Sincerely Sister Smith

Dear Loved Ones,  I have been transferred out of Kansas and into Independence!  It feels weird now, being in the state my call letter named. I'm thrilled to be serving in the center of Zion! I've long wanted to be in a visitors' center and prayed to come here. Back in 2016, when I was traveling through here as part of a church history stud abroad, I had an experience that seems in hindsight like a clue that I would eventually come here. I was reminded of this experience when I brought someone I was teaching to the Independence for a tour a few weeks ago. I fully expected to end up here. I won't mention that experience here, but I'll talk about another one I had. One of my favorite parts of the tour I'm learning to give is a video at the end about the growth of the church. It shows this black and white picture of the Salt Lake Temple under construction with scaffolding all around the towers. I tear up a lot when I see it. After I was barred from serving...

Dear Loved Ones, This is a transfer week, so I find out Tuesday whether I get deported out of Kansas and into Missouri. When I email people individually, I can always tell who hasn't been reading my mass because they ask how I'm doing in Missouri. I have my fingers crossed for Independence. I would like to serve both there and Liberty at some point. Both of those places have pros and cons, but I want to be in the centerholds of church history and church future. Liberty Jail is always going to be special to me because of what happened with Fia. Now I need to go to Independence and make that place special. We had stake conference this week and it was all focused on the family. I'm reminded that the family, not missions, should be the center of our lives. I pushed through a lot to get on my mission, but this is not my ultimate goal. I have greater things to do.  My friend has a kid who lives in a city 30 minutes away. She doesn't have a car, but one day, her son cal...

Dear Loved Ones Last week, my friend Fia and I took a road trip to Liberty Jail, ran into a guy she wanted to baptize her, and decided to jump her baptism up to this Saturday, three weeks ahead of schedule. That meant we had devote our entire week to her.  Here is the story of how that had happened. First, we put our P-day (day off) on pause last Monday to spend three hours teaching her one of the final lessons, prepping her for her baptismal interview, and talking her through some scary stuff with her family. I wish I could share the full story so I could show you fully how incredible Fia is, but I can't. All I'll say is that her family are dangerous. They're not afraid to hurt people to get their way.  They hate not only The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints but Christianity in general and she knew she'd be in danger if they knew she was joining. She was torn because she wanted to stand as a witness and share her newfound love of the gospel, but als...

Dear Loved Ones, I am drafting this on my phone from the lobby at Liberty Jail, Fia beside me. A miracle just happened and I need to get this down. Fia spent some time in the Witness Protection Program. She met with missionaries back in her old life and her original sisters introduced her to an elderly couple who would drive her to church. When I put Fia on date for the 31st of this month, she said she wanted the husband of that elderly couple to be the one to baptize her, but she couldn't remember his name and had no way to get in touch with him. Our mission holds a special devotional every fast Sunday where recent converts share their testimonies on why they decided to join and all of us missionaries bring the people we're teaching to listen. The location switches off every month. It's either in Independence or at the Liberty Jail (I can't get over how often we pop by church history sites here). My companion previously served at the jail, the location for th...