August 19

This week has been one amazing miracle after another!  Since we're opening an area, it's been a lot of tracting and finding people because there aren't any potential investigators, and not really any former investigators either.  We are in an area the missionaries basically haven't ever touched!  However, it's a more wealthy area with a lot of gated and "No Soliciting" areas (granted, we're not technically solicitors because we're not selling anything, but whatever).  We have knocked on doors for 3 weeks with no success and no teaching appointments.  However, this last week we've finally had 4 people who are allowing us to come back and teach them!  Will they all keep their appointments?  Probably not...But this is a start and we're so excited about it!  Plus, we got a referral that sounds really promising so we're hopeful that we can work with this family and help them as well!

Here's my favorite miracle though...I love it when the Spirit is direct and we just KNOW what we need to do!  After dinner one night, we had plans to go and tract on a street.  As we were driving there, we felt like we should pull over and pray about which street we should tract on.  We had several planned and we felt like we should actually go on a street that we had planned as a back-up.  So we turned around and started heading to that street.  About 1 mile later, we saw a family that was re-modeling their home and we felt the strongest prompting to pull over and offer to help.  Conveniently, we had work clothes in the back of the car (can't really do a lot of service in a skirt so we've started to make a habit of keeping the clothes in the car so we can be ready for any service opportunity that might come!) so we grabbed our bags and marched to them and offered our help.  They said yes but realized that they were almost finished for the day.  So no, we may not have actually done anything, but we knew that we HAD to go and talk to this family and that the Lord made sure that we were guided to them.  They were very appreciative of our offer and then we found out that they knew a member of the ward.  We will probably end up helping them next weekend and we are very excited about it.  I love it when the Spirit just tells us what to do and we don't have to second guess ourselves!

I can't believe that school is starting already.  School started today for most students here and it just baffles me that summer's already almost over!  I swear it just started!  What grade is everyone going to be in now?  I may have everyone's age, but I never remember what grade everyone's in.

Is there any way that you could send me another pedigree chart?  I seem to have lost mine in the process of moving to Olympia and I can't seem to find it anywhere!  Online, I don't have all of the information from mom's side and I would love to be able to do a little bit of genealogy when I can because we're trying to get better at it so we can use it as a teaching resource!  But we kind of need to know what we're talking about so we don't act like robots.

Is it OK if I send a check that grandma and grandpa sent to me and you put it in my checking account?  And could you please pay my tithing on it as well?  I want to use the money for a GPS because it's hard to maneuver around Florida without one thanks to the fact that it's not a grid system and there aren't really ANY mountains to use as a reference!  I would greatly appreciate it if you did!  I'll make sure to send it today.

The Savior is truly amazing.  We aren't having tons of success, we aren't teaching anyone, but we are still seeing miracles every day.  He truly is blessing us for the work that we put in to being a missionary.  We are trying to work harder on always being a representative of Jesus Christ.  We literally wear His name on our chest and we want to honor that name.  However, just because members don't wear a black name tag doesn't mean that they don't have His name in their heart.  We are all His representatives, and we all need to live up to that calling.  It's amazing to be able to have this experience and share the gospel.  I love my Mission President and all that he does for us, I love my companion who pushes me to be better.  I am an obedient missionary, but Hermana Allred has taught me the difference between an obedient missionary, and an exactly obedient missionary.  How grateful I am for her and her diligence.  I love being a missionary.  I know that the gospel is the greatest gift that we are a part of.  Without the gospel, we would have nothing that would sustain us into eternity.  We are truly blessed in many ways that we feel like we don't deserve.  But in our Heavenly Father's eyes, we deserve all that He has if we choose to accept it.  

Well I love you.  Thanks for being awesome!  Good luck in school, and thank you for the love and support.  Be safe, and I'll hear from you soon.

With love,

Sister Ward

PS. Here's a picture of me and Sister Allred and then just a really cool picture of the Orlando Temple.  I love that we get to serve in the area with the temple!  We are incredibly lucky to have this here and we are blessed to have the chapel just across the street from it!  What a blessing.

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