Truly a miracle

So let's see, this week was pretty busy! Started out with the Petane family last Tuesday that told us half way through the lesson they all want to be baptized within the next 3 weeks...pretty amazing their story is truly a miracle and they Lord works in mysterious ways. The father was away from the church for a number of years but this last spring reconnected with our bishop who was a collage friend. When they moved in just down the street from where they live (they didn't know until after they moved in) we are meeting with the Petane family again this evening to finalize a day! 

We also had a book of mormon referral from the DC Washington visitors center. It is quite the story remind me to tell you after the mission the rest but basically she had a lot of questions about the law of chastity and in the middle of our discussion she said "oh hey will you pass me that big old black Box there in front of you Elder...it has a lot of drugs in there, you two are welcome to try some you like, since it would be your first time. offer will always stand"  it was NOT a light box.

GARY was baptized this weekend! It was so good to see such a good friend enter the waters of baptism! We are now looking for a time to go to the temple with him. I actually was asked to give a short talk on the gift of the Holy Ghost and one of the first scriptures that came to mind for was this one.

Doctrine & Covenants 8:2-3

   2  Yea, behold, I will tell you in your mind and in your heart, by the Holy Ghost, which shall come upon you and which shall dwell in your heart.

   3 Now, behold, this is the spirit of revelation; behold, this is the spirit by which Moses brought the children of Israel through the Red Sea on dry ground.

To often we forget that the same still same voice that told the great prophet Moses to split the Red Sea is the same Spirit that is gifted to us when we are baptized and it is among the most well know bible stories in the world. But more importantly it has changed the world (imagine what would have happened if the sea hadn't split) the Israelite people would have been killed. Ask yourself "am I acting on promptings from the spirit?" God shouldn't have to shake us to get our attention. 

Love Elder Palmer 

Being Busy is Joyful

So sad to hear about Logan... what a blessing that we have modern medicine! 

This transfer has been going by extremely fast! To fast. We have been so busy with appointments between the two wards that we are having to do splits so we can go to all of our appointments. We had 4 appointments within 2 hours so we had to split up. 

I had the opportunity to interview Gary this last week since I am not teaching him anymore...but he is so awesome likely the definition of Christ like service. He has been taught for on and off for about two years and this Friday!!! Not sure if I told you this but he (everyday) pick up food from the food bank and drive around delivering food to the homeless. He is retired and has only 5 dollars a day for gas. Let me tell you he covers a lot more ground than 5 dollars of gas can carry him.  

Then we have Jodie's baptism next week!!! 

This last week has been so awesome our ward is great they throw parties all the time and invite literally everyone to them. This last one on Saturday had half the community at it and our legendary Bishop (Bishop Swalger) set up a lesson with a family of 4 four tonight that said they want to be sealed In the temple!!! The Petane family they are so great they are samoans and are super easy to talk to. Little nervous that the lesson will get sidetracked because of it. 

Also just to clarify the pictures... that is dog food with fruit loops. 

The best way I could show how San Diegans treat their dogs. 

"The gospel of Jesus Christ is a pattern of living of the most joyful lives." 

Love Elder Palmer

Love this work

We have been so busy we have had hardly anytime time to spend in our area which actually is kind of rough, had to plan a couple of trainings and we had a big service project that we were I charge of for the city of la Mesa so we spent our evening from 4-8 helping out at a fundraiser where everyone was very drunk and we were still in our name tags so we had a bunch of drunk contacts with people that were pretty funny. We then had time to write our talks at 8pm for sacrament meeting the next morning at 9am... got to love this work!

Other than nothing much is new so yup.

Loved this quote from Elder Holland

"Brothers and sisters, every one of us aspires to a more Christlike life than we often succeed in living. If we admit that honestly and are trying to improve, we are not hypocrites; we are human. May we refuse to let our own mortal follies, and the inevitable shortcomings of even the best men and women around us, make us cynical about the truths of the gospel, the truthfulness of the Church, our hope for our future, or the possibility of godliness. If we persevere, then somewhere in eternity our refinement will be finished and complete—which is the New Testament meaning of perfection."

Love Elder Palmer

ONE YEAR!!!

ONE YEAR! I'm officially counting down now... so weird. I actually missed my year mark I wasn't paying attention until the day after I realized that I had been out for a year Haha. 

This Year has Gone by to Fast! It seriously feels like 6 months ago that I was dropped off at the MTC. 

This Year has been something else let me tell ya. I have never felt so consistently Joyful. I Love this Work And I Love My God! 

My favourite days are the days are the Days I see people Eyes light up with understanding and a realization of the Joy that the Gospel brings. This is a Gospel of Joy, of peace, of Love unfeigned. I have had the Sacred Opportunity to enter into broken homes to teach broken hearts and Wipe away the Tears of Broken Spirits, because Christ wiped mine away. 

The Sisters had been teaching this lady for months who had struggled with Substance abuse for the past year, we tried stopping by in the morning before she started drinking but she was already under the influence... so we asked her if this is something she truly wants to over come? Then we Gave her A Priesthood Blessing. We left not thinking much of it, she had had a blessing before. A few days passed and we stopped by her place to check up on her...a completely different woman answered the Door! She had been sober for 3 days! And she told us that it was the Priesthood Blessing that gave the the will power to put the bottle down and find help! She couldn't stop thanking us. She has been sober now for over a week and counting!

Let see so this week was pretty good we are kept very busy with lessons and any spare time we use to get to know towards better nice they are powerhouse wards with many large families that we are trying to get to know. 

So we now cover la Mesa 2nd ward that Sister used to cover and they were teaching his lady named Jodie who is a super kind woman with a young son. Jodie is so amazing she left the church over 20 years ago with her family, but for months the Spirit had been softening her heart until she came to church again for the first time in a very long time. Her First Sunday she felt like crawling our of her skin she knew she need to be there but everything was telling her to get up and leave. Until she saw the Missionaries giving a talk in sacrament meeting... then the "voices telling her to leave, left" 

Long story short she has been working with the sisters for a few weeks working towards baptism, and when we were transferred into the ward Jodie was super nervous to meet us because she isn't comfortable around men. 

Well we met with her at a members on Wednesday and it was so Awesome we talked and laughed all night, and when we were getting ready to have a lesson Elder Hampton and I felt that we should just bare our Testimonies of the divinity of a Loving God and the Book Of Mormon. It turned into a very spiritual uplifting discussion, then Jodie shared her Testimony, which if you knew her whole story was Huge! Once we left Jodie turned to Sister Jeffs(the member) and said "Oh I like This Two". 

Reason I tell you this is because Jodie really really didnt' want to meet with the "Elders" and the Ward was nervous about her being able to progress towards Baptism. Aka the Ward didn't trust us... but this was a huge step for us because we gained the Wards trust and especially Jodie's!

Love Elder Palmer