Week #15 AKA Week of Miracles

Dear Family,

This week was incredible. Of course one of the reasons is because all 270+ missionaries in France Lyon got to see Elder Andersen, his wife, Elder Kearon, and his wife speak to us. It was something we had been preparing for spiritually for quite some time and the experience I had is one I will never forget ever.Yes I got to shake his hand :) Elder Andersen is an apostle of the Lord, it is clear. I have a testimony that God still calls men today to guide His children. 

His focus was on Faith and Miracles, which was exactly what I needed to hear, whether I knew it or not. Faith is a decision. France is a unique place to do missionary work. I don't know why, it's just special here. To people who like stereotyping, apparently it's a harder mission, but it's no harder than any other mission. He totally called us to righteousness. It was awesome. Where is your faith? Have faith. It doesn't matter what your circumstances are or who you are, Have faith. God works miracles. I know that. He works miracles everyday. I can't tell you how many people have told me that miracles are in the past. Where is their faith? Ether 12. Mormon 9. Moroni 7. There was a lot more that I learned that I won't be able to tell you, mostly because they were things the spirit taught me. But what an experience. 

That leads me to the greatest miracle of my mission. F :) . Wednesday we get a call from her :) It wasn't that out of the ordinary because she'll do that from time to time.  Remember how I said she wasn't ready to talk about/read the Book of Mormon? We meet with her, she tells us she watched the restoration video, and has the exact same questions as Joseph Smith, then says that weekend she felt a push to read the BOM. She refused and refused until she read a Ensign referencing Alma 32. She couldn't resist. Then she tells us she is doing what Joseph did and learning about all the churches. "I want to know the truth!" she says. So she asks for our testimony on the BOM. Done. Couple hours later, she calls and says she knows it's true. Moving on. Friday we meet up and she has read like a bunch in the BOM. Like a bunch. All of Moroni, & and 2 Nephi some, Jacob, Alma, Mosiah, Ether. She asks us what the conditions are for baptism. We show her the interview questions and smoking comes up. She said "that's fine I stopped yesterday and stopped coffee. And tea is no problem." WHAT? Yeah. We continue to meet up and we discuss Nephi killing Laban, the tree of life, allegory of the Olive tree. We invited her to church, (she's been once before) but she wasn't sure. The one she goes to now she just loves. They sing and praise and she just loves it. Sunday comes and she is at church with her two kids. She loves it. Then a member comes up to us (he has been working with her a bunch too) and says he fixed a date with her for baptism.....!!?? That's what member missionary work is. Best news ever. F is literally a waking miracle. She has done a complete 360 degree turn around since the first day I met her. I love her so much. 

So our week was great. I really have a testimony that God really does have His own timing. People can change no matter what. Miracles happen everyday. I know God is our Father, and Christ is His Son and Savior of the World. And when we let all the worldly things in our life take less precedence than the Gospel, we find true happiness. I testify that is true. With all my heart. I love you all so much. The gospel is true. Happy Birthday Mom and Happy Father's day Dad!

Love, Soeur Roberts

Montpellier Week #13

Dear Family, This week was really great :) I love Sister O. She is from Tahiti, but not actually Tahiti. She speaks French, Marquesan, English and Spanish :) This is the first time she's been in the actually France! like the heart. She has been in Switzerland mostly Geneva her whole mission! She is finished in August. We get along super and she helps me a lot with my french and help her with English and I can't tell you how much I love her :)  After she got settled in we were able to have some great lessons! With F, D, and E.  D is doing great :) We taught her the Plan of Salvation and it went wonderfully. She was really touched by the Spirit World. She has an older brother who passed when he was a baby. She never knew him, but the spirit was strong and I know that she will see him again, and he will have a knowledge of the truth. She finally got her question resolved about the three kingdoms too. Our member explained that really well to her. Next is baptism! She has some questions about age, immersion, etc. So I'm stoked for that lesson :) She is so great. So prepared. I love her.  F called us too! She is really looking. We don't teach her exactly like an investigator, as in consistently, but we do when she needs us. She is really studying the bible. She isn't ready for the Book of Mormon yet, she told us she just isn't ready. It's already a lot to change from Islam to Christianity so I think she is taking it little by little. As she studies the bible she will see things are missing, and when she does, the sisters will be there :) Soeur O is an incredible teacher. So simple. I'm learning so much from her. She showed F the connection between Christ and the Fall. How Resurrection is taken care of, but If we want to be with our Father in Heaven, we must follow the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Fanny understood so well and the spirit was so strong. We hope to have some bible studies with her this week :) Then E! It is so cool to be teaching her again. She is incredible.We taught her obedience, prayer and scripture reading. It went great. The spirit was there and when we were leaving she was so anxious to see us again. I hope she will be able to accept . I love her so much!  Other cool little miracle..... :) We have four Sisters from our ward hospitalized, so Sunday we went and visited one. On our way back, we totally didn't get off at the right tram stop, so we just kept going. In my head, I was like well there must be someone we need to meet then. We we get off just at a random spot and decide to contact. We are walking and we see this guy with a little boy in his stroller, just walking. The spirit was like Go! So we go. We had a cool contact. Cool conversation. He asked about prayer and we said it's communication or conversation with God, and he was so amazed. Said he never heard that before, he loved it. So we were able to set up a lesson for next week. I don't know if anything will come of it, but I know that the Lord needed us to talk to C for whatever reason.  I believe in revelation and inspiration. I know that we really can be instruments in God's hands if we are worthy and doing everything we are supposed to. He will accomplish what He needs to through his children :) I love you all and I am so grateful for your example's to me. Christ lives and this is His church, led by a living prophet. I love you!  Love, Soeur Roberts

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Week #12 Montpellier

Dear Family, 

Great week :) but transfer news! My dearest Soeur Mod left me to go to Lyon. But I have a wonderful companion from Tahiti kinda! Marquis? Soeur O. And no that is not a Tahitian name. She's great though and I'm really excited to work with her :)

So the week! it was great like I said before :) well we had to kinda do some legal things. I started my legality in Béziers and Soeur Mod finished hers in Perpignan so we were on trains a lot. Apart from that, we had a couple cool experiences.

I'll mostly just talk about D. So she is great. I talked about her last week. So cool. On exchanges we went to pass her and she wanted us to come in which wasn't super expected just because she has this huge dissertation to do for her masters. Anyway, she talks to us and she's like hey! Shows us the picture she posted on FB of us and her for her birthday and the comments. Turns out she had friends in the church and didn't even know! They were like D these girls will change your life, read the Book of Mormon, etc. So cool right?? Then she told us she knows that she will have questions and that she knows it will take time to understand, etc. So we tried to address a couple of them right then. It was good. I love D. All of a sudden she stopped contact! WHAT? Then we got it back and went to dinner and found out that a friend of hers was sending her anti Mormon stuff and she was a bit uneasy. But she loves being around us she said. So she came to the elders baptism and she loved it. She said she felt such a peace which was cool. Before we saw the ordinance, I told her to pay special attention to how she feels. The spirit was strong. Sunday she came to church. Anyway, I really love her and I don't want to lose her, but the adversary is really pushing hard. 

Other than that, not many new things. J is doing well. We work with quite a few recent converts which is super fun. I love it. Their testimonies are on fire and they strengthen mine. We are still trying to find solid people to teach. We need the ward's help so hopefully we'll find some souls to save :) 

OH MIRACLE!  E. Remember her? So Our last night together after we walked D home, we decided to pass E. Soeur Mod really wanted to just see. Well the spirit was working on her because we got there and E let us in. We talked, caught up. I love E. I'm so glad she doesn't actually hate us :)

That's all folks. I really love you all and I hope you are doing well. I know the gospel is true. Like Elder Andersen said in his last conference talk, the Gospel is going to grow and change the lives of many, but as that grows so will the influence and power of the adversary. But don't worry. We are on the right team, and we've already won :) let's try to bring as many people we can on the winning side. I love you all. This gospel is the only true gospel on the earth and I know it with all my heart. 

Love, Soeur Roberts

Week #11 Montpellier

Family!

This week was so so great! Mostly this weekend. Seriously.

J is doing great! She was freaking out because she was afraid we wouldn't teach her after her baptism. SO CUTE. Love her. She is doing really well :) still making loads of progress, because that's what the Gospel does. It helps us progress :) I love her.

Anyway, I will start with Ev We taught her this week :) She is doing well. She hadn't had time to read the Book of Mormon so we read with her the first chapter and a bit of the intro to help her understand. And let me tell you! She understands very well. Her comprehension skills are fantastic. She promised to read the first half of the next chapter. She is hilarious too.

Now I will move on to the next coolest thing. Er. Soeur Mod knocked into his home (which turns out to be his parents, he lives in his car and travels everywhere. all the time.) He lived in Canada and knew of LDSaints. So they introduce the BOM and he says okay so I read this and you come back and answer any questions? and they're like yeah sure and he's like okay this Saturday? COOL So we go and we have a lesson and he is solid. Still very much searching, but very open to the Spirit. He asked some great questions and it was really great and the spirit was strong. He came to church the next day too for all three hours :) But he is going to Spain so we don't know when the next time will be! Bummer, but he will get there.

Now the grand finale. So Wednesday was a tough day. Mean people,  lessons fallen through, other problems, whatevs, mission life right? But I was like OK contacting will fix this. SO I see this girl and I say Bonjour! SO does Soeur Mod. At the exact same time. She says "Sorry I'm in a hurry!" in English! SO obviously we talk. She is from South Africa (anglophone) and we literally talked for about an hour on the road. Miracle. So we set up a lesson for  Saturday and it was again incredible. D is her name. I could go on for hours talking about her. Yikes. Anyway, she is catholic but she told us she hasn't been to mass in three weeks. 3333 WEEEKKKKKSSSS. She said she has felt like it was such a routine and she was not finding the meaning in doing it. She was losing the reason. Then she said she met us and we were really an answer to her prayers. Come to find out her birthday is Sunday (yesterday) SO naturally we invite her to church and then an American couples home for a little birthday party and she was so grateful.That night we had a lovely time. She told us her life story, her struggles and it was very powerful. The last two years she received a bible from her boss and this year we thought it relevant to give her a precious Book of Mormon. We wrote our testimonies and when we gave it to her and testified, there was the spirit so strong and tears.It was powerful. This girl is ready.

Anyway, I love D. I will be devastated if the Lord decides my time is up here. I love it too much. I will cry. I love you all so much. This gospel really does have the power to change lives. I promise you that.

Love, Soeur Roberts

Montpellier Week #10

Dear Family, 

Happy Mother's Day! It was so great talking to you. I love you all so much! 

So yes, J was baptized and confirmed this weekend! It was really awesome. We were super busy running around doing last minute things, so we were a tad stressed. She wanted me to buy her what I understood to be a bouquet of white lilies, but apparently she told soeur mod she wanted them small so she could put them in her hair. So we just plucked some petals off and put them in like that :) It is always such a blessing to see people enter the waters of baptism. After she went under she came up and started crying. We thought it was just the overwhelming of the spirit, but i guess she actually hit her toe!  I'm sure the spirit was apart of the tears too though. And the when she was confirmed she cried again, but this time i think it was all the spirit. I love J. Her testimony is really so very strong.She is going to do so well.We pray for her everyday. 

We are a little slow on work right now. We don't have any solid amis so we are looking! We had a couple cool lessons. Well, lessons at least. E let us come back for a second lesson. We taught the first lesson and it went well. At first she was like, How did God appear to Joseph Smith and we explained how in the Bible God also appeared to Moses and to Steven and she accepted that super fast. She completely understood how a restoration was needed.  She read a bit of the Book of Mormon. Hopefully she"ll want to change her life for the Lord. 

I told you yesterday about my experience with the Catholic family. It was really just an interesting experience. The Gospel of Jesus Christ had to be restored. There is no question. We need to have a prophet. No question. I can't describe the difference in feelings I felt, but the spirit really testifies of truth and it testified to me in a way I hadn't really felt before. But in any case, I know even more how true this church is. We have the restored truths on the earth today. I testify that this is Christ's church, in its fullness. 

There isn't a whole bunch else. I got harassed by drunk college boys Sunday morning. that was annoying. But i talked to a really nice girl who wasn't interested, but we are friends now so that's a plus!  I'm sorry this is a boring email. But i love you all so much and I pray for you every day :) I know this gospel is true, in case you didn't believe me before :)

Love Soeur Roberts

Week #9 May 5th

Dearest family,

I hope all is well and the springy sun is coming out to stay! Summer will be VERY hot here in Montpellier. It'll be great! 

This week was a great week in the lives of a missionary :) I'll focus on a few key points :) soooo....

Zone Conference. Super cool. We have this great new formula for finding people. We are really wanting to work with members. We want to meet their friends. Not to baptize them right away but to become their friends, and then baptize them. Really though. The people we find on the street are way less likely to stay active, not to mention even get baptized in the first place, when compared to member friend converts. We are really excited :) It'll work. Members in France struggle with member missionary work. It's hard when you are surrounded by not just other beliefs, but when it's 47% atheist. So basically no belief. Sad. They will get there though. It was a great great conference. I always am filled with so much light after.

J is doing well. In the past two weeks I have seen a change in her and a growth in testimony.  We love her. Her baptism is set for this Saturday.She is like my mom here in Montpellier. Always telling me how to properly care for myself. And feed myself. Love her. 

We had a couple first lessons. R is Evangelist and very practicing. She reminds me of American Christians actually where you just have to accept Christ and you're saved. She is so sweet though and so sincere. But her understanding of the necessity of authority for baptism and prophets isn't yet there. She is so practicing and so set in her ideas so it was challenging. It was an interesting experience. It reminded me of some conversations I had with some friends from school about religion. This other girl we met was so cool. C. She is hopefully going to meet with us next week again. She is catholic but doesn't really know whet to believe. She is our age. Some days she believes in God, other days she doesn't. We'll see.

We are still trying to find people. After J baptism we won't have much work so that is our focus and we hope that our member's will have the courage to help us. :)

Anyway, that's about it. We found a miraculous less active who loves the church and wants her family to be baptized so bad. She is only in Montpellier for a month longer though :( and her family is in Carcassonne. That's it. 

I love you all. This work is true. God lives. Christ is our Savior. Happy Cinco de Mayo. or Happy Cinq de Mai en Francais. I love you all. 8:30 am, May 11. Mother's day to confirm :) see you then. I love you :) 

Love, Soeur Roberts

Montpellier Week #6

Dear Family,

Sometimes in life things are going too good and so Heavenly Father needs to give us some things that will test our faith and show Him that we are willing to do whatever He says. 

This week had some ups and downs. A is completely dropped. Unfortunately he convinced himself that the spirit he felt when he decided to get baptized was just psychological. I think he was expecting a column of light.. Maybe in the future. E has been laying low. She hasn't really been responding much to our calls or texts and we haven't been able to have a lesson with her for 2 weeks. We decided to finally go pass her and she didn't answer at first so we waited and prayed that we'd know what to do. She then comes out and graciously accepts our company. Cool :) so we just catch up a bit and say a little prayer. She said she was going to come to our ward activity and didn't and then she ditched us at church and hasn't responded again. The period right before break ups are hard. We hope and pray that she will recognize the spirit. We had a couple other bummers, but they were more along the lines of miracles one day and the day after was the bad news. That's okay :)

J is doing good. Yesterday she had an interview with the bishop and it went super great. She is really ready and doing great.

Miracle time! So we had exchanges and I was with a sister who served here 6 months ago so we were super busy seeing all these people. One of which is A, whose story is incredible. The sisters taught her after she referred herself after staying in Utah and meeting the missionaries and gaining a testimony, etc. But then life got the best of her and contact was lost. So we have heard how cool this girl was but never got a hold of her. Soeur H comes, calls her, and she answers! she had been in New Zealand and Germany and doing life and apparently she is having quite the trial right now with being accused and betrayed. So I got to meet the infamous Au and she still has a testimony and wants to get baptized the only problem is that she has no sense of urgency. When it comes it comes so it is our job this transfer to help her understand that she needs to do it now. She is sooooooooo incredible though. I hope we can really work with her.

We had a lesson with G who was a former Jehovah's Witness. He has been searching for a church for a while. He is super super cool and seems really prepared, but we need to make sure his intentions are honest. We showed him the church and he was so excited to start reading the Book of Mormon! He asked such good questions too, which is always nice. He really is so cool. It was such a miracle!

Anyway, I may feel a little down. It's crazy how the work just goes so up and down sometimes. But me and Soeur Mod are working hard and I know that our efforts are not wasted here among these people. I love this Gospel so much and I just want everyone to be happy like I am because the only reason I am happy is because of the Gospel :)

I've been studying prayer, guidance and being more in tune with the Spirit and I can already tell a huge difference. The Holy Spirit is real and He guides us when we are worthy and willing. I love you all. I know this church is true. I know God lives and Jesus Christ is the Savior. Remember the last week of His life and all the things He did before His Resurrection. I love my Savior so much. I love you :)

Love, Soeur Roberts