10.14.13 | Week 27 | Homestead Zone

Family!

How is my family doing?!:) I love you all so much! I am so excited to talk to you and tell you how amazing my week has been! Here is my email from President Anderson to explain a little bit of what happened...

President Anderson,

This week was a great week. We saw so many miracles down here in Coral Reef South. We started off the week working hard trying to get 15 Harvest blessings before Wednesday. We stayed diligent, and really made sure we were where the Lord wanted us to be.

As we prayed about where to harvest, we pulled up to this neighborhood. We were trying to find somewhere to park and as we pulled over on the side of the road, the house in front of us kept sticking out to me. We talked to a lady in the street, and the spirit continued to tell me that we needed to go and knock on this door. The lady behind the door yelled out, "Who is it?" we replied, "Representatives of Jesus Christ!" she went to ask what church we were from. We told her, and she replied with, "Did they send you??" and hurried and opened the door. Turns out that she had been trying to get in contact with the church for a while now. She has a friend from Utah that is a member and told her about the church. She accepted baptism, and Her 3 kids will be getting baptized with her as well. It was an answer to her prayers and an answer to ours as well. They came to church and loved it. What a miracle!

A couple weeks ago, we received an MTC referral for a lady named Pauline. She had called for a Book of Mormon. Yesterday she was baptized. We were so blessed to be an instrument in God's hand and help her live the word of wisdom. She wanted to come closer to Christ and be able to be that example to her children. I feel so blessed to have the honor of helping people come closer to Christ. What a privilege.

As I was reading in the Book of Mormon this week, in Alma. I noticed how strong of a testimony he had. He didn't always have a testimony, but when he came closer to Christ he noticed how much it blessed his life. He shared it with his sons, and was an amazing missionary. I love Almas great example of sharing the Gospel because he has been so blessed to have it in his life.

Thanks for all you do President!

Sister Rogers

That's a little bit of what happened this week. As you can tell, we had an AMAZING week of miracles. Sister Daines and I are loving every minute of it here in Coral Reef. We are so happy that P got baptized this week. It wasn't an easy thing to get her ready. We went over the commandments with her and she had some problems with the Word of Wisdom. She first told us that she only drank Coffee and Tea. We went back and we saw a lighter on her couch, and her home really smelled of smoke. Sister Daines and Iooked at each other and said, smoke? We went back the next day with the chapter in Alma. Alma 32 to read with her when the Nephites buried their weapons of war so they wouldn't be tempted to kill. We related it with her smoking. We told her that we loved her so much and want her to be baptized. In order to be baptized though, she needs to get rid of those temptations and stop smoking. She gave us everything she had. She passed her interview and was baptized! Such a miracle!! The family we found this week. Wow They are a blessing from God. They have been homeless from time to time. I promise her kids are like Will Smiths little children. They all have amazing voices and are so artistically talented. They came to church this week, and we were taking the kids to class...they ended up seeing their cousins in the hall that the elders had taught and baptized the week before! Little did we know that her and her sister that was baptized by the elders, they aren't friends. The bishop had to pull both of them into their office and talk with them. Looks like God has a bigger plan for the both of them! We were so stressed yesterday at church between that drama, Paulines baptism, and we had to help Sister Bake teach Relief society. Haha Don't ask us how we are still alive and kickin;)

Funny story for the week. We were at a members home eating dinner, and the little boy started quizzing us on our times tables.............we all know how that went down. Haha we were laughing so hard we were crying. Kids these days are so smart! I think I need to go back and go to school all over again. Haha

Tell Mitzi and Macey I love them and am so excited for them! I loved that picture:) They are going to be the cutest missionaries out there.

I gave Herbert the letter that dad sent him this week. When I gave it to him, he was reading it silently to himself, and he kept of saying, "Wow..." He was so honored that my dad thought of him that way. He loved it so much. Thanks dad:) As we were talking he asked us..."How long do you have to be a member to get sealed in the temple? I want to get sealed with my family." WHAT!! THATS MY MISSION DREAM! Sister Daines and I just started dying once we got in the car. Haha I can't wait to come back for the with my fam:) What an amazing day that'll be.

I love you all so much! I hope you are all doing great! I pray for you every night:)

ps. Keep Shannon and her family in your prayers if you could. Thank you so much! I love you!!

Sister Rogers

10.07.13 | Week 26 | Homestead Zone

Hello Fam!

Once again, I am so happy to be talking with you! I cant wait every single weekend to tell you about all the amazing things and miracles that we saw here in the Florida Fort Lauderdale mission! Also, Thank you, Thank you, Thank you for the package that you sent me:) It was hard waiting for it, but once it got here it was like christmas! Every single one of us in the apartment got a package from our mamas that day. So it was extra good:) I loved everything you included in the package. I told Sister Daines, "My family is way too good to me." We have been using the diffuser at night, and I loved the emails included from my friends on their missions. Its always such a fun thing to see how everyone is doing. The best part of the whole package was though...The picture of Zack and Kaisa!!! I can't tell you how excited I was to recieve that!! Ah! i am still waiting on a letter about the story....ZACK!;)

Well. As you know, General Conference, was AMAZING! It was so fun to be able to be here on the mission and watch it. On saturday, we went up to the church and watched the first session, then we came back down and watched the second part with Sister Baker on her Ipad. Then sunday, we went up to the church and watched it. Our new investigator Pauline made it to the first session which I will explain more about her in my email to president. We didn't have our baptisms this week:( The two girls mom doesnt want them to rush this decision to be baptized...so we are still working on that. We are going to start teaching the mother to get her to make this decision with the girls, which will in turn be way better for all of them:)

I don't have too much time on the computer but I wanted to share a couple of my favorite quotes from Conference:)

"Faith is always pointing to the future" -Edward Dube

"The man without hearing or sight responds with..."Heavenly Father has been so good to me" -Thomas S. Monson

"The stronger the wind, the stroner the trees." -Thomsas S. Monson

"Don't forget to look up" -Adrian Ochoa

"The Gospel of Jesus Christ is a Gospel of Change." -Rusell M. Nelson

"Doubt your Doubts before you doubt your faith." -Deiter F. Uchtdorf

I loved conference so much. The best part of it though was thinking, my family is watching this at the same time! So awesome:) Also the Daniels family made it! And Herbert and his son went to the priesthood session. How solid are they?:) I love them so much. I can't wait to give him dads letter. He is going to love that.

I love you all so much! i hope you all have an amazing week and know I love you!

Sister Rogers

*heres Kaceys letter to her mission president

President Anderson,

It has been such an amazing weekend, being able to hear the words of the Apostles, and also the Prophet. As a missionary, that is truly one of the greatest experiences. I had the chance to think of some questions before Conference, on what I need guidance and help with. I enojyed the talks, and wrote down all the words that I felt prompted to write down. Just today in personal study, I was able to go over the questions that I had writen down, I went through the conference talks, and I couldn't believe the answers that were in those talks directly to my questions. My heart is full of gratitude for the guidance we recieve from the Prophet and his Apostles, and the revelation that they recieve from our Heavenly Father for us.

We had an amazing experience with an MTC referal we had recieved this week. In the text it said this lady was in need of a Book of Mormon and wanted to go to General Conference. We couldn't have been more excited to contact her. Especially because about 2 minutes after we recieved this refereal, we recieved a call from the mission office telling us to call her right away! We did just that. We ended up going over to her house just that night. She explained that she had seen the missionaries on bikes, and also a member at her church was at her brothers house one night in Orlando. Her desires to know what they were all about grew, but she didn't do anything about it. She continued to see comercials about The Book of Mormon on TV, and wanted to know more about it. Until one day, she decided to call the number on the commerical. That's where we come it. Here we were sitting in her home, teaching her of the restored Gospel, all because of the promptings she followed. She accepted Baptism and made it to sunday morning conference session! I know that as my companion and I worked hard and were Diligent, we recieved an amazing new investigator. Not the way we expected, instantly. But on the Lords timing. I have such a testimony that Heavenly Father will bless you for your hard work.

What an amazing weekend it was! My testimony of this Gospel grows daily!

Sister Rogers

09.30.13 | Week 25 | Homestead Zone

Hello again!

Another week flies by once again! I was so excited to come and e-mail you all today because truly, I love and miss you all more than you could ever even imagine.

We did get our new roommates! Sister Daines old greenie two transfers ago, Sister Garcia. She is from California, and she is also a spanish missionary:) and then Sister Gordon. She is from Utah! They are in the YSA ward with the other two YSA sisters. They split the area. Elder Ovard is their district leader. They are both super cute sisters. Sister Daines and I knew that sister Gordon was going to come down. Its weird how you can sense those things. haha I am loving my area here in Coral Reef South. We are getting to know the ward better, and its been a blessing. There is this lady in our ward, Sister Baker. She lives alone, and we have been donig a lot of service for her. Cooking her meals, and cleaning her house, and today we are going grocery shopping for her. She is so fun. I love her. She used to live on a sail boat! Haha she's the cutest. She was converted by the missionaries a while back! We already have plans for me to come back and stay with her. This is our plan, Beach, temple, beach, temple, beach, temple. ;) Haha I can't wait for you all to meet the people here in my mission. She is the lady that made the bunny that I am sending home in a picture!

This week has been a good week. I have had the oppertunity to truly come to know, that through our trials, our weaknesses are made strengths.

*Kaceys letter to her mission president

Dear President Anderson,

Once again, another great week of miracles, as we stayed diligent, and got through the hard times. Sister Daines and I were finding so many prepared people that said yes to baptism, and when we would go back to them, they were either not there, or they told us that they had changed their minds. We tried our best to keep our spirits up, and do everything we could do get those yeses to become progressing investigators. After a hard day, for what seemed to go on forever as we were going to house to house trying to find people, we didn't have much success. I am not going to lie and say it was easy, it was hard. The adversary was working really hard on Sister Daines and I to get down on ourselves. The next day, we were ready to see miracles. We were able to see just that! That day was amazing President. We were harvesting near an area to a recent convert that we had tried to get in contact with that never had the chance to get confirmed. As we felt prompted to harvest in this area, it was in the middle of the day, and the sun was hot! We knew that someone was here that needed to hear the Gospel. So we went forth! Towards the end of the harvest, we had not found anyone that accepted baptism. We were standing at a door, waiting, and we saw a girl across the street. We followed the prompting to go and talk to her. We prayed with her and her brother. She accepted baptism! The next day we went back to see her, and we met her mother and her sister. Her sister also accepted baptism, and her mom hasn't accepted it yet, but will in the next meeting we have with them! President, time after time, my testimony has grown on how much God really does have a greater plan for us. As we go through these rough times, we learn the lessons we need to learn, and miracles are right around the corner. Those two girls were able to come to church, they made so many friends in the young womens, and are preparing for baptism this week coming. I know this Gospel is the true Gospel that has been restored on the earth today. I am so thankful for the oppertunity that I have to be a missionary and bring people here in Florida the truth. There is nothing that will ever compare to this experience to serve my Heavenly Father.

Sister Rogers

I hope that all is well at home. I love each and every one of you. Every week, this hour goes by faster and faster:( I am so glad you got my letter as well! I was really stressed, because I thought I sent it without sealing the envelope. I prayed it'd get to you. Looks like it did!

Have another great week family!! I love you!

Sista Rogers:)