Michael is getting baptized!

Every time Sister Moore and I have been together this last week we have been in unison, synchronized, it is kind of creepy.

Monday,  pday we did laundry and emails and all that jazz. Then we went to Sushi, so good! Then we went to the Pava building. We hung out and played sports. We also went to Family Home Evening at a member’s house for a BBQ. We saw Michelle, she's the one that her boyfriend is a member. She bought her own scriptures and and she and she has been going to all the temple open houses. We want to start teaching her.

Tuesday, we exercised and did our personal studies and then we went to a district council. District Council was super good. Then, I got to go on an impromptu with my best friend, sister Clayton. She got hurt playing basketball on pday and so we called the nurse and the nurse told us to have her stay in bed. We took turns staying with her and going out to work. I stayed in that first long part of that day. We made cookies for people and then I went out to work with sister Burton. She is a doll.

For sacred finding time we tracted a new street. While we worked, we talked about why we’re on missions what happened to get us out here. She is amazing. She truly has such a light and really loves her Heavenly Father and really loves her Savior. We saw a lot of Miracles. We were you able to pick up two people for them to teach. Joe, who is military personnel and loves Jesus Christ. He's not a practicing his religion because he finds error in his church.We started talking to him and introduced him to the Book of Mormon. We testified to him about the truthfulness of it and why we love it.

A similar story, Jackie believes in Jesus Christ and she has two little kids. She reads what she calls the Bible for Dummies to them every single night. We gave her a book of Mormon and she said, great, I will read it to my son tonight . She's excited to learn more and is religious but hasn't been practicing her religion,

I got back with my companion, Sister Moore and then we went and exchanged again with the Lake Skinner sisters. Sister Hansen came with me to YSA and Sister Bradford and Sister Moore worked in Lake Skinner.

Wednesday, June 5th, we got up and exercised and planned and did our studies. We ended up going to college campus MSJC We took Leah with us who just got back from her Mission about a month-and-a-half ago. She served in Jamaica.  The campus was kind of dead cuz it's summer. A little miracle happened. As we walked around campus, a gal named Karmara contacted us because Leah was wearing a Jamaican bag. Karmara is from Jamaica! They talked for a little bit about Jamaica and then we started talking about religion. We introduced the Book of Mormon and we are able to give her one and testify of it. Even cooler is that they were able to connect and they are trying to get together to make Jamaican food and to talk about Jamaica. This has been the biggest push by our mission, to involve the members in our work. We got to see firsthand how easy it is to connect members with the people that we meet and how important it is to include members in the missionary work.

We saw the elders there and so we talked to them for a minute. A guy approached us.  He started talking to us about the identity of Jesus Christ and the Trinity and stuff like that. He just wanted to bash but we stood up and testified of the things we know.

While tracting later that day we met Jay who was actually raised a member of the church.  We asked him why he doesn't come to church. He said, oh I believe it all. He believes in Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ, The Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith/ He believes Russell M Nelson is a prophet. We were confused why this guy doesn't come to church. So, I asked him about the sacrament. He answered, I'm not sure. I explained why we take the sacrament. I explained it is renewing our baptismal Covenants and remembering Jesus Christ, who he is and what he did for us. We talked about how it was cool how he believes all these things, but he needs to act on them. Whether he chooses to change or not, it was nice to testify.

We exchanged back and met with Bishop Taft in Lake Elsinore. We talked about the should be YSA list in their area. Next we exchanged with Morgan Hill sisters.

Thursday June 6th I was at Morgan Hill with sister Vernon.

We went to their District Council. It was about an asking inspired questions. We taught the first three lessons: the restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ; The Plan of Salvation And The Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Later we went to a lady's house, sister Kelly, and started doing Come Follow Me with her. It was super great. It was nice to sit down in a group setting and discuss the life of Jesus Christ, the scriptures and how they apply to us. I loved it so much . She is such a sweet older lady.

While tracting we found a of people. Felicia and Richie. Felicia is religious. We asked her how she developed her faith in Jesus Christ and she talked about little things like praying, reading the scriptures and going to church. We told her that we as missionaries help people come unto Christ and build that Faith. So we gave her a book of Mormon. We invited her to read it and to pray about it.

Richie actually contacted us. He saw us knocking on doors and approached us. He told us about how he found Jesus Christ in his life. He told us how he knows Jesus Christ is there and is real. More people need to have faith like Richie. We also gave him a book of Mormon and a restoration pamphlet. He is moving into the Las Brisas area but we were able to find him and he was amazing.

We went to a family who has experienced a crazy amount of trials lately. They were part of the Paris fire and recently moved here. They also have had a rough time with their son. We read scriptures with them and offered peace and prayers. Then we exchanged back.

Friday June 7th I picked up Sister Olsen and and Sister Vernon and we went to a meeting for missionaries departing June July and August.

It was basically President Thomas doing an exit interview in bulk for all three of our groups who are going home. He testified what was really important, the foundation of everything, 1.1 God is our loving Heavenly Father. That should be the basis of everything and the rest of our lives. That should be the basis of everything for the rest of our lives. He said you've taught it, you've testified of it, now it is time for you to start believing it. We also talked about dating and marriage and finances. That was really fun :/ It was a two-hour meeting of President Thomas sharing what he knows we need to learn before we leave. It was interesting ... kind of mind-blowing ... I have to completely admit I wasn't happy to be there. I do not want to talk about any of that stuff I just want to be a missionary so it was kind of crazy. Afterward, we had lunch and we mingled because it was the last time we'd see a lot of those people.

We drove back and I was happy to get Sister Moore back. We had a lesson with Grace. I shared a favorite scripture that has really helped us out in our missions and will in life. It is in the Book of Mormon in Alma chapter 26

6 Yea, they shall not be beaten down by the storm at the last day; yea, neither shall they be harrowed up by the whirlwinds; but when the storm cometh they shall be gathered together in their place, that the storm cannot penetrate to them; yea, neither shall they be driven with fierce winds whithersoever the enemy listeth to carry them.

7 But behold, they are in the hands of the Lord of the harvest, and they are his; and he will raise them up at the last day.

It brings me so much peace. We are promised that we will not be dragged down by the storm and overcome because of the Lord, because we are in His hands and we are His. It brought a lot of peace to me this last week. Food for thought.

We went and did the mall booth which is fun. We used our little spinny wheel and white board.

We talked to a lot of people and a lot of kids who were able to tell me who God is.

We had district correlation and talk about our friends and how they are progressing.

Saturday, June 8 we went to breakfast with the Chaparell sisters and then went to San Jacinto. We had a pass off lesson with Kathy. We did service with the Riverside elders who we will be working with. We got to know them and work together to help a lady in her storage unit.  I am excited about the change, it will be good. After, we did a passoff lesson with Kathy. We actually put her on date for June 29th. We are excited for her and hope she will be able to progress to that date.

I had to face reality and started My Plan. That was short-lived, two guys walked in the computer lab and started chatting with us. We had a full blown conversation with them about the plan of salvation and the restoration. They ended up taking a book of Mormon and a Plan of Salvation pamphlet. The miracle of that was, I was being obedient and we were able to meet them. We invited them to church. It was cool to know we were there for a specific purpose and realize how God uses us as missionaries.

We had dinner with Elder Anderson and his family. He is a service missionary in the YSA. We had a game night and played apples to apples.

Sunday, I love Sunday, I love church. It is amazing to me. The sacrament is so amazing. We are able to celebrate Jesus Christ every week and worship Him and our Heavenly Father. I am so grateful I get to renew my covenants every week. I am grateful for the peace that comes through repentance. I need it every single day. Kayla, a person we are teaching, came. We have another lesson with her this week. Cory also came. There were also two recently returned missionaries who shared their testimonies and love for their missionaries. The best part about that meeting is we sang Called to Serve. It brings me so much joy and happiness I am called to serve. It has been the most amazing ride and it’s still going. I love you, but I don’t miss you and don’t want to come home. Just know I wouldn’t be mad if they told me I could stay for two years.

We had an amazing lesson. It was on April 2019 General Conference talk from President Oaks, called Where Will This Lead?

“Where will this lead?” is also important in choosing how we label or think of ourselves. Most importantly, each of us is a child of God with a potential destiny of eternal life. Every other label, even including occupation, race, physical characteristics, or honors, is temporary or trivial in eternal terms. Don’t choose to label yourselves or think of yourselves in terms that put a limit on a goal for which you might strive.”

This is important and was also the focus at our meeting with President Thomas. It is making itself evident that God is a loving Heavenly Father and gives us amazing blessings like our bodies, our families, this beautiful world and the gospel. Please remember, do not label yourself. The only label that truly matters is that you are a child of God.

We had dinner with Hunter and his family. His dad is a convert. He shared with us his gratitude for missionaries, he went through 10 years of missionaries and appreciates every missionary who stepped foot in his door. He said missionaries saved his life.

I am happy to share with you that Michael who we have been talking to and teaching for a little while now decided to move his baptism day up to next week, June 21. He has known the church is true for a long time now. He is excited to be baptized. Everyone we tell is surprised because they thought he was a member already.  We also set a second date with him, a date he will go to the temple to do baptisms for his ancestors, June 28th. We are so excited for him. Keep him in your prayers. He has wanted this for a long time but that doesn’t mean the adversary will let him have it easy. We know it will bless his life and we are so excited to be a part of it.

It has been a great week. I feel like I am sprinting around. I am amazed by the other sisters and have learned much from them this week. Sister Clayton is a light. Sister Vernon is the youngest and has four older brothers. She is amazing at teaching and testifying. Sister Hansen is cool and she has a super strong testimony of the Book of Mormon.

I love hearing from all of you! I am trying to soak up every minute I can while I am here.  I am grateful for my Savior, Jesus Christ and the sacrifice he personally did for me. I am grateful for all I am learning and the eternal joy I have found on my mission.

Love you, love you, bye!

Sister Dalley

josie.dalley@missionary.org

Sisterjosiedalley.blogspot.com

Zone Conference - I Feel My Savior's Love

It was a good Monday, we did the normal p-day things. We ended up playing soccer and hacky sack and had a lot of fun. All the sisters from the Temecula and Murrieta zones came. It was fun to be all together. We also practiced our song for Zone conference and did phone work for that day.

Tuesday was May 28th Zone conference and I absolutely love zone conference. It was President Thomas's last Zone Conference of the Carlsbad Mission. Everything about zone conference was kind of sentimental. Everything was just conducted with so much love. I absolutely love President Thomas and everything that he is and everything that he does. As was expected, all of  Zone conference was focused on Jesus Christ and making connections in life and making connections with people. President Thomas talked about the people who we help come closer to Christ. We call those people our friends and our converts. They call the missionaries that teach them their missionaries. He focused on just how much love comes through the Gospel of Jesus Christ and we become connected when we go through stuff together. President Thomas explained he loves us all so much because he was with us during spiritually building experiences and when we were growing and when we were frustrated about our lack of growth. We talked about member work and doing it because we love Jesus Christ. We talked about contacting and doing it because we love Jesus Christ. And we should pray for that love. It was so spiritually filling. We sang “I feel my Savior's love” a very fitting song.

After Zone conference, we went to work. We went by a lot of our should be YSAs and then we got ready for exchanges.

I went on exchanges with the Chaparral sisters, my old Ward. I was with sister Clayton who is like my best friend. She is an awesome soccer player and a Taekwondo champ. We went to the food pantry and I got to see a lot of the people that I worked with every week in my old area.  

Miracle/tender Mercy, while tracting, we picked up Steven and shared the Book of Mormon with him.  He is actually ysa age. We testified to him how important it is in our lives and how we came to find out that is true. We shared how we find peace and joy and happiness in reading it and applying it to our lives.

Sister Clayton is amazing at testifying and teaching. She teaches so personally. We got to meet a lot of amazing people and see a lot of amazing miracles. There was a man sitting at Harveston Lake with his daughter. We went up to him and started talking to him. He told us that he was trying to decide who God is and trying to decide what is true. He had started studying with Jehovah's Witnesses. We talked to him and testified of the Book of Mormon and shared one with him. We were able to explain why we have the Book of Mormon and why it is important to us. We testified how it how it shapes us and can change our lives and bring us closer to Jesus Christ. Miracle!

We also met a lot of people who were not necessarily excited about us being there...

We had a blast and tracting and contacting. She is literally like my best friend, I love her so much. We went and exchanged back and I got to be back with my companion Sister Moore which is awesome because I love her too.

On Thursday, May 30th, we did our studies and we started doing a little bit of weekly planning and then had president interviews. This was my last interview with President Thomas. He took me into the room and we sat down together and he just looked at me and he just said what do you want to talk about?  Literally, our whole interview is just us talking about the sisters that were working with and talking about different life advice he has for me. It ended with present Thomas asking me if he could give me a blessing and of course I said yes. President Thomas gave me a priesthood blessing and it was so beautiful. I love that blessing so much and I love every single thing he said in that blessing. It has truly been one of my favorite honors to be one of his missionaries and to have him as my mission president.

I was low-key freaking out about going home and he laughed at me and said he doesn’t even feel bad for me because he goes home in about two and a half weeks. My new mission president will be President Hammond and apparently, he's super cool and he's super smart. I have been praying for him. It's my goal is to become fast friends with him. But I love President Thomas, he's my mission president and he has changed my life. I was sent to this mission for him.

After interviews, we met with the RS president of our Ward. We talked about how we can do missionary work and how we can have the help of the Lord in missionary work. I love them, they're so cool. We went and did more should be YSA list - lots of work there.

We talked Michael. He's on date for July 20th. He's so cool. We talked about recognizing the spirit and how we can know the truth and when the spirit is talking to us. He's just so elect.

We went on exchanges and we exchanged with the Meadowview sisters. On Friday, May 31st we went to service, yard work at this lady in Temecula to help Sister Bradford and sister Hansen. Shout out to Sister Hansen, cute story - she found my blog before the mission and she and her grandma were reading it. So Sister Hansen knew a little bit about me before the mission.  After yard work, we got donuts at the donut shop cuz you can't go to that part of Temecula and not get donuts.

Then we went to the mall and had a booth. We have a big spinning wheel and on it we have different topics of the Gospel. People spin the wheel and either they can ask us a question or we can ask them a question. A lot of people got Jesus Christ and so we ask them who is Jesus Christ?  Their answers are really eye-opening. There was a little boy. He came up and he wanted to spend the wheel and so he spun it and it landed on Jesus Christ. I said who is Jesus Christ? He answered God. I asked him how he became friends with Jesus Christ and he answered that he prays. He was little, like three or four. It just made me so happy that this little kid had faith in Jesus Christ and he loved him.

Sister Palmer is a really cool sister. She is from Tennessee and she also came out with Sister Kartchner and sister Clayton. So she's been out for about four months. She was trained by Sister Palmer who's also sister training leader. She is so funny. I was laughing the whole day. I literally I love her so much. She's soft-spoken, but she loves to share her testimony. She taught me so much about breaking out of her shell and about not being afraid. She was able to push through that and she is truly is a warrior for the gospel of Jesus Christ.

We also had a whiteboard where we wrote questions. We had people to come and write their answers on it. Questions like how do you find peace and what makes you happy. It is really cool to see people's different perspectives and to testify of what the source of true peace and happiness. It was a really good successful day. We exchange back, I was with sister Moore for approximately a half an hour and then we exchanged again with the Oso Oro sisters. Sister Moore stayed with sister Kartchner and Sister Johnson and I came back to my area. With Sister Johnson, we talked about what success looks like and about building faith in missionary work.

We went to dinner with the elders and with elder Anderson. Elder Will Anderson is a service missionary in our Ward and he brought a non-member friend, Ethan. Ethan has kind of been around for a little bit. The elders shared a video called the Hope of God's light and it was really is perfect for Ethan.

I realized I haven’t talked to you about my dear companion Sister Moore. I love Sister Moore and learn a lot from her every day. She is amazing. She teaches me patience and boldness. Those are things she is really good at.

Also, something that stood out to me this week. I was studying diligence. I found a scripture that sums up my experiences here in California, why I chose to be happy. Here, it is hard to share the gospel because they aren’t as excited as we are about it. This is why I love to work.

Moroni 9:6

“And now my beloved son, notwithstanding their hardness, let us labor diligently. For if we should cease to labor, we should be brought under condemnation for we have a labor to perform while in this tabernacle of clay that we may conquer the enemy of all righteousness and rest our souls in the kingdom of God.”

It is hard to get in with many and have them be excited about the gospel but we are here to labor diligently without stopping. We cannot stop. We have a labor to perform, to conquer the enemy of all righteousness. Every single day every time we step out that door we are entering into the battlefield.

I'm so grateful for the opportunity to fight for God and Jesus Christ and to share their light in there share their Joy and the peace that comes from that. I will not cease to fight for my God and for my savior and we will conquer all righteousness. I've been learning so much and finding so much joy in the scriptures. I want to continue to invite you to study the scriptures, to learn from them, and apply them in your lives. It helps us stay in the right mindset with perspective in the light in our lives and I just love it. I love the scripture so much.

I want to share with you my love for my Savior, Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is real. He is my friend. He is my light. He is my joy. Because of Him, I have no bad days just because of Jesus Christ and because of the opportunity that I had to share his light and his test and my testimony of him. I love you all so much and I'm grateful for all of you in my life. I'm grateful for this opportunity that I have to be out here to labor and to share that light and the gospel with all others. You're amazing and I love you so much!

I'll talk to you later! Love you, love you, bye!

Sister Josie Dalley

josie.dalley@missionary.org

sisterjosiedalley.blogspot.com