Remember the Church is True!

Hello Family and Friends! 

     Guess what this week is a very very special week!  Why you might ask?  Well let me give you a scripture hint.  Alma 50:16 "And thus ended the twentieth year."   

     Yeah!!  My Birthday!  Weird right!  On August 30th I am going to be turning 21 years old!  Isn't that weird!  I can hardly believe it.  I am getting so old. :)  So as my mom could probably tell you I love my Birthday!  I think it is so much fun.  I love the sweets, I love the presents, I love it all!  I have had no shame at all about telling everyone that it is my Birthday Week.  This next week Sister Noe and I practically have a week full of parties.  I am so excited we have already had 2 early Birthday dinners and they were so much fun!  I am going to be an expert at blowing out candles by the time we get to the 30th! :) 

Sister Noe and Me

We love Wonderful

One of my Birthday dinner's African style

     This week we were able to start teaching a Native American mom and her 7 kids, almost 8.  She has been investigating the church for about 3 months now.  The Elders were teaching them but now Sister Noe and I are going to try and teach them.  We are going to try and see if we will be able to help her open up more and help her so she will be able to meet more of the sisters from the Relief Society.  So far things are going great.  We have been able to get some new sisters there that she hasn't met before and we have been able to really get the kids engaged.  The kids are amazing!  They love coming to church and they love the people.  We are really excited for them.  They are heading down the right path.  I will tell more about them next week. 

     Last week I had said that I was going to talk a little more about Desirae and her family.  She is Native American and she has 8 kids.  She and her family have been investigating for about 3 months now.  She is 31 years old and she has a lot of kids who are going to go down some really hard paths if they don't change soon.  The biggest thing that is holding them back is her.  Yes, she wants to change and she wants her kids to have a better life.  But she isn't taking any action.  She needs to exercise her faith and start making changes in her life so that the kids can follow.  The kids are all really smart and they have good hearts.  But they know a lot of things that they shouldn't at their age.  Last Monday we were able to have a Family Home Evening  with them about the Word of Wisdom and it was okay.  It is kind of hard sometimes to teach them because they don't take the lesson very serious and they joke around a lot.  It is hard to help them recognize the importance.  Especially when their mom is joking around with them.  But they all came to church on Sunday and it was a good experience for them.  This next week we are going to have to be really bold with them in telling them, mostly the mom, that she needs to step it up.  That is our next step with them so hopefully we will be able to help them progress towards baptism.

Making dinner with Sister Kooper

I Love Sister Kooper and Brother Mentoe
(they are married just have different last names)

     This week Sister Noe and I had a pretty cool experience.  We were out knocking doors and we started talking to this guy who was atheist.  He was asking us some questions but then said, "I don't really want to talk to you about this but you should go down a couple of houses there is another guy who is atheist and he would love to talk to you." Then he shut the door. 

     Sister Noe and I looked at each other and smiled.  That is exactly where we went.  Why not we thought.  We knocked on the door and an older man in his 60’s came out and said , "Well hello Sister Curtis and Sister Noe.  What are you here to talk about?" 

     Then with a big smile I said we are missionaries in the area from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints." 

     That's were it all started.  We were able to have a super interesting discussion with him that lasted for about a hour.  It was super interesting.  You could tell that he has talked to many people about religion before and he really knew what he was talking about, but lucky for us so did we.  It was really cool because no matter what he said about us and about our faith there was nothing he could do to change it.  He was really impressed with both of us and what we had to say.  He even told us that we were adorable and that if he could he would adopt us. ...Ahhh thanks Scott.  The coolest part was at the end we were able to talk about the Book of Mormon with him.  It was funny because he knew a lot about our church and he doesn't agree with a lot of things yet, he has never read the Book of Mormon!  Crazy right?  I know?  When he said that I was like, "What!  Come on Scott!  You have to read the Book of Mormon before you diss on our faith.  Basically anything you have said so far isn't valid because you haven't read the Book of Mormon." 

     We were able to leave him with a copy and he promised us that he would read it.  We are really excited to go back this week and see what he thought of what he read.  It is always a little scary to talk to atheists because they really do test us and our faith.  There have been times where I don't exactly know what to say but in those times I have always just share what I know to be true.  That's really all you can do.  Just bear testimony and because we did he now knows something that he didn't know about Mormons. :)

     As for me, a lot of what I have been working on is charity.  I'm not perfect at this, but I am trying to be.  This week I was able to give a brief training in District meeting about having Charity.  It was exactly what I needed at the time and I truly felt that I learned way more then the people I taught.  Isn't that how it always is.  I started of by reading in Moroni 7: 46-48 it says,

"46 Wherefore, my beloved brethren, if ye have not charity, ye are nothing, for charity never faileth. Wherefore, cleave unto charity, which is the greatest of all, for all things must fail.

 47 But charity is the pure love of Christ, and it endureth forever; and whoso is found possessed of it at the last day, it shall be well with him. 

48 Wherefore, my beloved brethren, pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart, that ye may be filled with this love, which he hath bestowed upon all who are true followers of his Son, Jesus Christ; that ye may become the sons of God; that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is; that we may have this hope; that we may be purified even as he is pure. Amen." 

     This scripture is so perfect.  It says it so plain and simple.  Charity is the pure love of Christ.  What an amazing gift that we are able to have.  But it is something that we need to learn as well. My favorite part in Moroni 7 is verse 48 were Mormon counsels us to pray to the father with all the energy of heart that we might be able to be filled with that love.  This is really cool to me because not only are we able to feel of the pure love of Christ but it is something that we can help others feel of it through us.  I personally have decided that the greatest Christlike attribute is charity.  Because when we are able to have charity then everything else will follow.  We will then be able to be humble, patient, diligent and grateful.  Through charity or the pure love of Christ, everything else will come.  This is something that I am really going to focus on this week and I invite you to try it as well.  The best part about trying to develop Christlike attributes is that in the end they are there so that we can help others.  And we know that when we are in the service of our fellow beings we are only in the service of our God.  What better of a way to please Him.  I love you all so much!  I hope you have a wonderful week.  

Remember, the church is true!

Love, Sister Kendra Curtis

Another Birthday party with the riggers!

The Riggers plus Mini their rat

Chantee gave me an Ohio State shirt for my birthday! I love her!