Trios, Duos, and Power Teams

I don't know if I've ever explained my favorite word "SFERS", but, guess what, it's Sfers day. My dear companion Sister Smith is heading deeper into the depths of Alabama to become an Ozark Sister. She is happy for the venturing, but is not so stoked about being in a trio! Hahaha, every sister's worst nightmare is to end up in a trio. ('_') ('_') ('_'). As Sister Smith told me two nights ago, when we were discussing possible transfer outcomes, "The scriptures say the Gospel is to be preached two by two, not three by three!!"

And that's not the only trio action happening in our world this week. The Brewton Elders, in a confusing stream of Emergency Transfers and Untransfers, have landed themselves in what they call the "Power Team" and the "Tenacious Trio" and other assorted things. We just call them a car-full of boys that we have to share way to small of a space with when we ride together. They were told that the trio would stay the same for the upcoming transfer, but then Pres changed his mind again, and on the transfer sheet today they found out that Elder Kimball, the original Brewton Elder, is leaving, and Elder Edwards and Elder Brewington are going to be the Jay and Brewton Elders now.

Whew. It has been a confusing week for us up here in no man's land. We were confused like 90% of this week and we invented a word for all of this backwoodsy strangeness and confusion that makes people scared to be called to an area like this. "BOONEYITS", named for the boonies, which is right here where I sit.

As I'm stalking my new companion, Sister Lloyd in any way I can (mission blog, lds tools), I'm starting to gather that she is either coming from a Branch or another group. So she's east of Tallahassee, but at least she's not in Tallahassee because Tally is for crazies. :D And yes, Tally thinks everyone outside of Tally is crazy. It's a love-rivalry relationship.

Oh dear, it's just hitting me that Brewton is being left in my nervous little hands. I'm gonna need a GPS and a lot of help from above.

We'll see how this goes. We're doing bad on miles, have a few investigators in Brewton, a solid recent convert, a sweet new investigator that is technically outside of our area that we have permission to teach (she's so boss! she wants to know about God's power being on the earth and about it being lost and restored! So sick.) We've got the Spirit and lots of people that we haven't talked to yet! And I've been craving a good bike ride. :)

Leggo. Let you know how it goes next week. 

-Sister Laura Cooper 

                            Me and the Sister Trainers at Zone Training.  (Sister Thompson, Me, and Sister Strickland)

8 Hours Never Seemed So Fast

Gah does anyone else feel like they should still be watching the Saturday Morning Session of Conference right now? Sometimes I think they should just make a Conference month with one session every weekend so that we don't get spiritually drained and then depressed because it's over too quick!

This week has been a lot of rain and a lot of running around. One of the challenges of Brewton, I've noticed, or perhaps one of the challenges of not whitewashing, is that there are actually times when we have no ideas what to do. Whenever I was opening or whitewashing it was like "GAH ENDLESS MEMBERS TO MEET ENDLESS PEOPLE TO TALK TO ENDLESS DOORS TO KNOCK" and now I'm in a place Sister Smith has like met everyone in the branch, has a deep relationship with everyone in Brewton Group, has knocked all the doors around our house, and is aligned with the reality that no one is on the street after 7. So sometimes I'm like it's only 7 and we can't be in, but we have a very dark city and not a lot to do... :P

The good side of not whitewashing is that things were already happening when I got here, so hence that we have a sweet recent convert family to see a lot, and they sure do need it. Since the whole group is recent converts, everyone loves and needs the missionaries. It's cute. It's a special area and as much as I want to like juice some life into it and meet everyone in the town, people here take a lot of individual time and attention and that's building patience which is good.

I loved Uchtdorf's talk on Gratitude! That was my favorite. You can leave it to that man to put it simply and come up with good phraseology. Be grateful in, not grateful for.

Catch yall next week. Watch conference reruns!

-Sister Laura Cooper

The Sound of Water Running in the Church

On the missionary CD, The Work, the last song is called "The Hardest Thing I've Ever Loved to Do". It's about this one Elder's most memorable moments of his mission. I love that song, and my favorite part goes like this...

The hardest tears I've ever loved to cry

Fell as I opened up my mouth and testified

Between the tiny walls of a stranger's living room

The Spirit told their hearts my words were true.

And the most wonderful sound I've ever heard

Is the sound of water running in the church

As someone I'd come to love got dressed in white

My eyes saw their first glimpse of heaven's light.

Although lessons and baptisms aren't quite as dramatic as the above song makes them sound, I love the whole thing about like the water and especially about seeing heaven's light because that part is totally real!

So as you might guess, we had Renee's baptism this past saturday. I know I joined her story rather far along, but in all cliche it does feel like I've known her for years. Especially since she has undergone so much change in the last few weeks that she even looks different than when I met her. 

We are so glad she's started on the right path. She bore a great testimony yesterday and inspired quite a few group members to share their thoughts on their baptism as well. So sweet! She, like us spent all day saturday involved in churchy stuff, which was really cool to see. And she said that she had a cigarette craving on the way into the water, and it was gone when she came up. Of course. Cliche but true as always.

So on a different note, how did everyone like General Women's Meeting? It was really special to have the first one during my mission! Hehe true I was making comments about how it was way more childish than Priesthood Session, but I mean there were little girls present.

Did anyone else feel like they were watching UP during the second video clip???? Please let me know I'm not alone in that! Haha.

laura.cooper@myldsmail.net

-Sister Laura Cooper

                                                      Sister Smith, Elder Gardner (who baptized her), Renee, and me!

The Prayer Rotation

Preach my Gospel says that we should have daily contact with our investigators for like a week before their baptism. Before I had taught anyone with a baptismal date I thought that was crazy. Then I understood it. Now we are working so overtime on someone that we are in contact like every three hours.

AHHHH. My head might fall off. But it's all good. She is doing good. Sister Smith knows more than I do but she says to take her word for it that our investigator is on a much better path now that she used to be. Every three hours we call and have a prayer with her whole family. It's awkward but missionaries are made for awkward. And it seems to be helping.

I don't know what else to say about this week because I feel like all that I've done is pray... We did get a referral to go up to Castleberry, Alabama (outside our zone) to teach an investigator's sister. Since it was in a random backwoods city that none of the missionaries in that area have even heard of, we got permission to head up into the Mobile North Zone (the only zone in the mission that does not and has never since it's creation last summer had any sister missionaries) and we taught a lesson to a lady in Castleberry! So this may or may not be true be we are just going to say that it's so that Sister Smith and I are currently the only sisters in the mission who have ever taught a lesson in the Mobile North Zone. 

So those are the exciting breakthroughs this week. Also I finished the book of Joshua and started reading Judges. Never read Judges. Violent as heck. Judges 3... about plunging the dagger into the dirt-fat of Eglon. Oh boy hehe.

Hope to have good news about Renee next week. Her baptismal date is Saturday!

Love ya to pieces.

-Sister Laura Cooper

Talking up a Storm

I feel like most of my week happened yesterday. Let's see if I can retrace everything else that has happened...

Well, the entire group got together on Monday night to have family home evening. It was cute. Seriously the Brewton group is so cute.

We walked around a ton because we like to look for people outside to talk to instead of trying to pull them out of their houses. We met this lady with a giant house and a bunch of foster teens and we kind of want to baptize the entire family.

Yesterday I was welcomed into the group by being asked to speak in Sacrament for 25 minutes and being asked to teach Young Women's immediately after. So I spoke on Pres Eyring's April '13 Priesthood Session talk "We Are One" about being united in our purpose to bring ourselves and others more fully into the Gospel. There is a promise made in that talk that if we are unified and do all we can to sanctify ourselves and others, that tiny groups (like Brewton) will become wards with caring bishops, stakes of Zion, and that one day upon their hills will be a temple.

Whoa.

Awesome.

Let's do it.

But the craziest thing that happened this week was that during Coordination meeting before church a tornado touched down on the outskirts of Brewton! There was this crazy warm thunderstorm going on and then all the sudden during the meeting, all five missionary phones erupted into "BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR" "TORNADO WARNING" "BRRRRRRRRRRRRR" "TAKE SHELTER" "BRRRRRRRRRRR"

I didn't get to see it though because we were in Jay at the time, but it must have been pretty close because the Jay elders and sisters got the same warning as us. So that was pretty exciting. I think it was a small one (Brewton was still there when we got back), but exciting none the less.

Of course, and I'm sure this will impress my dad, after the tornado warning came out, and the branch mission leader suggested we move to the chapel for the meeting, where there wasn't any windows, we all left the relief society room, headed for the chapel.

And all 8 young missionaries (yes, myself included) made a simultaneous detour out the front door to frolick in the pouring rain and high wind and look for the tornado.

Yes, it seems if all of my friends jumped out of a church into a tornado I would do it too. Excellent. :P :D

Love you, my peeps!

-Sister Laura Cooper

Where the Nice Road Ends

Welcome to Alabama, my happy followers! I am all settled (basically) into my new place in East Brewton. My companion is Sister Smith. (Not our mission president's wife, but that would be sweet). Sister Smith is an expert on the Lower Alabama backwoods. She's been serving in this area since I came into the field in August.

The Brewton area, I'm quickly learning, is very unique. I've never been in an area like it before (in like my whole life, not just my whole mission life). We are not big enough to be a ward or a branch... so we are a group! We are the Brewton Area GROUP, nested with the Jay, FL branch. We cross the stateline like 3 times a week on average. :D :D Such a strange place; I'm so excited. There are like 5 regular attendees of Sacrament meeting--three of them are recent converts. Then there's missionaries and sometimes a member of the Jay Branch Presidency.

How did I get so lucky?

I'm still learning how to work an area as unique as this, and trying to learn my way around. It is actually nice, for the record, to have a companion that knows the area. And I was worried.

The members here have crazy strong faith unto willingness to believe in something so uncommon, and come to church at a weird time of day (2 pm) in the city of Brewton Civic Center, instead of just going to one of the million corner churches that they could more easily choose. I can't wait to get to know them all better (which will probably take like a week because there aren't very many to know).

For our closing scripture let me search the realms of lds.org

This is what I love about the backwoods--ever since the days of DeFuniak

Alma 32:6-- And now when Alma heard this, he turned him about, his face immediately towards him, and he beheld with great joy; for he beheld that their ^aafflictions had truly ^bhumbledthem, and that they were in a ^cpreparation to hear the word.

People who live out in no man's land and don't have a lots of fits and fancy surrounding them, people who sometimes only have a little--they are humble and willing to learn. Such are the strong little converts in this group. And we are hoping to get more soon!

That's all for this week. Where Florida meets Alabama, the nice road ends, the potholed road begins, and Brewton adventures continue!

Love,
Sister Laura Cooper

Bama

I got transferred (the normal way this time!) to Brewton, Alabama. It's part of the Jay Branch. Elder Smellie, who recently came from there told me that it's awesome and that Brewton is really close to having a branch of it's own. So I might not be opening a proselyting area this time, but maybe I'll get to be there for the opening of a whole new congregation. Awesome sauce. I'm always down for an adventure.

Ok so as for the rest of the week. Basically we had some good breakthroughs with some part member families. The Barcos and the Suddeths. Both are young families with two kids, a super interested nonmember mom and a less active dad, and both have active extended family. Brother Barco's active sister just moved into the ward and she is super cool. She and Sister Barco are very close and such closeness helped the whole family to come to church yesterday! Righteous! The Suddeths are awesome too. They are very patriotic military people. One baby named Lillian America and another named Liberty. We helped them get set up to call bishop and have newborn Liberty blessed. The active brother is coming in to do the blessing. Hopefully this one sunday of required church attendance will help them build a habit. I don't know though. I'm sad I won't be around to see that, just like I'm sad that I missed out on a baptism the defuniak sisters had on saturday of a part member family we were trying to work with when I left. But the work moves on without ya, that's just how it works!

I am nervous, but I'm excited and can't wait to see what lies ahead. My companion is named Sister Smith. I guess we all have to have Elder or Sister Smith as a companion at one point in our missions or another. I've always wondered if they get asked a lot by investigators if they are related to Joseph Smith. I guess I'm finding out.

See ya in Bama! Roll tide?

-Sister Laura Cooper

P.S. Letters written to Palm Blvd in Niceville won't get to me anymore, and I don't know the new address yet, but feel free to write me at the mission home address until next week!

Sister Laura Cooper
1535 Killearn Center Blvd

Tallahassee, FL
32309