Merry Christmas in just 7 days! Wow it's just a week away. That's so fun and exciting, especially because I get the opportunity to see your cute faces! We're going to be skyping at the church using members laptops, so hopefully everything works out and the connection is good. We're going to be using the church WIFI so it should be just fine :)
This week we had a couple miracles that were really awesome. The first one was on Monday. After we emailed we went to the church to plan our missionary thing for the Christmas party. Sister ..... said her and Brother ....... went to ........ house to give her daughter a blessing for the rash that has been on her arms for weeks. We didn't even call them to remind them or anything. They called our investigator all by themselves and went to give her a blessing. It is so amazing how much these members care about our investigators and will take hours out of their week to help people. ......this weekend also said that the blessing helped and they found a medicine that is finally working and that is just so sweet to know that she totally had faith in the blessing before it even happened. The next blessing was on Tuesday. All of our appointments had fallen through, and we really had a desire to teach ....... because it had been a while and she was really getting excited and soaking in what we have been teaching her. She recently got a job which was a blessing from God and an answer to her prayers, which is amazing that she can recognize that, but she works literally every day. At about 12 we got a text from Sister ...... saying that ...... came home early from work and wanted to meet with us! We were so dang excited. That morning we thought it was finally time we could explain about baptism and that she was ready to understand it now that we have taught about other more foundational doctrines. We went and she had actually written some questions down that she wanted to ask. I love that because it means she actually has been pondering and thinking about what we have taught. Her question was "What is Baptism and why does everyone need to be baptized?" Sister ..... face was so happy and I was so happy. It gave us a chance to teach about the Holy Ghost and how it prompted us that morning to meet with her and to plan the lesson that she wanted to know about. She definitely is not ready to be baptized or make a commitment, but her heart is becoming open to it and that is a great miracle to me to someone who at the beginning only knew Jesus Christ as a name. Now he is actually someone important to her and it is amazing. Christmas is definitely different in a climate that is warm and a country where only a small percent actually celebrates it. But what I love is that those who celebrate it REALLY celebrate it. On Saturday was our Christmas party! We have spent the past month of December sharing Christmas messages with our investigators, members, and giving them all invitations for themselves and for them to invite their friends. Saturday morning we didn't have any lessons planned so we went to ..... house to see if she could come, but she wasn't there so we invited her daughter and grandkids to come just because that's what we as missionaries do, just invite everyone :) Then we went to a former investigators house, ...... decided to see if she could come. Her family doesn't really like us, so we were kind of scared we would get kind of yelled at again, but we were blessed and ...... came right out the door and she invited us to share a message with her. We invited her to the party but weren't sure she would come. Christmas parties in America are so lame. We just eat food and talk and maybe the primary kids do a little nativity thing. But in Indonesia for every church it's like a 2 month planned thing. They decorated the church for like 5 hours on Monday, 6 hours on Friday, and all day on Saturday. Everyone participates. Sister Roylance and I had solo's in a song with the Relief Society, then we did a dance with the Relief Society, and then we as missionaries did a thing with Sock Puppets and Chin heads and it was really funny. The Primary did 2 things, the young men and the young women both did something, and the Elders Quorum did this hilarious play of the Good Samaritan and it was just wonderful. Total, there were over 180 people that came! That is so many people in one LDS Church in Indonesia! We had FOURTEEN Investigators and friends of members that we knew come! THAT IS SO MANY!! The Elders also had 8 investigators come which was awesome. ...... came and ........ family came! It was just SO AWESOME to see all of these people celebrating together when not everyone around us here in Indonesia does. They really love and support each other as a Christian community here and I love it. The last miracle was on Sunday. ...... came to church again for the third week in a row. We still didn't know how to invite her to learn with us, because each time we asked she just kind of didn't really answer. Brother ...... also didn't want to force her to learn with us. After Church we went home to eat lunch, and Brother ...... called us and said that they were still at the church and wondering if we could come back to teach ....... OF COURSE WE WILL! So we went back to the church straight away and were able to teach ..... with Sister ......, who is the Relief Society President and one of my absolute favorite members. She just is so friendly with everyone and she was perfect to have in the lesson. Their situations ended up being so similar, growing up with Chinese Buddhist background but starting to learn about Jesus by going to a Catholic Church. They just connected so well and it was so awesome to teach her about the Book of Mormon. She has already read a ton from the Gospel Principles book and downloaded the Gospel Library app on her phone. I have so much hope for her and I just know it wasn't a coincidence for her to get in contact with Brother........again after just being friends in junior high. After we taught ...... we went with a bunch of members and youth to people's houses to go Christmas Caroling! I have to admit it's way more comfortable Christmas caroling in 80 degree weather rather than 20 degrees haha. They want to go caroling to all the members throughout the week, which is quite a big feat when you think about how big the ward boundaries are. With only like 30 families to visit it will probably take like 7 hours, so we'll probably go for a few of them this next week. We're not quite sure what we're doing on Christmas day because it's Sunday and we don't know who would want to have the missionaries over, but we'll figure it out :) On Friday we have a devotional in Jakarta with Bruce R. Mckonkie's grandson or nephew or someone like that with the missionaries in Jawa Barat so that will be a lot of fun. I hope you have an absolutely fabulous Christmas! Remember the Savior in Everything you do and make a New Years resolution about how you can follow his example better in your life. LOVE YOU!!! Love, Sister Davis
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Selamat siang semua :)
Happy Christmas Season! It's been kind of hard to make it feel like Christmas, but last P-day we cut out a Christmas tree and put it on the wall. We also made like 50 paper snowflakes and decorated the whole house so that helped a lot too :) They only have like 8 Christmas songs in Indonesian so that makes it a little difficult, but we do what we can. This week is the Christmas activity for the ward. We are singing, dancing, and the missionaries have to do something else that we haven't planned yet, so be excited for some photos of that. Thank you so much for the pictures and information about the funeral. I would have loved to come and while I was in my bed I thought about how the funeral was just about to start. I've been blessed and it doesn't come across my mind very much. I know the Lord has blessed me to keep it out of my mind during the day so I can stay focused on the work. This week we had some changes in our house! Sister Wheeler went home on Tuesday, Sister Hyde moved to Solo on Thursday, and Sister Jatmiko got her new child Sister Rowntree new from the MTC. It is so fun to have her with us. She is black and was adopted from California but is from Utah. She reminds me so much of Tara with her excited personality and that makes me really happy. We're also little by little cleaning our house even more so we love it there now. On Saturday a member Sister ...... got married! The wedding was just at the church. We get a call that morning from Sister ....... telling us the bishop asked her to sing, so she wanted us to sing with her. We got to the church and she tells us this song that we have no idea what it is, and then she wants us to just sing "Love is Spoken Here" and she recruits the Elders who were teaching a lesson at the church and all of a sudden the missionaries are of course the ones who get to do a musical number at the wedding. So that's something I never thought I would do in my life. Now Sister ..... has a video of us on her phone so I get to be remembered as the missionary who sang at her wedding. Gila haha. Also Sister Joyce came to church! She is the one who had the accident with the boiling water being spilled all down her front. She is finally better enough and she came to church! I have never been so excited to see someone come. We went over to her house yesterday evening and it was just so fun to see how excited she was to be there. At the Christmas party on Saturday she is going to help play the guitar for the song we are singing. It is just really fun to see the joy people feel when they come to church and are continually active in the gospel. Also Brother ...... brought a friend to church last week. Her name is ...... She is Catholic from the school she went to growing up, but she is also really open to know what is true. She has been super busy with work lately so she still hasn't made an appointment for us to meet with her, but she came to church again yesterday and we really hope she will keep coming and we can help her find what she has been searching for, but didn't really know how much she needed or wanted it. I'm so thankful for members here that aren't scared to tell their friends and invite their friends to participate in the gospel. I am so proud of you mom for trying to find ways to share the gospel with others. By doing things that are scary, we show our faith and Heavenly Father will place in our paths ways to bless other people because he knows he can trust us to do our part and share with them the truth. ...... is still great, but getting her to church is the hard part. She has such great faith and is really ready. She got a priesthood blessing from Brother ...... on Saturday and the spirit was so strong. She believed everything he said and I hope that blessing of comfort will give her the comfort she needs in her life to take that step of faith to be baptized and rely on the Lord to help her keep the covenant she will make. For Christmas I'm pretty sure we will skype on the 26 for me and 25 in the evening for you so we can just do it on p-day. I hope I remember my skype account... It's probably just one of my normal passwords so hopefully all works out there. I'll have more info to tell you next week. I love you and hope you have a wonderful week! Everyone get better soon so you can enjoy Christmas healthy and happy. Love you! Heavenly Father Loves you! Make sure to watch the Light the World video and commit to do the little service activities every day. Love, Sister Davis This week for missionary work was pretty great :) Some lessons fell through, but it was a testimony of how great the members are with working with us in Bogor. Overall, every lesson we taught this week was with a member! Every single one. And considering the percentage of lessons taught with members in our mission is usually 17%, 100% is really awesome! Every time, it was literally like the member was our third companion. They were able to explain things we couldn't because of our language barrier, or they were able to relate to a situation that neither me or Sister Roylance could relate to because our experiences are so different. I'm so thankful for the willingness of the members in Bogor to help us with our missionary work. They really have embraced being member missionaries and we are so grateful. Our goal for this transfer is to get 10 new investigators from member referrals. So far it is just the first week and we got 4! It was amazing! That is so much for us and that will just bring that much more of an opportunity of support from their friends when they decide to become a member. So far with ..... she still has a lot of concerns. She is someone who is really hard to commit to anything. She feels like if she commits and it doesn't happen she has failed, so instead she won't commit at all. When we want to go teach her, she won't make an appointment with us until she is 100% sure she is at her house and she will be there when we get there. We are going to finish teaching her all the commandments, and pray that when she knows she has received all the lessons, she will be ready to make that commitment. She is so ready to be baptized, she herself just doesn't know it yet. I love you all. I know Heavenly Father's plan is real. I am so grateful for the joy we can always feel through the Savior. I hope this week can be filled with wonderful memories that can bring joy to you throughout the rest of your lives. Love you! 20 days until Christmas!! Love always, Sister Davis |
Sister Jacqueline DavisSister Davis is currently serving as a missionary in the Indonesia Jakarta Mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. ContactMission Address: Sister Jacqueline Davis Indonesia Jakarta Mission Jalan Senopati 115 Kebayoran Baru Jakarta 12190 INDONESIA Email: [email protected] Prepare to Serve Link: http://preparetoserve.com/indonesia-jakarta-mission Learn more about the LDS Church:www.lds.org
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August 2017
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