Spiderwebs and Sister missionaries

What a week!

I hope you all have had a great week and that your Mondays have been a

pleasure! Who knew that Monday could become one of your favorite days

of the week? Not me that's for sure! Life here in DTown is still just

fantastic! I really love it out here and the work is pushing forward

more and more everyday! It's still pretty warm out here, not too hot,

not too cold, all you need is a light jacket! For real though it's

great, I love PA, it's like home to me.

We don't have much to report on this week, we had to wait all week for

the Elders area book so we didn't have a ton of lessons. We finally

got the area book on Friday so we could start contacting people and

man does the area book need to be cleaned out. We were blessed to have

a cleaned out area book when we got to DTown so that we can clean this

one for the next missionaries.

We did have a few service opportunities this week! We served at a

church called Jubilees, which does like a soup kitchen type thing and

it was really fun! The guy who runs it is crazy & it's in Coatesville

so we got some interesting people in there. Lots of homeless people,

it was really fun though! We served at the rest home as usual, which

is always fun! We also did a family night thing with Sister Gregory

(Bergholm, she just got divorced) and her boyfriend Shane, who is

slowly investigating the church! We started helping him build legos,

in fact it's the Imperial star ship, yeah it's pretty cool. It was

super fun!

The lessons we did have this week were awesome! We taught Denise again

and she's just progressing really well, she's been baptized for a year

now and just still really has the gospel click for her. It's so cool

to see how it has changed her life! We also had Oscar, he's so fun, it

honestly feels like we are teaching a member most of the time which

makes it really cool too see how much he has progressed!! He's just

awesome, December can't come fast enough for him! Sister Nutting

taught Maurice while I was in P1 on exchanges and he's still doing

great! He's coming to church on Sunday whoot, whoot!! Ugh I love it

when people just get it, it's so hard to see people just not

understand what you are talking about. When I was in P1, Sister Payne

and I taught Sister Cholo, and she is the coolest, she wants to go to

the temple so bad to do her family names, she was really tired so we

just testified of the temple and family history and it was so

powerful. Testimonies are powerful people!! Family history is really

cool when you think about it, it's helping you understand the people

who came before you, it helps you grow closer to them and then to your

Father in Heaven who wants you to know your ancestors, and your

ancestors want to know you. Doing family history work is the only way

to do that, write it down for your children, find and take names to

the temple if you can, write and keep your our journal for your

children's children's children, you never know who will benefit from

the family history you do. Whether it's great or small, it all

matters.

Another thing we did on exchanges was some service for a member in the

P1 Ward. She just moved back to PA from Texas and is moving into her

fathers old house. Which hasn't been lived in for three plus years.

Sister Payne and I were in charge of cleaning out the add on that was

full of chairs and tables and junk. It wasn't too bad, except the

chairs and tables were covered in spider webs, some of them even had

like the sacks that their babies are in (or maybe their kills? I

dunno) anyway, in order to clean the chairs we had to pop the sacks.

Don't worry I died inside like three times. I also killed two wolf

spiders so that was fun. You should've heard me on one "I think it's

dead....oh, it's alive. ITS ALIVE." Its fine, I'm still terrified of

them. It was fun though, just know that spiderwebs and sister

missionaries don't always mix well. We were covered in dust and web

after the fact. Oh so fun!

So Darren, do y'all remember Darren? Here's a quick refresher for you

if you don't. He was the gator I invited to be baptized on my second

day out here in glorious PA, and then the one who also dropped us like

threeish weeks later. Anyway we were in his neighborhood the other day

and he got into his car as we were walking close to his house, he

drove past us and stopped to talk to us and just said it was good to

see us and that he is sorry that we couldn't agree, we talked to him

for a minute and said our goodbyes. That night we got out of our

dinner appointment and checked our phone to make sure that Oscar

didn't cancel and we had a text from Darren, at first we were like oh

cool, and then we read it....MIRACLES HAPPEN PEOPLE, I was legit

crying for a hot minute after reading the text. Oh, ha, I should tell

you want he said. He said how good it was to see us, that he had been

thinking about us and that in the few months we've stopped meeting

he's gone to different church's and nothing has made him feel like he

did when he was meeting with us sooo he wants to take lessons again

and come to church and AHHH, the tears of true joy and gratitude for

our Father in Heaven were real!! The Holy Ghost is real y'all and He

works miracles for missionaries as we do the things we are supposed to

be doing! God is great!

We had an awesome district meeting this week, our District Leader gave

us a quote that he heard. He said "the best way to share the message,

is to be the message." How true is that!? If we aren't acting like a

member of the church, or being an example of good people how are we

going to share what we want others to know? We aren't. If we aren't

being the best person we can be and acting like who we say we are,

then people aren't going to believe us when we tell them something.

It's amazing to see what being the message really means, especially

with the holiday season coming up, I encourage all of you to be the

message, whatever that message maybe. Whether it's being a more

Christlike person, being more loving, or more kind and charitable

towards others, be the message you want other people to have, to know,

and to become.

It's weird to think that I've been on my mission for two months now,

people ask me how long I've been out and I'm always like oh a few

weeks, but really I've only got 16ish months left doing the Lords

work, how weird is that?? So weird. I love my mission, I know I say

that every email but seriously, I love my mission, more than I ever

thought I would. I love my companion too, she's an amazing missionary

and has done her very best. Preparing to help her go home is going to

be so hard, but knowing I'll see her again is a blessing. That's one

thing I'll always love about the mission, you find the people you'll

be friends with forever out here. The things you go through as a

companionship and as missionaries just binds you together, it becomes

less like a friendship and more like a sisterhood. Sister Nutting has

become more than just a friend to me, she's truly become my older

sister. She's so funny, this week she lost her iPad and we were

freaking out for a hot minute but we found it don't worry. We have the

same sense of humor if that gives you any idea of how our

companionship works! The Lord truly knows what we need, and he knew

I'd need a companion that I got along with as my trainer or I wouldn't

have been as humbled to listen to her as I have been. She's made me

into a better version of who I am and helped me become a better

missionary along the way. I couldn't imagine doing this without her.

Well, my peeps, I love and miss you all. I invite you to take time

this week and remember our Heavenly Fathers love for us, just take

time at the end of each day to think through the blessings He has

given you and the little miracles He blessed you with that day,

because I know He blesses each of you everyday. I promise you as you

notice those things and take that time to thank Him for them He will

give you more and more blessings, and I know I could be a little more

grateful for the little things this holiday season. Feel free to shoot

me an email if you have any cool experiences you'd like to share, I'd

love to hear how you see Heavenly Fathers hand in your life. Never

forget how much He loves you, how much He cares for you, and how much

He wants to bless you. His blessings are always raining from heaven,

so take the time to put away your umbrellas and go dance in the rain.

Love you all!

Have a great week!

Sister Jackson

Sent from Downingtown ❤️

Josie, Oscar, and Sister Nutting

Sister Josie Jackson

Sister Jackson and Sister Nutting

Sister Jackson