mardi gras

Hey Family!

 

I'm sorry to hear about all the crazy things that have happened to y'all this week.  I will definitely keep Grandma and Paul in my prayers.  The power of prayer works I tell ya, that's all there is to it.

 

We've had a pretty sweet week here in Baton Rouge!  Oh and hey it's actually transfer week.  The library is closed tomorrow for mardi gras so we're emailing today but we don't find out until tonight whether we're being transferred or not.  So I'll let y'all know next week what the news is.  Sister Wolf and I really hope we'll be staying here together, man I just love this place!  Baton Rouge, I tell ya there's no place like it.  :)

 

Last monday we went down to the captial with our district and then we went to touch the Mississippi.  I'll send y'all some pictures because it was definitely one of the best p-days I've had.  Man I'm gonna miss our district!  Elder Morrow is going home on wednesday and Elder Bushman is flying out to Brazil today.  And then usually one of the office elders gets transferred, so everything's getting switched up. 

 

We went to a Mardi Gras parade on Saturday.  We were allowed to go to one parade during the day and the spanish town parade is the big one in Baton Rouge.  Sister Mills was supposed to come with us but she was sick.  But we hung out with tons of other missionaries.  Haha and boy let me just say it was supposed to be a family friendly parade but it wasn't family friendly at all, haha I never want to go to any other parade.  It was nasty, we'll just leave it at that!  There were tons and tons of people it was crazy.  We did catch quite a few beads though so we have them all hanging from our chandelier in our apartment, it's pretty sweet!

 

Let's see..here's the sweetest story from the week.  Yesterday we go over to see Chandra and we're just talking about all these random things because it's Johnathon's birthday on wednesday and they're having a big party on saturday so she's gotta get all this stuff done before then.  We had planned to talk about baptism and it felt right but when we got there Sister Wolf and I both kinda felt unsure about it because of all the craziness going on with her life.  And she mentions how she's very involved with her church and she can't just leave them hanging because she's in charge of all the media stuff.  And she doesn't know what to do...Then just out of the blue this is what happens. 

"So how was the baptism today?"  Chandra asks. (Catherine Wleh turned 8 so she got baptized right after church and we invited Chandra but she couldn't come)

"Oh it was wonderful, I mean they didn't turn the water on in time so we had to dump pitchers of water to fill up the font.  But otherwise it was all good."

"So you do full immersion for baptism?"

"Yep, we sure do, just like Jesus was baptized."  (go on explaining about the symbolism)

"Chandra why do you think it's important to be baptized?"

Then she goes on to explain all these awesome things of exactly why we need to be baptized.  (follow Christ, always remember him, etc)

"Exactly! all those things you just said, here let's read some scriptures about baptism"  We turn to Mosiah 18 and read when Alma baptized all these people.  And the crazy thing is the scriptures just said exactly what she said for why we need to get baptized!

"How do you feel about those scriptures?" 

And then she just starts crying and says, "That was my confirmation that this is what I need to do."  Definitely the sweetest moment ever!  You have to keep in mind that when we first started meeting with her she kept saying that she needed a spiritual confirmation that this is all true.  She's very religious and knows a lot but she wanted that answer from God, and it just wasn't coming.

"You know, I've been fasting and praying since January and I told God that he needed to tell me if it's true before Easter.  And Easter is in April!"

"So you're saying you know all these things are true?" 

"Yes, otherwise I wouldn't let y'all keep coming over to see me!  So what do I need to do to get baptized?"  Ahh that's every missionaries dream question!!

"Keep inviting us over, reading, praying, and come to church." 

And then Geneva says, "I want to go to church with them!"  It was incredible y'all, absolutely incredible.  Man I'm so excited for them!!  We didn't set a date from them to be baptized yet because she's gotta get things figured out with her church plus they gotta get a ride figured out to come to church.  But hey those are only minor details.  I couldn't be happier.  :) 

 

Anyways, I just want y'all to know I love ya.  And I love being a missionary.  :)  I'm gonna send some pictures home so this email will be a little short, but enjoy the pictures. 

 

Love Always, Sister Schmutz

seems like spring is here

Hey Family!

 

My email is being really weird today and won't let me write any new emails without replying to old ones so I hope y'all get this!  I'm glad y'all are feeling better too and the weather in Utah sounds real nice.  It got up into the 80s here this past week and man it was hot let me tell ya.  I thought I'd be ready for summer but I like the cold weather just a little bit.  :)  things have been going great here though!  How's life treating y'all? 

 

Mardi Gras is coming up so we're gonna be going to a parade downtown this weekend with Sister Mills and possibly the spanish sisters.  Can you believe it, I'm going to my first parade.  Man, I feel all grown up!  Haha but for real everyone can't believe I've never been to any parade before.  Not very many people in Baton Rouge really celebrate Mardi Gras though.  Over in Covington people were putting up decorations two months early and what not.  It's a weird holiday and king cake is nasty.  Geez there's no school for anyone the entire next week! 

 

Let's see, what else has been happening.  So I told y'all that Chandra moved just about two houses south of our area but President said that we can keep teaching her.  She's great and I love her family so much!  It's hard though because they got no car and our ward already has a big enough problem to get members to church.  And then the bus system doesn't run on sundays.  She said before though that they'd take a taxi to church but last week she said they couldn't come on sundays but they'd take the bus to church wednesday nights if we start up bible study again.  I think we'll just need to teach her the importance of church and then they'll make the sacrifice to come.  The thing I've really learned this week is that no matter how bad I want something to happen, it won't happen if it's not on the Lord's time.  I know that Chandra and her family are going to come to church and join the church too and it will completely change their life.  I wish so bad it could be right now, I'd give anything to give them a car to come to church.  But ya know what, Heavenly Father has a plan and we have to trust in his timing.  So in the meantime we're just gonna keep teaching her and doing our best to help her work towards baptism.  Goodness they are just the sweetest. 

 

The same thing kinda applies to Kiwanna.  We hadn't been able to see her in a couple weeks because she was never there and then her phone broke and all these other things.  She's the same way as Chandra.  She wants to do these things but her circumstances won't allow her to at the moment.  So once again, I know it's hard for her to get to church now and it feels like there's so many obstacles to get her baptized but at the same time I know she will be able to when she's ready. It's not on my timing, it's on the Lord's time.  She got a job working at Sonic so hey at least now she's making some money and she really wants to move out which will be really good for her.  Maybe we'll convince her to move within walking distance of the church.  :) well see. 

 

But for now we aren't gonna give up on either of them and we'll just help them prepare for when the timing is right.  Man I tell ya, I love how God has a perfect plan for each of us.  It can definitely be so frustrating but he does know best.  

 

This transfer we've been focusing lots on investigators because all the time here before we were really focused on less actives.  And the thing is it's so easy to find new investigators in Baton Rouge because everyone will listen.  I mean our investigators won't always be here waiting around to find the truth.  Our less actives will always be there, no offense to them, I mean I love them all dearly.  It's awesome though we've given out more Book of Mormon's this transfer than any time before in my mission.  I just love it!

 

Another sweet investigator we have is Andrea.  I think I told y'all about her last week.  She's from Brazil and is the cutest and sweetest lady.  Her and her husband came to the ward activity we had friday night and she really liked it.  She loves for us to come visit her too.  

Sister Banks spoke at church yesterday for the first time in her entire life!  It was amazing too.  :)  haha she was freaking out all week and didn't know what to say. She tried calling all these people to help her but no one really gave her that much help.  It was real good.  She just started temple prep yesterday too so hopefully we can get Sister Banks to the temple soon.  That'd be awesome!

 

It was quite a good week to say the least.  We got to go to the temple on tuesday for our ward temple night and it was so good to be back.  Goodness the peace that comes from going to the temple is unreal.  :)  we walked though the ghetto to find some less actives and met some sweet potential investigators.  Haha here's a story from the ghetto...Sister Wolf is much better at telling stories though so I'm just gonna quote her: 

 

So the other day we're walking down the street. We just came from contacting a lovely fellow who was quite interested in learning and it had only rained a little so we were only a little wet. It was a great day!

WELL, you know that Satan (the little bugar) has to put some sort of kink in things! He doesn't like seeing missionaries happy! So we cross the road and pass by a bus stop. This man comes out of the bus stop and asks us who we are. The man is about 6"2, black, probably 63 years old and has no teeth, poor fellow.

"I'm Sister Schmutz." Sister Schmutz says. He takes her hand and kisses it. Then he turns to me. 'Oh boy, this is going to be interesting.' I think.

"I'm Sister Wolf." He takes my hand and kisses it too. Then he puts his arms around both of our shoulders with him in the middle, kind of like those pictures of those people at the drunk parties with the drunk fart in the middle and two beach babes on both arms. Except we aren't beach babes and this guy was a lot older than those guys in the pictures. Poor Sister Schmutz looked kind of shocked and was just sort of standing there with his arm around her. I really didn't feel like being hugged by this guy so I was trying to step away from him but I couldn't really, especially since he was still hugging my companion and I wasn't quite sure what to do in this scenario.

"Why don't y'all come to my house?"

"We can't, we're missionaries." I say.

"I'm on a mission too." He says. Then he kisses both of us on the cheek. That kind of ticked me off. His breath stank on ice and smelled like bad beer!

"Nope, we can't." I say again.

"Nobody can?!"

"Tell you what, we'll send the Elders and they can come teach you. Take this Book of Mormon and it can teach you how to know Christ better." I take the Book of Mormon out of my bag and sort of shove it at him. Sister Schmutz, (I love Sister Schmutz, have I mentioned that yet? She's awesome!) takes out a pass along card and begins to write down the elders' number.

"Why don't you girls come teach me? I'm by muself and I'm nice!" He says. Sister Schmutz is writing down the end of the phone number when he reaches over and kisses her on the neck! That made me mad. You do NOT kiss my companion on the neck!

"No!" I said.

"I'm nice!"

"If you're nice then you're not gonna touch us!" He looked shocked and let go of both of us.

"Now you take this book and phone number and you call the elders and come to know Jesus Christ." Sister Schmutz handed the card to him and we began to walk away. Then he called us, "Hey, you se that apartment over there? On the corner? That's mine!"

"Ok." we said and walked away.

"It was probably mean to the Elders to give him their phone number..." I said.

"We'll tell them about it at dinner" Sister Schmutz said and we walked away laughing.

That guy was ridiculous and obviously slightly tipsy. It was a very interesting experience but kind of hilarious in a really weird way too.

 

I was reading in 3 Nephi 11 this past week and here's something I really liked, there was this voice that came from the sky talking to them but no one understand. It came again and no one understand. "And again the third time they did hear the voice, and did open their ears to hear it; and their eyes were towards the sound thereof; and they did look steadfastly towards heaven, from whence the sound came. And behold, the third time they did understand the voice which they heard." (v.5-6) The key is they had to open their ears to hear it. That doesn't mean that their ears were blocked, it means they weren't paying attention. It's the exact same way with us and the spirit. We always have the spirit with us but a lot of the time we don't tune ourselves in to hear it. I think it related to what Elder Perkins said at zone conference. We can't just do things when the spirit prompts us to. We must do everything and stop if the spirit prompts us not to.  After all, Heavenly Father isn't going to tell us every single step we need to take, otherwise we'd have no agency.  It's up to us to do something, and he'll stop us if we're going the wrong way. 

 

I just want to say that I love y'all.  And I think you're pretty awesome.  :)  I'm so grateful for the gospel of Jesus Christ and the pattern it has to lead and change our lives.  It's not just the principles we learn, but it's our way of living and effects everything.  Truly wonderful. 

 

Love Always, Sister Schmutz  

belated valentines day

Hey Family!

 

Happy late Valentine's day!  I'm glad y'all are still alive after having to go to the doctor and the hospital so many times this past week.  Goodness everyone is just getting old and sick.  Haha or at least that's what I feel like.  Coming back to Baton Rouge there's a couple people that have cancer now and are sick, it's rough.  But none the less it's been good. 

 

Haha here was the highlight of my week in a short story for y'all.  We were helping Chandra move so it was us, the elders, a couple of her cousins, and then the minister from her church.  All the guys took the stuff we loaded up to the new house and we stayed back with Chandra to help pack up more and what not.  So we're just talking and she's like man, guys sorry this is awkward...my minister is here and then you guys are here.  I didn't tell y'all he was gonna be here and I didn't tell him y'all were gonna be here.  So we were just like nah it's all good he's real nice and it's not awkward at all.  Haha then she says, it's awkward for me!  I feel like I'm cheating on my boyfriend or something!  Haha it was so funny.  :)  I just love that family.  President gave us permission to keep teaching them even though they moved out of our area.  Plus they're gonna be moving up to South Carolina next year.  They still haven't come to church yet and it's just hard because she's super busy.  She even said that they were gonna take a taxi to church because they don't have a car and the bus system doesn't work on sundays.  We aren't gonna give up on them yet though.  I'm excited for them to move to South Carolina because Chandra's friend that's a member lives up there and they will be living like only thirty minutes away. 

 

Hmm let's see, I forgot my planner so I can't remember a whole lot about what happened this past week.  Oh! We did find this sweet new investigator.  Her name is Andreia and she was actually a media referral because the sisters from temple square have been teaching her over the phone.  She's from Brazil and is real sweet.  We got to teach her and her husband when we saw them the other day and they're awesome!  Plus they actually have a car unlike the majority of our ward so they should be able to get to church.  Her husband works with taxes though so he's super busy for a little bit but hey I'm excited for them! 

 

Oh yeah!  here's the best part of my week!  So we get this random phone call from a number we don't know and they left a message just saying to call them back.  They didn't say who it was but I knew I recognized the voice so I thought about it and it was Melissa Lewis!  So we called them back and got to talk with Miranda for a little bit.  Goodness, I love that family so much.  They ended up coming to bishops storehouse on saturday to pick up some food.  It made my day getting to talk with them and see them!  They're gonna miss Miranda so much when she leaves on her mission but I tell ya, it's gonna be the best thing for her family.  The bishops wife in her ward is flying out with Miranda and they're going a couple days early so y'all should totally invite them over for dinner or something!  Remind me to send you her phone number next week.  Miranda said I can come to the temple with her when she goes too so I'm real excited for that!  She's gonna make the best missionary!! 

 

Anyways that's about all, sorry this week not much happened.  But still it was really good.  Man I can't believe how fast time is just flying by the transfer is almost over.  I hate it!  I wish I could be a missionary here forever.  I love the people in Baton Rouge.

 

Y'all are awesome!  And I love you!!

 

Love Always, Sister Schmutz