We All Need the Fullness of the Gospel

Hey ya'll,

Happy Mothers Day a day late to all the Mom's!!! It was so good to Skype my family last night.  I wish it could have been longer.  I'm not going to lie, it kinda made me homesick.  I loved it though. :) Oh and Happy Birthday to Ang this week! :)

So funny story... Sister Joseph and I were driving down the road. There are tons of trees around here and it is turning so green.  They say that it rains more here than in Seattle.  There are crazy Jurassic Park thunderstorms.  It's so cool :)  Anyways, we were passing by an open field and there was one random white tree and I said, "Hey look!  It looks like the Tree of Life!" Then Sister Joseph looked at me... there was a long pause... and then i was like, whhhaaa who says that?  I can't believe I just said that.  It seemed funnier in the moment, now that I just re-read it, it doesn't seem that funny haha, but a missionary would definitely say that. But ya... I'll just stop now.. :)

This last week was busy busy.  We had Zone Conference, which was so good!  We had to sit with missionaries at the lunch table and act like we were in a member's home.  Well, of course, President and Sister Vellinga and Elder and Sister Wells (Johnson Home missionaries) sat at our table.  It was good though.  They pretended to be a family with two teenage kids... and we were the missionaries.  President Vellinga told me and my companion that we were perfect and he wouldn't have changed a thing, that we did and our unity is awesome.  Soooo we felt pretty special. :)

We were also able to go to the Johnson farm this week.  I was being trained because we are the "back ups" for the Johnson Home. It is SO beautiful there and the spirit.  Wow.  I hope we get to go there a lot more.  I also gave about 8 tours the last little bit in Kirtland.  I am getting the history down a little bit more.  It's a lot of information and I'm studying as much as I can. We have had some very special moments on tour in the School of the Prophets.  We were telling one couple that came on the tour that there was "Amish" chocolate in Hyrum (about 45 minutes away) so they went to Hyrum and bought some chocolate on Saturday and then drove back to Kirtland to bring us some!  So nice of them!  I love meeting all these people who come in from all over the world to do church history tours.

We have also been able to get on chat.  We have been talking with people from ALL over the world.  We had a guy from Maylasia the other day.  We sent the missionaries to him and he told us that he knew he needed to convert and he knew that it would bring him happiness.  We bore testimony and said it will bring him so much joy, so he is going to go to church and he was so excited!  It made me so happy. :)

We were also going to go and see a former investigator named Brad (he had dead squirrels pinned all over in front of his house) and he told us we could teach him, but he also referred us to his friend named Chucky and his wife Elkie.  We get to his house and his wife doesn't want to talk to us... but Chucky says, "I love Jesus!  Come talk to me about him!" So we are like... okay.... haha and go sit on his front porch.  We end up talking about prophets and we tell him that just like there were prophets before, there is a prophet on earth today.  He freaked out and said, "WAIT A SECOND!  You know the prophet today?"  We told him we knew who he was.  He asked how we knew and long story short... he said, "If I heard the prophet speak, and I felt the spirit, I am sure I would know if he was the prophet."  WE got so excited!!! 

In John 21, Jesus is telling Peter, if you love me.... feed my sheep. One way to show our love for our Savior is sharing His gospel.  He says in those verses to "follow him".  If we think about it, He was baptized, partook of the sacrament, charitable, humble, etc.  We try to follow him in those ways, but he ALSO shared the Gospel and He wants us to follow Him in all ways... including sharing what we know.  It's a commandment.  I love the analogy Kory shared with me about sheep and why does the Savior always refer to us as sheep?  Because I mean... sheep are dumb.  It's true that they get completely stuck when walking into a bush and don't know how to back up.  They are too scared to drink out of a moving river and so they die of thirst.  They walk into a forest and already forget which way to get out.  But they do know the sound of their shepherds voice.  They NEED Him to direct them or they will become lost or die.  Just like we ALL need our Shepherd or the Savior.  We (the sheep) can't do it without help and guidance. 

The gospel isn't just a "cool" thing to share with others.  We NEED it. Others NEED it in order to progress and return back with our Heavenly Father.  I seriously never realized how much the missionaries need the members.  I never really thought that we are all instruments in His hands.  Just being there, planting seeds.  God is preparing His people through you and us.  In Preach My Gospel it tells us a quote from someone that says, "It filled a hole in my heart that I didn't even know was there".  Alma 29:1-2 is Alma having a desire to want to tell the world. He's so pumped!  We can be pumped too.  We all need the fullness of the Gospel.  It brings so much joy and happiness.  I know Heavenly Father created a perfect plan, a perfect Gospel, perfect world, perfect everything.  He loves all of us and wants us to succeed.

Missionary work is great!  We can all be missionaries!

Love you to the moon and back. Be happy. Keep working hard.

Sister Johnson

"Do you want to be happy?  Forget yourself and get lost in this great cause.  Lend your efforts to helping people.... stand higher, lift those with feeble knees, hold up the arms of those that hang down.  Live the gospel of Jesus Christ." President Hinckley