Excellent Week!!!

This week was excellent! We taught Bernice in about 4 times and she was SOOO ready. I remember she told us in a lesson "I should have done this a long time ago." She has just blossomed so much and she is so much happier. The baptism was on Saturday afternoon. It was amazing!! We invited a lot of the ward to participate in the program and so we were excited to get more people to fellowship her. Well about 5 minutes till 4 (that was when it started) we only had 4 people! Oh man I was so nervous and just prayed to heavenly father for people to remember and to come. It was a miracle, my prayers were answered. About 20 people ended up attending. We were thrilled and Bernice was so happy to see all the support and love, although crowds are not her cup of tea, she was happy. Sister Longhurst and I did a really cool intermission while she was changing. Longurst started to play the piano and talked about the Love of God, Jesus Christ, the 12 apostles and the apostacy and how God reached out in love and called a prophet on the earth to lead and guide the church today. Then she went into playing come thou font, I stood up and sang Joseph Smith's First Prayer. The arrangement works almost perfect for the wording, there is a pause in the middle of the song and so I recited Joseph Smith's First Vision. Wow. Then I continued the song ended and bore my testimony of Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon. It was powerful. Many tears were shed. Luckily I kept it together during the song. I felt the spirit testify to me and all who witnessed the baptism that it is only through proper authority that we can be baptized. That was restored back on the earth when Joseph Smith was ready and prepared. Ah it was cool. I wished we could have had some investegators attend, but we are still working hard to find new ones. Kayla Shiflett is getting baptized on Saturday!!! July 31st!! Holy cow I am so excited for her! She is 18 years old and is so solid. She loves and accepts everything that has been taught to her. Her countenance has change so much. She wasn't happy, but she has a light inside of her and she knows that this will help her get a fresh start of a great new life! We had a lesson with her on Tuesday and she brought up the fact that she got work off so she could be baptized on the 31st!!! So cool. We were at teh Milhoans house when we taught and Sister Milhoan just about flew off her chair when she heard Kayla say that. I guess that when we invited Kayla to be baptized, Sister Milhoan thought we were inviting Kayla to witness a baptism, not her own baptism!! haha it was great!! Kayla is solid, or what we would say "golden." I love this girl! i am so excited for her. Oh yeah and we talked about the spirit world and how we can perform ordinances for those who have passed on and her eyes just lit up and she was just grinning from ear to ear. Her brother committed suicide a year ago and she was questioning what would happen to him. It was great to see her qeustions answered.
We were supposed to have interviews this week, but instead we had President instruct us of the new lessons and training for missionaries. We talked about the role of the holy ghost in conversion and the role of prayer in conversion. Both were powerful. We also watched a video of some missionaries that did this, one of the missionaries was Elder Bott!!! Steve Bott from Payson!! He was a teacher in the MTC when I was there too. Holy smokes it threw me for a loop when I saw him on the TV. It was pretty cool. These trainings are already helping us. When we had the lesson about prayer we went and had a lesson with Bernice that day and when we said the closing prayer, Bernice didn't want to say it. She was really scared. It was cool to actually see my practice put into action. We helped her know what to say and she did awesome! I was tearing up when i was able to listen to the simple humble testimony and prayer that she gave. It was great! President also said something to us 4 times during our 5 hour meeting with him. He quoted Elder Oaks from the 2001 October Conference. "The intestity of our desire to share the gospel is a great indicator of the extent of our personal conversion." I have thought a lot about this. I know that this is true. So I am making a goal to be more converted. It is so true that the more we know, the more we want to share with others. *Remember that!
The other night I got off my knees when i was done praying and Sister Longhurst looked at me and said "have a good conversation with Heavenly Father?" I guess she noticed that I had a grin on my face when i was done. My reply "yep, it was great. You know what, when you pray you never feel bad, it just feels good." I have realized just how true this is!!
All in all this week has been fantastic. We are working with many potentials and our pool is filling up. I feel so blessed to be here right now. The work is starting to build and it is great to be apart of it!!
Here is a pic of Brother Bell ( he is in the bishopbric and baptized bernice, Bernice, Sister Longhurst and I) Oh yeah Sister Longhurst is great and is 5 ft tall. haha She has lived in Washington, Iowa and her parents now live in Virginia. She went to BYU for 3 years and is going to school to become a physical therapist. I know that she is here for a reason, to help me be better and to help the work progress as we teach together. It is amazing to serve with her!!!! I have felt so close to the spirit lately. I know that the Lord hears us, he is aware of our situations. We have a loving Savior and Heavenly Father. They can help us be happy, if we let them help us!! i love the gospel and am grateful to be a missionary!! Love you all!!

Love, Sister Glasgow!!