It's a Christmas miracle!

December 23, 2013

I have seen so many blessings this past weekend- such a tender mercy from Heavenly Father. This weekend was pretty rocky, but never have I had such a strong testimony of the Plan of Salvation. I have received so many spiritual confirmations that Grandma Stoker is more than happy where she is, and that Heavenly Father is so aware of her. It has been so great to see His hand in my work and all the things He has taught me from this.

We had the COOLEST experience this past week with a lady that lives out in Lake Las Vegas (the fancy place where Sister Dion lives) She has been researching near death experiences and has been placing together bits and pieces of the Plan of Salvation, then researched different religions to see what matched up with her beliefs and came across the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- Day saints. She already has a testimony of Joseph Smith and told us she wasn't sure what we called him, but she is pretty sure he is a prophet. How golden.

I'm going to keep it brief since I'll talk to you in a couple days AND it's SIster Nilson's birthday so we are going to party! This morning i woke up at 2 am and put streamers and balloons all around the living room. We have too much fun.

LOVE YOU!!!!

Thanks again for the letters and packages. I really appreciate it :)

Love,

Sister Stoker

December 16, 1013

Family!
Sorry I got a little crazy emailing people and talking with the missionaries...so this will be short. But I love you and can't wait to talk next week!!

We had a fun Christmas leadership training this week. Sister Nilson and I played guitar/ violin/ sang Mary did you know? (and yes, Mallory. I thought of you) It was fun. I missed half the notes. Nobody noticed.

Serena is progressing like crazy- she is ready to be baptized. Her uncle is about to disown her because of this and the adversary is hitting her like crazy but she doesn't let it phase her.

Sister Nilson and I have been caroling at every door- sometimes we just knock on random doors  and sing to them and ask if they want to hear a message about Jesus (which is kind of unheard of in this mission since we don't knock doors) The only problem is that we are far too silly to get through a song so we usually sing half then have to stop because we are laughing too hard. What a blessing and a curse. Also there is an elder who just told me he is from Nesa (Nisa?) Oregon and knows Ballantynes. E. Boster. Tiny world.

Arlene's dad told her last week that she couldn't be Mormon, but came to church yesterday!! It was such a blessing...I'm telling you. Fasting works.

My companion from the MTC (Sister Nichols)'s mother passed away last week. She went home for 3 days to speak at the funeral and clean out the house then came back to work right after. She is such a saint and I look up to her in every way.

Thanks again for the letters and package! I feel so loved :)

God Bless and Merry Christmas!

Sister Stoker

This is Miracle, Jasmine's sister.... I love her to pieces. 

December 9, 2013

Hello! It's been such a great week- the work continues to pick up, except I'm not quite sure what happened this week. I LOVED that Christmas devotional yesterday- what a spirit it brought! We watched it at a members house with our investigator Serena and had such a great experience. She just cried and cried as she watched it and I realized that's a spirit I take for granted. I loved how the Prophet talked about how the only way to find true happiness is by helping others feel it and HELLO that is the epitome of the mission. Also, here is something funny that happened. The other morning Sister Nilson and I decided to conserve miles on our car and run to morning sports, except she can't run because of her broken foot, so she rode her bike while I ran. Well we live in this fancy house that is gated so I ended up having to crawl under the gate to open it for her to ride through. Well I failed to mention that the gate I opened opens towards you...and I'm not even sure if you can follow this story but the gate ended up just completely taking her and the bike out. She didn't really get hurt from it, it was mostly just the funniest thing to watch. And she laughed about it so it's ok for me to.

Yesterday at church was just great. I hung out with Brandon Flowers in the Primary room- we had a nice casual chat while I composed myself like a dignified missionary and pretended I wasn't talking to a celeb. Apparantly he is visiting for 2 months so that will be a fun challenge for me...remembering the power and authority of my calling. Haha just kidding. It's no big deal. But what IS a big deal is that we are serving on Lake Las Vegas and it turns out Celion Dion and Chris Rock and other celebrities have houses up there. Challenge ACCEPTED. It is so crazy having THE nicest neighborhood in all of Henderson and also the most ghetto in our area- how fun is that!

Sorry I don't really have any crazy spiritual experiences to share- guess I"m just used to those by now. We have an investigator who was set to be baptized this weekend and is SO ready, but her dad won't give her permission :( So if could keep Arlene and her family in your prayers, I would really appreciate that.

Love you all! 

Sister Stoker

December 2nd, 2013

Hey Family! 

The work is BLOWING up here in the Lake Mead stake!! I don't know if i told you but we inherited another ward in the stake (the Elders got double transferred out) so it has been crazy. SIster Nilson and I have had a fun time adjusting to the two wards which means 6 HOURS of church each Sunday. It has been a bit overwhelming with all that is going on with transfers and the new ward, but hey. What a good problem to have. We have over 20 investigators right now so balancing time between finding, teaching, dropping, and working with members is our latest challenge. But I'm up for it! Oh and plus also Brandon Flowers was in our Sacrament meeting yesterday (lead singer of The Killers) and I just about died. Someone mentioned his name and said it was good to see Brother Flowers visiting ( I guess he grew up in this ward and it his parents still live in it) and I looked over and was a bit distracted for a good portion of the meeting. But I got up and bore my testimony/ introduced myself to the new ward. So if his next hit is about a testimony he heard in sacrament by a sister missionary, you'll know it's about me. 

The new ward we got is one of the richest in all the land. There are these fancy gated homes that have gate keepers who have to check you in. You have to be on the guest list of someone's hosue in order to get in the complex and then they take down your license plate # and give you a ticket. It is crazy 

Let me tell you about Serena. She is GOLDEN. She referred herself on Mormon.org and says she just feels like God has led her to the mormon church. After our first lesson we set her for baptism (beginning of January) and invited her to read the beginning of the Book of Mormon. We went back a couple days later and she had read 10 chapters! That has never happened. 

Now let me tell you about Eric. He works at the church bookstore but isn't a member (crazy, I know) but he decided to read the Book of Mormon to see what this is all about. He was told to read with an open heart and claims to be doing that, but to be honest he is pretty narrow-minded about all of it. I don't mean that to be rude, that is just what I've observed. Well as he read, he got to the part where Nephi kills Laban and it was really hard for him to picture a God who would command someone to murder someone else. Well we tried telling him to pray about it and he wasn't too fond of the idea, so Sister Nilson pulled out the Bible and read a couple stories where the exact same thing happened (one in Judges where the Prophetess drives a tent stake through someone's temples? yeah never thought i'd use that in a lesson) It humbled him a bit and took him by suprise, but he said he wanted to read the story because it still didn't sound right. 

Now back to Serena. When we went to her house the second time, she had the exact same concern as Eric and her lesson was an hour after his- it was crazy. But the way she handled it was completely different. As soon as we started testifying and invited her to pray about the Book of Mormon, she accepted it and moved on to the next question (which by the way was wether we have to pay tithing on ALL we have ever earned or just from this point on, because she said she would have to sell her house) She is SO humble and ready for this gospel! She LOVED church and I am so excited to be a part of her conversion! I love this gospel. Oh and then at church she told us she prayed about Laban then watched Zero Dark Thirty and got her answer. She realized that sometimes bad people just have to  die. Heavenly Father has some peculiar ways of answering prayers. I love it.

Last week we went to Great Harvest and I got some AMAZING eggnog bread- you need to make that if you haven't yet. Holy cow. Then the owners came out and gave us a free loaf of Honey Whole Wheat, some HUGE mint brownies and some cookies. It reminded me of Dad and how he is always giving to those who need and there I was, back at home. It was such a tender mercy on the day before Thanksgiving. We spent all day Thursday visiting members then went to a couple widow's houses that evening. We only ate once (thank goodness) with a huge family that had to reserve the church to fit everyone and it felt like I was at a Stoker or Haueter gathering. 

Our investigator Arlene (17 years old. Cutest thing ever) is doing so well too. She is ready for this step, but her dad is a bit skeptical. He thinks this is just a phase she is going through and is scared she won't follow through. Well I fasted for him yesterday and after our lesson with her I talked to her about him and she said he agreed to come to church with her next Sunday! I know every other email is about the power of fasting...but honestly. It's as real as it gets. 

It doesn't quite feel like the holidays yet- I was in short sleeves on Saturday but I hear it will be getting colder soon. So hopefully. Also there is an Elder in my zone from Mattawa- Elder Callaway. Tiny world. Oh and the Bennet's son (Tyler?)'s girlfriend is serving in this mission too. 

Love you all!!

Sister Stoker

Novmeber 25th, 2013

What a crazy week it has been! I'm going nuts. We had transfers AND boundary changes this weekend- i have to keep telling myself that change is good. We lost part of our ward which was sad- we had to give away our awesome new investigator to the elders :( I hate that. BUT good things are comin! Sister Remund is leaving me and going to Kingman to be with my MTC companion Sister Nichols! I'm SO happy for her. She has been here all her mission and I'm sure was ready for a little change. I'm so excited to stay here because this ward is now my family, so I'll be able so spend the holidays with them. My new companion is Sister Nilson. I don't know her very well, but she is actually a visa waiter headed to Brazil, so we'll see how long we are actually companions. Word on the street is as soon as they get their Visas they are gone within the week.

We had an awesome meeting with Elder Bruce C. Carlson from the 70 on Thursday. He gave some really good trainings and mostly they were all focused on us becoming better people- not missionaries. I thought it was interesting. He talked about how (and Elder Anderson told us this too) they are more concerned with how active/ strong we are in 30 years then how many people we convert. I also had the privilege of leading the missionary choir for him so that was fun. There was fancy violin and everything.

So the temple trip with Yamilet. We had such a sacred experience when we went on Tuesday and I don't want you to freak out when I tell you, but it was such an answer to prayers and concerns I've had. We planned to go at 6:30 on Tuesday night and were freaking out SO excited and were determined to not be late. The baptisms were at 7:30 but we were going to have a lesson with her before and walk around/ show her the atrium before. Well somehow we were late- don't know how that happened- but we got out of an appointment a few minutes late. So Yamilet called us and asked if she should wait inside for us or out in the parking lot and we told her just to sit in her car till we got there. Well as soon as she hung up the phone, she heard a gun shot. Someone committed suicide that night in the atrium RIGHT when we were supposed to be there. Such a tender mercy from Heavenly Father. It was such a blessing because at no point during the night did we get an overwhelming feeling that we shouldn't go, or that we should be late. It just happened. To me, that was my Father in Heaven letting me know that He is guiding me through everything- whether or not I have a spiritual prompting or not. They closed the temple for the night but we were able to go on Friday night and OH what an awesome experience! IT was so fun to be all dressed in white with her and Sister Remund and watch Yamilet let others recieve the same blessings from baptism as she just had.

Jasmine came back to church this week! Her baby is old enough to take now so her and Sa'Niyah (the baby) and her sister Miracle (3 yrs old) came and sat by us. Mom thank you for teaching me how to keep kids entertained during sacrament. We colored with her and looked at the pictures in the gospel principles manual and somehow kept her quiet. She loved primary though. And after church, I saw the Burrups! Brother and Sister Burrup flew down here to pick up Laurel and they met her for the first time in the foyer of the chapel and we were standing right there during the reunion and it was so sweet! You all better take good care of her when she heads home.

Well I love you. HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!

Sister Stoker