I'm wiped out this week. Batteries are not included on missionary work

& man does the spirit drain!

Hello all though! I hope you all had a great week! Here's the

highlight if you haven't 😉

Well this week was crazy. We had dinner appointments again where we

were able to grow closer too and strengthen our members! One of the

sisters we visited with this week had a missionary experience the next

day! She was taking her oldest to the bus stop and ran into a lady who

lives in her building. This sister had just moved into our ward & the

lady asked her if she had made any friends yet, when the sister

responded that she had made lots of them this lady was surprised. The

sister explained that we have a ward family and the lady was so

interested that she agreed to come to church and meet with the

missionaries! We can all be missionaries whenever and wherever!

We had service at Simpson Meadows again and these old people are so

funny! I'll send a selfie that we took with the ones we work with!

They're just cute and even though they don't have their memories they

usually remember us because of our name tags! It's so fun!

We also met a lady in our complex named Cordelia. Cordelia is an older

lady who is lived across the country and in many different places in

Europe. We were looking at a tree that was changing into it fall

colors right in front of her house and she thought we were students.

We were discussing how pretty the colors looked and she called us over

to explain to us what type of tree it was, the name of the tree has

escaped my mind so don't ask. She then asked us where we were from and

what we were doing. we talked to her for a little while about her life

and she was super cool and nice. She told us anytime we walked by and

she was sitting outside to stop and talk to her! We are hoping to keep

talking with her and eventually bring up the church, she knows we are

missionaries for our church but she didn't really want to talk about

religion.

The temple. Oh, the temple. Sister Nutting and I had such a good time.

It was so beautiful and the peace around the temple is crazy. It's in

the center of Philadelphia which is not a quiet place if you're

curious, but as soon as you walk onto the grounds you don't even

realize it anymore. The noise fades into the background and the spirit

overwhelms your senses. It was, ugh, I can't even describe what it was

like to go through the temple here. It's always going to hold a very

special spot in my heart because PA has become home, and the temple in

Philly just fills me with warm fuzzies. I dare say it's the most

beautiful temple I've gone through. There is not a city in the world

who needed this temple more than Philadelphia and the brethren knew

that. It's amazing to see the impact it's had on the community here,

people are just attracted to the spirit that resides there, the

comfort that is found. It's beautiful. I can't wait to go back and

just soak it all in through my mission.

We did a lot with RCLA's this week (recent converts, less actives) we

met with Iryna again, she's so cool! There is always the Bangura

family that we do FHE with every week and their awesome, we want her

to get to church so bad but we don't know what else we can say to help

her understand, plus she works every Sunday so it's not like we can

tell her "quit your job so you can come to church, the Lord will pay

your bills" so yeah. We have Denise who is an RC and her daughter who

is an LA but they live in Coatesville which is out of our area but

since there is no man the elders gave her to us! She's cool! We also

had lessons with a lady named Bonnie, she's way cool too! Has a lot of

medical issues and can't really walk so it's hard for her to get to

church because her wheelchair doesn't collapse, she wants to go to the

Philly temple really bad though so we are trying to figure out what we

can do to help her get there!

OSCAR oh man Oscar! He's just the best! He's finally started reading

and understanding his scriptures! He always has questions about his

reading and he makes sure he is understanding it correctly! He's just

the best, no lie. We also had a lesson with Maurice this week, Sister

Ashcraft (our STL) and I tracted into him when we were on exchanges.

He doesn't really have a religion but he's interested in learning

more. Sister Nutting and I gave him a Book of Mormon a few days later,

we set up a time to go back and teach him about the Book of Mormon but

it ended up falling through because we couldn't find a woman to come

teaching with us, it's whatever. We talked to him two days later

though when we had to cancel because we were around his place anyway

and he told us that in those two days he had read the whole first book

of Nephi! WHAT?! That never happens! He had really cool insights about

Laman and Lemuel and their hard heartedness and murmurings and how he

can apply that to his own life by listening to Sister Nutting and I

instead of being hard hearted towards us and our message. We set up a

time to go visit him later that week. When we met with him he was

pumped to learn about the Book of Mormon and why we have it. It was so

cool. I love this work!

Speaking of things that were so cool, Elder Robbins came and spoke to

our mission!! It was cool to see all the missionaries in one place!

Elder Robbins had really cool insight on Christlike Attributes and how

there are a lot more than just the nine that are included in Preach My

Gospel. He also talked about how our mission life can apply to our

married life in a few years and it was way cool! He talked a lot about

making sure that we don't put a lot of emphasis on where we serve but

more on how we serve. I learned a lot from him and how much the

mission life prepares us for the rest of our lives. The spirit was so

strong in that meeting, and again it was draining, but so powerful. I

was really impressed by the spirit during his talk about how

everything I'm demonstrating or going to demonstrate in the mission

field I'm going to demonstrate when I get home as well. It was just a

great talk about increasing faith, becoming more Christlike, and how

important it is to prepare for the future. It was so good! Plus it was

cool to meet the missionaries!

That's all that happened this week! I love the mission, I love D-Town,

I love Philadelphia, I love my companion, I love my mission president

but really I love each and everyone of you.

I love our Savior.

Love,

Sister Josie D. Jackson

(Your favorite missionary)

Sent from Downingtown ❤️

Josie and Sister Nutting

Josie outside the Philadelphia Temple

Josie and Sister Nutting

Josie

Wazzup!!

Good morning from Downingtown! I hope you all had a fantastic week and if you didn't here's my email to, as my hero Victoria Beckham once sang, spice up your life. ;)

This week has been good! Philly was truly amazing! After philly we had service at a place called CYWA, where on the second Monday of every month the church goes and feeds the homeless of Coatsville. That was super cool! We also got to do some service for a member in our ward Sister Seaman! She's my favorite! I love her so much! The Seamans are just an awesome family! 

We met with some RCLA's this week! We do tend to do that a lot as you may have noticed. Sister O'Conner was super cool, we walked in and started talking with her she told us she has some Word of wisdom problems but that she wants to come back to church one day. We also met with the Bangura family again they're so cool the only problem is their mom works every Sunday and we can't really tell her to quit her job because she is to provide for her family somehow so we're working with her to see what we can do to help her come back to church. We met with a lady in Coatesville her name is Denise she's been a convert about a year now she was super cool. She has faith in Christ and what he did for us and she's just really awesome. We also met with Iryna, oh man Iryna, she makes such good food! She's been a convert of about a year, she's taking temple prep right now to be sealed to her husband Jeremy. They met each other in the Ukraine while he was serving his mission and then they reconnected when she moved back to United States after she finished getting her degree in the UK.

We taught Oscar again this week he's super awesome, and doing super well. He finally read from the book of Mormon all by himself and was understanding the things that he read so we are super excited to keep working with him and continue to have him grow his testimonies that he can prepare to be baptized in December! We also met with the Samual family again we are having a struggle with them because we think there's a language barrier and they don't fully comprehend all of her teaching them. They also haven't come to church yet even though we've invited them multiple times so we are wondering how truly interested they are.

We met with an investigator this week her name is Theresa, she's from Liberia. She was super cool we walked in and give her a scripture from the holy Bible and also from the book of Mormon and she told us that she wants to re-center her life in Christ because since she's come to the states she has not her life centered on Christ. We're hoping to continue to meet with her and to teach her a little bit more about what we believe so that she can understand and hopefully want to become a member of the church. We also tracked it into a few people Maurice and Jeff they're both super cool. Maurice doesn't really have a religion but he accepted the book of Mormon and gave us a return appointment so that was really cool. We also met Jeff. Jeff had been taking lessons in Lancaster before he moved out here to Downingtown and he actually gone to a church before so we're hoping to continue to meet with him and to continue to help him understand the Gospel.

We had zone conference this week and it was super cool they talked a lot about making sure our planning sessions and study sessions are being used effectively. It was awesome to get some suggestions on how to better study for investigators in to make sure that we are putting specifically for them to each night so we can teach them to the best of our ability the next day.

The Downingtown Dodge. So this week we had a dinner appointment with Sister Bergholm and we left on time to get there on time and we arrive to her house to find out that the address on LDS Tools was actually her sisters house. So we called her to see what her actual address was and we put it in the GPS and it said she still live 30 minutes away. So we drive for 30 minutes and we end up in basically what you would imagine it's homage country. Pull up to the house and there are no lights on so we call her to see if you're at the right place and we are not. So we put in her correct address and we're still 15 minutes away I'm she was super cool about it though and we made it there and had some delicious Mexican food that she made. she is a super cool lady who is dating a non-member who was also there and he excepted our pass along card challenge like to the biggest extent. He posted about on Facebook he's been sharing it with people and he wants to meet with us again so we're hoping that we can continue to teach him in to have her become her own missionary so that they can become a family. 

We also met a lady who only believes in science and not God. Yes we quoted nacho libre for like 10 minutes.

This week has been awesome! I love being a missionary, I love Philadelphia, I love all of you. You're the greatest!

Love,

Sister Jackson

Sent from Downingtown ❤️

Heart attacked

Josie

Josie and Sister Nutting

Hello my dear friends and family!

This week has been an interesting one. Monday after we emailed & went

to Valley Forge, we hit the streets! To no avail but we did it! We

worked hard and tried to find all that we could and we just loved it!

Tuesday became a little more interesting. We were trying to find a

less active mom & her son, when we knock on the door he stuck his head

out the window and asked what we were doing, so we asked if his mom

was home and he said "yeah" and then not so nicely told us to leave.

We had the chance to teach Oscar again twice this week! Tuesday and

Saturday! He's just awesome, I wish you all could meet him and see

this mans faith. He has the most incredible faith and knows how much

the Savior loves him. Every time we go over there  he tells us how he

knows that Christ has saved him from so much and that Christ continues

to save him. I love Oscar!

We also got to continue teaching Vinobh & Anu Samuels, also twice this

week! They're awesome. They are an Indian couple who are here for

Vinobh's work at Comcast, they were also Christian in India so a lot

of the things we talk to them about they already know! We've invited

them to be baptized twice but they are having a hard time with that

because they've already been baptized. They also don't know if they

want to come to our church because they've got friends at their

church. They tell us every time we leave that they love having us over

though! They love to talk about Christ during the week instead of just

on Sunday. Anu has been reading the Book of Mormon and told us that

she gets the same feeling from reading it as she does from reading the

Bible so she knows that it's true, but we don't think she's actually

prayed about it yet. I adore them though, they are just so cute!

So Darren. Oh man. Darren. We're pretty sure he found some Anti stuff.

So consequently we were dropped like a hot potato. He didn't like some

of the deeper doctrine that we have & know to be true. Satan is a punk

though. Especially because Darren was so close! It killed me to have

him drop us but the moment I sat down in total defeat, the Savior

picked me up, brushed me off and pushed me out the door. He's awesome

and He loves us all so much! He knows that eventually Darren will hear

and accept the Gospel, he's just using his agency, and because the

Savior knows this. I know it too.

We also met with a former named Rocio Perez. She is a seventh day

aventus, but loved to talk about Christ. It was super cool because she

let us right in & we taught the plan of salvation, which was inspired

because her Pastor had just died and that day she had been at his

funeral. She was very open to our message and we tried to set up a

return appointment but she said she was really busy. I brought up the

fact that we can do Facebook lessons and she seemed more open to that

idea! The work is moving forward in ways we never would've known!

We had a lot of different meetings and things today that caused us to

be so busy that we didn't really find anyone else.

We had Golden Re-training on Wednesday & it was so spiritually

uplifting! We talked about patterns in our lives. Specifically

patterns of the Savior, patterns in our companionship & patterns in

our individual lives. In the last one we set a vision for our mission,

basically what do we want to say at the end of our mission? It's hard

to think that my mission is ever going to end and it's hard to believe

I've only got about 16ish months left. I really don't ever want this

to end, but sadly all good things do. So my end goal for the best 18

months of my life is to "be perfectly honest and upright in all

things; and be firm in the faith of Christ, even unto the end." (Alma

27:27)

Zone training, this was awesome as well! We talked about making sure

we had faith and no fear when tracting/street contacting. It was so

awesome to just have those faith building experiences!

We had interviews this week too! Crazy right? So many meetings so

little time. President is seriously and inspired man, I can say with

whole heart that part of the reason I am here is to know him. He's

incredible! He asks the most inspired questions and always gives the

best advice! He's honestly someone I will look up to for the rest of

my life & cry like a baby when he's ordained an Area Seventy & speaks

at general conference or something!

We also had exchanges! Sister Ashcraft from Springville, Utah was my

companion for about 24 hours! It was super weird to be without sister

Nutting but I learned a lot! Sister Ashcraft is so unafraid to talk to

people, there was a lady just sitting in her car and she walked right

up and talked to her through the car! This lady was so awesome! She

goes to some Christian church in Coatesville but wanted to talk about

Christ and had a few questions about the Kingdoms of Glory & Joseph

Smith! She'd met with missionaries before and was always open to

hearing and talking about Christ because He's the only way we can get

back to God! She asked where we were from and when we said Utah, man

you should've seen her face! She was so curious as to why two little

white Mormon girls from Utah were all the way in Pennsylvania! So we

explained the mission call process and why we are called where we are

called and all that! We also went to find a less active and we ended

up getting in contact with her neighbor who invited us back!!

We went to the city today and it's incredible!!! Independence Hall is

beautiful & Jim's Steaks has a bomb cheesesteak! With the whiz! I love

it here, I really hope I get to serve in the city. It's beautiful. One

of the most beautiful places I've ever been, I just love it. I promise

to send pics!!

I love the work! I love our Savior & I love Philadelphia!

Love you all!!

Love,

Sister J

Sent from Downingtown ❤️

Sister Nutting and Josie - Philadelphia Temple

Jim's cheesesteak

Sister Nutting and Josie

Love Josie

Hello family & friends!

I love the work. Wow, I can not explain to you how much I love the work.

We had a few dinner appointments this week, the Seaman's, the Sagers,

the Hemmingers & Sister Hein! They are all amazing families and so

welcoming of us into the ward and the mission!

The Seamans have a son out on a mission right now in Brazil! Brother

Seaman is a convert and knows deep, deep doctrine. He asked Sister

Nutting and I some tough questions, but they kept inviting us back! We

had dinner with them on Monday night, they invited us over for the

morning session of conference on Saturday, invited us on Saturday to

stay for the second session & then invited us over again for the

second session on Sunday & for dinner Sunday night. I just hope we

aren't wearing out our welcome! They are extremely nice people though,

just amazing and strong in the Gospel and totally make Sister Nutting

and I think!

The Sagers are way cool! They are both Returned Missionaries from the

Atlanta Georgia mission! Their kids are super cute & their oldest

(Josi) is putting in her papers in December!

The Hemmingers are the people whose garage we cleaned out, they are a

less active couple but they both still do everything we do. Just not

church. They are super nice and have traveled all over! They are in

Vietnam for the next month visiting some exchange students that they

had had! We are trying to figure out ways to get them back to church

but they are just not interested in going to church.

Sister Hein is the mother-in-law of our Ward Mission Leader, she's a

funny older lady and she took us to Cracker Barrel for dinner and it

was pretty good! She is so excited to have sisters back in Downingtown

because she is single so she can start feeding missionaries again!

So that's an update on how I am being fed, so now I'm sure you're all

dying to know how the rest of my week went, what I thought of

conference and so much more!

Darren is progressing so fast! He has not accepted a date yet but we

are hoping that we get him a date this next week. He watched

conference and the priesthood session this week and found them

interesting. When we taught him about what conference is he was very

excited and amazed that our prophet speaks to us and addresses our

needs as a church!

Oscar is so awesome! He watched part of conference as well and really

enjoyed it! He is so pumped to be baptized, he has a date for December

and just can't wait for it! He tells us all the time about how he is

so ready to become a Mormon!

So we went tracting this week, like we always do! Most were

unsuccessful but we did find Hector and Jay. We knocked on Hectors

door, because we were walking around and didn't know where to go until

we saw a bright yellow door, we both said yellow door and ran over! He

invited us to come back another day! He was super cool and one of the

way nicer ones we had met! Jay was a street contact, we were driving

home one night and he was walking his dog in the park and I just said,

we should go talk to him. Sister Nutting pulled into the parking lot

and away we went! He was so cool and open to our message! He gave us

his number to call him and set a day for a lesson! The spirit will

lead us to people! The spirit will also lead us to less actives, who

want to stay less active! The most memorable experience we had with

that this week was we knocked on a door and this older lady opened it.

She saw our tags and said "Mormons?" We barley had time to respond

before the door was shut in our face! We also had a lady tell us that

she was not a member and didn't understand why the missionaries kept

coming by (uh, cuz you are a member? You're in our area book?)

needless to say we probably won't see her again.

So our cute Indian couple, the Samuels. They are both Christian and

are super open to our message! They are brand new to PA and very

welcoming! Anu (the wife) is so sweet, she always makes sure we don't

need food or water and then settles in to hear our message! They are

an interesting couple because they were an arranged marriage in India!

They are super sweet though, some of the nicest people we have met! We

are hoping to get them to church and then set with a date soon!!

So the weather here is getting colder! It rained for about three days

and then had a fog/mist everywhere on Sunday, the leaves are just

starting to change and I'm pumped!

Conference. Oh man where do I even start? Prayer, sacrament,

missionary work, repentance & Book of Mormon. What more could you

want? Nothing? Correct. Eyring was so good, plus he gave Philly a

shout out! #coolest Bednar & Robins were my favorite talks though. How

many of us follow and serve Christ, but don't believe Him? Sure you

believe in Christ, but do you BELIEVE Him? Do you believe He can take

you and make you better, make you celestial material? How many of us

are judgemental? How many of us focus on the faults of others instead

of fixing ourselves? I loved it. What a great and inspired conference.

Plus I saw my homie Elder Arnold belting it out in the MTC Choir on

Saturday Afternoon. So proud!

We went to valley forge today for P-Day and it was awesome! There is

such a reverence on the grounds for the things that happened all those

years ago. The trees were beautiful and the buildings were way cool.

Sister Goodsell, a lady in our ward who has a son in Ghana currently,

took us and showed us around! She's awesome and super cute!

I love you all, I love the Savior & I know the Savior love you all too!

Love,

Your fav missionary

Sent from Downingtown ❤️

Josie and the Hobbit hole (root cellar)

Josie and Sister Nutting - Valley Forge

Valley Forge

Josie and Sister Nutting

Sister Jackson in Downingtown

Hello all!!!

Downingtown, Pennsylvania is the coolest place you're ever gonna find.

Just saying. Want a place that looks like Logan Utah but is not Logan

Utah? Downingtown is the place for you! The people here are well,

nice, when they don't think you're solicitors. "One way ticket to

heaven! Get 'em while they're hot!" Just kidding, we only had one lady

think that. Tracting is hard because most doors go unanswered and when

they do answer they aren't interested but I LOVE the work. Knocking

doors all day just to get them shut is the greatest thing I could ever

be doing. I am so blessed, for real.

My trainer is Sister Nutting from California, she is awesome! Super

into the work, not trunky and always keeps us laughing! The first

night we were here in glorious Downingtown, she realized shed left her

bedding in West Philly (her last area) and slept on a bed of clothes

until we could meet the west philly sisters and get her bedding. We

just opened the apartment here and so we had to make an emergency

grocery run, because we literally had zero food. We went to this store

called Aldi, and it's awesome. It's the cheapest place you'll ever go,

promise. We also are doubling in (white washing) and so neither of us

have any idea what we are doing. It's fine, we are rocking it! We also

had to go to Walmart & spent ten minutes on the floor looking for a

good candle because our apartment smells like smoke. Lol.

One thing I love about the PPM, is that we are not called greenies, we

are goldens. Because we have a golden fire for the work. I just love

it! President Randell is super cool and loving. Sister Randell is an

amazing cook and will just tell you how it is. I love my mission, I'm

never leaving. We also had this way cool experience our first night

here, president circled us all up & said "bear your testimony in one

sentence." We all did & it was so spiritual, I can't even explain, the

tears were real. I love it.

So we have two really progressing investigators right now, Oscar and

Darren. Oscar has a date for December to get dunked! He set it up with

the sisters in our area before we got here so it was not our doing p,

but we love him! He's an older gentleman and has a love for our

Savior. All the older people here have a hard time calling me sister,

it's just me too. They call sister Nutting, Sister Nutting. They all

call me Miss Jackson. I blame Janet for this. Oscar has started

calling me sister Jackson now though! He's so awesome. Darren is

amazing, he's super buff, and has the cutest granddaughter (also

called me Miss Jackson). He is so ready for the gospel & I was crushed

when he didn't make it to church on Sunday. I got to invite him to

baptism and he accepted!! We just gotta get him to Church! I've got

the faith we can do it!! I believe!

We had this awesome service project this week! We cleaned out the

garage of a less active couple, it was like being on an episode of

hoarders. I'll send pics. We found 3 mice, 2 alive, 1 dead. We also

found a dead bird & tons of spiders. It smelled like death. But hey I

got a cool original painting out of it. Valley View 3 by Perez. (Idk

who that is but its cool) we also got homemade cheese steaks out of

it! It was super fun believe it or not!

One of the elders in our district is literally elder Lange. Every time

he talks I'm like "umm Alec you're supposed to be in AZ" it's so funny

to see people who remind you of people from home out here. There's a

lady in our ward that's literally going to be my mother when she's

older. She's super nice & can talk your ear off and I feel right at

home with her! She fed us last night and man was it good. There is

also a young woman in our ward, Josi, who is going to be my best

friend cuz we have the same name. We talked about it, she's down. I

love it here guys, so much. The things that have happened since we

landed in Philly are amazing. In fact, our pilot from Detroit to PA

was a member and was so excited to talk to us that he found us before

we left to go find president. I will never forget what it was like to

walk through the doors and see the AP's with a giant banner for us,

welcoming us there, and then the Randell's so happy to see us and just

laughing and talking with us. Unforgettable. One of the best moments

in my life so far.

I love you all, I love the work, I love our Savior.

Look up "Lord I Believe" by Elder Holland you will not regret it.

April of 2013 general conference. ALSO WATCH GENERAL CONFERENCE!! It

will be amazing. I pinky promise. I don't know how many of you ladies

got to watch the general woman's session, if you didn't go watch it.

If you did, watch it again. President Utchdorf gave this amazing talk

about not giving up. He spoke of the missionaries that converted his

wife, Harriet, and oh my, oh man. It was the best story for me to

here. Like I said we tract ALOT and we rarely get the door answered &

when we do we get told no. He talked about how these missionaries in

Germany walked past an apartment building and felt impressed to go

inside and knock doors, so they did. First floor? Nothing. Second

floor? Nothing. Third floor? Nothing. Fourth floor? Nothing, until the

last door. Where young Harriet opened the door and invited them in. We

all have to keep going until we find our fourth floor, last door. It's

out here in Downingtown for me at this moment. I just gotta keep going

and I'll find it. I know I will. Fourth floor, last door.

I know & feel my Saviors love for me & you is real.

Love,

Sister Josie Jackson

Ps my address for letters & such is 1 Blackhawk circle apartment b-15

Downingtown PA 19335

 

Josie on Jackson Drive

Service Project - Garage Cleaning

Downingtown Greenway 

Downingtown Greenway Hike

Downingtown Greenway 

Yes this week. Prime. It's been the fastest week of my life. 

First order of business, we got a new gold tag investigator named Lawanna, she is awesome! She is originally from Arkansas and she moved to Utah for the Huntsman Cancer Research Center. We don't know what kind of cancer she has, but we do think she is a real investigator. I made the mistake of bringing up living prophets and she did not like that at all. She didn't understand if he is a living prophet how come shes never heard of them. We just talked about how he is the leader of our church and you have the ability to learn about him through the wonderful tool that is lds.org

Second order of business, within the last week and a half I have had the opportunity to hear two of the twelve apostles speak!!!!!!!!!!!! Elder Christofferson came on Tuesday and spoke a lot about the missionary theme "teach repentance and baptism converts" and how repentance is such a profound part of our lives. Repentance is more than just confessing your sins, repentance is making a daily choice to choose God. Then on Sunday Elder Ballard came and spoke just about missionary work in general, that was really good and cool. One of the things that stood out to me was he said we can tell anyone anything, as long as we do it with a smile on our faces! 

Now the moment I know you've all been waiting for....................FLIGHT PLANS!!! We finally got our flight plans Friday night and man, ya'll should've seen my face. You would've thought it was Christmas morning in Disneyland. We leave the MTC Tuesday morning at 3:30 (woof, I know) and then our flight leaves SLC at 7:20, we then have a lay over in Detroit at 12:55 (yes, I did sing the song from Happiest Millionaire & thought of you Amy) and then we finally arrive in the city of brotherly love at 3:40. MAN I can not wait!!! 

So I did something I never thought I would do this week. Something a lot of you probably thought would ever happen. I auditioned to sing opening numbers for the meetings here. WHAT I know, I have gone crazy. Plus I guess it wasnt just me. It was Sister Stubben, Roberts, Taylor and I. Sister Taylor played the piano and the other three of us sang. We sang a mixture of Savior Redeemer and Called to Serve that was super beautiful. We took a video of it so when I get it from Sister Taylor I will be sure to send it!! 

Monday night was cater night and well, Taco Bell is not good. My tummy was not a happy camper after that. Safe to say, I will not be eating there again anytime soon. Man speaking of food, I can't wait to get out and eat real food. I am super worried that I won't even know what real food tastes like anymore. It's just like Mountain Crest. 

One of the best decisions I made this past week was to buy a new Book of Mormon! I have been color coding it and there are so many answers to prayers, this last week was hard to be away from all of you guys but I had the most amazing thing happen while I was reading this week. I was reading in 1 Nephi, when Lehi tells them to go back to Laban to get the records and Nephi says "I will go and do the things the Lord commands" so they leave on their mission to get these plates. We have no idea how long they are gone, while they are gone their mother is back at camp worrying about them. A chapter or two later there is a verse when they arrive home that says something like "We returned unto the tent of our father and behold our joy was full and our mother was comforted." WOW what a blessing to me!! I fully know that that was God saying "Jos, you got this. Your joy will be full." This book is a blessing. I challenge you guys to start reading it again or if you are currently reading to continue reading, because it will bless your life so much!! 

This week has been awesome. Next week I will be coming to you from PA!! I cant wait! 

Love you ALL!!

The pictures attached are of me and the girls in my district, us and our flight plans, and then me and sister stubben at the temple. Yes in the picture of us just holding flight plans I couldn't even hold it out because I was waiting to wake up from my dreamlike state and have them disappear! 

Love,

Sister Josie D. Jackson

Philadelphia Pennsylvania Mission

Josie, Sister Stubben, Sister Roberts, Sister Taylor, Sister Morwood, Sister Tew

Josie & Sister Stubben

What is the MTC compared to Mountain Crest? Well they are a lot alike in food, but they have a little more flavor up in this joint. It is a lot like school, and don't get me wrong I know I can learn a lot here and I have been, but man, this is not my favorite place in the world. I love my district and my comp and the people I meet are nice and all but man I just wanna be in Philly. I can hear the city calling to me, I can hear the hour to get ready calling to me, I can smell the better tasting food. Honestly my spirit is just longing to be there. 

This whole in bed by 10:30 up by 6:30 thing is killing me. My dear friends who have been here, where was the warning??? I blame you for this ;) I have had to adjust to the eating schedule because as most of you know breakfast is a foregin concept to me and eating dinner before 8 or 9 is also something new too. Also getting shots all alone are the same situation. also these computers dont have spell check so I may misspell somethings because I am tired and dont have spell check. 

So first order of business, I will always be emailing my parents and they have set up a blogspot for my weekly emails, I honestly don't know how much time I will have when in the field so I may just have to send monthly emails to this large group of friends and family. If that does start happening please find your way to www.sisterjosiejackson.blogspot.com

I am positive that my mom will keep that as updated as she can and you will find most, if not all, my weeklys home! 

So who have I run into thus far into my stay? Elder Bodily, Elder Larsen, Elder Gillingham and Sister Bernhardt. They are doing well and loving life as we missionaries do!

My comp is from New Mexico, she is really cute and her name is Sister Stubben, we were also called as the STL's (sister training leaders) for our district. So that is way cool! Also things that are cool are getting letters and things, we can get these everyday and write back when we have time! you can also use Dear Elder to send same day letters and just type in my address! Emoji's don't show up on the printed paper just FYI

Oh! Fun fact, three days into our stay here we had to move because our old building had bats in it. I never saw a bat but apparently they were there. 

We had the crazy opportuinity to hear Brother Norby bear his testimony on Sunday, yes he is the elder that was in the Brussles airport attack. It was so crazy cool and spiritual. We get to leave the MTC on September 20th and wow the light at the end of the tunnel is coming fast! 

One thing we learned in our Sunday devotional is that Jesus Christ is always running to your aide, I can testify that he is! He is waiting for you with open arms to run back to him and accept him in your life! He love you guys and I love you guys!!

I miss ya'll 

Challenge of the week:

If Endowed: GO DO INITIORIES BECAUSE THEY ARE AMAZING

if not endowed: Read Alma 26 because it is all about missionary work and it had been getting me through this week!

Love,

Sister Josie D. Jackson

Philadelphia Pennsylvania Mission