Catch up time!!!

1/14/2013: 

The lessons we had this week went really well. C----- and S------ are continuing to progress. We invited them to live the word of wisdom last night, so they are a bit grumpy today, but we hope that we can provide them with the support they need right now. We also had a lesson with G----- again, finally! We tried to encourage her to make the decision to want to come to church, but she isn't sure. Hopefully she will open back up to us as we continue to teach, she is really shy so it's hard to know what she is thinking. But, her parents tell us we can keep coming, so hopefully we are doing something good for them.

Also, at church there were a few non-members there that members had invited, so we hope to have some new investigators soon. We have also been focusing on the part-member families here. Looking for interest among those families. I feel like the potential in this area is beginning to really show forth.

It is amazing to see the change in people as they accept the gospel, or work on living it better. C------ and S------are really good examples to me in their willingness to listen to us and to change their habits and put their lives more in line with God's will. We also have a less-active who shared with us some of the ways she was blessed last week (how she was protected when driving), and I know that those blessings came from some changes she made in her life just the week before!
This gospel is necessary for each and everyone of us in our lives. Why prevent God from giving us blessings far greater than what we have right now? I am so grateful to be here right now. For the people who have touched my life far more than I could touch theirs. For Heavenly Father's trust in me to give me challenges that are hard, but He knows I can face. We don't always understand in the moment why some things happen, but there is always a reason.
Have a great week! I love you!
Sister Goodwin

P.S. I forgot to mention too that we got to go to a leadership training in Sparks on Thursday. That was pretty sweet! The Spirit was so strong and President H--------- talked about focusing on our purpose and really understanding why we are out here. Another thing we learned was that we are trying to implement, that I have failed to do before, is to take investigators on a church tour before they come to church so they are more familiar with the building. Because one of the hardest things to do is get investigators to come to church.

Love ya!

Sister Goodwin

1/21/2013:

This week was also good because Sister N----- who is one of the traveling sister missionaries now came with us on Wednesday and worked with us on every aspect of finding! And helped us set goals. And it was AWESOME!! We were going through the former investigators and trying to contact some of them and experienced a miracle!! Let me back up first. A week ago Sunday one of our ward missionaries invited a friend to church who is going through a rough time. But we didn't get a chance to meet him. Well, then Wednesday we were trying to find this former but the address didn't have an apartment number that matched the information we had. So we took a guess and knocked on a different apartment. AND GUESS WHAT? It was the same man who had come to church on Sunday, only we didn't know it at the time. He said we could come back and leave a blessing on his home in a couple days. We didn't find this out until that night because the ward missionary called us and asked if we had stopped at that man's home. As of yet we haven't started teaching him yet, but he came to church again yesterday and Sister B--------- and I happened to be teaching the lesson in gospel essentials. And to add to that, the Bishop invited a non-member friend to church yesterday and he came to our class as well and we have an appointment with him and his family tonight!! 
 

I hope you could follow all that! Back again to Wednesday- Sister N--- showed us how to tract, so I did that for the first time. And we set a goal to go tracting for 30 min a week. At first I thought that wasn't very much, but we have tried to do more and we keep having appointments and not having time to tract! I think I like this :)

We already have 10 lessons set up for this next week! That is the most lessons I've have set up in advanced. Our goal is to make it to 20 lessons, so we'll see. 

Things are still hard, but I am enjoying this work more and more everyday :)

I love you! Thanks again for the letter! I think that was the only letter I've gotten in the last couple of weeks... everyone is slackin'! haha! 

Love, 

Sister Goodwin