"I Stand All Amazed" - Monday, January 31, 2022

Oh hello wonderful family and friends! Welcome to another week in the life of a missionary here in Barboursville, West Virginia. This week was full of cold weather, tracting and miracles!

Let's jump in! The most amazing thing happened on Saturday night! We were inviting as many people as we could to attend church with us the next day. We messaged David, not really thinking about him coming to church even though we were trying to invite lots of people. We asked how he had been and he said he had been feeling a little down the past few days. We asked how we could help and he said we couldn't really do anything BUT he would be coming to church the next day!!! It was amazing!! By his own free will he said he would come to church!!! It was the best!!! Sunday morning we showed up to church and David was there!!! I know Heavenly Father sees each of us and He knows our needs. He is so good! (I also got to lead the music for Sacrament Meeting!! I loved it!!)

We had many member meals this week which was a lot of fun! Tuesday we ate with the Garcia's and Sister Garcia made some delicious curry!! It was soooo good! Brother and Sister Garcia talked about their missions and had some great advice for us! They talked about how they were able to attend the temple on their missions. It made me super excited for when I will be able to attend the temple once again. But for now I need to be here in West Virginia helping prepare these people for when they will be able to have a beautiful temple built here!

This week Elder Oilar and Elder Kelson taught at district council! They had us do 2 minute Restoration roleplays! It was pretty exciting and reminded me of being in the MTC! It helped me remember how simple this Gospel message is. It's not complicated unless we make it complicated! That is a beautiful thing about this message that we share. "The Gospel is Beautifully Simple and Simply Beautiful." (Quote from Elder Stevenson, kinda paraphrased)

It was very cold here! It's a different cold than in Utah because of the humidity. It was an exciting new experience! We did our best to break up our time outside. We would spend an hour tracting, warm up, go back out and continue and just push through to the end of the day! It is definitely hard but we just smile, laugh and keep going! Sometimes it's really funny because people will open the door, not want to hear our message, comment on how cold it is, tell us to stay warm and then close the door. We could be warm if you would let us in for a minute! Haha! It's ok! We have fun while we do it!

On Tuesday we had a lesson with our friends Joyce and Ricky! They are a sweet couple. We shared a short message with them and asked if we could come by again and share another message. Joyce said we could call the next week and see if they'd be free! We are hoping we will be able to continue meeting with them. They love the Lord and are so amazing!

We had some time Sunday afternoon set aside for tracting and decided to go visit Jenica! She is a friend Sister George and I met before Sister George left. When we went by yesterday she let us right in and we had a wonderful lesson with her. We shared The Plan of Salvation with her and she compared it to what she believes. It was super cool! We asked if we could continue to come by and she said she enjoys our visits! We are hoping to help her come to understand who Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ are and the goodness this message can truly bring into her life.

Linda is doing ok. Please keep her in your prayers. We are meeting with her this Friday!

Song of the Week: "I Stand All Amazed" Hymn 193. We sand this song in Sacrament Meeting yesterday right before taking the Sacrament. I have been working a lot on daily repentance this past week. Singing this song has reminded me of the beautiful gift Christ gave to us. He suffered for us so we could become clean. He loves us that much! Even when we feel we have failed too many times to be worthy of another chance, He is there lighting our path and giving us another opportunity to try again. As long as we do our best to be better, He will forgive us. Sometimes we mess up on the same things, I know that I definitely have, but Jesus Christ still forgives and helps us try again. He is there! Reach out to Him because He is reaching out to you.

Have a beautiful week everyone!! Talk to y'all next Monday!

-Sister Sariah Francis

Pictures!!!