Week 75- Lilburn, GA- My Mission President is awesome!

So honestly, sometimes, so many things happen that it feels like a
whole month passed by, when really only a week. It's insane.
This week we had some good tracting days. Honestly, tracting here
sometimes terrifies me. That's because we now go to the big nice
houses, instead of trailer parks and apartment complexes. However,
I've found that it's the times when I'm the most scared when people
are the nicest. It's weird. During weekly planning we normally pick a
street to tract on the map and then we show up! And I think that's
part of the stomach churner... But on one street we started with Jen,
who has her own church, but as we talked with her, she said she was
interested in reading the Book of Mormon and would like to know for
herself! Then we met Jennifer. She said she wasn't sure of anything
because she felt like Christianity had just been oppressed on people
throughout history. So we told her the reality that is that God's
authority has been lost on he earth, but it has once again been
restored. Forcing people into religion is not His way, and thus she
can accept of reject our message. She was then very intrigued by our
message and wanted to read the Book of Mormon too!

Our investigator on date is Arrica. She has 9 kids. 8 live at home
with an age range of 19 to 3 years old. It's super fun. She is so
sweet and cries every time she prays she's so grateful for the church.
She is incredible and we are excited because we are now also teaching
the kids.
And I have the best mission president ever. Really. Arrica only has a 5
passenger car, and so she can't bring all of her kids to church on
Sunday. So President came to the rescue and actually helped bring her
kids! He's awesome.

We are also teaching Chris, who is doing great! He said he felt a
strength and confidence that helped him confront some problems this
week. It was an evidence of "scripture power" which we know is really
the Holy Ghost. It's been incredible on my mission. There are some
people who avoid the spirit at all costs. They don't like singing, or
videos, or anything that invites the spirit. Someone once explained it
to me: "The Holy Ghost feels good, but it also gives one a sense of
urgency to fix problems in their lives. Sometimes people aren't ready
to confront them or they just don't want to." It's so true. The
reality is, our Heavenly Father loves us and He wants us to be happy.
Sometimes we paint ourselves into a corner, and the only way to get
out and fix it is through repentance. Which requires a lot of work,
but it's worth it. It's incredible, and I'm so grateful it's available
because of Jesus Christ!
I love and miss you!
Hermana Wallis

Feel free to visit mormon.org for answers to questions.

To write to Madeleine: madeleine.wallis@myldsmail.net

Georgia...

Week 74- Lilburn, GA- English- Joy to the World!

Have the donkey and the elephant disappointed you?
Turn to the lamb.

This was outside a church here this week.
I love Georgia.

If there's one thing I've learned it is that because of Jesus Christ,
all wrongs will one day be made right for those that love and follow
him.
Because of him, we can have joy and peace even when we have trials.
Remember our friend who's husband has the drug addiction? Well he
relapsed this week. And when he does, he disappears for a few days.
It's very scary for his wife and kids because they don't know when
he'll come back, and when he does it's never a pleasant sight. We
spoke with our friend and she was in tears about what to do. We
offered the elders to come give them priesthood blessings and she
gladly accepted. They had to give the blessings outside because of
mission rules, and it was pretty cold. But when the spirit came,
the cold disappeared. We each felt the warmth of the spirit and the
girls had the biggest smiles across their faces. Their step mother was
so surprised, "I feel so happy, but I shouldn't!" That is the miracle
of the gospel of Jesus Christ. He isn't going to necessarily take away
our trials, but because of Him our hearts can still be full and we can
have peace. It reminded me of Elder Nelson's talk from this last
conference: "Joy and Spiritual Survival". I loved what he had to say:
"When the focus of our lives is on God’s plan of salvation, which
President Thomas S. Monson just taught us, and Jesus Christ and His
gospel, we can feel joy regardless of what is happening--or not
happening--in our lives. Joy comes from and because of Him. He is the
source of all joy. We feel it at Christmastime when we sing, “Joy to
the world, the Lord is come.” And we can feel it all year round. For
Latter-day Saints, Jesus Christ is joy!
      That is why our missionaries leave their homes to preach His
gospel. Their goal is not to increase the number of Church members.
Rather, our missionaries teach and baptize to bring joy to the people
of the world!"
We can have joy because God's authority has been restored and
therefore we can be made clean and pure through repentance and
baptism, as well as receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. We then have
the right to access those feelings of peace, comfort, and joy, even
though we live in "perilous times".
I love and miss you!
Love,
Hermana Wallis

This week Sister Gonzalez and Sister Ray go home! I'm going to miss
them so much!
Our zone and physical therapy adventure. Arm is good. I still have to
wear the splint. I just took it off for pictures. I'm sick of it.

To write to Madeleine please use: madeleine.wallis@myldsmail.net

Week 73- Miracles, Lilburn, GA

I love the people here. 😄

I can now lay my hand flat on a table to paint my nails. You can say
PT has been going well. 👐🏼

This week was absolutely amazing! Miracle after miracle. The Lord has
been so good!

I don't even really know where to start.
On Tuesday we went tracting at this random street I picked during
planning on Friday. When we showed up it turned out to be in one of
the ritziest parts of our area.  I was
basically thinking this was one of her stupidest idea I've had my
whole mission. Really I just felt really intimidated because my whole
mission has been in a different neighborhood. But my motto for the
rest of my mission is "Fourth Floor, Last Door". So we prayed and
started knocking. To see the talk she is referring to:

 https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2016/10/fourth-floor-last-door?lang=eng

The first people to reject us gave us dessert! They were Hindu and
having a holiday so they shared with us! Then we saw this woman taking
out her trash so we ran to help her and we started talking with her.
She said she's been "done with organized religion" for a long time,
but has always tried to live the 11 commandments. (Love the Lord and
your neighbor+10 commandments) We shared that part of our message is
that God's authority has been lost, but we are here because it's been
restored. She let us come back Wednesday and when we shared the how
the gospel has been restored, she thought it was beautiful! She had
even read the pamphlet and committed to read the Book of Mormon. She's
had a lot of people over since the Hurricane (pretty much everywhere
is loaded with hurricane evacuees) so we haven't really taught her
again, but she's really excited and tells us she's been looking for a
change!
Also on Wednesday we started meeting with our new friend who wants to
get baptized at the end of the month! She has a friend who's a member
in Norcross, and she decided she wanted to join the church! She even
came to our relief society activity on Thursday and loved it! She is
so sweet and very sincere. Also she has 9 kids.
On Friday we tracted this side street we just felt like we needed to
knock and the first door let us in. As we taught one of the girls said
she's been looking for a church and that she wanted missionaries to
visits her in New York! That night we stopped by a Walmart to contact
until 9, and we were also looking for otter pops to give out on
Saturday, and the Walmart employee who was helping us just began to
open up about how she's been thinking a lot about how she needs to get
back to being close with the Savior.
On Saturday we went to the street with the girls and kept on knocking
doors. The next door also just immediately let us in. They were
refugees from Iraq and they took us in as their own. They were so
sweet as they showed us pictures of their daughters. They even fed us
dinner!
Then we felt like we needed to visit this less active that doesn't
really let us in ever. They weren't home, but we figured the Lord led
us there for a reason. So we started knocking doors. We found first a
guy from Vietnam painting his garage. We tried talking with him, but
he wasn't super interested. We left him a sticky note to
followhim.mormon.org and invited him to check it out because he could
change the Language if he wanted. His name is Kan.
Then we met Melvin. When he opened the door, the first thing he said
was, " oh. I know what this is." We had a nice conversation about my
arm and his finger, which was also operated on. Then Sister Selch told
him the truth: "We've been praying to find those God is preparing to
hear our message and we were led to you. Can we share with you our
message which is of great value and importance?" He said he was
alright and the wind was blowing super hard so told us to follow the
wind. (Important detail.)
Then we met Arturo. He had been recently divorced so we shared the
beauty of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the good news that His
authority has been restored! As we shared the Book of Mormon with him
he touched his heart. After he read Moroni 10:3-5 he looked up and
asked us when we could come back. So we made a return appointment.
When we went back out to the street Melvin ran out his door: I changed
my mind! I want to know what the message is! It's just. The wind. And
you prayed. I think this message could be for me.
Yes Melvin. Yes. This message is most definitely for you.
Then last night we had a little bit of time left so we stopped by
another friend's. We've never met her at home because her husband is a
former alcoholic and is struggling with drug addiction. They've had a
rough week because he's relapsed. Their kids have been staying at a
friends and honestly, we'd never met the husband because she's been
nervous about how he'd respond. Well when we showed up he ran outside
: It's the Mormon girls! Y'all are my favorites! Let me tell ya!
You see, about a week ago we had dinner with our stake president and
he sent us home with lots of dinner left overs.
Which we gave to this guy's wife. (Sorry, not sorry?)
He invited us right on in and told us about his journey with the Lord.
He then was very interested and listened very sincerely as we talked
about Christ's atonement and the significance of the restoration. He
even committed to read the Book of Mormon.
There's no way the Lord's hand wasn't in that. He knew the bible very
well and was not shy with his opinion, but was very open and listened
to us and considered what we had to say.

Sorry this is forever long. As we've been praying to be led to those
the Lord is preparing, we've been finding them.  All I know is that
the Lord's promises are sure:
“And whoso receiveth you, there I will be also, for I will go before
your face. I will be on your right hand and on your left, and my
Spirit shall be in your hearts, and mine angels round about you, to
bear you up” (D&C 84:88).

I love this work and am so grateful to be here. I know our Savior
lives and that He knows and loves us personally.

I love you!
Hermana Wallis

Also. I got permission to visit families in the Spanish branch here.
The Lord is so good!

To write to Madeleine please use: madeleine.wallis@myldsmail.net

Week 72- Is this a book club

"Is this a book club?" Why, yes it is. The Book of Mormon is our reading. We meet every Sunday for three hours and we'll even come help you read during the week. When you're done we might even have a baptism! 

Haha twice in one day someone came up to us asking, "is this a book club?" We've been praying that the Lord would guide us to those who are ready to receive our message and people just came walking in! It's been great.

However, we felt like something was missing. It was the spirit. It was power. So we reevaluated ourselves and made some changes. We then prayed for spiritual earthquakes like in Mosiah 27:11-12 and the Lord lead us to our dinner apt. We thought she'd been fine and active in the church, but we learned that she had been harboring deep resentment against the church for some injustices that had/do occur in her life and other member's imperfect reactions. While listening to her I felt inspired to simply testify of Jesus Christ and His atonement. We started by testifying of the truth that our Heavenly Father loves us. He rejoices in our successes and weeps with us in our sorrows. I felt the spirit guide my words as I said what I know to be true: Because of Christ's ultimate sacrifice, one day all the wrongs may be made right. We come to church to remember HIM. He who lived a sinless life but willingly took upon himself all of our sins and paid the price for our sorrows. Alone. He who was falsely accused, beaten, whipped, and hung on the cross by His own people. She went quiet and then said that when you think about Him, you realize that nothing else really matters. 

Throughout conference something I wrote was "Remember Jesus". Unfortunately it can be all to easy to forget about Him, but when we can remember Him, how much else really matters? Charity can begin to replace pride as we learn to forgive and forget, and reach out to others in Christlike love and service. This can come in many different forms, but something that has changed my perspective has been this quote from Sister Reeves: "Dear sisters, our Heavenly Father and our Savior, Jesus Christ, know us and love us. They know when we are in pain or suffering in any way. They do not say, “It’s OK that you’re in pain right now because soon everything is going to be all right. You will be healed, or your husband will find a job, or your wandering child will come back.” They feel the depth of our suffering, and we can feel of Their love and compassion in our suffering."

More than anything this sister longed for an empathetic, listening ear, and maybe a hug. Is that too hard to give? The Lord knows the sacrifices we make and cherishes them. 

While watching conference my arm, (I know, the arm!) became just extremely uncomfortable. I just wanted to shake it out and stretch it and pop it. Like an internal itch. I became discouraged and began to silently pray that the Lord could just let me know that He was still aware of me. Then Elder Kazuhiko Yamashita spoke. He spoke about an elder with one leg who had to be reassigned. I felt grateful I still had 4 limbs and an overwhelming sense of gratitude that I can continue to serve here. He spoke about Being Ambitious for Christ. How grateful am I to be Ambitious for Christ! 

I love and miss you so much! 

Love always, 

Hermana Wallis

I thinned my hair.