This is it!

Well family, this is it.  And I can't even believe it.

It is really hard to put into words how I feel about the last 18 months of my life.  But what I do know is that the decision I made to serve a mission is the best choice I have made thus far in my life.  Being a set-apart representative of Jesus Christ is the most incredible, fulfilling, and meaningful thing you could ever choose to do.  I feel so blessed that I have been able to feel that and see that this last year and a half.  The reason that missions are so special is because they are a front row ticket to watching the Atonement work.  You get to watch the Atonement work in the lives of everyone around you, but most importantly you get to watch the Atonement work in your own life.  Missions are really hard.  And they literally wouldn't even be possible without the Atonement to help enable us to accomplish the things our Heavenly Father has asked us to do. 

I have learned a lot.

I have come to know that Heavenly Father and our Savior Jesus Christ love us.  They love us so much!  They love us each individually and perfectly.  They show their love to us by the tender mercies that we see in our lives everyday, and often times through other people.  They love us so much that they want each and every one of us to return to live with our Father again and be exalted in the Celestial Kingdom.  God knows us better than we know ourselves.  He knows what is best for us and he knows what we need to become better- even if those things are hard.  Jesus Christ understands us perfectly because he has felt and experienced everything that we have ever felt and experienced.  God loved us enough to send us His only Begotten Son, and Christ loved us enough to perform His infinite Atonement.  That is love.

I have also learned that the Book of Mormon is true.  I enjoyed reading from the Book of Mormon before my mission.  But not until now have I come to understand its role in the Restoration and its importance in helping us to learn more about Jesus Christ.  The Book of Mormon testifies of Christ EVERYWHERE.  I truly believe that the real reason that missions are so life changing is because we devote this time to not just reading but studying from the Book of Mormon every single day and helping others to learn about it as well.  The Book of Mormon is how I learned about the Atonement.  There is a special power that comes into our lives as we read the Book of Mormon every single day.  I can't even describe it.  You just have to do it yourself and find out the difference that reading the Book of Mormon makes.  The Book of Mormon is also how we can come to know the church is true and that the gospel really was restored through Joseph Smith.  If the Book of Mormon is true, then Joseph Smith really was a prophet and this is his church on the earth!  The Book of Mormon is a book with a promise.  I have done as Moroni directs and asked God.  I will tell you this much- The Book of Mormon is true.

I have learned that Eternal life= Family life.  Living with God and our families forever!  The gospel blesses families so much!  I already knew that because I have seen what the gospel has done to my own family.  But on my mission I have seen families that don't know about these principles start to apply them, and they are forever changed.  They are happier and they are closer!  When your family starts to live the gospel, you can't even stop the blessings from coming!  Families can be together forever because of the binding and sealing power of the Priesthood.  The authority to act in God's name has been restored to the earth for us today through a prophet.  We can all feel the priesthood giving us power in our lives as we keep true to our covenants.  I am so grateful that I was able to serve a mission because I have been so blessed to have to knowledge that I can be with my family forever and everyone deserves to know that!

Even though missions are full of life lessons and hard times, they are also a lot of fun.  I have met people- investigators, ward members, less-active members, President and Sister Cutler, and especially companions- that have changed my life. Preaching the gospel is fun and it makes me happy.  That really is why I love this gospel.  It brings peace and happiness into our lives.  So while this year and a half has been hard and a huge struggle, I also don't think there has been a time when I have felt happier and more fulfilled.  Serving others, and most importantly, serving God is the best thing we can do. 

Having to leave all of this behind is going to be one of the hardest things I have ever had to do.  But I have learned that God has a plan for each and everyone of us.  I know that God always has greater things in store for us than we will ever be leaving behind.  My mission will be a part of me forever.

I love God.  I love my Savior Jesus Christ. He is the Savior of me, you, and anyone you will ever meet.  Even though my full-time missionary service is coming to a close, I look forward to continuing to serve and love God through out the rest of my life and the rest of eternity.

I love you and will see you soon!

Love,

Sister King

Farewell Sister Hammatt, Hello Sister Kelley!

Hello Family!

Man, this week has been pretty crazy with transfers and everything.  But it has been a really good week too.  The weather is really starting to get pretty cold.  We have got quite the winter ahead of us, folks! 

Sister Kelley and me

So... what you have all been waiting for.  My new companion is Sister Amanda Kelley and she is absolutely amazing.  She is from Riverton, Utah and has been out for about 4 months.  She went to BYU for a year before leaving on her mission and is studying Public Health.  She is the oldest of 4 and they are all brothers.  She served in Wisconsin Rapids before coming to Madison.  She is an amazing missionary.  There is so much that I can learn from her.  We already get along so well and we have a lot of the same goals and are both here to work hard.  So I am grateful for that.  I am grateful that she is the companion that I get to spend both Thanksgiving and Christmas with.  We are going to have a lot of fun and see a lot of miracles.  I can tell.  :)

But... Back to the beginning of the week.

Saying goodbye to Sis. Hammatt

How we really felt about saying goodbye...

The quote wall the Sis. Hammatt and I created of all the funny things that were said this transfer.

Tuesday was just full of goodbyes.  Sister Hammatt had to say goodbye to all of the people here which was rough.  So we spent the day saying goodbye to people and packing.  It was really cool to be able to have one last lesson with Shay.  The three of us have a special relationship together.  Usually investigators go through a couple different missionaries before they get baptized because of transfers and stuff like that, but Shay was just so prepared that it didn't take her long.  So Sister Hammatt and I are the only missionaries she has known.  It has been quite the journey that we had together and I will never forget the things that we learned. 

Wednesday was TRANSFERS!  Crazy.  I can't believe that another transfer has already come and gone.  That transfer sure went by fast.  We got up early in the morning to drive to the transfer point and then the moment that I had been dreading all transfer came... I had to say goodbye to Sister Hammatt.  :(  I really learned so much from her and I am so grateful for the amazing example that she is for me.  I know that she is going to have an amazing rest of her mission in Florida.  But still tough to say goodbye.  Pretty much the duration of the day was spent waiting at the church for my new companion to get here.  From the moment that I met Sister Kelley, I could tell that we were going to get along great.  Still going to miss Sister Hammat, but excited about Sister Kelley.  Also- I was thinking.  I have had 3 companions in all of my areas.  that doesn't usually happen.  But it was nice because I had already had to introduce a new companion to the area before so it was a lot easier this time.  We were able to go to Rachel's house for dinner that night so that was a lot of fun. 

Thursday most of the day was spent weekly planning to teach Sister Kelley about the area.  And then we were able to volunteer at the American Red Cross for a blood drive.  So kind of a slow day.  But still good.  Later that night we were able to meet with Sarah.  She is planning on telling her family over Thanksgiving that she wants to be baptized and she is super nervous about it.  We brought the Bishop's wife to the lesson with us.  She was Sarah's age and dating a member when she was baptized.  And her family is super Catholic as well.  So it was really cool to have her there to bear her testimony to Sarah and give her some tips on how to talk to her family.  We are excited and nervous to see how this Thanksgiving goes for her!

Friday we spent the day visiting a lot of less actives in the area.  We were contacting some people on our ward's "lost sheep" list and we ended up finding this 97 year old woman named June in a nursing home.  When we got there she said, "I was wondering when the church would find me." haha.  June is very active and has a strong testimony but is just too old and frail to come to church.  So we were able to help the ward set up some people to take her the Sacrament on Sundays.  And hopefully we will get to continue visiting June.  :)

Saturday we met with Shay and we were able to teach her the first new member lesson.  We were kind of nervous to see how she would react to a new missionary, but she LOVES Sister Kelley!  So Shay is still doing so well!  She even went to institute this week!  She pretty much just dove head first into this gospel and has loved the blessings that it has brought into her life.   On Saturday we contacted were contacting a potential and ended up finding a family!  We have a return appointment with them this week so you can keep Franklin and Natalye on your radar.  I so badly want to find a family with the months that I have left on my mission.  I have been praying so hard for that miracle to happen and Franklin and Natalye could be it!  :)

Over all, good week this week!  Change is always hard, especially with transfers.  But I am excited about the potential that we have this transfer. 

I hope that everyone has an amazing Thanksgiving this year.  I love this quote from President Uchtdorf from his talk 2 conferences ago about gratitude. 

"We sometimes think that being grateful is what we do after our problems are solved, but how terribly 

shortsighted that is. How much of life do we miss by waiting to see the rainbow before thanking God that there is rain?"

Thanksgiving is an amazing time for us to take a step back and recognize the blessings that God has given us.  But one goal that I have for this Thanksgiving is to work on having more of an attitude of gratitude.  God does not expect us to be less grateful during the hard times that he does during the good times.  We need to continually be thanking our Heavenly Father for the things we have.  Not just once a year on a Thursday in November.

D&C  78:19

 19 And he who receiveth all things with thankfulness shall be made glorious; and the things of this earth shall beadded unto him, even an hundred fold, yea, more.

I hope that you have an amazing Thanksgiving.  Please know that I am so grateful for you and that I will be thinking of you on Thursday!  Love you!!

Love,

Sister King

4 Months!!

Can you believe it was a just a week ago that we were talking to each other???  It seems like a lifetime ago!  Mom- you asked me if I was homesick or if talking to you guys affected the work this past week.  It was actually something that I was really worried about.  I prayed so hard to Heavenly Father to help me continue to be focused and motivated after I got to talk to you.  It was seriously the biggest tender mercy because we ended up having a really good and successful day that day!  So many miracles had happened that day.  I KNOW that if we had had a bad day, then talking to you would have made me feel super homesick and not motivated to do anything.  But because it had been such a successful day, I was excited to get back to work after talking to you.  I know that was a direct answer to my prayer and a blessing from Heavenly Father.  Talking to you actually really gave me the push and the motivation that I needed.  Knowing that you guys are proud of me and that I have so much support from the people that I love most has made a world of a difference.  I know that getting to talk to your family is an experience that is different for every missionary, but I was so grateful for it!

Monday-  Ok so last Monday there were CRAZY rainstorms.  Like seriously some of the craziest weather I have ever seen.  There were 3 flash flood warnings.  Sister Newton and I were lucky enough to be caught outside right in the middle of one, so that was interesting.  But we are alive and here to tell the tale.

Tuesday was Zone Conference and it was absolutely amazing.  I really just can't speak highly enough of the Cutler's and how inspired they are.  They gave us trainings on how important the family is.  That is one thing that I noticed in my setting apart blessing as I was reading it the other day.  It counsels me to preach the importance of families and how we can be together forever as much as I can.  I was grateful for this training because I do want to make families a focus for me personally here on my mission.  It really is the biggest blessing that we get to be together forever.  We also talked about finding "the one" that we were sent here on our missions to find.  I really think that there is at least one person in every area that I serve in that needs me, Sister Courtney King, to find them and share my testimony with them.  I am determined to work hard to make sure that Heavenly Father will always be able to bless me with those specific opportunities.  Zone Conference was awesome because I got to see Sister Tanner again!  Boy, have I missed her.  It was really funny, Sis. Tanner volunteered me and Sister Newton to do a musical number at the zone conference so we decided that we were going to get her back.  Earlier in the week we had sent her this fake letter from an ex-boyfriend pretty much proclaiming his love for her and asking for her hand in marriage.  It was legit!  When we got to zone conference she started telling us all about this letter that she had gotten.  Sis Newton and I started CRACKING UP.  She totally fell for it!  Haha one of my prouder moments... :)

Wednesday was a MIRACLE day!  We found this brand new part member family and they are THE BOMB!  It is this couple that is engaged and they have the cutest little 1 year old daughter and another baby on the way.  The mom, Melissa, is a member and joined the church back when she was a teenager.  She hasn't been coming for the past couple of years because her fiance, Hunter, isn't very religious.  But we got in there and established a really good relationship with them.  We are so excited to start teaching them.  We were super nervous because we knew that a lot was riding on this first lesson.  But then a few minutes after we left we got a text from Melissa that said,

"Thank you so much for coming today.  You guys were so perfect, and Hunter is already excited to see you next week.  I know now for sure that he will join the church, maybe sooner than I thought.  Never thought this day would come."

I can not even begin to tell you how much that text meant to me.  After getting the training the day before about finding "the one" I really think this family could be the one for me!

Later that day we had another lesson with our investigator Tubree.  I think I told you a little about her last week.  The lesson went so amazingly well!  We taught her the Plan of Salvation.  She loved the idea of the Spirit World and how everyone will have a equal opportunity to accept the gospel there.  I have never really thought about that a lot before.  I think I have taken that for granted sometimes.  It really is amazing that our Heavenly Father loves us so much and he is so merciful that He wants to give us every opportunity to make the right choice so that we can make it back to live with Him again.  How grateful I am for the knowledge of the Plan of Salvation!

 

Thursday was my 4 month mark!  That is a good chunk of time!  It doesn't seem like very much when you think about how I still have 14 more months ahead of me, but hey!  My mission is almost a third of the way over!  There is so much that I have to learn and so much that I want to accomplish still!  Time is going by fast and slow all at the same time.  To celebrate we went to Organ Piper's Pizza for dinner with the sisters from Muskego Lakes because Sister Pope came out with me so it was her 4 month mark too.  It is the coolest restaurant ever!  Glad we got to go.

 Friday we met with Fred.  Last week's lesson didn't go so hot.  He hadn't been reading in the Book of Mormon.  But this week was so much better- he had been reading this week!  I don't think that is a coincidence.  Later that night we had dinner at Sarah's house.  When we got there, we decided to invite Tubree over to join us last minute and she ended up coming!  It was so fun!  Tubree and Sarah get along great and their daughters are the same age so they love to play together.  Sarah is so excited to help others learn about this gospel now that she has seen how much it has blessed her life.  We had an awesome discussion about how the Book of Mormon has changed our lives and the Spirit was so strong.  Tubree has started reading the Book of Mormon and has already seen a difference in her life.  It was such a wonderful night!

 

Saturday we had another lesson with Tubree.  She is seriously my new favorite person.  We taught her to Gospel of Jesus Christ and she loved that as well.  She is so golden.  So grateful that Heavenly Father is letting us teach her.  Later that night we went to visit a less-active lady in our ward.  She has MS and lives in an assisted living center.  She can hardly move and can't talk very well.  So trying to talk with her didn't work very well.  Instead, we decided that we would sing hymns to her.  The Spirit was so strong in that room as we sang and it brought tears to her eyes.  There were even some of the workers there that stopped in to listen to us singing.  Such a cool experience. 

 

Sunday Tubree came to church and this time she brought her 16 year old son, Josiah too!  He is way cool and has a lot of potential.  Tubree is seriously the biggest miracle. 

 

That is pretty much it for this week.  So many good things are happening here in West Allis!  Thank you so much for your letters and e-mails!  You are the best!

 

Love,

Sister King