Sister Kayla Talbert: Who Speaks Chinese

This Week in the Utah SLC East Mission

One day, Sister Anderson and I went out to contact less-active members in Relief Society and give them the manual being taught this year. Well, we experienced a MIRACLE! We knocked on an apartment door hoping to find a less-active sister home, but to our surprise we met a Chinese family who are not members and know very little about the church. The wife didn't speak much English, but she said her husband understood and spoke more. We asked her if we could go back, and she said that we could go back that same night! Well, that's exactly what we did! We called the Chinese speaking Elders in our mission and asked if they could come with us, and at the last minute that were open to come! Ahhh! It was so wonderful! The Elders met up with us and we taught the husband, Stephen, but Sister Anderson and I didn't say much; the whole lesson was in Chinese! It was so neat because even though we couldn't understand what was being said, we could still feel the Spirit. Stephen said that he would read the Book of Mormon and pray about it. New investigator...for the Chinese speaking elders! It was such a neat experience!

Sister Kayla Talbert: A Rapid Change of Heart

This Week in the Utah SLC East Mission

We taught two sisters, Jordan and Mallory, at different times this week, but we taught them about what they can do to feel the Holy Ghost in their lives. When we were teaching Mallory yesterday, I asked her if she has ever felt the Holy Ghost before, and said, "Yeah, I have. I was talking to Kelly (her aunt/mom) the other night and she was telling me that when I'm baptized I can let go of all of the bad that has happened in my past and start a new life. So, I want to be baptized." Wow! Sister Wall and I were caught off guard because not too long ago she wasn't sure if she even wanted to have a relationship with God and now she wants to be baptized!? Miracle! We able to teach Jordan a few days before Mallory and Jordan wants to be baptized, too, and she said that she already knew she was going to be baptized. Double miracle! So, they are both on date to be baptized on January 4th! We're so excited!

Elder Austin Smith: Needs of Investigators Come First!

This Week in the Utah Salt Lake City East Mission

We have an investigator named Brandon who we were about to stop teaching. Out first three lessons with him were great but after we taught him about the Word of Wisdom, thing began to fall apart. He told us he had been smoking since he was 10 and he didn't think he could do it. We gave him a blessing and promised to get him the stop smoking program.

However, from that day, he missed our appointments, stopped reading the scriptures, praying, and coming to church. Nevertheless, we wouldn't give up. We prayed mightily and repented of our own rush to get him baptized and not take of his personal needs enough. After we repented, we randomly went to his house and he was there! We had a great talk with him about all of his fears and hesitations and we asked him just to sit down with us in one week and hear the addiction program. He agreed and we made the appointment for exactly one week from then. 

During that week, we realized we needed back up. We worked with a ward mission leader to find someone who had great difficulty in smoking but also had succeeded and relied upon God to do it.

The next week we show up with our member and Brandon was there with his girlfriend (who we never knew existed). Our member friend told his life story to the both of them and Brandon was instantly ready to quit. He realized that if this man who struggled twice as long as him to quit could do it with God's help then he could too. We set up a rigorous but reasonable weening schedule, a date to STOP, and a date for him to be baptized. We then asked his girlfriend to be baptized and she said yes. She had actually been meeting with missionaries in another area but had stopped.

We saw the power of God manifest as we cared about our investigators as people, illustrated faith through diligence, and relied upon the strength of members in our area and we now have two people on date who we otherwise would have dropped or never met