Mississippi Jackson: Wasps, Bees, and Mosquito Hawks

Missionary Dictionary:

Key Indicators: how we rate our missionary work, essentially, every week. For instance, "other lessons", "tracting hours", "service hours", and "new investigators" are all key indicators.

Tracting: the time missionaries spend knocking on doors to find people to teach.

Good morning, everyone! It is a beautiful, sunny day here in Hattiesburg! I have decided that, no, Mississippi weather doesn't know what it's doing. At all. But that's okay! It's an adventure everyday.

Y'all already know about the flash floods, I'm sure. I've read your e-mails! The flooding was pretty bad in Louisiana. One of the highways here has been wiped out; the water actually knocked out part of the road, so it's closed. Sister Barney and I didn't discover that until we were confronted with numerous ROAD CLOSED signs. We now have to be creative with where we travel! Again -- an adventure everyday!

The wasps, bees, and mosquito hawks have been abundant lately. Cicadas are starting to sing, crickets chiming in at night, critters emerging from their holes in the soil -- tracting now consists of dodging large wasps, gawking at gargantuan bees, and watching out for little snakes slithering across the road. Sister Barney and I have fun with it; we sing songs, tell ridiculous jokes, and pray that Heavenly Father will lead us to just the right person.

As spring (or rather, pre-summer. That's what it feels like) approaches, we missionaries are manning ourselves with deodorant, light shirts, towels, water, and new teaching methods. As the sun rises, people's attitudes change. President Olson has revamped our key indicators and has made the MJM less focused on numbers, and more on the people. It's very easy to be focused on numbers, surprisingly. There are times when you work all week to find and teach, only to see it not reflect in the numbers you send in to the District Leader every week. However, President Olson is encouraging us not to focus on that. We are teaching people, not lessons. These people are children of God, not numbers on a sheet sent to Salt Lake.

Numbers are an unnecessary noise on a mission. Missionaries are removed from worldly noise for 18 to 24 months; we abstain from television, music that detracts from the Spirit, and even dress and grooming standards of the world to allow ourselves to be more spiritually focused and ready to sift through the noises of the world.

You never realize how quiet everything is until all of that has been removed. At home, I deeply enjoyed my technology. Texting was my jam. iTunes was my best friend. I was as well-acquainted with YouTube as I was with my friends. I read my scriptures, prayed, went to church, and did all the things the Church tells me to do to keep myself on the straight and narrow.

Yet, as I've had all of that away from me for six months, I've felt myself more aware of the voice my Heavenly Father has been using amidst all of the calamity. The voice is not reminiscent of the melodies I played from punk bands everyday; the voice is not loud like the rush of my past part-time job; the voice does not beg for my attention like children at play. The voice is still and gentle; it is the voice that cuts through every anxiety and noise that crowds out my spirit. It does not shake me and ask that I listen; it speaks, and waits for me to notice.

The Spirit is a funny thing. The Spirit speaks to us in our thoughts as well as our feelings. The Spirit can come in resounding waves of warmth and love, or as the Doctrine and Covenants describes: "Your bosom shall burn within you." (D&C 9:8). Those are miracles wrought by the Spirit of the Lord, testifying to us that what we are doing, seeking, thinking, understanding is from God and we must listen and adhere to that feeling.

However, we often ignore that the Spirit does not do that often at all. My lovely companion directed me to Galatians 5 the other day, where we read: "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance..."

The Spirit speaks to us in a thousand different ways, but no matter what, the Spirit will always challenge us to edify, to be better, to lift up, to draw nearer to God, to feel love, to be good. In the end, is what you do good for yourself? Good for others? Good for the Church? For your Heavenly Father? If you stood before Him and He asked you what you did, would you happily tell Him that what you experienced was truly inspired of the Spirit?

If we do not adhere to the Spirit's counsel, whatever it may be, then that is where our agency kicks in, and we must then choose what to do.

Never have I read of someone following a prompting of the Spirit and having it work out poorly for them. Your Heavenly Father wants to lead you to happiness; He is not an angry god, ready to smite you at the slightest slip-up.

He loves you.

Listen to how He loves you, and you will find yourself better able to help others and yourself. It all starts with a simple prick in your heart, a good thought to the mind, a small voice leading you to do something more -- and miracles will happen.

Purvis is doing well, everyone. We are teaching two brothers, who I sincerely hope will progress as their Heavenly Father truly wants them to. We are serving more, seeking out opportunities to be charitable and share the love and the Spirit with those that have been placed in our paths.

Have faith and listen this spring.

Have a good week.

Godspeed!

Sincerely,

Sister Rose