SISTER JOHNSON'S FEBRUARY 16, 2015 E-MAIL

SORRY FOR THE DELAY, FOLKS!

NEW BLOG POST COMIN' IN! 

VC sisters, Lauren and Sister Smith!

More VC Sisters with Lauren and Sister Smith

We love all Visitor Center Sisters with Lauren and Sister Smith

Those are bunny nose lollypops that I gave her back at Easter last year!

 Valentines for everyone!

Hello!!

My dear sweet mother.....of course, I always read your entire email!!! I just don't always respond to everything haha. So don't you fret about that! I love reading them and hearing about everything going on! It's my form of entertainment for the week!

Thank you again for the box! Sister Smith appreciated the chocolates, and her mom sent her a box too and had some stuff for me, plus our roommate's mom also sent chocolates for us, so we were well-loved on Valentine's Day.  About my room, yes that's totally fine to move the other (twin) bed in there. I'll be curious to know how you fit everything though   :-)

This past week here was really fun and amazing!!! We had stake conference with Elder Oaks, and Sister Smith and I being the lucky ducks we are got to see him speak three times. We got to see him at the single adult session Friday night (since we serve in a YSA ward), the all-adult session Saturday night, and then the normal session on Sunday. His daughter, Jenny Oaks Baker (the amazing violinist - famous in the Mormon world), also performed last night at the Inter-Stake Center across from the Visitors' Center, so a few of us got to go over there and greet people and what not (we couldn't stay to listen though sadly). So it was a fun and eventful weekend! Elder Oaks is amazing, and so is his wife - I think I've said this before but every time we get visited by a general authority and their wife, I feel like I come to know the Savior better. They truly are His chosen servants and messengers. Elder Oaks was so powerful, and addressed the needs of our stake very well. Also, before Jenny's performance yesterday, Elder Oaks hosted an inter-faith reception at the Visitors' Center (and we were serving there at that time :D) so we got to meet him and shake his hand! It was kind of a funny/awkward experience, haha... we were standing in the front room of the VC about to give a tour of the Christus statue, and he came in with his wife and was greeting people. Some other people walked in behind him (people from each of the ward's in the stake who were invited to the reception) and I saw Brother Hilliard, who I visited every week when I was in Moraga. Anyways I saw Brother Hilliard and went to go shake his hand (because I thought maybe Elder Oaks was shaking someone else's hand or something) but I realized it looked like I just walked right past him and ignored him because he was ready to shake my hand! But I didn't mean to!! Haha... anyways, just something awkward that only I would do... Sister Smith and I got to shake his hand though and he and Sister Oaks briefly told us about what the Rome Visitors' Center will be like when it's completed. The couple we were giving the tour to also got to meet him and the man just got baptized, so Elder Oaks congratulated and hugged him. He is such a loving person!! Without a doubt, a true apostle and prophet of God.

Some other fun things and miracles - we went on back-to-back exchanges, so I got to be with Sister Tam who serves in the Oakland Chinese ward one day, and then I got to go back to Moraga the next day with Sister Lindsay. :) Those were a fun couple of days! It would be so much fun to serve in the Chinese program - Chinese people are so funny and so humble. When I went back to Moraga we visited a member who I visited every week, which was so nice to be able to see him again! Last week was just overall nostalgic because I also got to see many members of the Moraga ward during stake conference and got to say hello to Brother R***, who recently got baptized!!!! ---> Huge, giant miracle -- he is the one who has been waiting for years to be baptized. Anyways, in Berkeley, we had a huge blessing of finding a new investigator from visiting a former investigator. He is a student at UC Berkeley studying to be a pastor, so he's always interested in learning about different religions but is also sincere about learning about this one for himself. With that came another huge miracle on Saturday. We went to the Berkeley Public Library at 1:30 to meet up with him, and when we walked in, we saw a member who we haven't seen in a while. We went up and said hello to her, and she told us she was there with M**** (M**** got baptized right before I was transferred from Berkeley to Moraga). Well, this is a huge miracle because  we haven't seen or have been able to get a hold of M**** in a long time!!!!!! So we were soooo happy to see her and it was an answer to our prayers! She looked a little nervous to see us, but it was still a huge blessing from the Lord to be able to just see her. We are hoping she will want to meet with us again and come to church!! Then, right after that happened, we ran into a guy who we found out got baptized recently in Nevada, but hasn't been coming to church (he should be going to the Berkeley family ward) and were able to get his info to help him get to church. So, in conclusion - miracles happen, all day every day, and the Lord is so very aware of His children.

Well that pretty much sums up my week. :) The Savior lives and loves us. Love you all!!!

Love,

Sister Johnson

EXTRA FUN COMMENT SECTION:  Sometimes we get to chat back and forth on e-mail.  This was one of her responses:

I'm here! Hahaha oh my goodness Brad is such a goober. I loved the box! Thank you so much for it and for the money! I spent it all today haha. I bought a new watch (my other one broke), some new tennis shoes (my other ones for some reason smell really bad but I'm still going to try and fix them so they smell better) and some new work out pants. So thank you!!! And thanks for the dress! Hopefully it's not too short! Thank you!!!!!