is District Meeting and weekly planning, so it was nice that we stayed in for most of the day on the 4th because it would have been hard to contact people: 1. because it is a family day. 2. people get intoxicated pretty early in the day. We had dinner with the Goodman's. We wanted to spend the whole evening with them but we had strict instructions not to "plop", so we couldn't. We ended up going back to their house, and here is why... We planned to go see Pearl but while we were on our way to her house a dog darted out in front of our car (I know you are all thinking we hit it. You can rest easy, we didn't). Sister Bauer said, "That dog is going to get hi--(gasp)--(covers mouth)". I look in the rear view mirror in time to see the dog doing a stiff somersault. We thought for sure it was dead but we decided to flip around so we could at least move the body. The dang car that hit it didn't even stop! As we approached the "scene of the accident" we saw the little dog was still breathing as well as twitching. No one was even stopping so we stopped traffic and rescued the poor pup. I was nerve racking picking it up. Questions, such as "am I hurting it more? What if it decides to die in my arms? Am I emotionally stable enough to handle that?" ran through my mind as I bent down to pick it up (Sister Bauer couldn't help because she has this thing about touching hurt/dead things). Anyway, long story short...The dog didn't die, but it was emotionally traumatized. The owner came riding up on a bike and said, "The first time in seven years this dog gets out and she get hit by a #$!* car..." He picked the dog up in a very rough manner and rode away. uuhhhh...yeah, "YOU ARE WELCOME FOR SAVING YOUR DOG!!!"
We got in the car and suffering from some serious emotional shock, we decided we weren't stable enough to visit anyone so we went back to the Goodman's...sorry not sorry.

The next big event was the departure fireside.The Sunday before transfers they have a fireside where all the missionaries that are leaving have the opportunity to bear their testimonies, and the people that they taught/got close to are invited. The only way other missionaries are able to attend is if they have an investigator with them, or if they are a part of the program. They hold tryouts for the missionaries with musical talents who want to perform a musical number at the fireside. Sister Bauer tried out with her song "Go and Do". She was accepted as part of the program. She really is so talented, plus the APs are obsessed with that song. So technically, because Sister Bauer was on the program, we could have shown up without anyone and no one would have said anything, but we not only had an investigator (Sherry) there, we also had a nonmember (Margaret), a less active (Betty S.), and an active family (the Goodman's). We went above and beyond the call of duty.There was a point in the program where all of the full time missionaries got up and sang, "Bring the World His Truth". That was very cool --chills...almost more so than "Called to Serve" in the MTC. Mama Goodman cried her little eyes out. Ah, I love her.

Transfers were Tuesday. Obviously I stayed. Thank Heavens! Heavenly Father knew I needed to finish my 12 weeks with Sister Bauer.Elder Komoneck is our new District Leader. He is in our ward. He is training Elder Thorup, who came out with me, and now he is training a visa waiter, so he has his hands full, Ha!

Other than the stuff I told you about on email, this week has been kind of slow. We did meet a guy named Christopher while tracting, and he agreed to meet with us on Wednesday. He got his degree in Bible studies and says he knows the Bible is true because it matches up with things found in the history books, and that the Book of Mormon does not. I am nervous that it might turn into a Bible bashing or something, but you never know...I'll let you know how that goes.

We had a Pioneer Day celebration on Saturday and it wasn't even like Utah...Oh well, I got over it.

Sister Brown and Sister Bauer at the Pioneer Day Celebration

We talked to this guy named Gary who grew up Jewish and then converted to Christianity. He had a lot of questions about what Mormon's believe. It was a really great experience and I definitely feel like his faith in Christ increased...at least I hope it did. He is awesome. He created this database where you can get daily readings  from the Bible sent to your email. He said he wanted to put the Book of Mormon on it as well, but his wife would not be okay with that. She doesn't believe we are Christians, in fact his wife had no idea he was at the Pioneer Day Activities. He said she would not be okay if she found out. Anyway, he is awesome and I know we were instruments in the Lords hand by being there to water the seed that has already been planted.

Yesterday was Sunday (7/21/13) and it was a normal day. Sherry came to Church but couldn't stay for Relief Society. She was there for "Our Heavenly Father" lesson in Gospel Principles. She participated. She's elect.

We watched The Testiments with the Janzen's and it was good...until it ended and the spirit left. It is a long story --actually that was Saturday..the days blur together. Sunday evening we ate dinner with the Gallup's...the peeps who called you on Father's Day. They made us enchiladas. Then we went to John and Margaret's and made an appointment to come back and talk to John about Ecclesiastes, which he asked us to read...and 3 Nephi 11, which we asked him to read. I'm excited for this appointment because I really think he will except this Gospel as long as he gets an answer from God that it's true..which he will...cause it is :)

I figure it's time to mail this baby because I have been working on it for a week.

I love you family!!!

I love you, everyone in "cyber world"!

Please give a shout out to Trenidy Thomas!!! :)

The Church is true --Love your missionary, Sister Brown