1.25.16

Hello everyone! 

This week has been an amazing week! We had a worldwide mission conference with all the missionaries in the world and I learned a ton. Elder Bednar talked primarily on the Spirit and how as missionaries, we carry the spirit to people's hearts, but their hearts have to be open to accept it. It truly is within the agency of others that the Spirit can thrive. 

In our stake, the group for the Young Single Adults was formed around October/November. The leaders took all the names of anyone in the area within 18-30 and threw them into our branch. There are a lot of less active people here/ people that have moved away so we have been doing a lot of work figuring out who lives where. This week we had plans to drop in and see someone by the name of Karra. We showed up to her house, turns out she has 4 kids, but she was way excited to see us! We shared a message with her and asked her to bear her testimony. She hasn't been to church for a very long time, for years but as she spoke, she referred to "her church" very often. We told her that we would help her to come back, to feel comfortable, and that her kids would be able to create their own testimonies. She has a son that hasn't been baptized and he's 9, so that was a miracle! We told the missionaries that are responsible for her area about her and they are going to work to help her come back to church and prepare her son to be baptized! It was amazing to see that even though we didn't help a "YSA" member, we were able to find her and help her family grow and progress! 

A couple of days later, we went to visit another less active member and after we did so, we began to knock the doors around him. Out of no where, we heart a car alarm and ran to see if it was ours. we left that particular building to check, (turns out it was another car) but when we went to go back to that building, we didn't really feel good about it. Instead, we went to the neighboring building, knocked a couple doors and left. As we were walking out, we stopped to talk to some haitians and gave them a card about the church. As we gave it to them, one of them yelled, "HEY! I've been to this church! I love this church!" turns out he had gone to church a lot over in Wellington! We told him about the church building closer to him and he got way excited to come and to be with people his own age. 

This week i've been reading a talk called "The Other Prodigal" by Jeffrey R Holland. One line i love from it is "Walk peacefully. Walk confidently. Walk without fear and without envy. Be reassured of Heavenly Father's abundance to you always." I know that the Lord loves us perfectly and has a perfect plan for all of us. We aren't here on this earth to compete for eternal life, He has prepared a way for everyone to have it. And i know that through the restored gospel on the earth today, we can get there. I love you all, have a great week!

Love Sister Kylie Erickson 

51 degrees

Well everyone, 

I'm not well equipped for this Florida winter.... It got to 51 degrees this morning and I don't know what to do! haha. the humidity here makes it miserably cold. I can only imagine what it's like in Wyoming. 

This week we had an amazing miracle through the Spirit. We were knocking on the street and as we were heading back to our car, I saw a house behind a house and felt the impression to go there. I thought it was just my brain so I kept walking.  the thought came into my head, "You now know that house is there, and you're just going to walk away?" without saying anything, I turned around and walked to the house. There we met Marcus, someone who hasn't prayed in years because his pastor told him that God didn't hear all of his prayers. When Marcus told him he was leaving that church, the pastor told him that God never would hear him. We prayed with him and he felt the Spirit. We testified that God hears every prayer and that He wants to hear from us. We committed him to pray tonight to God. He didn't commit to baptism, and he said he would come to church depending on how his prayer went, but I know that he needed us that day to share with him his worth and that he was more important to someone greater than us. 

A lot of people we are working with right now are friends of members of the congregation here. The youth are all missionary minded and want to share the goodness that they have. It's amazing to think that because of their examples, others have been curious about what they believe and know to be true, to the point that it starts to influence others too. 

The main message for me this week was that pure joy comes through helping others and seeing how it effects others. I've learned that in order for us to be happy, we have to give of ourselves to the Lord and if we serve those around us, then the Lord will bless us tenfold. Those that lose themselves will find themselves. I pray that some of the words I shared with you today will touch some hearts that needed them. I pray for you and am grateful that you are in my life and have helped me to be where I am today. Always remember to smile, be brave, and let the Lord help you. Because He will! I love my mission and all that it entails. Have a great week!

Love Sister Kylie Erickson 

Sister Pankratz and I- went minigolfing last Pday

bathroom selfies

Florida sunrise

YSA!

Hey everyone! 

Things have been great in Southern Florida :) It has dropped down to 65 degrees and i've been freezing. I was hoping that Wyoming blood with help me out with that, but it hasn't. haha. 

So this week we got our transfer call and I will be transferring to Boynton Beach to be in the YSA branch for our stake! Boynton is about 30 min south of WPB and as YSA missionaries we will be driving around everywhere so i'll be back up in West Palm for sure. I've really come to love West Palm and the people here and i'll miss it. But a lot of new things are coming!

So this last week, we had a random phonecall from a lady named Joann. She had been in the hospital and all she wanted for Christmas was a bible. So we took it to her and introduced her to the Book of Mormon. A week later, she loves the BOM and loves the spirit she feels when she reads it. She has been wanting to be baptized and find a church that will love and accept her and as soon as she's out of the hospital she will be baptized and go to church! Joann is hilarious, she talks so sassy, tells about her former life doing drugs and the dumb decisions she made, and always talks about how she needs to get in the habit of having her "spiritual breakfast, spiritual lunch, spiritual dinner, and spiritual snack." In other words, she want's to get in the habit of praying and reading the scriptures. She is a fireball! but she's so ready for these changes. 

The holidays were fantastic here and it's crazy that it's 2016. May the Lord bless you and keep you this new year! Something I learned this week comes from a talk from Elder Holland. In one of his talks he is explaining his idea of what Christ said to His disciple Peter. "Peter, if i wanted fish, I could get fish. What I need Peter, is disciples." It's really made me ponder how everything is in the Lord's power. But He asks us to do things so we can show Him that we want to serve Him and that we would do anything for Him. I hope everyone this year continues on the road to following our Savior- it is through Him that we find the utmost happiness :)

Have a great week! Love you all.

Sister Kylie Erickson