October 11, 2011

Greetings Everyone! :)

First off, I have to say that I LOVE the senior couples that are here serving in the Liberty Jail area as well as the other senior couples that come up every now and then from Independence. The Herron's came here in August and have been so much fun to get to know. This past week Elder Herron was talking about diets and he said "Yeah I tried weight watchers....that's when I found out I was a cheater!!" Hahaha. He is the funniest man. The other senior couple, the Sinclairs have been here since March I think and they are so fun! They took Sister Whittier and I out to dinner last night to On The Border, we had a really fun time joking and hearing random stories. It is like having multiple grandparents all around, it is the best :)

On Friday, the sisters in the visitor centers who haven't seen the historic sites got together with the Director (the Adams) and we all went out to see Far West and Adam-Ondi-Ahman. It was awesome, Sister Dodd was apart of the tour so of course I was excited! I included some pictures of it for you to see, they were truly special and sacred places. Far West was my favorite place, a man from one of the Liberty Wards came along and taught us about the history in the sites. He is an institute teacher and KNOWS his history. While we were there I got to walk around for a bit and really feel like the history came alive for me. I could see the pain from the cold wintery days, the faith of the saints with following the leadership from Joseph and really appreciating what they went through so we could have such a strong church today. With serving at the Liberty Jail, I feel like I have a deeper understanding and respect for the saints while they were here in Missouri. It is unexplainable.

Saturday was the BEST district meeting! Our district leader, Elder Masters, is so awesome. He set up the room to be like a court room with a judge, a suspect seat and we were all the jury. It was a trial for a fake murder of a stuffed animal (sounds lame but was funny then) and had a judge try and question his companion Elder Casper who looks like this cute innocent little kid. We all took a vote after a minute of questioning and of course thought he was innocent. Then he brought out evidence, pictures of Elder Casper holding a knife with "blood" on it standing behind this stuffed animal. Haha. It was a funny situation and had the questioning for another minute, we all took a vote and found him guilty of course. Elder Masters then tied the evidence that we have as missionaries is the Book of Mormon. It is our convincing evidence to all those who do not believe or who doubt whether the church is true or if Joseph Smith really is a prophet. I LOVED the analogy he used! It is so true that the Book really is our support and evidence to our investigators! What a wonderful thing that we have evidence behind our testimonies.

Sunday was another amazing day, but in a special way because my prayers were answered through children. I was on shift after church and was talking to Elder Adams about how I like the visitor centers. I really have been trying to LOVE being here and love it like I did being out in Odessa. A dad came in with his 3 boys, one of them with autism and his grandparents for a tour. As I started the history portion before going in where the jail is, I realized the kids didn't know very much about Joseph Smith and had been told by their grandpa who he was. I was excited to get to teach these kids about the basics! Then a married couple with their autistic daughter had joined in about 5 min in to the tour. The whole tour was amazing and the kids were so excited about being there at the jail. At the end of the tour, the little autistic girl who hadn't said a word the whole time said in response to my question, "how does it make you feel?"....she said "Happy!" with the biggest smile on her face. Those 2 families couldn't have been placed there just by accident, the Lord put both of those families together for a reason and He knew that I needed to take that tour to gain my personal testimony of being in the visitor center. I can honestly say that I know that I am here for a reason and I LOVE it, wouldn't want to be any where else at this time of my life or in my mission. What an amazing thing that is! :)

Sunday night we had dinner with my favorite family, the Gomez family! They are by far the funniest family here and has this incredible spirit in their home. Their oldest son came back from his mission in California this year and he was asking us about our first day in the mission or how our expectations of being out and it was really cool to reflect back on those days. Sister Gomez also asked us about what we feel like we have learned the most since we have been out on our mission and I realized that I couldn't just list one thing! I have learned so much but I think what I love the most of what I have learned...is that Heavenly Father is with me all the time and I am never alone. I started reading D&C from the beginning and I got to section 31 on Sunday. It brought me so much comfort, applying it to myself and the very last verse says "Be faithful unto the end, and lo I am with you". I realized that I can do this, I can do this mission for a short time all the way to the end because HE IS WITH ME :)

I am SO grateful to be out here serving a mission. I was talking to Sister Whittier last night about being out and I can say that there is NO place I would rather be than out here on a mission growing closer to Heavenly Father, strengthening my testimony, sinking my roots deeper in the ground to withstand temptations, learning about families and feeling the spirit every single day. If you ask me, I got it made right now! :) Thank you all for the time you take to pray for me or to write me! I feel so loved and I hope that my emails help you in some way even if it is small. I LOVE YOU!!

Love

SISTAAAAAA LARSON

Ps There are random photos near the end of some of us Liberty Sisters having fun or of me and sister Whittiers matching day :)