Oh how joyful it will be when our Savior we shall see!

Thank you all for your kind comments, thoughts and prayers for our Ali and our family We truly can feel your love and support at this time. And for those who are concerned we have our rain water cisterns so the 'water crisis' in Charleston did not affect us this time. But we have had our share of our own in the past when we have run out of water for more days than this. But glad the chemical leak has been taken care of and all of our friends are able to use the water now or will be soon. 

January 13, 2014

Hi everyone!!!

Thanks for all the love and support, especially the prayers for me and my family this week. I'm doing great. Being a missionary really is an incredible experience. I have felt the hand of the Lord guiding, strengthening, and comforting me. So do not worry about me one bit :) Let me try to update you from the past two weeks!

Our area is super super small. But we divided it up into three parts. If you are looking at the ocean, the left side is middle-lower class-ish. A lot of people under rent control or Section 8 housing. Or young families. Or nicer homes where older people live. The middle part of our area is mostly car dealerships, the promenade (outdoor mall and restaurants...3 blocks away from the ocean), super small but expensiveeeeee apartments, the pier, and tourist central. The area to the right is richrichrich houses---it borders Malibu. Stereotypically speaking, the richer you get the more Jewish and atheist you get. In case ya don't know as a missionary we aren't allowed to swim or get in the sand. But let's just say there is a less active member that lives literally on the beach. So we went down to the sidewalk on the beach to get there. And we biked on the PCH (Pacific Coast Highway) when the sun was setting on the ocean and we street contact by the pier all the time. Nuts business. People are much less receptive here than my last area, which is to be expected because of the demographic. It is a melting pot here. It's more eastern-european actually.

Everyone here has met someone famous, haha. Even the guy in our ward who owns a Rubber Stamp store claims Robert Downing Jr. as a customer. Our ward is just an eclectic group of people. I love it. Like I said before, lots of young families and people over the age of 70.  Our ward mission leader works for Amazon and also runs the largest Twilight Fan Club. I'm still working on getting a free #teamedward t-shirt. A less active texted us and told us he couldn't come to church because he was doing a photo shoot with Lance Bass. #hestillhasphotoshoots? #probablynotChristliketosaythat Another ward member is in advertising (most are), and talked about his photoshoot with Kobe Bryant and then we saw his billboard all over Santa Monica Blvd. Where am I?

We are building up our teaching pool with investigators, but we're just trying to help them progress and choose to be elect. #ugh #agency

We are trying to find those interested through less actives and part-member families, but we don't have a ton in our area (We share the ward with the elders. They have the other half of the ward. It is so weird to share a ward with other missionaries. It's much harder to get to know everyone which is very important to me.) We tract (knock on doors) quite a bit, because street contacting isn't as effective here. (Mostly tourists on the streets that are busy with people.) I actually love tracting. It is hilarious---you never know what is behind the door. Some of my favorite quotes or experiences---

In a very thick British woman accent "what do you want? you're bothering me. Does this have anything to do with religion?" In my kindest voice possible, "Yes! It does!" "Then get off my property."

"Our role as missionaries is to testify of Jesus Christ." "Well I'm Jewish and I think this is inappropriate." *cue slammed door*

One angry Jewish man (I promise most Jewish people are very polite!!) started to say really rude things about Mary and Joseph, so we cut him off to say he could check out mormon.org. Then we asked if he had any friends who needed God, etc., as always and he actually gave us a referral!! Nuts how people are so angry, but recognize who we are and that we can help people they love.

"Oh, we are more into nature." ....

One man opens the door and before we could even say hi he says the following, "I am a firm atheist and this is a waste of your time, but  I will say that it is awful that you all don't donate blood. I HAVE DONATED OVER 50 PINTS OF BLOOD. And one day you will need that blood." Once again in my kindest voice possible, "Oh okay! Well we better get going, but we hope you have a great day! And I have donated blood before." "How?!" "In school blood drives and such. Mormons don't believe you can't donate. Have a great day!" Like 20 minutes later and about 10 houses down the street, homeboy comes and finds us. He came and apologized for getting us confused with Jehovah's Witnesses! It was so humbling and so awesome.

I am pleased to announce that my relations with the homeless people of the city of Santa Monica are greatly improving. We gave one outside of our complex some hot chocolate and an extra blanket we had, the other night (we aren't allowed to give money, so we usually keep food in our car to give them). But then he camped outside of our window for a few days. #notmybestdecision He's gone now, so don't worry Mom :)

Oh my birds. So there is this a giant flock of crows that live near our house. Disgusting. Anyways we were getting out of our car the other day, and we seriously got ATTACKED by bird poop. I looked up and screamed INCOMINGGGGGGGGGG and Sister Rackleff barely missed some. Disgusting. (Was it secretly awesome that I saw it falling out of the sky and ran for cover like I was in WWII or something? Yes.) Reminded me of when a bird pooped on Micah's prom dress, hahahahaha.

Things with Sister Rackleff are great! She is a mixture of Kellie Javins (my friend) and Amy Fuller (spaztic comedian). One of my favorite quotes she said this week:

"How was your personal study?" -me

"Better than my personal life..." -her
Hahaha, it was super fun to spend our one year mark together!! NUTS!!! We celebrated and went out to lunch. I have less than 5 months left :( but I think the biggest thing is to not plateau my progression and work ethic. I'm excited to see the miracles! [Note from Dawn: Sister Rackleff and Ali received their mission calls the same day and entered the Mission Training Center the same day last January 9, 2013. And this Mom is excited that she only has 5 months left!!!!!!!!]

Remember Chris? My investigator from my last area?? Well I told you he works in my new area? Seriously that is NUTS. Anyways, because more missionaries got sick and had to go home, the YSA branch I was at won't have missionaries until the transfer. But that means we have permission to teach Chris!!! Super cool!!! He reset a baptismal date and is doing great. Highlight was watching the family video at the Visitor's Center with him this week. It was really powerful for me to testify that living with our families with God forever is the why of everything we do (I had lots of support from the other side of the veil on that one). The gospel of Jesus Christ is the how we get there.

We have other investigators that I don't have time to talk about, but I'd love your prayers for us and them!

We met someone from the Ivory Coast and we are teaching him! We don't have French -speaking missionaries here, so we are trying to do our best. I'll try my best to hone my inner-Mrs. Keller. :)

[Ali's high school French teacher] I should've paid more attention when Dad tried to translate in our Book of Mormon readings.

One of Margie's friends came to her baptism and told us she just saw the light in our eyes when we testified and wanted to be able to stand up and say she knew it was true like we did. It was one of the best compliments I have ever received. We are teaching her and her 16 yr old son that has high-functioning Autism (he seriously is one of the most pure people I have ever met.)
I'll finish with my favorite miracle of the week:

We got a referral for a woman named Peggy. She lives in a very busy part of town. We were walking to her locked apartment complex, just praying there would be some way to get in. We were still two blocks away and we were passing literally dozens and dozens of people. SIster Rackleff felt impressed to stop and talk to this woman. We start talking to her for a little bit before we realized... WHO WAS IT? PEGGY. It was insane!!!!! The chances of us passing her, let alone talking to her, were like 1 in 1000 at least.  And people say miracles have ceased? This is God's work. He is SO aware of us individually.

He loves you and He knows you by name. I love you! Thank you for everything! Make it a great week!!

Love,

Sister Ali Atkinson :)