For Behold, I am God; and I am a God of MIRACLES

Holy Cow Guys!

I have so much to tell you, I don't even know where to start. This week is seriously the week of all weeks, and I will never forget the events that took place this week!

It has still been super duper hot and humid. And when its not super duper hot and humid, its pouring rain. And sometimes its both! There was one day this week when we were walking down the street, dying of heat, the sun was scorching and there wasn't a cloud in the sky. And then all of the sudden it just starts pouring rain!! We took cover under a tree but not before we were drenched from head to foot. (Funny side-story: there is a returned missionary in our ward and we are teaching his non-member brother. We biked over there one day this week and it was so hot! We walked into their house and they asked us if it was raining outside. Nope, just sweat. Just sweat.) We were talking about it though, and we realized how much strength we really do receive from God every day. We are told by people daily that we shouldn't be out in this heat. But we are and we are walking and biking between 10-20 miles per day. If we were normal human beings, we would be dead by now. But Heavenly Father gives us strength.

Okay, so I have to share with you guys the incredible miracle that happened to us yesterday. Prepare to have your minds blown and your testimonies solidified :)

SO yesterday, we had NOTHING to do all day. We literally were just tracting ALL DAY LONG after church. And we were less than excited to go out in the heat for nine hours. But God had different plans for us.

So headed out after lunch and started walking to stop by an investigators house. While we were walking we noticed two young boys across the street playing basketball. Normally we don't really talk to little kids, but something told us we needed to talk to them. So we went over and invited them to come play Tuesday Night Basketball at the church. They said they would ask their mom and so forth... so we head back to the other side of the street and there was a lady walking the same direction we were. She complimented our clothes and asked if the blouse-belt-skirt combination was a new style. We explained that it was a style in Utah where we were from. (No one in Florida wears belts with their skirts...) And it opened up the conversation for us to tell her why we left Utah and what we did as missionaries. As we shared with her she expressed how she had been wanting to be baptized forever but she had not been able to find a church that felt right. We invited her to take the lessons and prepare to be baptized and become a member of our church and she accepted! We set a baptism date with her right then and there!

Then we said our goodbyes and parted ways.

Not two minutes later, as we are walking down the street, two women roll down their car windows and yell across three lanes of traffic, "Are you missionaries?" We yelled back that we were and they told us to stay right there. So we did, as they proceeded to make a couple U-turns to get to where we were. I jokingly said to Sister Day, "Looks like someone else wants to get baptized too!" We laughed. We had just been talking the day before about how cool it would be if someone pulled their car over and asked us to be baptized.

So the car pulls up to us and the lady in the drivers seat introduces herself as a member from California. She was here visiting her mother who is very sick. The woman in the passenger seat said to us, "Maybe you can help me, are you on duty?" We realized from that comment that she must not be a member and we explained to her that we were always on duty and would love to help her! They pulled off into a nearby parking lot and we started talking.

The woman who was not a member is a sister to the woman from California. She lives here in our area and we were right, she's not a member. But she explained to us how she knows that the church is good and she has seen the blessings of it in her sisters life and that she is ready to join the church and become a Mormon. They had just been by the church to see if anyone was there that could help them, but no one was. They had given up and were out of ideas and headed home when they saw us walking down the street.

We actually had someone pull over their car and ask us to be baptized. THAT NEVER HAPPENS. Every missionary always jokes about that happening, and dreams of it happening. But it never does.

This experience left my companion and I speechless and tearful. The gratitude that we felt towards our Father in Heaven for allowing us to be a part of this special miracle was overflowing. We literally had nothing to say for a while as we walked to our next destination.

As we were walking, I was pondering and trying to figure out what we had done to deserve such a miracle. Then it hit me how prideful that thought was... we hadn't done anything to deserve it. We didn't deserve it. Heavenly Father taught me something very important:

Sometimes we talk about how exact obedience brings miracles. But that isn't exactly true, at least not the way we think of it. I used to think that if I was obedient then God would bless me for that obedience with a miracle. But it doesn't work that way. We don't, through our own efforts EARN miracles. That is a selfish and prideful thought. In reality what is happening is that Heavenly Father is constantly working miracles in our lives and in the lives of others around us. Every single event that takes place is a miracle and he miraculously moves us and places us in just the situations we need to have the opportunity to make to choice to return to Him. As we are obedient and do what we are supposed to we keep our covenants and with that we are promised the spirit to be with us. And that spirit leads and guides us to the places where those miracles are taking place, thus allowing us to be witness of and sometimes a part of those miracles.

 But we do not earn miracles through our obedience.

The miracles didn't end there. After a lot of walking and knocking, we were running low on water and decided to stop by a members home that was close by to fill up. Her non-member husband opened the door and allowed us to come in and fill up. Her son spoke up and asked us what we were doing at 6. We said that we would be tracting probably, and he told us to come back around six and they would feed us a nice homemade Italian meal. This was a miracle for many reasons: it gave us something to do at 6 out of the sun, and it also gave us a meal because we were out of food for the week and not sure what we were going to eat for dinner!

I know that God truly is a God of miracles and that if we are living the way we should, we will be able to witness those miracles daily. I am so grateful for a little black name-tag that allows me to see such grand miracles so often.

The mission is glorious.

I love you all and hope you have an incredible week and see tons of miracles!

Love always, Sister Rowland

Beautiful Feet

Hey Family!!

Hope you all are having a super fantastic week:)

This week has been strange but its been so good! It is getting so hot here, every time we walk outside it feels like we are melting! But its an adventure. You just get used to the smell, kind of. I feel bad for everyone that has to talk to us though...

Sister Day and I are having so much fun! And the work here is well... changing. Its not necessarily picking up or getting worse but its kind of taking a new route. We just had three missionaries come home in this ward in the last two weeks and they are so great! There was one day this week when we asked one of them to come to a lesson with us and he did but the people we were supposed to teach didn't show up. So he sat there and started calling as many friends as he could until he found one that was willing to meet with us! That is how missionary work gets done, my friends. I hope to be a returned missionary just like them! They have been working like crazy to find people for us to teach! Two of them served in Salt Lake! One in Salt Lake North and the other in the Salt Lake South.

We have been doing so much tracting this week, we have literally knocked on HUNDREDS of doors. We had a pretty decent sized teaching pool at the beginning of the week, and there were a few days where we had seven lessons scheduled. But EVERY SINGLE ONE cancelled on us last minute. It got a little bit discouraging. Our feet were so sore and we were so hot and tired and the only relief we would have had would be a lesson in some air conditioning, and instead they all cancelled and we were left to walk more and knock more. So after the third day of this same routine we decided that obviously we need to change something about what we are doing. We prayed a lot and got blessings from the bishop and we decided that we need to drop all of our investigators. We went from having 12 to 3. Its hard to drop people, but the simple fact is that they just aren't ready for the gospel yet, they aren't ready to commit. And somewhere in Lakeland there is somebody who would be baptized today if they knew where to find us. And our job is to focus all of our efforts on them.

Tracting is actually really fine. In spite of the heat and the bugs and the fact that most people won't even open their doors, you actually have some pretty neat experiences tracting.

Neat Tracting Experience #1:

We knocked on this guys door and offered to say a prayer with him. He said, I'm a Baptist minister, I will pray for you! And we kind of looked at each other and agreed. And he waved his hand in the air and said, "I bless you in the name of Jesus." We thanked him and he laughed and said, "okay now you can pray, but don't pray for me." He asked us to pray for people in the world who didn't know Christ and for children who were not being raised in good homes. So we did and the spirit was so powerful. After the prayer he told us that he had just been studying his bible and praying and that he had asked God some questions but he couldn't seem to find the answer. He said he was just about to give up for the night when we rang his doorbell. He said that through the words of our prayer he had received his answer.

He wasn't interested in learning more about the church, but we were able to be an instrument in God's hand to answer the prayer of a Baptist Minister. Two twenty year old girls helped him to get the answer that he had been searching high and low for.

Neat Tracting Experience #2:

Yesterday we were knocking doors in this neighborhood with little to no success. We got to this one house and the front door was open. We knocked, and nobody came. We rang the doorbell and nobody came. So we just kind of waited for a minute. Then this cute elderly gentlemen comes to the door and says, "You girls must be from Salt Lake! Come on in." We tried to hide our shock, nobody EVER invites us in. Even when we pray or have a good conversation with someone it is on their front porch. So we go into their living room and his cute wife is sitting in her little chair. They shared with us how the Elders used to come and visit them all the time, and how a long time ago they had been to Salt Lake and taken a tour of Temple Square. They are so cute!

We also have some pretty hilarious tracting experiences.

Hilarious Tracting Experience #1

Sister Day and I were praying with this man on his front porch. Sister Day was saying the prayer, and he interrupted her mid-sentence and said, "That's okay, at least you tried!" And went in and shut the door and left us in shock on his front porch. We laughed about it for hours!

Hilarious Tracting Experience #2

We knocked on a door, a man answered and we offered a prayer. He asked us what church we were from and we proudly said, "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints," And he says, "Oh, crap! Its the Mormons..." And he informed us that we were a cult and he had no interest in praying with us. He started to shut the door and we turned to walk away, then he poked his head out again and said, "And I bet you both want to marry me at the same time!" Sister Day spoke up and told him that we don't do that. He said, "Yes you do", and slammed the door.

Thank goodness for people who know more about our beliefs than we do ;)

Tracting is hard, but its honestly so fun. You get to meet the coolest, kooky-est, most interesting people.

Miracles happen. We often hear stories from returned missionaries about the miracles that happened to them on their missions. Some pretty huge and crazy! But I've really come to appreciate the small miracles that happen every day, those tender mercies that remind us that God is aware of us, He loves us and He is pleased with the work we are doing.

For example, when we are walking down the street, melting in the heat, and randomly a really cool breeze blows through, or a cloud covers the sun.

Or when we run out of time for dinner and someone offers us food.

Or the fact that our water bottles are never empty.

 When you walk and bike out in the heat and humidity, you go through a lot of water. Without fail, every time this week that our water got low, somehow Heavenly Father fills our water bottles. He doesn't do it in some super-natural way but he does it. Our water will be almost gone and a kind homeless man who sells water to buy his food gives us two water bottles for free. Or the lady at the house we just knocked on notices our almost empty water and takes and fills them with water and ice. Or we turn the corner and there is a gas station where we can go fill up. 

Our water bottles are never empty because Heavenly Father loves us.

Alma 31:37-38

And after that they did separate themselves one from another, taking no thought for themselves what they should eat, or what they should drink, or what they should put on. And the Lord provided for them that they should hunger not, neither should they thirst...

I know that when we put the Lord and His Kingdom first in our lives, He will ALWAYS provide for us.

In my entire life, I have never been so tired, my feet have never been so sore and blistered, I've never seen so much disappointment,

and I've never been so happy as I am right now.

I know that this gospel is true. Every little bit of it. I can never deny it. And I can never stop working to help others to know for themselves that it is true. I am so grateful for my Savior who was probably even more tired than I am, whose feet were even more sore, who faced so much more disappointment and rejection, who did it all so that we could experience more joy than we could ever imagine.

"How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of those that are still publishing peace"... No matter how sore, worn or blistered.

And how beautiful upon the mountains are those nail-pierced feet of the Prince of Peace who showed us all the way to eternal peace.

Have an incredible week! I love you all!

Love always, Sister Rowland

Hey Family!

So transfers were this week! And I now have a beautiful new companion. Her name is Sister Day and she is amazing:) She is from near St. George and has been on her mission for a year. She and I have already been seeing so many miracles together and we are super excited for this next transfer!

We have been blessed to find so many humble and prepared people. It seems like everyone we talk to wants to hear our message and come to church! Our investigators are doing pretty well. One of them who was supposed to be baptized on the 27th has had to postpone his date for further notice, but he is still so ready and excited for his baptism. It is so fun teaching him because you just see the change in him every single time we meet with him. He is totally willing to meet with us every single day, he keeps the commitments without question or argument. Its only been a few weeks since we first met him, but there is such a difference in him. I know that the difference that we see is hope. He now has a hope for his future, that he really can change his life and move past his challenges and mistakes. That's what the gospel does for people. Its truly beautiful.

We have been knocking on a lot of doors this week! Our mission has set the standard of knocking on at least 30 doors a day. On Saturday we knocked on 74... I actually really like tracting, because you always feel successful. Even if every single of those 74 doors turn you down, which they did, you can feel successful because you are working hard and you are planting seeds. And behind one of those doors is a humble person or family who is truly seeking the peace and joy that will come from the gospel. And you may have to knock on every single door to find them, but it will be so worth it!

This week has honestly been so full of miracles that I don't even know where to begin... :)

Oh, so here's a fun faith-building story for you!

So there is a man in my ward here who was baptized in October. He started meeting with the missionaries about a year before that and he knew that the things the missionaries shared with him were true and wanted to be baptized. But, he was on probation and was told that he was going to have to finish out his probation before he could be baptized. His probation sentence was quite lengthy, but he was told in court that if he went to prison for 6 months that would satisfy his sentence. So this faithful and courageous man put himself in prison for 6 months so that he could be baptized sooner! Isn't that amazing?!

So I wanted to share with you all kind of a neat experience that we had at transfer meeting this week. President Cusick, before he announces transfers always calls up a few people to share their testimony. So just like he has done in the past he called up a few people to bear their testimony. At the conclusion of those testimonies he stood up and said that he would like to give us a few minutes to just sit in the chapel and ponder on our testimonies. The spirit in the room was almost suffocating!

As I sat there pondering on those things that I had come to know were true in the past weeks, I felt that I was in my own little Sacred Grove. I had learned that past transfer that the Atonement is so real, and it works. Even for me. Even for you. Sometimes it is so easy to tell others of the atonement and how it will help them, but its a little bit harder to believe that it can work for us. Sometimes we feel that once we have made a mistake, that's the end, and we can then never live up to our full potential. THAT IS A LIE. A complete and total lie. As a matter of fact, I have learned that sometimes the mistakes we make are just the boost we need to become who God needs us to become.

Alma the younger, for example, was called "the vilest of sinners". He completely rebelled against his family, the church and God and brought down a lot of people with him. That's a pretty big sin.

But the atonement of Christ worked on him, and he became one of the most powerful missionaries in the Book of Mormon and brought hundreds of people to Christ. I don't think that he would have been able to help so many people if he hadn't been so wicked and experienced so powerfully the healing of the atonement.

We really can be forgiven. I know that's true. Its not the end when we make a mistake.

As I sat in that Sacred-Grove-chapel, I thought also of other Sacred Groves in my life. Those places where my life has been changed forever. One of those Sacred Groves is my own bedroom. There have been many times when I knelt by my bedside in heartfelt prayer to my Heavenly Father and received an answer and guidance that changed my life. Another is a little bench in front of the Salt Lake temple where I used to sit and listen to music and read my scriptures before going into work. It was there that I decided that I couldn't settle for anything less that being in that temple someday. Our backyard was also a sacred grove where I would lay out on my blanket and study scriptures and conference talks. The list goes on and on. But I am so grateful for Sacred Groves in my life, for those powerful places that will always be close to my heart because of the experiences that I've had there. Florida is one of those sacred places to me, this ground is so precious.

I'm also grateful for the actual Sacred Grove where Joseph Smith knelt and prayed and sought for truth. I know that God and Christ truly did appear to him there. I know that Joseph Smith was called to be a prophet and to restore Christ's church to the earth. I know those things without a shadow of a doubt and with my whole being.

I love you all so much and I hope that this week is filled with miracles for all of you!

Love always, Sister Rowland

Few are Chosen

Hey Family,

Sorry for the lack of an email last week! We had a mission-wide June Christmas party on the beach. It was so much fun:) We basically just played all day. Then as the day wound down and the sun started to set it became much more sentimental. Sister Loveridge and I just stood and cried and talked about our mission and how sacred this place is. That was most likely the last time we would be on the beach in Florida as full-time missionaries.

This place truly is sacred ground.

I have so much to tell you guys! Two weeks worth, and both jam-packed with miracles!

The first person I want to talk about is a new investigator that we have started working with. He was a referral from a member in another ward. He called us up last Friday and asked if we could visit his friend. We called this friend and he told us to come over the next morning, so we did. We really had no idea what to expect! But the man we met was so prepared for the Gospel. He was going through a lot of hard things in his life, and he was really working to change his life. He asked all the right questions! He came to church the following Sunday and loved it. We committed him to be baptized at the end of this month. It has only been a week, but you can see the change in him. He is so happy now! His boys were over at his house this weekend and we gave them a children's book of Mormon and they have already read to chapter 12! They came to church and loved it too. I wish I could describe to you how much love I have for this cute family. They are incredible. The Gospel really does change lives.

The next experience that I would like to share with you is a perfect example of how we truly do not know how much good we do.

MTC Sisters 

So, I don't know if you remember or not, but a few weeks ago, in my email, I shared with you about a Friday that was really hard: no one was outside, we were feeling unmotivated, we lacked the courage to talk to people... Well, that day, we had prayed to know where we should go. And we felt like we should go to Target. So we figured that maybe we should go and contact people in the Target parking lot. We had been talking about how we wanted to get more courage to talk to people in parking lots, because honestly that is where most people are! So we went to Target and went inside briefly to use the restroom and fill our water bottles. Then we went outside and tried to contact people walking to their cars- it was a total flop. We didn't have the courage, the few people we talked to were in too much of a hurry to listen. So we gave up on that and left to our next activity.

Fast forward to about a week after this experience. We were walking to the church, and there are two ways to walk to the church that both take about the same amount of time, but one usually has more people out and about. But for some reason we felt like we should go the way where there usually isn't too many people. But both of us felt like that was the way to go so we did!... And there was absolutely no one outside. Not a soul. And it was really, really hot. Then we see a car pull up next to us and this lady rolls down her window. She said that she had seen us in Target a week ago and loved our warm smiles, they had made her day.

We didn't remember seeing this lady at Target, she definitely wasn't anyone that we had talked to. But she had noticed our smiles, and it touched her enough that even a week later she would recognize us on the street in a totally different area of town and stop us to talk to us.

You never know how much good you do.

This week is transfers. We found out that I will be staying in Gibsonia, but Sister Loveridge will be leaving. I am honestly so sad to see her go. She has become my best friend and my sister. I have never grown so much on my mission as I have with her. She has pushed me to be my best and together we have set goals and made changes that have changed us forever. We have seen so many miracles together. I am so grateful for this transfer that I was able to spend with her.

BFE's (best friends for eternity)

She shared something this morning in companionship study that hit me really hard. She was sharing the verse in Doctrine and Covenants 121:34

"Behold, there are many called, but few are chosen. And why are they not chosen?"

She and I discussed for a little while what it means to be chosen. The next verse describes those who are not chosen:

"Because their hearts are set so much upon the things of this world and aspire to the honors of men..."

How many of us are set upon the things of this world and the honors of men? I think it is really easy to get caught up in that. Its easy to get caught up in the things of this world, or wanting to be recognized and praised by man.

 But is it worth giving up our divine inheritance?

I have learned a lot lately about what exactly these "things of the world" are. They are Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, etc, when these things are not used for spreading the gospel. They are movies and TV shows that make violence and immorality look normal and fun. They are movies and TV shows with humor that is crude or jokes made at another's expense. They are songs that direct our thoughts to anything but Christ and goodness.

Some of these "things of the world" aren't even necessarily bad... Or are they? I guess that is for the individual to decide. But I have decided that I can't take part in anything that does not bring me closer to Christ. Notice I said "can't" not "won't". With the knowledge that I have and the blessings I have been given I cannot go back. I cannot go back to the world. And that means giving up a lot of things that I love.

I've learned that we choose to be "chosen". God has promised glorious things to those who are chosen, and He has a great work for them to do.

As I look around at the world, I see many people who are called but they aren't chosen because they choose to set their hearts upon temporal and worldly things, they care too much about what the world thinks of them, rather than what their Father in Heaven thinks. Little do they know what they are forfeiting.

Let's read those scriptures again.

"Behold, there are many called, but few are chosen. And why are they not chosen? Because their hearts are set so much upon the things of this world, and aspire to the honors of men..."

Later on it tells us how we can choose to be chosen.

"Let thy bowels be full of charity towards all men, and to the household of faith, and let virtue garnish thy thoughts unceasingly..."

Then comes the promise; Heavenly Father never asks us to do something without promising something in return:

"Then shall thy confidence wax strong in the presence of God; and the doctrine of the priesthood shall distil upon thy soul as the dews from heaven. The Holy Ghost shall be thy constant companion, and thy scepter an unchanging scepter of righteousness and truth; and thy dominion shall be an everlasting dominion, and without compulsory means it shall flow unto thee forever and ever."

I know that Christ is our Savior. He lived for us, he died for us, and he lived again for us. I know that the only thing that we can give back to him for all he has done for us is our will. We have to CHOOSE to do so. I know that we show our love for God and Christ through our decisions on what will do with this probationary state he has given us. How will we use His time? What will we accomplish? Who will we become? Who will we help along the way?  And will we truly be prepared to meet God?

I am so grateful for everything that I have been learning. I have been changed over the past 7 weeks and I am a new person! Its exciting! Changing and repenting is so exciting. I hope you all have or will find change exciting too.

Love always, Sister Rowland

Florida storm

And the "sky" view