December 4, 2017 #LIGHT THE WORLD

Hola Familia,

   Hey everyone, how are you all doing? Another week goes by, and time continues to fly by on the mission! I love the new Christmas video, and it makes a great way to introduce the Gospel to so many people!!! Last P-day, we started knocking and the first door we knocked, we met Miguel and Oura and their little girl Paula! We shared a prayer with them and then we shared theLight the World video, and they loved it! Miguel knew a little bit about the church, he had heard of the Book of Mormon and of Joseph Smith, so we started teaching  him the Restoration. We met with them last night and taught the Book of Mormon and how it came about, he has so many questions, but seems interested in learning more, and accepted baptism! Their daughter Paula is around 2, and she has so much energy, haha, it can be a little challenging to teach them, but she is super cute!

   We also met with our investigators Yaima and Lais on saturday, Lais is Yaima's 24 year old daughter who is in Nursing School. We teach them in Spanish, but they haven't ever been able to come to church and are waiting until the semester ends on December 9th, so hopefully they will come then. We really emphasized the Sabbath Day on Saturday, and why it is so important, and I know that as we keep God's commandments, that we truly are blessed. God only asks for one day out of seven, and as we dedicate our time and our energies to serving the Lord through weekly church attendance and remembering and renewing our covenants, we are given Spiritual Power that carries us through the rest of our week. I need the Sabbath Day! It truly is a delight:) 

   We finally were able to meet Emily face to face on Saturday night after calling and trying to set up appointments, unsuccessful visits and her not being able to come to church. It was a miracle! And it was so good to talk to her again! We shared the Christmas video with her, and she loves the Church so much and how service oriented she is, and she set her own date for February 9th! We are excited to help her progress in the Gospel and become a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints!
  Something that I really love from my personal study in the Book of Mormon in Alma, is what he writes about Faith, and it is so beautiful. Even if we can only muster the desire to have faith, when we "try the experiment" and take it to God, our faith is added upon, strengthened, so much so that we can see the change in our lives and go out and help others do the same! This is so applicable to missionary work, as we help so many people act on their Faith, no matter how small it is, and they are then able to see God's hand more noticeably in their life, and it is amazing! I love being a missionary and helping people learn about and come unto Christ! 

   So we are having our Christmas Conference/Zone Conference next week, so P-Day will be on Wednesday. Elder Foster is coming for our Stake conference this weekend, and will be staying to tour the mission, and I am so excited! We were supposed to have stake conference in September, but then Irma happened, ha. Oh, well, better late than never! I love you all so much, have an amazing week, and MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Love,

Hermana Stokes

Pictures:

I'm not sure what order they are in, but we had a District BBQ last P-day, which was fun, with the ZL's and Coral Reef sisters (we live with them:) )

The one with the baby is Sister Cowart's, they were able to be a miracle in a homeless couple's life yesterday, and it turns out the  wife is Mormon! They lost everything in Hurricane Harvy, and have been working for traveling Carnivals but were treated so badly that they left. Brother and Sister Cowart are amazing missionaries, and Brother Cowart went full missionary mode on the nonmember husband and friend while we talked with the woman, Sandra. It was cool!

Not Sure what else is in there, but enjoy!!!