Sister Ricker

thanks for all the pictures. y’all are awesome.

so this was my first week as a twosome. it went pretty well except my companion was pretty sick most of the week. she tried to ignore it and keep working but we weren’t able to go tracting at all until sunday cause she was pretty nauseous. on friday we ended up staying in all day because she spent the night before throwing up. that was sad cause i want to work but it was also nice because i got lots of personal study time and since i have been out i have realized how much i don’t know. there is so much to learn and so little time to do it in. plus she looked pretty pathetic so it was sad to see her like that. she of course had a priesthood blessing and by saturday she was feeling better. so last week we took it pretty easy but by sunday we were tracting like i mentioned above. and yesterday we were at full force, which feels great.

so we were tracting this street and near the end we knocked on a door and the lady came out. i did my little speal (not sure if that is how you spell it sorry) and when i asked if she would like to hear more she said “yeah sure” i looked at my companion and neither of us spoke for a minute cause well, i hadnt heard that before and it had been a while for my companion. so we set up a return appointment for this week. that is my first return appointment from tracting. exciting huh! next time i will be more prepared when someone actually wants to hear more .

so saturday night i had my first baptism (well kind of). it was bobbi jo’s baptism and i helped teach her up untill tueday when the areas split. but all the lessons were done by then. n-e-ways the baptism was awesome and the spirit was so strong, as to be expected. the best part was the she felt like she needed to bear her testimony at the end. how powerful!
i was sitting behind her and at the beginning it was pretty obvious that she was nervous. she reached behind and held my hand pretty tight till the opening song began. it was just a few moments but i was surprised by what i felt holding her hand. i cant really describe it. i am not a touchy person so at first i was uncomfortable but that passed quickly and i was just grateful to be there. i just taught her for a few weeks but i was so grateful to have been a part of this huge step in her life. i was grateful to have been there for just a short time to help this daughter of God come closer to him through baptism. i was intense. she was looking to me for support in this step she was making. what an honor to be there. i hope that i am able to live up to my calling. i am so grateful to be out here and i dont fully understand it all but i know this is exactly where i need to be and these are the people i need to be helping. i love my Savior and my Heavenly Father and i love to be able to testify of them and Their love of all those i come in contact with.

sister ricker

hey,

so this week was just as busy as the last two.

we have a new investigator who is so ready for the gospel. he called a you man in one of our wards that he works with and he asked him what he needed to do to convert. so of course that young man gave him a book of mormon and called us. what an awesome referral. the man (mike) just said that he has been looking for something more in life and he noticed all the lds people he knows are so happy and they act like a huge family and i wants to know more. so we went over to teach him in the member’s home on saturday and everything we told him he said it just makes sense. he has been reading in the book of mormon and he is just soaking it all up. he just told us “i want to go to you church and i want to learn more”. wow they should all be like that.  and he said “they dont tell me this stuff in my church but it makes sense”. we are teaching him again this saturday and we are really excited.

we are still not sure if we are allowed to continue teaching our muslim investigator (for his own safety). president gave us a list of questions (does he plan on going back to iran, does he have family there, etc) and we asked him but we have a few more things to ask him. we got him a book of mormon in persian so he can better understand what he reads. hopefully we can keep teaching him. he read the pamphlet we gave him but he had trouble reading the book of mormon in english cause it is not his first language.

so as of 1 o’clock this afternoon i will nolonger be in a threesome. we are recieving a visa-waiting sister from the mtc and she will be sister mutz companion. so sister stutz and i will be over only edison ward and the singles branch and they will be over the other two wards. we will still have a car. which i was kind of disappointed to hear. i kind of wanted to be on a bike or walk more but president really takes care of the sisters so they are bringing in another car. it will be nice to have when the weather gets bad. it finally rained yesterday which was nice cause the it had been warming up this last week (in the 100s) so it cooled way down today and it is really windy so once again the weather is nice.

i am excited to have a smaller area. we still have several really good investigators but we will have more time to go out finding more people who are ready. and we will be able to really get to know the ward and work closely with them. i better go my time is up. thanks for all the emails, letters, and pictures. i still need a picture of rane if anyone has one please send me one.

sister ricker

this was better than last week. we taught lesson one to a family that is really interested in learning. they have been reading the book of mormon as a family and attending church as a family. both of the parents had been converts in their youth but both eventually had their records removed due to pressure from the family. after they were married and had several children they realized they had that in common and now they have decided to be rebaptized and raise their children in the church. so, we are teaching their family. they have twin 10yr olds a six yr old, a four yr old, and a brand new baby. we are also teaching his brother and his brother’s girlfriend who live with them. they have also been reading and attending church. the lesson went so well. the spirit was there even though the baby was fussy. they all gathered around with their own book of mormons. we didnt think the kristy (the girlfriend) was even listening but after the lesson she came up and talked to us about how she has had her prayers answered and how important prayer is to her.
we have also been working with bobbi jo. she is going to be baptized on the 23rd of august. she is an amazing investigator. last night we taught her tithing and there wasnt really much to teach her because she was already trying to do it and she already believed that everything she had came from God and it only made since to help others.
random funny moment of the week. so we were at bobbi jo’s and i was playing with her puppy and he was sitting on my lap just sniffing a licking as dogs do and all of a sudden she started sniffing my chest and next thing i knew she opened her mouth she was doing more than sniffing. so basically…i breast fed her dog. not really, but that sure is what it looked like. awkard i know. i pulled her away and my shirt was a little wet. gross! dont worry no harm was done. i can continue my work. i did take a while for all who were present to stop laughing so we could regroup and get the spirit back in the room but the lesson went on.  (if y’all don’t think that is appropriate for the website feel free to edit)
n-e-ways, it is great here. we also had my first zone conference which was amazing. we had elder walker of the 70 and then he spoke at stake conference on Sunday which was also great. we had several investigators present and i hope they felt the spirit as strongly as i did. we did have one investigator with us who has a three yr old and a 10 month old. the kids had a hard time sitting through two hours so that was quite an adventure. we brought snacks for them, coloring books, and a few toys but each thing only kept their attention for a few minutes. plus as missionaries we are not allowed to hold kids or have them sit on our laps so it was hard to keep them restrained enough that their mother could listen. let’s just say we were exhausted by the time we got home.
i love being out here and teaching the gospel. i get such a rush each time i teach by the spirit. we are so busy with so many people we are working with in each ward but it is good. the days are flying by and i cant believe it is already tuesday again. i love my Heavenly Father and i am so honored to be called to serve Him in this great work that is so eternally important. i love this gosepel so much and i want everyone to feel this peace and comfort that i know it brings in to my life. i hope that i can do all that i am here to do.

sister ricker

So it has been a week and i just thought i would full y’all in on the details. i am in the kennewick east stake and i am in a threesome. we are covering three wards and a singles branch. we are living with members (the haffners) which is really nice. i think about 75% of the mission is living members so i will probably live with members my whole mission. since we are covering three wards, we get fed every night and we have exchanges several times a week. the members here are really supportive. the weather is great. apparently this part of washington has about 360 days of sunshine a year. is is supposed to get hotter this week but so far it has been relatively cool for summer. we do have a car since we are covering such a large area but some days we try to work on one ward so that we can walk more and have more contact with people as we pass them on the street and stuff.
the first day we had several appointments and i am surprised by how easy it was to just jump in. it felt so comfortable to open my mouth and put my two bits in. they were mostly follow up appointments but i did get to teach my first lesson a few days later. ahhh! it was awesome. we taught mo at a vacuum shop where he works. we met him there and we came back a few days later to teach him lesson 1. he seemed excited to learn more so we set up another appointment for this week. the gospel is so amazing and i hope that he felt the spirit that was so strong as we were teaching. i am really eager to teach lessons after coming from the mtc. hopefully i will get more opportunities to teach in the weeks to come. we teach but it is different than i had expected. i am working on learning to sit and talk to people and build relationships of trust. y’all know how chatty i am, j/k. there are already a number of people in each ward on the track to baptism and we got 3 new investigators this week so it should contintue to be busy. i am so excited to work with these people and see their growth as they come to know for themselves.
I am so grateful for the opportunity to be out here and teach the gospel. i know my Heavenly Father loves me and I know that is it only through my Savior Jesus Christ that i can return to live with Him again. i am so grateful for the peace and direction that this knowedge brings in to my life and i hope that i can live up to my call to help others gain that same knowledge and peace.

love
sister ricker