Kendrick, Meghan

Hola hola!  It has been a very busy week here! We had lots of lessons with our friends and members of our ward and branch. A little background info on our friends Rebecca and Savannah... they live in the Mesa 20th Ward boundaries, and some Elders cover that area. However, they don't feel comfortable with men going over to teach them since its just them two in the house. The Elders talked to President Fisk, and he gave permission for me and Hermana Shefchik to teach Rebecca and Savannah. We had another lesson with them last week. We have been bringing women from the Mesa 20th Ward to our lessons and inviting Rebecca and Savannah to go to that ward. Rebecca attended church two Sundays ago, so we started our lesson by asking her how it went. She was excited to tell us that everyone was super welcoming and she felt the Spirit very strongly. She said that she picked up a book after church. We asked her which book, but she couldn't remember the name of it. She had looked through it a...

Hola hola!  It has been kind of a crazy week here. Hermana Shefchik got sick towards the end of the week, so we spent a couple of days in the apartment. She's feeling much better today so now we're just hoping that I don't get whatever she had.  Our friends are doing really well! Melvin hadn't been able to come to church for a little while because his wife recently had a baby. We finally had another lesson with them last week and they told us how much they missed coming to church and that they had felt a difference in their lives while they hadn't been able to come. They came yesterday and were so happy to be back. The members of the ward were also very happy to see them again.  We had a few more lessons with Claudia, and her daughter Anahí joined us for one of them. Anahí also had a baby recently so her and Claudia aren't able to come to church right now, but they are wanting to come when the baby gets a little older. We started teaching a lady named Rebecca an...

Hola a todos!  I hope that you're all doing well! We had another lesson with the Romero family and they are doing so well! Their goal this year as a family is to come to all of the branch activities. They have lots of friends in the branch and the members have been great at helping them feel welcome. We have been praying hard for the Romero family to open up more, and every lesson it seems like they feel a little more comfortable with us.  Last week was Zone Conference week, and President Fisk introduced a new mission initiative called "the lost coin." As a mission, we started teaching quite a few people last year but only a small percentage of them ended up getting baptized. This year, we are going to focus more on using the tools that we have to find those who were taught by missionaries last year and in years passed. Then we are going to check up on them and see how we can help them to continue learning. We have lots of amazing tools as missionaries and it will be awes...

Hola hola a todos! This past week has been filled with miracles! We recently started teaching a few new people. A couple of weeks ago, we helped a member of our ward wrap her Christmas presents. She lives in an apartment complex and didn't want her kids to see us wrapping the gifts, so we wrapped them outside on some tables. Her neighbor, Dawn, joined us and said that she was interested in doing Bible studies with us. We've now done two studies with her. Dawn said that she feels like she has a hole in her life, and she is searching for God. She had some bad experiences with the last church she went to and is hesitant about joining another church, so we've been taking things slowly. We introduced her to the Book of Mormon, and we have been using both the Book of Mormon and the Bible in our studies with her. We recently found out that she has a brother who is a member of our church but isn't super active. Dawn told her brother that she started doing studies with us and he...

Feliz Año Nuevo!  Happy 2024 everyone! I hope that you are all having a happy new year.  Hermana Shefchik and I had the opportunity to speak in the branch Sacrament meeting yesterday. The branch is already pretty small and lots of people were out of town for the weekend, so it was us and about 10 other people. Thankfully, it helped me to not feel quite so nervous while speaking haha. We were asked to talk about how to share the gospel. It was amazing to reflect on some of the things that I have learned on my mission that have helped me to share the gospel in normal and natural ways. Before my mission, one of the hardest things for me was to know how to invite people to learn more. One of my favorite quotes from Preach My Gospel states that "Often, inviting simply means including our family, friends, and neighbors in what we are already doing." We can invite people to church activities just as we would invite them to go watch a new movie or attend a sporting event. I've le...