Now Christmas can begin!!

Merry Christmas to all my family and friends!

I Love being a missionary here in Gainsville!                          

 Mom and Dad sent me snow on Saturday, so now it can finally be Christmas.  Sister Blatter and I listen to Christmas music nothing like Christmas music to get you into the spirit. It still is weird that it's Christmas time.

But any way...

I got the packages!! :) I love the 12 days of Christmas, and I especially love all the pictures on them. It has only been 5 months but everyone looks so much older... :/

I opened up the ten hugs and kisses today. They sent pictures of them hugging and kissing each other. I thought it was a super cute idea!! :)

I have used everything I have opened up so far! :) I have even been good and have not opened up the wrapped presents. Though I showed my companion my really good guessing skills.

After I proved I could tell what was in a wrapped package she told me I was not allowed to touch her presents.

We have been sharing some of the treats with the other sisters that are close by. People just keep giving us treats. I'm going to get fat!!

!

THANKS FOR THE SNOW!!! :)

I made some up on saturday night then put it in the freezer. Then on Sunday morning I took it to our ward mission meeting. There is an RM who just got home from chile and he was just shocked.

He kept asking, how did your parents send you snow!!?!? It was hilarious.I even took it over to the bishops house that evening and stumped all of them as well. They think it's so neat.

Now it can be Christmas, I have snow. 

p.s. how did you know what outfit I was wearing when I got the package?? :)

This week we found 4 new investigators! :)

On Monday night we were walking around an apartment complex and met 3 13 yr. old boys. We talked to them about how they can get rid of the feelings that sin brings into their lives, and they were really excited about that. We taught them to pray and challenged them to pray every night this week. We went back last night to have another lesson. Only one of them was able to meet, but his sister listened in on the lesson too! He said he only missed two days and one of them was because he fell asleep praying. He said that when he woke up at 4 he prayed and then went back to sleep.

His sister was shocked that he had been praying every night. She said that this past week he has changed. That he has become nicer and kinder. Just because of praying!! :)

She continued to tell us that he has anger problems and usually has to take medicine for it, but this week he didn't need the medicine! :)

We might get two new gators tonight! We have two referrals we are going to contact, maybe their hearts will be softened  because of the Christmas season and will want to learn more!

We have had the opportunity to take advantage of the Christmas season and have gone caroling. It was really fun and you could just watch as peoples hearts would soften a little by the Christmas music. 

We are even going caroling for christmas eve and probably a bit on Christmas too! :)

I am so excited!!

Well not much more to report on.

Just had an interview with the president. He is wonderful. I had a question that I was praying about and couldn't seem to get an answer to, so I asked Heavenly Father to tell president what the answer was. I told President my question and he knew the exact answer!! Heavenly Father does hear and answers prayers!!

Our president is so wonderful, he works so hard to help each one of us and I am so grateful for that!

Well I hope ya'll are having the best Christmas week ever!

Love ya soo much!

Love,

Sister Chambers

Humility

Dear family and friends!

This weeks title comes from a less active.

We visit their family once every so often, we noticed that she had a post it note with humility written a crossed it. We liked the idea, so to work on our humility me and my companion write each other post it notes with Humility written on the top and then on the bottom the reason why we need to be humble.

So this past week....

I will begin with monday.

After p-day the Elders forgot to give us the keys to the car, which is a problem because we don't live in the area we work in. So we walked  to a less actives house then came back to wait for the Elders to bike back. 

When we got to the apartment complex we were not sure what to do but we wanted to fulfill our purpose as missionaries so we both prayed really hard that Heavenly Father would put someone in our path that we could help. Well Just like Matthew 7:7-8 says Ask and ye shall receive!

We did! A guy walking his dog asked us for a cigarette. We told him that we don't smoke, then he asked us if we were sisters. We explained that we were missionaries then he said yeah I know, I was raised a mormon. 

This was my face :O

Any who we talked to him and had a lesson with him for a while. The conversation ended with him saying that he would come to church if he didn't have to work.

Tuesday...

There is a sister in a ward next to ours, she has been sick a bunch recently. Because of this they  have not been able to do as much work as they would like to. So on Tuesday we decided to help them out. (After getting permission) we went over and Sister Blatter went out with the non sick companion while I stayed with the other sister while she rested. 

Now she is feeling better and they have some people to visit and teach! :)

On wednesday we went service tracting. We were lead to a lady, she didn't want us to serve her. She did, however, want us to serve her neighbor across the way. So we did.

Turns out that she has been to our ward a ton! Her son is a member but she is not, nor does she want to be, but she is 96 and very sweet. 

Thursday!! We had our Mission Christmas Partaaay! (I mean devotional)

I'm sure most of ya'll saw the video that I posted of our Zone's talent. 

Things like that just keep happening to me here. You sing one song then bam, everyone wants you to sing more. And also I got a ton more friend requests after that. I guess they just think I am cool or something. :) (I probably could use a humility sticker right now)

It was great to see all the missionaries in one place together. Can you imagine a cultural hall filled with nearly 300 missionaries! Because it takes us 2 hours to get to jacksonville the party and travel time was our whole day. Also many sister missionaries came up to me and told me they read my blog before coming out, I'M A LEGEND!!!! (tally up another humility sticker!)

Friday....

I think I had the after the christmas party bug... just kidding, but I was tired.

We planned for our week and then set out on the grand adventure of inviting tons and tons of people to the ward christmas party.

Saturday.

We went to go caroling at the mall, but found out we had to get that approved by the general manager. So we went across the street to the hospital. Unfortunately we could't walk around without an escort so we just sang at the entrance for a while. Later we had our ward christmas party where I sang o little town of Bethlehem. It went well. (humility sticker?)

The party was awesome, people dressed up in biblical garb and they had tons of easy ups covered in fabric, each one was a different thing (I can't find the word I am searching for). One was  bread, another fruit, and my favorite was the pastries one! :)

Sunday Funday!

We went to church, like usual.

We also ate a members home, who made me sing a solo. I think this is going to become a trend....

Some humor highlights for this week.

We took cookies to a less active for her birthday (she is the one with the humility post it notes) Any who she was not feeling well and nothing sounded very appetizing for dinner, except cake.

Her little 2 yr. old boy keep asking her if he could have a cookie, she replied,

"No you can't have cookies before dinner, we are having cake for dinner."

She looked at her husband and said,

"Is that ok, we are the parents, and hey it's carrot cake, there are vegetables in it!"

Oh how I love them! :)

Any who there is my week! We are still excited for the baptism coming up on the 28th! :)

This upcoming week we are planning on caroling, a lot!

Tonight, Friday and Saturday, Christmas eve, and Christmas. I'm going to have very strong vocal cords after this! :)

Well I sure do love ya'll! :) 

have a Cheery week!

Love,

Sister Chambers

That is not important....

So on Saturday we were out knocking doors, ya know the usual for a missionary. 

Any who we knocked on one mans door, when he opened it we began talking about the restoration of Christ's church.

 He then said, "oh we are not from here" (in a russian esk accent, maybe arabic?)

 I said, "oh where are you from?"

He replied, "that is not important."

all while gesturing his hand in a stop motion that slowly descended to his side. 

Yeah we promptly left, incase some other countries spies were worried about our where abouts. 

This week we engaged in a (friendly) competition with the Elders in our zone. 

It worked off a point system. 

New gator=1

Gator with a baptism date=3

So we were really motivated to not only find people but set more baptism dates. 

Unfortunately the Elders won, but that is ok because we really are all on the same team! ;) 

And next time we will crush them. 

We found one new investigator on Saturday night and were able to set a baptism date for Dec 29, She is 20 though and so we will be handing her over to the YSA sisters tonight. We were texting her yesterday to keep constant contact with her. We asked about her praying and she said it went well. We also asked her about her book of Mormon reading. She told us she read it, we asked her how she felt about it. She said that when she read it she felt really different but good. We were so excited! We asked her what she thought that meant?

She replied, "that the Book of Mormon is true!"

AAHHAHAHAHH Soo SOoo SOooOo  Exciting! :) 

Can't wait for tonight's appointment.

So Last night we had a really awesome night as well.

We went to a lesson with a gator named Dylan. He is 23..ish... Well about a year ago he had investigated the church because his girlfriend (now fiancé) is a member. We are not exactly sure why he stopped but that is besides the point. A little while back the fiancé  went to our bishop to ask him if he could marry them in the cultural hall. He said yes and asked her about the guy she was marrying and then asked her if it would  be alright for the missionaries to come by and talk with him. She agreed and then BAM we began teaching him again. 

We had two lessons and were approaching our 3rd. We were not really sure what we were supposed to teach him. Seeing as he has previously been taught.. the first lesson we got to know him and talked about how if they build their marriage on christ it will not fail.

He told us he just really wanted to know more about the teachings of the church, so the next lesson we taught the doctrine of Christ. He really seemed to enjoy that lesson and the spirit was so strong there. We were asking him some questions and he said something to the effect that he believes that it is true. The way he said it though was kind of tricky and we were not sure if that is what he really had said. 

Any who we were just praying so hard trying to figure out what he needs. We both received different answers so we just kept praying. We eventually just decided that the spirit would have to lead us. That we would just have to be confident that we knew the material enough to do an impromptu lesson. So we showed up said a prayer, and just began following the spirit. 

We asked him some questions and then I just felt like I needed to ask him if he believed that it was true. 

He said, "yes."

I think our faces were a little shocked. Not because we didn't think he did believe or that he could believe. 

So he is going to be baptized on the 28th of December!!! 

YEAH!

He could be baptized earlier but he wants to finish the Book of Mormon before he is baptized, that means he has to read 26 pages a day! What conviction he has.

Recently I have been trying to do the commitments I leave with my investigators but something is telling me I don't have the time that is needed to do that one.

We also had the Festival of the Nativity on Sunday.

It was really awesome to walk around and see different Nativity sets. We were able to meet one of our investigators there along with her husband who is a less active member. 

We are seeing soooo many miracles right now at this wonderful season of the Year! 

Also we called one of our investigators on Thursday. Last week we had a church tour with her. We ended the tour in the chapel and just sat there for a moment. She said that it felt so different in the room, peaceful and calm. 

We knew what that was!

I believe I have written you about her before but any way we got a hold of her on Thursday to see if we could visit her. She was busy but she said that she will be coming to Church on Sunday. She said that room was very different and she had to feel that feeling again. 

Oh she is so wonderful. Also the Bishop was able to meet her at the church tour. He is very excited for her and feels like she will be baptized soon. Maybe we will have another baptism this year! :) 

This week on Thursday we have a Mission Christmas party and I am so excited to see some old companions and friends. 

It does not really feel like Christmas without snow, but I like that because then I don't miss home too much! :) 

I love all ya'll!!! Bunches and Bunches! 

Hope your week is merry and bright! 

Love,

Sister Chambers

ps thanksgiving Florida style

Happy Cajun Thanksgivingkah!

So Cajun Thanksgivingkah, that is what we decided to call Thursday.

Cajun because we had deep fried cajun Turkey.

Thanksgiving, because it was Thanksgiving.

And kah because it happened to also be the first day of Hanukah. 

We had a great day! Our ward mission leader invited us to the biggest thanksgiving celebration that I ever did see. 

It was kind of funny because there was a good chunk of people that I am most likely related to there. Ya see there is a man by the name of John Anderson (he is also a former 70!) He was born in Bothwell Utah and he says that my great great grandfather was probably his grandfathers brother. So basically I just was having thanksgiving with the fam!

Approximately 100 people were there. 

We ate tons and tons of food and received a huge amount of left overs. 

They had a petting zoo, a hay ride, the golf ball game, bean bag toss, fire pit and even a BOUNCE HOUSE.

While everyone else went on the hayride me and sister Blatter went and bounced in the bounce house, it was the most physical fun that I have had on my mission I believe. We even planned on wearing tights that day to help avoid any embarrassment. 

Oh also people have been inviting us like crazy to come and eat there left overs. I think I will be eating turkey for another week...

Any who... back to missionary work...

I believe I told ya'll about the 3 investigators that we found on Monday!! Well one of them showed up for a church tour on Saturday and the other two came to church on Sunday!! There is actually a family in our ward that lives close by and they are super awesome and I think that they will be great fellow shippers. 

Also our 14 yr. old investigator was able to make it to a baptism on Saturday. An 8 yr old boy in our ward was baptized and we really wanted her to be there because he would receive the gift of the Holy Ghost right after the baptism. She is baptist and so we have been talking to her about the importance of receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost.

She has not been reading the book of mormon Recently and has been very frustrating. She tells us that she feels the spirit at baptisms and that she really wants to know but she just does not want to do the work to find out the truth. 

We have been fasting and praying about how we can help her and if we need to drop her right now so she can have some time to find out for herself. 

I told Heavenly Father this morning that I was going to drop her and if that was not what he wanted then he would have to intervene. WELL... this morning we got a surprise text from her saying that she is going to be doing some work and research to find out and that she wants to meet with us on Saturday at 3. 

I'm praying so hard that she is ready to be baptized. I hope that she will be able to be baptized while I am here. I am thinking this might be my last 6 weeks in this area. 

Oh also one day this week I just felt like we should stop by and see one of the active members in our area, I was not sure why but we stopped by real quick and talked to them for a moment. Near the end of our visit I felt prompted to just ask about some random furniture that was in a pile down the road by one of the houses. The father told us that a family down the street was kind of going through a rough time, that their house was getting repossessed and that they were living in an old run down home across the street. He then said well maybe you should go and give them a visit and say that I sent ya. So we did.

We began talking to the lady he referred us to and she was very nice, then her husband quickly came to the door. He told us that he was a member, was raised in the church and was looking for  a church to go to here. So we gave them our card, invited them to church on Sunday. Unfortunately they were not able to make it but we have a meeting with them tonight. Hopefully the wife will be interested in learning more about the religion and he husband can help her learn!!

God blesses everyone! All we have to do is keep the commandments and he will bless us greatly!! I have learned a very big lesson this past week about trials. I learned that there really are two types of trials in our lives. Those that come from disobedience, and those that come because Heavenly Father sees that we are strong enough to bare them and that they will help build us up and bring us closer to him. 

I might even venture to say that he blesses us with trials to increase our strength. 

This week I guess Heavenly Father thought I was strong enough to bare a new trial. 

One thought that came to my mind was were is my foundation? Is it build upon Christ? (Helaman 5:12)

How do I know that I have a sure foundation?

Well you know me being the Sheldon that I am (big bang theory for all ya'll who didn't catch the reference) started thinking a little scientifically. 

Well we can know we have a sure foundation if we test it. 

I feel like this trial was a test of my foundation, to help me analyze what my foundation is built upon and to even allow me to build it stronger. 

Well I survived my trial and indeed was able to come closer to my Heavenly Father and Savior as I relied upon them to help me through it.

Now I can testify with even more power that I know there is no trial too big, no problem too difficult, and no circumstance that our savior can not reach us in. He is always there to help us NO MATTER WHAT! 

Heavenly Father loves us so much and wants us to live with him again. He wants that more than anything. (moses 1:39)

Also we were at dinner one night and the patriarch of the family said the closing prayer, in which he said "Father help us to return home safely," before I just thought that that meant to return to that place we eat and sleep in safety, but I now realize that could also mean that we return to live with our Heavenly Father in our Heavenly Home again, in safety. 

My life has changed so much, or rather my perspective has changed so much, and definitely for the better. I love being a missionary. I know I say that every week, but I mean it every week and I only have so many weeks that I can say that. 

This is a wonderful experience.

Before I close this e-mail I just wanted to remind you all to look up Elder Ballard's talk from this past conference. He asked ALL of us to bring someone unto the gospel before Christmas. WELL... clocks a ticking.

Just because ya'll live in Utah does not make you exempt! There are still our brothers and sisters there that need our help! Don't just be a good example, INVITE them to learn more and grow closer to Christ and our Heavenly Father. Invite the missionary spirit into your lives and I know that you will see great miracles and blessings! And this I testify of in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

Love ya'll!

Rock hard, rock on!!

Love,

Sister Chambers

Whilst in Narnia...

Ok so this weeks title comes from last night! 

We had a very awesome day yesterday. During the day we went out to Newberry and explored some new territory. We found a few complexes that we can knock in and located a few less actives homes. :) 

Later we went to dinner and we were treated to a pre thanksgiving dinner.

After we had two kind of appointments...

We went to the one and taught the lesson on the restoration, got two new investigators!! :)

Then we had a potential to go see, so we plugged that right into our GPS, and it took us to this little dirt road and we followed it... and then BAM civilization. Like a huge whole complex of really nice houses!!! it was like going through the wardrobe and straight into Narnia.

Any who we talked to the potential who became an investigator and we have an appointment to meet with her on Saturday for a church tour!! :)

It was a good time.

Later we had transfer calls, I'm going to stay here! with sister Blatter! So basically ya'll need to send me some more mail.

Any who... 

It's been a pretty great week.

We started that with going to a home that was roach infested. Never thought that I would teach the restoration while swiping roaches off my legs. I kept it together, and then we had to shower right when we got home because it was just gross.

This weekend was pretty crazy.

We had a Free chili stand to help others come to the gospel, we met some people but not really many, we are going to try it again in a week or so...

Also on Friday and Saturday we had blitz's.

All the missionaries in my zone got together and went and seen less actives and knocked some doors. We found lots of gators. 

I loved it. I felt more unified and like a team.

Well sooo.... my mind is going blank.
I'm excited for this transfer. Thanksgiving and Christmas, and skyping!!!

Can't wait, but so excited for this transfer and to take on all of Gainesville (for now, later the whole world).

Well I love all ya'll!! with my whole heart!!!!

Have the best week EVER!

Love,

Sister Chambers

Monday Funday!

So this week was a bit rough, we didn't see as many people as we would have liked to, had many appointments drop, and were not able to contact all our new investigators, but hey we had 2 investigators at church and two members reactivated, that's winning in my book! :)

Me and my companion (Sister Blatter) went to see a potential at the store she owns. She was busy so we pretended to be busy looking around and such until she was available. We happened to find two awesome granny dresses that were only 3 dollars so we bought them! We rock them! :)

OH I'M A FACEBOOK MISSIONARY!!!

so I can be friends with my family, they can follow me, but I can't instant message them or anything like that.

It's pretty awesome, I can now send mormon messages to some of my investigators and have more daily contact to help them progress :) I love it!

So last night I cut 3 inches of my companions hair off (with her permission of course) and this morning she cut off another 3 inches!!! :) I am having short hair envy!

Well I'm not really sure what else to tell ya'll...

Our 14 yr old investigator has not decided to be baptized yet... but she is still reading the book of mormon, progressing, and coming to FHE tonight!!! 

There will be a baptism on Sunday for three kids in our ward. Hopefully she can come and feel the spirit at a baptism again and really desire to come closer to Christ and have that feeling more prevalent in her life.

I have been gone for 4 months!!!!! I really can't believe it, I know that in no time I will be back home in the snow. I'm still not sure if I miss the snow or not. Last week you had snow, we just started wearing light sweaters in the morning. Oh the sunshine state!!

This week should be fun, we have trade offs, and zone conference, and our zone is currently teamed up against another zone in a competition to find new investigators. In two days we (as in our zone) have found 18 people who are interested in learning more about the gospel. I know that the Lord is blessing all of our efforts and softening the hearts of the people here so that they will be able to learn more about the gospel. In fact one of the preachers announced over the pulpit to his congregation that the mormon missionaries are great and to let us in if we knock on their doors... MIRACLES DO HAPPEN!

The work is hard, but the work is really good! :)

I love it!

I love ya'll!

Make this the best week ever!!
Love,

Sister Chambers

Now into November!

So we found 6 investigators this week!!! AWESOME! That is the most I have found in one week! Some may not be baptized but I know that others will!

I'll tell ya about a few of them...

One is named William, we tracted all of Halloween because we didn't really have much time to work any way (seeing that we had to be inside at 6pm). 

We started talking to him about Jesus Christ and the Church that he established and how it was corrupted, when the man began to interrupt us and told us that he was Catholic, and I said oh really? Good strong belief in Jesus Christ? He said well... I am actually not really into church now. I don't like how all churches are just becoming businesses. 

DING! 

That's when me and my companion pounced, telling him about how our clergy isn't paid and how we don't believe in church being a business.

He then talked about how he wanted to really see a church serving others. He said like in Haiti, when the Earth quake hit, I wish I just saw people from a church there helping others out and just giving them food.

My companion was quick on her feet and told about a man from her ward who actually flew to Haiti to help out and how our church was actually the first on the scene, flying their own plane there. 

The man was really interested. We proceeded to tell him about the restoration of the Church, gave him a book of Mormon and told him about how it is evidence that the Church was restored, and that Joseph Smith was a prophet. We were about to invite him to read the intro, and a chapter or two when he said yeah I'll read that in two weeks. We were  kind of confused then he realized he was saying he would read the whole book in two weeks!!!! AAAHHAHAHAH!!! GOLDEN GATOR!

We said a prayer with him and we will be heading back on Thursday with one of our ward missionaries. It's going to be awesome!

So on Friday this week we had a conference with a member of the 70 named Elder Zwick, he was very awesome and super spiritually uplifting. He rebuked us, but in a way that made us want to be better missionaries, and then he gave us tips and tricks to empower us even further to be the best missionaries that we could be. 

We heard from him, his wife, our Mission President and his wife, ate lunch, then listened to them some more. That put us at about 4pm. We had a fireside for all the stake presidencies, bishoprics, ward missionaries, auxiliary leaders and so forth at 7 that night so they wanted us (the gainesville zone) to take some other missionaries from other zones (ocala, and lake city) out to tract with us for an hour, then grab something to eat. 

We took two other sets of sisters with us to an area that was close by and just began knocking. Only three people opened their doors for us, but everyone became an investigator. They listened to our message about the restoration, accepted a book of mormon, set a return date and let us leave them with a word of prayer. 

WAHOO! :)

We did go back and see one of them, he said that he doesn't think this is the path that God wants him to follow right now, but that's ok. We will just get him later. A seed planted. 

So that leads us to Sunday. Last week we got a call from our bishop saying he had a new investigator for us. We got ahold of them and set up a time to meet with them yesterday after church. 

The guys name is Dillion, and his fiancé is marissa. Marissa is a member and the two of them will be married in January by our Bishop.

So we talked with them for a bit, found out he had received some of the lessons before but had felt too pressured to be baptized so he stopped investigating until now. 

He wants to know more about the teachings of the church, so we will be teaching more about the gospel of Jesus Christ next week. He is going to read a chapter of the Book of Mormon and said that they would be at church on Sunday!!! :)

AWESOME!

We talked a ton about how if they build their marriage on Jesus Christ it will not falter or fail. We shared with them the scripture Helaman 5:12 and just applied it to marriage. I think they are really excited to be married, and I think she is really excited that he is willing to listen and investigate the church again. We will meet with them next Sunday and I am really really excited.

We are seeing some awesome miracles here! I was having a hard time a little bit ago to keep pushing myself, I knew I was having a trial of my faith, but after the trial comes the miracles in full force!!! :)

Something that I liked that was said at our conference was that Hard things are not bad, they are just hard.

I know that! I know that as we push through our challenges and plead with our Heavenly Father for help, he will help us. He will bless us and strengthen us to overcome the challenges. He never makes our challenges lighter or easier, just strengthens us to be able to endure them and become even stronger from them.

I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!

I LOVE THIS GOSPEL!

I LOVE FLORIDA!

I can't believe we are half way through another transfer. Our next transfer will be the day before Thanksgiving. YIKES! If I leave I don't know what I will be doing for Thanksgiving, but I know it will be awesome!

Oh also our ward fasted and prayed for missionary opportunities this week. I know that there will be a huge amount of opportunities coming to them, and eventually to us ;)

Well now I am just kind of rambling on. 

I hoped all Ya'll had a great and wonderful week, and that you are keeping your eyes open for missionary opportunities as well! 

Love ya'll!

Rock hard,

Rock on!

Love,

Sister Chambers

All Hallows WEEK!

So here comes Halloween and I love it!

It doesn't really feel like Halloween time because it doesn't look like fall here, but oh well.

Oh and we found out that on Halloween we have to go to a members house at 6 for the rest of the evening because it's too dangerous out in the world for us. Apparently some people dress up like missionaries for Halloween and yeah...

This week was a good week to be a missionary. We started teaching the sister who decided to come back to the church and found out a little bit more about her situation. So what will happen is that she has to write a letter, the bishop has to write a letter and fill out a request for her to be re-baptized which will have to go straight to the first presidency of the church. The whole process will take about 6 months, and she doesn't count as an investigator, but oh well :)

She is coming back after all, that is just as good as a baptism.

We had our first lesson on Tuesday then she shared something with everyone in Relief Society.

She began to cry and told everyone how touched she was just from the one time we met with her. I started to tear up. I knew she felt more of Heavenly Fathers love for her, it's those moments that I feel so close to God, I feel how happy he is that his children know they are loved. I love being a missionary!

We met a new investigator this past week and are going to meet with her and her friend tonight. She lives in the apartment of one of our less actives, when she opened the door I just began to teach her about the restoration, and she listened, after she told us that she has not found a church since she started school here, that she really needed what we said, and that she is looking for more in life. AAHHHH!!! She's it, the Golden investigator. Unfortunately because she  is ysa age we would have to hand her over to the ysa sisters, but hey same team! :)

One day we were out tracting, we talked to two men who were sitting on their front porch and they referred us to a lady named Kathy. We fallowed there directions as to which house she lived in, or so we thought. We knocked on this door, the lady opened up and we told her that "the bossy twins" (that's what they told us to call them) had sent us. She had no idea who that was but agreed to let us in! We went in and began to talk with her. We quickly found out she was not interested in learning more about our church, but the Lord lead and guided our conversation to the point where we began to talk about family history. She asked about our family History library and resources and of course we told her all that we knew. We then told her a bit more about how we do work as proxies for the dead, and even told her about sealings. I am not sure why I was lead to tell her about those things but she said that was very interesting and she had never heard it described that way before.
She then told us about how one of her ex sister in laws (a sister-in-law from her previous marriage) was a Mormon and was married in the temple but she never really understood. 

We hope to stop by sometime this week and check in on her. :)

Oh so I guess now I should tell you about our lovely Saturday.

We began by going to the Fall Festival. We dressed up as Elders :) We both wore white button up shirts and created little elder stickers to cover our sister on our name tags. We slicked our hair back and had a grand old time. Everyone thought we were really clever. There was a costume parade for the primary and people made us walk across the stage too. It was awesome. 

We had an investigator come to the fall Festival. She is the 14 yr old girl we have been teaching for a little while now. After the fall festival we watched Joseph Smith prophet of the restoration at a members house and then went to a baptism. After the guy was baptized they opened it up for a testimony meeting and I felt like my investigator really needed to hear my testimony, so I got up and bore it. After she began to really open up to us and told us that before she was not really sure if she was completely open to the possibility of our church being true. She then told us that she could'nt join our church because she was afraid of loosing her friends at her church. We talked about how she just needs to trust in God. We created a plan with her where she will read a chapter of the Book of Mormon everyday for 2 weeks and pray every night, asking Heavenly Father if it is true, then on the 9th of November at noon (she had a weird thing with having it be an alliteration) she is going to tell us whether or not she will be baptized on the 16th! I'm so excited for her to receive answers. Oh she also came to church on Sunday and we helped her make friends :)

Today we carved pumpkins!! :) Me and sister Fenn had a joint effort because if ya'll know me well enough ya know I can't carve a pumpkin in one sitting. :)

Tonight we have 3 lessons!! :)

Can't wait!!

Hopefully by the end of tonight we will have a few baptism dates too!

God is Good!!!

I love it!

I Love you!

Love,

Sister Chambers

Sister Chambers would love to hear from you if you would like to drop her a line here is her address 
1505 Fort Clark Blvd
Apt 16-203
Gainesville Fl 32606

                                               Sister Chambers first companion Sister Atkinson

Sister Chamber an her new Companion Sister blatter

We've got a DATE with our GATOR!!

So I picked up my trainee on Wednesday and by that night I already knew she was a good luck charm. We found two potentials that night and then went to the B.O.M. class. After we met with the Bishop and received blessings, then the Bishop told us that there was a lady who had her name removed from the church a number of years ago, but had gotten ahold of the old bishop of our ward and said that she wanted to be apart of the church again. This means that she needs to be taught all the lessons and re-baptized!!! :) So we met her on Sunday and we are having our first lesson with her tomorrow probably! She will be baptized in two weeks. I know that the Lord will bless us when we work hard, even if it's not the way we are expecting him to.

My new companions name is sister Blatter, but the a is pronounced as a long a, more like an o. 

It was funny though when we were getting our new companions. The President said that Sister Atkinson (my old companion) would be training sister Chamberlain... I laughed so hard, and then when I saw she had red hair my laughter increased ten fold. Then it the took off and the President began to announce the next companionship, and realized that he had messed up on the last one. He said oh no, she just trained sister chambers, she is not training sister chamberlain, she is training sister... (I forgot...opps!)

Any who we got that mess all figured out. Then he was announcing others and he said that one sister was training sister Blotter with an o, so then I thought (out loud) "does that mean there is a sister Blatter with an a? wouldn't that make it BLATTER? and guess what, I'm training her! :)

She is great. She just turned 19 and just graduated high school. She is pretty funny and we get along just grand!

I can't wait to see all the miracles that happen during our companionship.

Also there is another set of sister missionaries in my ward. Making 3 sets of missionaries. We have had to split up the areas so now we are getting used to the new area. It is kind of hard to give up some investigators and less actives that I have been working with for so long but I know that the Lord has a plan for them and that these lovely sisters will help them come closer to our savior! :)

Well last night we had a musical fireside and I performed( How can I keep from singing). It was a great night. A few people in the ward had friends with them who were not of our faith and hopefully they will want to know more soon. I think because it went so well we will be having a stake musical fireside sometime soon!

We do need to find some new investigators in our new area so we will be doing a lot of tracting and searching and I know that we will find those whom the Lord has prepared!! :)

Being a trainer is hard because you basically have to do all the planning, and I am no bueno at planning but I know that if we bring our weaknesses before the Lord he will help us to make them our strengths, so hopefully I will be a better planner soon!

OOOHHHH

On Saturday there was an article in the Newspapers about some missionaries in our area! The article was front page and went on to a whole other page! It was the most read and the most shared article this weekend! HOPEFULLY more people will come to us and ask us more about the gospel, that would just be wonderful!! 

http://www.gainesville.com/article/20131019/articles/131019560

I know that the Lord is preparing these people here, just in the past 3 months I have seen some major changes in the peoples attitudes. GOD is GOOD!

Love Ya'll!

Hope Ya'll have the most wonderful and splendid week ever!! 

Love,

Sister Chambers

on to the Evangelists‏ (week11)

So yesterday we went to an evangelical church. It was pretty good, they stood and sang for a long time, a lady shared a "testimony" (it was more like a story) about being a mother. Then a guy read this handout thing which was very very similar to the family a proclamation to the world and then went over the roles of husbands and wives. Then we sang a ton more, than they had a barbeque, but we were fasting so we just left early. Overall it was pretty good!
The lady who invited us came with us to sacrament meeting which was our fast and testimony meeting as well. 

She said it was pretty interesting and then asked me if it was like that all the time, I told her we have a meeting like that once a month but the sacrament we take each week. Something that people do down here is called the Lords supper, which is like the sacrament, but they only do like once a month. She had some more questions but we had to take off to teach gospel principles class. I told her we would love to come by and explain a little bit more if she would like us to, and she invited us over for dinner on friday!! :) Being fed by an investigator, boo yeah! 

ANY WHO, by the end of my mission I will know SOOOO much about other religions! I will be able to ace any religion course! :)

Oh we were running low on miles this month so to save miles we have been walking quite a bit! One day we walked about 7 miles and my feet felt deflated for the rest of the week. Luckily a new month is coming up and we can use our car more. I have never been as appreciative of a car as I am now. I also realized how we can visit SOOO many more people when we can drive to them instead of walking, cars save so much time.

The Relief Society Broadcast was amazing!! we even had a lady in our ward invite a friend who she thinks would really love to be a member of the church so hopefully we can have a lesson with their family this week and have them watch conference this weekend. If you can count on anyone to help people become converted it's the prophet and apostles! It was really interesting how frequently keeping our covenants came up. 

So here is a really cool story for this week...

There is a lady in our ward who we LOVE! She has been having some struggles recently and on Sunday was really stressed out. She could hardly sleep and was in her room crying her eyes out and praying to Heavenly Father. She said that she needed help and he needed to send someone or she wouldn't go to church.

Meanwhile me and my companion were on our way to the Evangelical church (which was on the other side of town) when my companion decides that we really need to go see this member, and I agree.

We knocked on her door and told her that she better let us in. Her young son finally after a few minutes let us in. We walked upstairs and talked to her and talked her out of going to work and made sure that she came to church. 

When we left she texted us what she had been doing not even 5 minutes before.  

It was so neat to know that she really needed us at that moment in time and the Lord sent the impression to my companion to go see her. 

THERE ARE MIRACLES EVERYDAY!

well the trinity is still frustrating me!

How could God and Jesus be the same? 

Why would God say this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased at the baptism of Jesus if they were really the same person?

And who exactly would Jesus be praying to in the garden of Gethsemane? 

GAAHHH!

Mans philosophies.

So now for a funny story.

Last night we were teaching an investigator, he is the one who's girlfriend was less active but is now really active. Any way they have a 7 yr old and 6 yr old girls. We were looking at a picture of the Salt Lake temple and we asked her what she knew about temples. She replied...

"Well all I know is that George Washington is on the top and he's gold." 

BA HA HA

my companion replied,

"yeah, George Washington, angel moroni, same thing."

That little girl is my favorite!

Fall is on its way... for everyone who doesn't live in Florida. For everyone here it's still as green as ever, very warm too. It going to be 14 month of never ending summer... I'm not sure how I feel about this exactly, but I'm pretty sure I don't like it.

Halloween is going to be here before I know it, and then it will be gone.

I think I might go as a missionary this year, or my companion, not sure which one yet :)

I WOULD REALLY LOVE FOR YOU ALL TO SEND ME PICTURES, E-MAILS AND REAL ONES!
 

Especially the Family pictures!!

Well I hope everyone prepares some questions to be answered at conference this upcoming weekend! 

I'm so excited to hear from our prophet! :)

Well off I go to baptize most of Gainesville! 

Have a great week!

Love Ya'll!

Love,

Sister Chambers

The Baptist Bash‏ (week10)

So yesterday I went to my very first baptist church. So on wednesdays we have a Book of Mormon class where we read with investigators and help recent converts and less actives get more out of their reading. The elders have been teaching a 19 yr old and he has been coming to church and the book of mormon class very regularly. This wednesday he brought his little sister who is 13 yrs old. She has even come to church once. We talked to her after the class and asked her if she was going to church on Sunday. She said that she would come to our church if we went to church with her. 

So we did.

When we walked in everyone was looking at us, reading our name tags. They had a billion greeters and they held onto our hands for a long time very sincerely thanked us for being there and followed up with handing us pamphlets about their church. WEIRD, who gives pamphlets out about their church and beliefs... oh wait... ours does :) ha ha

So we go in to this great and spacious building and sit down next to our friend. They then had us stand up and sing, the music was really loud and they had an entire band stand up front. The music was not bad, but not super inviting to the spirit. We then sat down and they prayed, then we sang a ton more. They also passed out the offering tray and the pastor asked us to think about all the things Jesus gave to us this week and then give back to the Lord. We just sat there thinking... "hmm how does this go to the Lord when it goes in YOUR pocket?" After all Jesus wasn't paid, why should we be for the work we do for him? plus isn't that breaking the sabbath day? Any way then they had a guy give his testimony but it was really just a big long story about how he doesn't work on wall street any more. 

Overall it wasn't TOO bad, and it was actually pleasant because me and my companion realized how many people are searching for Jesus and Heavenly Father, and use to know more in their lives.  

After we went to bible study. We went with our friend so we ended up in a class of high school aged girls, similar to young women's. They read from 1st Timothy chapter one, and it was pretty good except the teacher kept talking about how we should really teach from the bible so that we are not teaching false doctrine, this was accompanied by looks in our direction.

We didn't say anything the whole time. We just read from our bibles(which were different then theirs) and listened to what they had to say.

After the class a lady (who happened to be the preachers wife) came up to me and began asking me tons of different questions. She was asking questions but apparently she really didn't want the answers because she wouldn't let me answer. It was so hard to keep my composure. She thinks its absurd that we don't believe in the trinity, yet couldn't answer my question about how Heavenly Father says this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased at Jesus's baptism if they were the same person. ????E?Eldskfjal;dksjf;lskdenlkn!L!LKJ:LK?

I don't understand! MAKES NO SENSE!

Also she never answered my question about why wouldn't we want more revelation from God? 

The words from 2nd Nephi chapter 29 (I believe, not quite a scriptorian yet) where it says something along the lines of A Bible! A Bible! We already have a bible and have no need for a bible. 

Any who me and my companion bore our testimonies and then they asked if they could pray ... basically pray for us.

So they asked for our first names. I said, "I go by Sister Chambers" She said no what is your first name, apparently she didn't hear me the first time, or I must have stuttered, so I said again, "I go by Sister Chambers" She paused then asked me why that was. I replied... "I am a representative of Jesus Christ, I'm not doing this for myself, this is not for my glory so I don't go by my first name."

The lady was shocked. So then she continued to pray for us, that we would be lead to the right, funny thing is that is a prayer that has already been answered! :)

Oh also in the prayer she addressed my companion by her first name and referred to me as "this lady" she wouldn't even recognize me as a disciple of Jesus Christ. That was probably the rudest thing that has happened to me so far. BUTTTTT... me and my companion wished them a lovely day and began to walk out of the building. They immediately rushed to the girl we were with and hugged her and  were talking to her, but then she left them and began walking with us. She  apologized to me for the preachers wife, which was sad that she felt like she had to do that because of her preachers wives behavior. Then she came to church with us :)

Any way!

We met a lovely lady this week who we will be having a lesson with on tomorrow. She opened up to us pretty quickly and began telling us all these stories about how so many of her family members have passed away recently, and how it's really hard and difficult for her to deal with. My companion gave her a picture of the Salt Lake temple and told her it is a place where we can feel closer to our family that has moved on, and how we can feel closer to God.

She seemed to have many questions about it but we had already talked to her for an hour so we told her we would talk about it at our meeting. I can't wait to go see her :)

Early on last week we went out to a small town that we can rarely go to because it takes SSSOOOO many miles to get there. We are now running kind of low on miles so we decided to walk around the town instead of driving, also this helps us have more visibility, and our mission president has asked us to spend more time out of our cars. 

So we walked, and walked and walked, and WALKED... 7 miles.

Then the next day we could NOT walk.

We ended up meeting a lady who we had a good hour long lesson with. She said she would love for us to come back so that she could convert us. THESE PEOPLE JUST DON'T GET IT!  I KNOW THE CHURCH IS TRUE!!!!

OH! 

LAST WEEK I SAW ALLIGATORS!!!

TONS!

I EVEN SAW ONE EAT A BIRD!!! 

IT WAS REAL LIFE!

CRAZY!

I can't show you pictures, however, because I left my camera and cord back at home :(

So I guess I should share some of the lessons that I have learned this week. 

I can't teach those who are not ready and will not harken unto the word. 

Also, investigators MUST understand the NEED for a RESTORATION vs a reformation. If they don't understand this one thing Nothing else will matter.

I don't know if I mentioned this recently but we learned about miracles and how miracles only come After you have done everything in your power! 

Sometimes other peoples agency is frustrating but it's really crucial to being on this Earth and stuff.

Well I guess in closing all good things come from God and this was a pretty good week so it must have come from God!

I have had a wonderful 2 months out on my mission so far and am excited to see what the next 16 of them bring! :)

I would love to hear more from all ya'll! most of ya'll are slacking on the e-mail and letter writing!

I hope all is well and ya'll can have some missionary experiences of your own! :)

Love ya'll!

Love,

Sister Chambers