happy mother's day

Hey family!

 

It was so good seeing y'alls faces yesterday.  :) man I love y'all.  And thank you for the surprise, Sarah. You're the best!  Geez I can't believe how fast time is just flying by.  School is out next week and summer is practically here.  Way too fast I tell ya! 

 

It's been quite the rainy week this week.  Haha we've had to walk in the rain more times than I would prefer, and definitely way too wet.  But that's alright, I love the rain!  My shoes are still wet and smell nasty though!  Goodness, I hope the people sitting around me don't notice.

 

So the exciting news is we got a car yesterday!  I know I mentioned it on the phone, but hey I still wanted to let ya know.  We hardly have any miles though so we're still technically a bus area, but that's alright.  We're supposed to share the car with the North Elders too but they don't have their license at the moment so we get it just for now.  It's so weird to be back in a car from walking all day everyday.

 

Ya know, something sweet I've learned since being back in Baton Rouge is how God has a perfect timing for everything and everyone.  When I was here before we were super focused on less actives because we felt like we needed to strengthen our ward before we could bring anyone into the ward.  I don't know, I guess I was just scared of baptizing less active people to say the least.  But I've learned that everyone has their own timing for coming back to church and it's unique to them.  We went over to see Chandra this week and she told us how she went to mutual with Geneva and how none of the girls were showing any respect to their leaders so then she just straight up told them how they needed to behave and what not.  (and let me just say, someones needed to do it for a while now!)  The next week she went back and none of them had their cell phones out and they actually paid attention.  Chandra is so awesome!  Goodness, I think she's exactly what our ward needs right now.  When she see's something that needs to change she goes and does it.  It's kinda hard to explain but she's perfect for our ward.  She reaches out to others which is so awesome because she'll be able to reach out to the less active people as well. 

 

It's crazy, I've also been reflecting on why I needed to serve a mission, like what was my specific purpose.  And ya know what I realized?  I had to come here and serve a mission to realize what kind of a member I need to become.  For real, without coming out here I would probably never go visiting teaching because I didn't see the importance of it.  I'd never call up a member that wasn't at church just to see how they're doing.  The list would just go on and on of things I wouldn't do.  But that's the biggest thing I've learned.  As a member of the church we not only learn the gospel at church every sunday and in our own studies, but the most important part of that is how we apply it and live the gospel.  The gospel is so much more than just doing the right things.  It's about reaching out to those around you and actually doing the things Christ would do himself.  Aw man, it's so awesome!

 

Anyways, enough about these random things I've been learning lately.  Here's a sweet scripture for y'all.  Jacob 1:7 "Wherefore we labored diligently among our people, that we might persuade them to come unto Christ, and partake of the goodness of God, that they might enter into his rest."  It's as simple as that, if you want rest (rest from your cares, afflictions, troubles, physical, anything) then you have to come unto Christ.  And you can come unto Christ by learning of him and following his example.  When we do such we're able to come to the power of his infinite atonement, therefore truly finding rest. 

 

I love the gospel of Jesus Christ so much.  I love the power that it has to completely change everything.  And I love y'all so much too!

 

Have a great week. :) 

 

Love Always, Sister Schmutz

 

p.s. I'm giving y'all an invitation, read 2 Nephi 31 (it's my favorite chapter :) and think of how you can live the gospel better.  The gospel of Jesus Christ is not only the how we should live, but it's also the why. 

may!

Hey Family!

 

Hope y'all are doing well.  :)  I'm so excited to talk with y'all next sunday!  Brother Maughan said we could come over to his house and use his computer again.  Iris didn't tell us what time would be good, so I have no clue what time to tell y'all.  Will Andrew's ipad be there though?  I'll use Brother Maughan's ipad again to facetime y'all.  Our church is from 9-12 and I'll be sure to call y'all after your church is over. 

That's exciting that McKenzie came home last week.  Tell her I say hey. :)

 

Goodness, this week has been so tiring I don't even know where to begin.  Man I wish I could just go to bed for a couple days and wake up all ready to work again.  Here, I'll explain so on tuesday Gladys Knight and the choir she directs, Saints Unified Voices came to sing and share testimony for our stake and the Denham Springs stake.  It was really stressful because the instructions from the stake and from the mission was different so we ended up running out of tickets we told people we'd get for them and then it took forever to actually get them over to those we had tickets for. 

 

Then tuesday rolls around and we had plans to ride the bus down with Chandra and her family.  The bus system was way off and her bus barely got there in time but then the other bus that we needed to get to the stake center was really late.  So we ended up getting there an hour late for the first show.  We decided to just skip it and go get ice cream and then we waited in line for the later show.  Really frustrating but I'd say it was worth it.  Holy cow the performance was so good too!  Tons and tons of people came and Gladys Knight and her husband shared their testimonies and sang lots of songs, it was really cool.  :) 

 

Anyways, during the fireside they gave everyone programs and on the program you could write your name and address if you wanted to receive a sample cd, Book of Mormon, and the restoration DVD.  And we had to deliver all those within 48 hrs.  So wednesday morning our zone met up to receive all our request cards and packages.  There were all these different stacks for each district.  Goodness, there was one giant stack too.  Haha I turned to Sister Wolf and said, "I sure hope that giant stack isn't ours."  Haha and low and behold it was.  We had 53 different requests cards for our area!  Our ward had the most out of all the wards that came, we had double of any other ward.  Pretty cool but very busy too.  Luckily the zone leaders went on exchanges with the north elders and they double worked the area so at least some of them could have a car.  And then the next day the gonzales sisters came up and we went on exchanges with them so we could use their car too.

 

There's some sweet miracles from it too.  Some people are real excited to learn more and have even already said that this is what they've been looking for.  I'm really excited to see the little miracles from it. 

 

And that's about our whole week right there for ya.  Just walking all over the place to deliver all these packages!  Too many people to see and not enough time I tell ya. 

 

Oh here's a sweet/funny little story for y'all.  So we're walking down the street the other day and this man rides up to us on his bike.  

 

He says, "Are y'all pentecostal?  I saw y'all walking and I knew you were spiritual people so I just had to come and talk to y'all."

 

"No, we're actually missionaries for our church.  The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints."

 

Long story short we gave him a Book of Mormon and he said he'd read it.

 

The next morning we get a call from him!  (His names Elder Taylor)  and he's just asking if we made it home safely.  We ask him if we can come over and talk more about the book we gave him so we schedule a time and head on over. 

 

We ended up being at his house for an hour and a half and the whole time his wife was just preaching to us about how we don't have the Holy Ghost because we don't speak in tongues.  It was strange, but a good experience.  We didn't really even get to say a word! 

 

And then a couple hours later he called again and asked if we could come back and this time we can share with them what we believe since the last time we listened to what they believe. 

 

It shall be an interesting experience for sure!  I hope the next time they'll actually listen to what we say. 

 

Anyways I'm excited to talk to y'all on sunday.  Y'all are awesome and remember to keep reading your scriptures and choosing the right.  Love you!!

 

Love Always, Sister Schmutz 

happy may :)

Hey Family!

 

Hope y'all are doing well.  :) that's so crazy to hear it was snowing yesterday back home.  It's been pretty cool here lately too which is really nice considering we have to constantly be outside.  Man, I tell ya by the end of summer I'm gonna have some pretty funny tan lines.  Don't worry though, I'm gonna be buying some sunscreen today so I don't get too sunburned. 

 

Haha Emily, all I gotta say is don't worry about failing the calculus test because guess who else failed it..haha yep, yours truly.  I'm pretty sure I should've got a zero on the test, but hey I got a one!  (shh you can ignore the fact that one is the lowest number;)

 

Sarah, such a sweet video you sent!  Sister Mills showed it to me the other day.  :)  dude and of course I'll come to the gym with you.  I've gotta work off some of this chubbiness.  Goodness, I don't know what it is with the food down here but everyone soaks their food in butter no joke so practically everything makes you gain tons of weight.  Man, I always say I need to eat healthy or exercise more.  And then the other part of me just says nah, you can do that when you get home.  It's bad I tell ya.  Congrats to you too Mom and Dad on your healthiness!   

 

This week was pretty lame to say the least.  We had tons and tons of appointments with all these potential investigators and every stinkin one cancelled.  It was frustrating but that's alright.  This week is gonna be a really good one!  Oh my, here's a funny story for y'all though.  I got a boyfriend this week!  Hold up, here's the story behind it:

 

So we're going to see this potential investigator and we ride up to her house.  Lots of people are over and they're all sitting outside drinking and what not.  My first thought was, "hmm, I think we should reschedule...looks like a bad time" 

 

Then her neighbor pulls up and is cursing all up in here while getting out of his car. 

 

One of the ladies yells over to him, "Can't you see these are church ladies over here!  Watch your mouth!" 

 

So of course he walks over.  In the meantime Sister Wolf is talking to our potential investigator.

 

And to me he says, "What's your name?"

 

"Sister Schmutz, we're missionaries for our church."

 

"What do missionaries do?"

 

"We go about teaching others about our beliefs..."

 

"What church you go to?"

 

"The Church of Jesus Christ of Later-day Saints. You ever heard of it?"

 

"No."

 

"You want to learn more?"

 

"No I don't." 

 

And then he walks inside the house.  By this point I was just thinking alright, this is really weird.  Then he walked back out and said a couple other things which I won't write and will spare you the details. 

 

And then he says,  "You want to go on a dinner date with me?"

 

"Sorry, we can't date while we're missionaries."

 

"Well when you be done?"

 

"Oh in about six months"

 

"Honey, I got nothing to do, I'll be right here in six months."

 

"I'll be a couple thousand miles away though."

 

Haha and that's about it.  Quite the experience.  :) It was pretty funny and so ridiculous at the same time. 

 

Anyways, on a side note everything is going great!  We were waiting at a bus stop earlier this week and this guy walked by and then came back holding two waters he just bought for the two of us.  Super sweet, I love moments like that.  I love Baton Rouge so much.  The people are crazy but so awesome too.  :) our ward barely functions sometimes but it's like a giant family that I love so much. 

 

Oh yeah, and here's a sweet scripture I wanted to share with y'all.  At this point in the scriptures Nephi's brothers are complaining about all these things because they don't understand.  So he asked them if they prayed and asked God yet and they said they hadn't.  So this was Nephi's answer, "Do ye not remember the things which the Lord hath said? - If ye will not harden your hearts, and ask me in faith, believing that ye shall receive, with diligence in keeping my commandments, surely these things shall be made known unto you." (1 Nephi 15:11)  I like it because it applies to all of us with our questions.  The key that stand out to me is where it says "with diligence in keeping my commandments"  we have to pray and then go do something.  We can't just wait around for our answers to come because that's not how it works.  I know it to be true because God doesn't start helping us until we start helping ourselves. 

 

I hope y'all have a wonderful week.  Y'all are awesome and I love you so much!!

 

Love Always, Sister Schmutz