Richton, MS- Week #55

Good Afternoon Everybody! This week has been super great! I hope y'all have been doing good! This week is transfers already! It always goes by so fast. Sister Saunders and I will still continue to kill it in Sandhill! We are soo pumped! (: I love her to death, we have had a ton of fun together! 

Monday: We had dinner with Sister B again! She is soo sweet. I love that lady! She is always spoiling us every week! We also saw Steve MCcardell, he is such a funny guy! (He is Selena's uncle), but he is so cool! We read the talk by President Monson about choices and it was good! He really enjoyed it! We also tracted for a little bit and taught a lady named Ellen, she was cool! 

Tuesday: We had an appointment with Rhonda (who is our investigator) in the morning, and she wasn't there unfortunately! We usually knock three times before we give up on anyone answering the door and after the third time she didn't come. Well! We started writing her a note letting her know that we were sad we missed her, and then her son (Brian) came out a few minutes after we knocked. We asked him if he would like to hear a message from us, and he said yes!! We taught the restoration and it was really awesome! He answered all of our questions, and made good comments! At the end of our lesson we asked him if there was anyone he knew that could benifit from our message? And right as we asked him his friend (Jonathan) walked by and he called him over to meet with us! So, he came by and we asked if we could share a message with him and he said yes! We taught the restoration back to back AND both him and his friend stayed for the entire lesson!! It was awesome! Thankfully we were able to set a return appointment later and we were soo pumped!! (: 

Wednesday: We had District meeting! Today was probably the BEST district meeting ever!! Sister Elms ( Who was serving in Petal) was going to go home at the end of this transfer! Today was her last district meeting, and so we decided to throw her a death party! Hahah Sister Saunders and I got the table cloth, streamers, made her a death cake, and balloons all together and went early to set it all up! hahah because it was a death party, everything was black of course because apparently that is the color that the world decided would symbolize death! haha it was so funny. We seriously looked all over Richton, (which is like hardly anywhere at all)  for Black ballons!! We went to dollar general, and found some ballons that looked black, and while we were blowing them up they were purple!! We were so sad! Nobody told us what would happen at this DDM, but we were pretty excited! Sister Elms and Sister Williams made programs for the "Funeral". Opening song was "Be Still My Soul" and the closing song was "God be with you till we meet again" and then everything in between was Sister Elms. She had to bear her testimony, teach the lesson, do the mission quote ect. It was so funny! The whole district got to say our "last words" about Sister Elms and it was soo hilarious! Good thing we are smart and recorded this whole meeting! I will see if I can send it to y'all, it was awesome! (:

Thursday: We had a return appointment with a lady we tracted into on Tuesday. er name is Gertrude, yes that is really her name! She is the sweetest black baptist lady ever! Usually, baptist get pretty defensive when it comes to the restoration, and the Book Of Mormon, but she kept bringing up repeatedly how she wanted to remember Joseph Smith name and what he saw! haha that NEVER happens! But she was super sweet and took the Book Of Mormon and we scheduled a time to meet with her again. We are excited to see where it goes! 

Friday: We had weekly planning, and then that night we had a lesson with Ray and Sam again! Sam was the only one who listened to the message this time. We decided we would just read the Book Of Mormon with her, and help motivate her to read it! She is still nervous about reading the Book Of Mormon, and so we just read it to her. It seemed like she was listening so hopefully she will read the Book by the time we come by next time! We also invited her to come to church, and she said maybe. We asked her why not and she said " I have tatooes and I don't have a dress". We explained to her that it is alright and it doesn't matter what you wear because we are all God's Children, and he loves us all perfectly and there is no reason for us to judge one another. She has had some bad experiences with pastors before who have judged her for some things and so she is nervous to go to church again because she doesn't want to be judged. It makes me so sad to see her like this, she is seriously so sweet! Please pray that she will come to church soon! 

Saturday: We went out with Judy Carol in Leaksville and it was super fun! We had an appointment with a lady named Marie that we tracted into last week, and it was awesome! Her son sat in the lesson and was open to the message too. The spirit was so strong in there. Each one of us testified the power of the Book Of Mormon, and we also talked about the Restoration too. It was definitely one of the most spirit-felt lessons I have ever had! It was amazing, until the son spoke up after we were finished and he said "Y'all I appreciate you coming over to talk with us but you stepped over the line. You cannot change the bible, and I don't believe this to be true. " We tried to re-explain the book of Mormon, but it just was not working. We just did not understand how he could be feeling this way especially with how well we felt we delivered the message! We decided that we would still invite them to church and he said he would come. We were happy about that! 

Sunday: We had church and early that morning we had a phone call from Marie's son saying that he didn't feel right that he should come. He felt that it was better for him to stay at his other church. It was another reminder to me that God gave us the best gift he could give, and that was our agency. I had to remind myself that no matter how well we may feel we delivered the message, it doesn't change the fact that he still has to choose. I am grateful that we have that gift to choose! The choices we make will really determine where we go in life that is for sure. We had the Roger's family come to church and it was awesome! They stayed for all 3 hours again! They are feeling more comfortable with the church and branch members which is awesome! There was a guy who came and spoke in sacrament who is going to South Africa on his mission the day Logan leaves for the MTC! I was super excited for him!! He will be going to the MTC in Africa though, still cool!  For the 3rd hour classes, Sister Saunders and I split up and we both taught separate lessons at the same time! She taught Jade the stop smoking program, and I taught Bristol, and Mandy the Gospel Of Jesus Christ. It was really good! We had planned to extend the invitation of baptism today, and we did! They accepted to be baptized on June 18th! We are so excited!! (: Ps- we did have another Sister in the Branch with us in these lessons. It was a great day! Yup, that was my week! Sorry it is soo long! But y'all made it!! Thanks for all you do!! I will attach pictures on here of everything we did. I love y'all! 

Spiritual thought of the week: 2 Nephi 2:27 is the scripture that I have been thinking about all week. We really are free to choose liberty and eternal life or captivity and death. I know that our Heavenly Father loves us so much that he gives us choices, and that these choices will determine our destiny and where we go in life. Thankfully we are given tools to help us along the way. With President Monson I say, "May we ever choose the HARDER right than the EASIER wrong. We will know we have made the correct choice if we choose to follow Christ." I know that to be true! I love my savior, so much. I am grateful to serve with him in his vineyard. He will help lead us and guide us where we need to go. 

I love y'all! Have a fantastic week! (: 

Hey momma! 

This week was good! We were really busy trying to work hard and bring souls to christ! I was thinking this week, sometimes it is hard to be a missionary, we can't always choose for our investigators what to do and what not to do, and it is hard! I love what I do, but at the same time it is tough job. 

It sounds like y'all had a crazy good week though! That is awesome! Except the FLOODING!! Oh my goodness! Not again! I remember it had flooded before I came out a little bit and we had the fan going, hahah I remember that because I got my hearing aid and it was super duper loud! that is one of my last memories back at home. I still remember some things but not everything that is for sure. My memory is kinda blurry when I think about home, it has been so long since I have been with y'all. I miss you guys and love you with all my heart! I think about you and pray for you everyday. I had a cool experience the other day, I just was filled with the spirit, and I just knew y'all were praying for me and thinking about me. I knew y'all really were for a moment. i think it was God's way of letting me know y'all care. Thanks for all you do for me. I really do feel of your love and prayers literally over here. I hope you feel mine. 

Love Always, 

Sister Scott 

Richton, MS- Week #54

Hey y'all!

What a crazy week it has been for us! We have had lots going on this week and been staying busy which is great for us! Hope y'all have had a great week too!

I can't remember every detail of this week unfortunately, and I forgot my journal this time, so sorry!! I will be better next week! Thankfully we took pictures this week so hopefully it will load up this time!

On Tuesday: We went to the Nursing home to visit some really awesome old people! Today we came on party day! They planned to have a "country day" they had a karaoke machine all set up and everything! Of course, Sister Saunders and I feel like we are intruding, and so we were about to leave...NOT! The sweet old people that were sitting in the main room volunteered us both to sing! We still tried to leave, and then one of the elderly ladies said " hey, y'all have to listen to your elders! So come sing!" We are not really shocked they used the "elderly card" but it is a good thing we love them and sang anyways! Also, Sister Saunders was asked by one of the sweet old guys to be her girlfriend! haha it was so funny!

On Wednesday: We had zone training meeting!! I LOVE seeing my missionary friends! In Sandhill we never seen anyone because we are out in the boonies, but we love it here!! It was a good meeting, we talked about the mission culture and the importance of explaining the BOM simply. I love these meetings and the spirit I feel when I am with all the missionaries!

On Thursday: We met with katrina! She is a really nice lady! She works for Miss Gracie, and is super sweet! We taught the resto and felt super good about it that we extended the invitation for her to be BAPTIZED! Yay!! We were really excited about it! The spirit was definitely there and she said she would think about it! Please pray for her! 

On Friday:

 We finished weekly planning! We were pretty pumped about that! Recently, we have not been able to finish our weekly planning sessions because we have had set appointments which is great, but planning is important too! That night we went out to visit a few people and then we came home and usually as a missionary you do your nightly planning, and that is what we had planned to do! Usually we start with a prayer, and it was my turn to say it. Y'all would NOT believe what happened next! I started praying "Dear Heavenly Father, we are so grateful for this day, we are grateful for..." And next thing I know Sister Saunders taps my shoulder what seems to be 20 minutes later and said "Are you okay" and I was like yeah! I was just sleeping! And she said, " Sister Scott you never finished your prayer! You literally fell asleep during the prayer!" hahah oh my, I swear she was dying of laughter. I was super embarrassed! I have NEVER fallen asleep during my prayers. I guess that tells you how tiring missionary work is! It really is a lot of work, but I love it so much!

On Saturday:

We had planned to go to Leaksville, which is about a hour away from where we live. It felt like we were road trippin' together! hahah we had a good time though! My favorite artist to listen to in the car is the "Lower Lights" I am pretty sure they were made for missionaries in the south. It is the best thing ever! I will attach some of their songs on here for y'all to listen too! We were really relying on the map that was hung on our wall to help navigate us around because we don't own a GPS...hahah so Sister Saunders was driving, and I was holding this massive map and I couldn't even see outside because the map was so BIG! It is okay though, we managed to get there in one piece!  We went tracting  and we found some interesting people! One lady named Marie, who we thought would not be interested in hearing our message but ended up setting an appointment, a man who was outside just chilling with tortilla chips chomping in his mouth, and did I mention his mouth was not closed while he was chewing? EW! We already couldn't understand him, but the accent topped it all off! We also met a guy named Alex who was a student attending william carey junior college and it was a great lesson! He actually comprehended which was a good change! He took a Book Of Mormon and said he would read it. After that, we decided to go visit less actives in that area. Sister Saunders and I are not very directionally gifted..but God managed to help us find their houses! There was a family we were looking for, and we couldn't find their house. We were on the right street, but none of the houses had numbers on them! We decided we would tract all the houses to find them. We started at the bottom of the street, and worked our way up! We ended up finding the house but they weren't home! It was super sad! So, we decided to leave them a note, hopefully they will call us and invite us over sometime! Like I said earlier, Sister Saunders and I are both not directionally gifted. Well, we were on our way home and we were confident that we were going the right way, well come to find out we were on the wrong higway!! We were leaving the mission!! It was super scary! We were only 15 minutes outside of our area, but it was still scary! It took us a couple hours to get home, but we still had a blast! We just laughed about it all the way home! 

On Sunday: We had church and the Rogers family came again! We were hoping to extend the invitation of baptism, but then of course, THEY WERE ANTIED! This always happens! We cleared up their questions and concerns, and they were still willing to come next sunday. So grateful for that! Please pray for them!

It was a crazy week, we had a lot of fun though! I hope y'all had a great week. thanks for all your love and support. I miss y'all! Be safe this week! (:

Love, Sister Scott

Richton, MS- Week #53

Good Afternoon everybody!

What an awesome week it has been! I love Mother's day! I hope all of you moms had an amazing day, y'all are amazing! This week I have been thinking of a scripture and I just wanted to share it with y'all! It is one that we are all familiar with, but it basically describes how I hope to live my life, and the way I AM living my life. It is in 1 Timothy 4:12 "Let no man despise thy youth; but be thou an example of the believers in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity." I love this scripture! I came across this scripture during one of my studies and it hit me to the very core! I made a goal to think about this scripture throughout the week and see how I did at the end of the week. I have a very strong testimony of this scripture! I KNOW as we are conscious of what we say, and what we do when we are around others it will have an effect on them! I love my savior and I am constantly striving to be more like him. Striving to be like the most PERFECT person can seem kind of daunting, because we are imperfect. I know that by living by this scripture is the perfect way to start! We can use it as a guide to achieve perfection. I know that to be true!

Some awesome things that happened this week!
 Tuesday , we had a follow-up appointment with a girl we are teaching her name is Diamond! She was super sweet. We taught her the Restoration, and it was awesome! She loved it! We extended the commitment to read the Book of Mormon, and she said YES! She started flipping through the pages and she said, "Y'all I will read 3 chapters before you come back, No, I will read 5 chapters, no, 10 chapters!" And Sister Saunders and I looked at each other and then back at her and said,"Uh..you can just read the Book Of Mormon and we would be happy with that! hahah it was super funny! She definitely has some potential. Please pray for her! (: We also met Elliott while tracting! (He was a preacher's son) but he was open to hearing our message! We taught the restoration, and he was really open about it! After we taught him, we asked him what he thought about the lesson. He looked at us and said, " I think this is worth looking into, I will read and pray about it!' We were super excited! I am telling y'all, I have faith!! He could be baptized!! 

Thursday, We had our Family History Class, and we were super pumped!! We thought it would be a good finding opportunity! It was supposed to start @ 1:30, and we got there early so we wouldn't miss anyone walking in. After a few minutes siting there waiting for people to show up we looked at the clock and it was 1:28 and no one showed up!!! We were so sad. We decided to wait a few more minutes, and then 15 minutes later, Blair walks in!! We never met her before, but she was really interested and wanted to find sources about her family! While we were talking with her she said she knew of 7 more people who would be interested in doing this too! We were so pumped! (: Satan definitely did not want her to do her family history because while we were setting up her account it wasn't working!! We had to give her like 3 or 4 usernames and passwords and it was a big mess! Thankfully we were able to call Salt Lake City missionaries over the family history department to help us out. Now she is on her way! She loves it so far and will be coming back this week to do some more! 

Friday, Is weekly planning! It is a looonnnnggg process. We just plan for everything we are doing for the following week. All of our lessons and appointments ect. We also did 2 hours of service! We helped Miss Gracie (Who is 93 years old)  She asked us to help her clean out her flower vases, candy containers and her silverware drawers. You have to understand Miss Gracie is a hoarder..she can't throw anything away! While we were cleaning her candy containers there was gunk at the bottom of the candies that has been sitting there for who knows how long!! I couldn't even tell you what kind of candies she had, that is how gross it was! And then in the silverware drawers, is where the cockroaches live...EEEWWWW! I don't know what the other bugs were, but it was nasty. Some were alive, some were dead. It was so gross! The funniest thing about all of this is what Miss Gracie was wearing that day, she wore a legit ADULT DIAPER ON HER HEAD! hahaha it was like she thought it was a hat or something. We just kind of laughed to ourselves..we really didn't know how to bring it up to her! She is a sweet lady though.(: 

Saturday,  We went out with Judy Carol to visit some less actives in State line again! She fed us dinner too, it was super yummy! It was my first time having gumbo in a really long time! I was super excited to eat it again! Judy Carol sang for us and she has the cutest country voice, I should have recorded it! We sang together and she said next week she wanted to pull out the karaoke machine and sing some songs together then! hahah I loved the idea of course! I am excited for that! 

Sunday, Is my favorite day. There is nothing like going to church and feeling of the spirit there. I want everybody to experience that!! After church we had lunch with the Price family, and then we went to visit Miss gracie to wish her a happy mother's day, and then we talked with our families! It was the best thing ever. I miss them, so much. They mean the world to me! It was my last one before I come home, so I was sad to say one last goodbye, but then that means I am that much closer to seeing them again! It was a great happy/ sad experience. I love them so much!

Well, that is my week! I hope y'all had a great week too! Feel free to email me anytime! I would love to hear from y'all or you can write me letters to this address at the bottom. I love y'all! I will talk to you soon! Sorry I don't have any pics this week!

Love, Sister Scott

1175 highway 15 south

Richton, Ms 39476

Good morning mom! Yesterday was probably the best thing ever, it was also the saddest thing ever! I loved talking with you. I don't know about y'all, but I always feel empty whenever those calls end. My heart just feels sad for a few minutes, and then I have to pray for strength to do what I have been commissioned to do then get back to work! It is hard at times, but the Lord strengthens me. He hears my prayers and then I council with him and get back on my feet. Thank you for a great call home, I will remember it forever! I meant to ask about the blog, are you still doing it? I was wondering if I can see it? Anyways, I love you! I hope you have a fantastic week! Let me know when you receive my gift (:

Mother's Day letter:

Dear Mom,

Happy Mother's Day! Oh my goodness. I cannot believe that me are already in May.  Time is going by really fast! I will be home in a hot minute! Honestly, I cannot wait to hug you again and just see you! (Not on a screen!) It kills me to not be with you for Mother's Day, but I know that this is where I should be, and people are waiting to hear my message!  Words cannot describe how I feel and yet here I am writing a letter...because I know this is the only wary to convey how I feel.  I just want to say Thank YOU.  Seriously, ya'll have helped shape me into who I am today.  This mission has taught me a lot about who I am, and I love who I am becoming.  You raised me so well, and you raised the boys well too.  I hope that you see the fruit of your labors.  All of the prayers you and dad probably have prayed always included us in hopes that we would grow up strong in the gospel and to be good kids and example to others around us.  I look at my brothers and I  now and we really are making good decisions, and trying to do our best.  Your work is paying off!  Thank you for loving me, teaching me, and loving me enough to chastise me!  You are the greatest person.  I always brag about you, I am so glad I am your daughter!  This Mother's day I wrote you a poem and gave you a SD card full of experiences I had this past week.  My hope is that you will feel like you are with me when you watch these videos!  It is hard to describe and explain the mission, so hopefully this will give you a little taste!  I also have a poem that took me about 3 months to write...we don't really have a lot of time to do stuff like that, but now it is finished.  I love my Savior.  I love serving.  I love giving.  I love the gospel.  I love the joy I feel in my life.  These videos will not do it justice!  But it was the best thing I could think of to give.  Thank you for everything you have done for me! Thank you for all the late night talks, for embarrassing spa moments, time spent on our knees, going shopping, supporting me in school, giving me confidence to do hard things, helping g me realize my divine nature (etc.)  I can go on for days!  This family is lucky to have you!  You are the cornerstone of this family foundation.  We are who we are because of you.  I LOVE YOU!  I miss you so much.  It makes me so sad thinking about it sometimes!  I will see you very soon though...6 more months.  I can do this, only because you believe I can.  Ending letters are just as hard as ending Skype calls.  I love you eternally.

Sister Scott

McKennah's Poem

So many feelings fill my heart,
as I reflect on my decision to depart,
Those last few moments of long warm embraces,
Caused us to think of favorite memories, as tears fell down our faces
This is the hardest thing I have ever done
Couldn't look back, I had to move on
On a mission you adapt to many changes
Will it go by fast? Or will I be here for ages?
I will never forget when they put on my tag,
A feeling of strength & courage; hope these next few weeks aren't a drag
18 months is a long time to be away
We came to teach about one who is mighty to save,
It's an honor to represent him and to have his spirit,
we are searching for those who will want to hear it
to help them understand their divinity within,
and give them an opportunity to be with him again
It is a process of developing charity and faith,
through the Atonement of Christ, it can give  us so much strength,
This is a message of hope we bring,
He can change our lives are we give him everything,
18 months later, I am a different person
I did my duty, I fulfilled my purpose,
I can only imagine the beautiful scene,
as my family reunite, all of our faces will gleam,
we will have our long warm embraces
we have different memories from different places,
This is the moment I have been longing for,
I know all of this will be worth it as we enter the celestial doors.

Richton, MS- Week #52

To all my wardies that I love so much!! I can't help but think of y'all when we pass by this street! Y'all are such a great support to me! I miss you more than you will ever know! 

Good Afternoon everybody! 

I cannot believe it is already May! Time is going by so so fast on me! Sandhill is doing great! A couple of our Branch members are having extremely terrible health problems. Please pray for Sister Diane and Levon for me! He is going into bypass surgery today, and hopefully it will go well! Thank y'all so much! All prayers makes a difference! 

This week I got to go on exchanges with Sister Bartsch!! I have not seen her since we went our separate ways after the MTC experience and so it was a super great reunion! I love that girl so freaking much!! (: 

We went to go visit a lady in the morning and her and her daughter were heading off to Gulfport so we didn't get to see her. However! I got to see Dede again! She is a investigator (NOW CONVERT) who I got to help teach!! It was so awesome! I love that lady! We also got to do service at a thrift store and as a result I got 2 more skirts! YAY! New clothes are the best! It was a great exchange.

We also decided to do a bet where we cannot eat ANY sugar (unless a member offers us some) and so, whoever caves first, loses and then owes the winner a super fun manicure spa day when we get home! hahah it was a deal! At first she originally said that the loser has to stand behind the winner down the escalator at the airport when we go home. I told her Whatever! We will be linking arms all the way down! haha it was super funny. I will keep y'all posted on that. Sister Saunders is in on the bet too so, she will help me keep the deal! 

We also had to fix the car this week..we had a dent on passenger side of the car, and we also had to fix the scrapes on the bottom of the car, Sister Saunders accidently drove into the ditch of the road, but it only scraped the bottom of the car! everybody is okay! This all happened with her last companion and I am just the lucky one to help with the repairs! It rained a ton this week! Our car was in the shop and we were on our bikes! hahah we were super wet some days, but our message is worth sharing no matter what the weather is right?! 

We also had interviews this week with President Olson, I love that man! He helps us so much! He is truly called of God to lead this mission. I had a sweet experience during interviews, President Olson shared something with me that I really appreciated. He read to me what my Stake President said about me, and what my bishop said about me before my mission. That meant so much to me and gave me so much encouragement! I was lucky to have such great leaders to help me make good decisions in my life. He also told me that he truly does believe that baptisms will happen here in Sandhill and he has full confidence in Sister Saunders and I to do the job. It was super awesome! Good meeting all around. Sister Saunders and I also got to see Mr. Bob Buckner! That was the best thing ever!! I loved every second of catching up with my friend! I love him so much! 

We also heard from our Branch President about Milton, he was the excommunicated member that we were teaching, come to find out they don't want us to meet with him because he made some serious transgressions with his wives, and will have to get approval from the first presidency to be baptized again into the church. It totally freaked us out! We hope and pray that he really was sincere and will continue to progress, but we had to hand him off to the branch, it was pretty sad. Whelp! that was my week! We are busy searching and finding those who would like to come unto Christ. We did a mission fast yesterday for all the companionships in our mission, we hope to reap many blessings from that. I love y'all so much! I KNOW that God loves us. I l know that he is absolutely always here for us. He knows every breathe, every pain, every joy, every trial and our heart desires. As we turn to him, he will strengthen us, and lift us HIGHER. I know that to be true from personal experience. Have a blessed week y'all! Have a happy mother's day to all my moms! I had a lot of examples in my life and I am so grateful for that! Happy Mother's day to my Mom especially! She is the greatest lady I have ever known! please hug her for me! Take care y'all!