Week 45 - TRANSFER NEWS

Transfers in Syracuse 2/21/20--Sister Penrod gets to go be companions with Sister Turley 

(on the other side of me) who was in my MTC District! 

Saying Goodbye to Sister Penrod.

Well I know you have all been sitting on pins and needles waiting for news about transfers ;). Well, I am still here in Massena! But, I have a new companion! It was sad to say goodbye to Sister Penrod, especially since we were companions for 3 transfers, but I am excited for the next 6 weeks with Sister Mayer! She is actually a temple square missionary doing her outbound here in new New York! She is from St. Louis, Missouri, and spent the last 6 weeks near Buffalo and will spend her last 6 weeks here before going back to Temple Square. Crazy! If you go look up the face to face with Elder Cook in Nauvoo, she was one of the hosts! (Note from Mom--Emily finally gets to serve as a senior companion and STL with this transfer.)

My new comp Sister Mayer, me, and Sister Spear who served in Massena with us until 

right before Christmas. Sister Spear is now in Buffalo, where my new companion is coming from!  

It was so great to meet up for transfers!

Ready to go to work!

It has been quite the week. We had a branch member who I was quite close to pass away. It was pretty sad but also happy because we know she is much happier and without pain. I know her number one hope is that this experience will touch her family and soften their hearts to accepting the gospel.

The weather the last two days has been in the 40s! It's so nice and warm--I really hope it's going to stay!

We have had some powerful lessons this week. I'm really excited to be with Sister Mayer who is pretty bold and powerful. We are really going to focus on getting people progressing and clean up our area book so it's not clogged up with people who really aren't interested. We are going to rock Massena for the next 6 weeks!

I'd love to hear how everyone's conference preparations are going! The biggest thing that will make this next conference different than any other is how much more we will get from it as we are preparing to receive what the Lord's servants say.  T-minus 5 weeks people!

Love, Sister Potts





FUN FACTS:

1. After the three witnesses were shown the plates, they rushed back so excited to share what they had experienced.

2. Joseph threw himself near his mom and told her how extremely happy he was because the Lord had called three others to be witnesses and testify of what they had seen. He was no longer entirely alone in the world!

3. At this point it had been over 10 years since the first vision, and he had been alone. No one else could help bear the burden of testifying that it was true. Yet he stayed firm!

4. A short while later 8 more witnesses were chosen to see the plates in the sacred grove and testify of what they had seen.

5. We don't have to see an angel or the plates to stand as a witness of the Book of Mormon. I invite each of you, once you have received a personal witness, to sign your name in your Book of Mormon under the three and the eight witnesses. YOU can be the 12th witness!

BONUS: all three of the three witnesses would later fall away from the church due to disagreements with the prophet or church policies, but they all stayed true (to their death) of their testimony of the Book of Mormon, and two of them later rejoined the church.

Week 44- Galentine's Day! & 10 months!

10 Months today!

Hello everyone! Crazy to think that 10 months ago today I was heading to the MTC. WOW! This has been quite the exciting week! Good news is that we got a new senior couple, the Purcells, brand new to the mission (and from Tremonton, Utah)! They are really sweet and still adjusting to crazy Massena life but they'll get used to it ;).

Styling our Valentine's monster masks.

It was also Valentine's day! It was more eventful than it was when I wasn't a missionary Haha . We handed out some chocolates and such and had some lessons. We visited with a person we are teaching, and her sons wanted to give us cute valentines.  One of them was a monster mask Haha. Then her kitten tried to east our hair so that was exciting. 

Another crazy moment was when a car pulled up to us as we were contacting some people and asked if we wanted to exchange literature. We laughed and gave them all we had which was a card and then looked at what they gave us, which was from a local Baptist church, and it was this cartoon book bashing the Catholic Church! A lot of their points of doctrine were congruent with our beliefs, but it was sad knowing that Heavenly Father wouldn't want us to promote hate, but he would want us to show love and kindness towards all. 

We had a really powerful lesson with a recent convert last night on faith in Jesus Christ. He has been going through some rough things lately and so we tried to share the most hopeful message that we could: that Jesus Christ loves us and suffered for every anguish we may experience so that we are never alone. With faith and trust that he is there and understands, comes healing. I know that to be true! I'd invite you all to watch the video "Mountains to Climb" this week. It is a message that has often touched my heart!

Love,  Sister Potts 

Here's a picture of the Nature Center we volunteer at.

Fun times!

FUN FACTS:

1. Shortly BEFORE the translation of the Book of Mormon was complete, Joseph Smith, Oliver Cowdery, Martin Harris, and David Whitmer went into the woods behind the Whitmer home. 

2. They knelt down in prayer and went around, each offering one in a circle. 

3. After 2 prayers each, Martin Harris (who had been forgiven but still felt very badly about losing the lost manuscript pages)  stood up and said that it was his fault nothing was happening and left. 

4. The rest continued praying, and shortly an angel appeared holding the golden plates and turned the pages one by one. They also heard the voice of the Lord testify that the translation of the plates was correct, and they were to testify of it to the world. 

5. Joseph found Martin praying a ways off and knelt with him in prayer. Martin was able to have the same miraculous experience as the others! 

Week 43- Snow and Bowl

Styling our new Massena, New York shirts.

Hey y'all! We got a lot of snow this week. We already had about a foot, and we probably got another foot and a half on top of that! Crazy stuff. Then it got too cold to snow. Haha. It's a great leg workout at least! Climbing through snow piles and drifts is no joke. 

Also we just finished with our very first DISTRICT PREPARATION DAY! That is a new change for our mission with the handbook we have been really excited about. We drove to Ogdensburg and went bowling! I'm terrible at bowling but that's okay, it was a lot of fun. This bowling alley hasn't changed since 1967 according to the owner, so no bumpers and we had to score ourselves. It was pretty funny but hey it was bowling! Then we went to a senior couple's house for linner and chatting. It was fun! 

This week we started teaching a couple new people, and we are especially excited about a couple who has had a rough go of it and really needs the gospel in their life. You can almost feel their souls stretching out to you begging for the joy and happiness you have in your life. It's so sad! But we know that they can find the peace and happiness they are searching for in the gospel. The other person we started teaching is quite the character and is quite excited (we think) to learn the "book of normon" haha.

So one snow storm we had it was literally snowing horizontally and blowing snow and was about 0⁰ so it was quite the interesting day but we didn't feel safe driving in the dark so we tried working on the one street near our apartment.  We were quite the spectacle walking around trying to not get blown over or get frostbite. But we did it! We even had a great conversation with a guy shoveling who I guess had met with missionaries when he was young.

So this last week I started studying the old testament pretty in depth, and it has been really special. It has also helped me appreciate the modern revelation that we have. So much of the Old Testament has really confusing things that most of the world has wondered about for centuries, but through Jospeh Smith Translation and modern prophets we can understand the significance and truth of things we couldn't before! It's amazing! I'm so grateful for all the scripture, ancient and modern, that we have been blessed with to lead and guide us.

Love, Sister Potts 

Fun facts:

1. So turns out that Sarah Heller Conrad, who I talked about last week, is my 5th great aunt! That was exciting to learn!

2. The summer that Joseph and Oliver were finishing translation was a record breaking year for heat! It would have been VERY stuffy up on the 2nd floor, take it from someone who's been up there in the summer.

3. The last thing to be translated was the title page of the Book of Mormon, and it was finished most likely late June or early July of 1829.

4. But first, as they were translating they came across scriptures like this one found in  Ether 5:

"2 And behold, ye may be privileged that ye may show the plates unto those who shall assist to bring forth this work;

3 And unto three shall they be shown by the power of God; wherefore they shall know of a surety that these things are true."

5. Shortly before translation was completed the Lord revealed who those three were to be: Martin Harris, Oliver Cowdery, and David Whitmer! More next week.....

Week 42- Switcharoo and Laundry Detergent Poo

I got to go on exchanges with Sister Geddes this week!

I thought that was really a clever title, so forgive me Haha. To explain, we had an exchange this week! It was super fun, and I stayed here in Massena with Sister Geddes coming to join me. It ended up being a crazy day, and we were super busy which is good, and we had so much fun! Sister Penrod went to Plattsburgh and enjoyed Chick-Fil-A. Mmmm. 

For the second half of the title, we had a new friend text us that she wasn't up to us coming over so we should reschedule. We may or may not have pretended we didn't see it because we didn't think that was a good enough reason and turns out she was just cleaning. So we offered to help and do her dishes! Well she is a funny lady and had run out of dish soap, so she was using laundry detergent to wash her dishes. . And then, she realized her cat had pooped on the floor so she grabbed the laundry detergent and poured some on, then took her mop and just moved it around a bit to 'clean it up' 🤢. Haha! Gotta love it. 

Also got word this week that I will not be returning to serve at the historic sites this next season. (Note from Mom:  it sounds like none of the sisters who were called there last year and had served last summer will be returning.  The historic visitor sites will no longer be under the umbrella of her mission president--they will now be under the Church Historic Director assigned there, which makes sense, and there are 40 new sister missionaries who will be arriving this Spring to serve 6-month missions at the sites and then be sent elsewhere--which is exactly what Emily ended up getting to do, I guess. It has been very sad for a lot of sister missionaries throughout the mission.  Her mission president called each sister privately to break the news, which had to be a tough job.  Now back to Emily....)  It's bittersweet, and I am sad that I won't be able to be there for the last pageant or 200th anniversary of the first vision, but I am still serving in the mission where it happened! In fact I didn't really think about this before, but it was the first mission in the world! And I am grateful for the opportunity I will have to continue finding new people who need the gospel and teaching it to them. 

We had a friend watch the movie, "How Rare a Possession: The Book of Mormon."  If you haven't watched it, I highly recommend doing so! It really makes you think about what you would sacrifice for the truths found in it. I think that the truths about Jesus Christ and His atonement, and the plan of salvation that are expounded upon and clarified by the Book of Mormon are of more worth than most things in my life, and that is why I want to share it with others! Please read it! 

Love, Sister Potts 

Other rewards of tracting:  a nice 89-year-old man gave us chocolates and told us a bunch of crazy jokes.
He wasn't interested in the church, but nonetheless, he was fun to run into. 

FUN FACTS:

1. Last week we talked about Mary Whitmer. How about today we talk about another influential woman, Sarah Heller Conrad.

2. At the time, she was only a teenager, but she was helping Mary in the Whitmer house with the chores as Joseph and Oliver were upstairs translating. 

3. They would often come downstairs for a drink or break, and she said that they appeared to be glowing. Sarah asked Mary what those men were doing, and Mary was hesitant to tell. 

4. Eventually Sarah wanted to know so bad that she threatened to quit if she didn't find out. So Mary told her about the sacred work they were doing and how the spirit of the work was causing the strange appearance. 

5. Sarah believed, joined the church, and made it all the way to Utah with the saints. She has thousands of righteous posterity because of her faithfulness!