Grow where you are planted!

Hola y'all!

Dang can i just start off by saying i love you all so much!  i wish i could put it into words but there is just no words that are good enough.  I really do love you all so much though!  This week has been filled with so much awesomeness.  We went to the temple on Wednesday!  I love being in the temple.  I didnt want to leave haha but i guess the next best place to be is on a mission serving the Lord.  I was thinking about how great it is being on a mission.  You get a free car that you dont have to pay for gas or a car payment.  You get to read the scriptures and talk about Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ and their restored Gospel all day long!  You get to find some lost sheep.  You get fed everyday!  You make a new friend everyday!  How great it is.  how blessed am i!

Our invesitagators are doing well.  They are all progressing!  None of them are on date yet but the grass is green!  So i remember thinking in my head when i first arrived here on the mission "i cant wait for the day where i just enjoy being here."  The mission is dang hard, dont get me wrong but it is Dang good too!  So the other day we were driving and i was rocking out to "scripture power" or something like that and i just though, "wow i just enjoy being here.  I am content with this life.  This is my life for the next 15 months and im ok with it."  I finally reached that day!  I just enjoy being here.  There are moments where its way hard and people are mean and you just think "you dont realize that what im telling you is of greatest worth for you and it will make you happy" haha but you just have to keep going.  Thats the only way we will be happy in life.  there will always be something hard in life, but you cant bypass and float above them... (at least i havent figured that out yet, if anyone has then let me in on the secret).  but no that is not our purpose in life.  

We are here to learn, grow, and gain experience.  The only way to do that is to struggle a little here and there.  But what i cant tell you is that the struggling is oh so worth it.  If we hold on, keep on running we will have joy!!  Heavenly Father doenst want us to be misserable, "men are that they might have joy"  Now thats what i want!  I know we can have it too!  In this gospel we can have JOY!!  How blessed are we!  Wherever life takes, by golly just grow where you are planted.  That is the only way to have joy!  It took me almost 2 months to figure that out, and im still learning and figuring it out, but i have planted myself here in Georgia and now i am growing.  Not very fast, but i am growing.  I am so happy here!  Its hard here, but now that i have just accepted that this is my life for just a short time i can be happy.  I am so blessed to be doing this work.  I love the work!  Sometimes when we are out knocking doors and its 103 degrees and my clothes are soaking and an some angry person slams the door on our face, i just smile.  I smile and say to my companion "well we are one more person close to finding that lost sheep thats been prepared for us."

So this week i ate "gizzards".  I asked what it what and Alex one of the members just said "eat, dont ask, its eatable." haha he said he would tell me after i ate it.  It was actually not that bad haha!

So all the kids in the branch call me and my companion "Elderas" jahja!  Cuties.  

I love teaching the Lesson 1 the part where it talks about "the gospel blesses families."  my companion loves when i teach it because with out fail every time i will whip out my family picture.  And i will bear my testimony on my family and how much the gospel blesses me and my family and that i want them to have that in their life.  The spanish is going really great actually!  I cant wait for the day when i just all of the sudden just know really good though.  Just like the other day, it will come one day!  

 

Oh life is great!  Today we are having the Brocket Sisters and Sandy Springs sisters over to our house!  We are making them mexican food!  We are making arros con leche, arros, fijoles, tortillas, and choriso!  mmm my favorite!!  I cant wait to make it for you all when i get home!  all the memebers like to teach us how to make stuff!  

Well i just want you to know how much i love my savior.  Jesus suffered for everything.  Not only just our sins, but he suffered for every bad day at work, every headace we feel, every spicy taco i have to eat, every struggle we have, are or will ever go through.  He went through that.  He knows how we feel.  He gave us this gift so that we dont have to feel all of that.  Wow how blessed are we!  I love you all so much!

Anyways..... remember that your burdens may be light through the joy of his son, "and now, my bretheren, i desire that ye shall plant this word in your hearts, and as it beginneth to swell even so nourish it by your faith.  and behold, it will become a tree, springing up in you unto everlasting life.  and then may god grant unto you that your burdens may be light through the joy of his son. and all this can ye do if ye will. amen." alma 33:23.  What every hardship you are going through, remember you have a loving savior who through him you can have joy.  We can do this!  I love you all!  Until next week, have a blessed week, and remember, you can do this.

Hermana Stewart

xoxoxo

Our ward missionary leader and his family took us out to eat!!

  Our ward mission leader with his fish haha