Week 9 - 1st Transfers in the Mission Field - I'm staying in Red Bay! My companion is going home!

Hello again!

So transfers are this week, which means I say goodbye to Sister Baird TOMORROW 😥. She'll be stepping off the plane back in Idaho at this time on Wednesday! So excited for her.. so bummed for me. We've been packing her missionary life up (and eating ice cream) all weekend. BUT we found out my new companion will be Sister Nielsen! I've never met her, but Sister Baird says she's amazing and super kind. Looks like Red Bay's got me for another 6 weeks!

Ok, we were eating lunch yesterday at a member's house after church. (which is super kind of them to cook for us, and I'm totally grateful..). This family has all the missionaries in our ward over for lunch most Sunday's, because they live close to the church. There are two sets of Sisters and one set of Elders in our ward, because the ward boundaries are crazy big (because we are literally in the middle the backwoods). It takes 30 minutes to drive from the Bay to cizilization (where the rest of the missionaries get to live) ANYWAY, we're sitting there, and I feel something tickly on top of my head. Just as I reach up to swat at, what I hoped was one of the thirty flied buzzing in the window behind me, a quarter sized SPIDER parachutes off the top of my forehead, down between my eyes, and onto my dinner plate.. I was stunned just long enough for it to scamper across my potatoes, over my arm, and make a b-line for the cornbread, before Sister Mathis snapped me out of my horror, and trapped the spidy under the cornbread plate, where it remained for the rest of the meal. All the while our member family just keeps on the usual conversation about this and that like it "ain't no thang." ...This is my life now.

As you may know, it's been a bit of a struggle for me so far. I know it'll all be ok though, thanks to incredible and inspired parents, and the best family and friends. I love you all so much. One thing I've learned this week is that Heavenly Father is there, ALWAYS. Even when it doesn't feel like it. When we are so down we can't feel anything, he goes to the people closest to us and starts working on them. Giving them the inspiration they need to come help us.

The people here do not understand what we are saying most of the time.. they don't get that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is different from what they already know. We aren't here to convert people to Christianity! Why in the world would Heavenly Father send missionaries to the South, if it were the same message they already know.. Everyone is Christian here (aside from one Hindu we met last week). It gets super annoying. But Sister Baird and I were discussing and studying last night, and I had some comforting thoughts I wrote down:

John 15:16 "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you..." It's not about what my choice and expectation was in serving a mission.. "Remember that He called you. Through your thoughts and desires, the Savior of the world called you, as you were, to preach his Gospel to his people. And to grow and become as you were always meant to be. Try not to get discouraged when things don't go the way you hoped or thought they would. He chose you. This is not about your success, it is His. It's about people accepting Him, not us."

I truly want to help people.. because I know this message is true! I would not have drug my butt all the way to Alabama, to talk to random strangers about Jesus Christ, if I didn't know with all my heart that He is our Savior. And that the Gospel he established when he came to earth has been restored. The only reason I know this as fact is because I tried and tested it! Otherwise I'd still be sitting around, thinking it was weird that everyone put so much of their souls into a "nice story about a good man." He is our brother and best friend, He has a body of flesh and bone, and he came to earth to teach us the Plan of Happiness. That plan was restored to us through the Prophet Joseph Smith. Matthew 7:20 "Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them." I know the Book of Mormon is one of those fruits. I know that it is by applying the principals taught and revealed to us in these Latter-Days, that we come to know for ourselves the truthfulness of this Gospel. NO ONE else can convince us of that. It was always meant to be between us and The Lord, through the gift and witness of the Holy Ghost.

I am not here to convince, I am here to invite, and there is so much peace in that. I would love so much to be able to witness the process of someone coming to know their Savior, and understand how loved they are, and recognize the Holy Ghost for the first time. But even if that never happens while I'm here, it is comforting to know that this is His work. He is aware of every person I will ever come in contact with, and He knows where they are at in their journey.

Thanks for letting me ramble a bit. I love you all so much!

Xoxo Sister Teirsa Smith