I'm an Okee from Muskogee! :)

Dearest Family,

Muskogee is GREAT! It's the biggest ward I've been in since I was in Bella Vista! Which seems like forever ago but it really wasn't that long ago. There's even a family that moved here from Miami. They only moved in August so not too long ago. They are the Garretts. We had dinner with them last night and they are awesome! They have 4 boys ranging from ages 4 to 13 I think. I felt bad for Sister Moe because pretty much the whole time we were talking about Miami and all the wonderful people that are up there. I miss it so much but am ready for new adventures and am excited to see what is in store for me here in Muskogee!

My companion is Sister Moe. She is awesome! She's only been out for about 4 months but she is a great missionary! When I first got here, since it's a new area and I don't know really anything, she was really great in helping me figure out who is who and what their story it. She continues to help me because I don't have a great memory and so she'll have to tell me things again I'm sure.

So leaving Miami was really rough. Especially leaving it to two missionaries that haven't been in the area before so they don't know anything. But one of the missionaries there is Sister Meredith and she is training and so I'm sure that the work will progress greatly up there!  We went around and saw a lot of people before we left so we could say goodbye. We saw Cheyenne everyday before we left! I'm going to miss her so much! But she is going to be great! On Wednesday night, we went to the church for mutual/activity days/scouts to say goodbye and while we where there they tricked us and stole our keys and heart attacked our car! When we walked outside, they were laying in the bed of our truck and when we got to it, they jumped up and scared us! They are so great! I love them so much! It is amazing how much love you can spread around as a missionary! You love one area so much that you think you can't love anymore but then you are transferred and you automatically love everybody there in that area! That's what happened with me. Yesterday in church when Sister Moe was introducing me to everyone, I just automatically felt love for everyone. Nobody will replace Bella Vista, Nevada, or Miami, but I already love Muskogee as much as my other areas! Which makes the work easier - because I don't have to try to love them, it's automatic!

Something cool that is going on here in the Muskogee Ward is that they are trying to get it split into a ward and a branch. There is a town, Wagoner, about 20 miles north of Muskogee that is in the ward and they have been having "cottage meetings" up there once a month to see what the attendance would be like. Then yesterday, our Ward Mission Leader told us that he sent the letter off to the high coucil or whoever he needed to send it to, to get it approved! It will have to go all the way up to Salt Lake but hopefully it won't take too long and they'll be able to create a branch up there! It's pretty exciting!

Yesterday we had a lesson with a guy named Jarrod. He is a pretty awesome guy. Unfortunately, he is homeless at the moment and is trying to find a job. There is a place in town that he lives at called "The Mission." It is a place where homeless people can stay. Regardless of his hard life, he has a super strong faith in Jesus Christ. He's had a few baptism dates but something always came up. He now has a date for February 23rd. Pretty much all he needs to do is to continue to not smoke and come to church! He is even already being a missionary! He asked us for some copies of the Book of Mormon that he could give to some friends and he said that he is going to bring one of his friends to church with him. It is amazing to know that you have a testimony but even more amazing when you see someone else gain a testimony and then share what they believe.

We are also working with a lady named Chasity. Her and her daughter, Micah, like to meet with us. I can't remember if they've come to church yet or not. But they're really great. Chasity is going to beauty school and trying to make ends meet. She and her daughter live with her boyfriend. I don't think he's super supportive of her investigating the church but allows us to come over and meet with her and Micah. Hopefully he'll turn around and they'll be able to come to church!

Well, I think that's about it for today. I hope you are all doing fantastic! I sure am loving my time here in Muskogee. I would love to hear from all my family and friends! My new address is:

1723 Sallie St.

Muskogee, OK 74403

Write to me!!! :)

Picture 1: Welcome to Miami!

Picture 2: Elder Richards, Sister Reeves, me, Elder Atkin at the Joplin transfer point.

Picture 3: some of the sisters in the mission at the Bentonville transfer point.

Picture 4: me and my new companion, Sister Moe.

Love you all!!

See you soon then!

Love, Sister Pahl

Transfers!

Dearest Family,

I apologize in advance for the shortness of this email. I don't feel like I have a whole lot to say today.

First, I am being transferred!!! On Thursday I will be heading to a place called Muskogee, Oklahoma. My new companion's name is Sister Moe. She's from Idaho and just finished her two transfers of training so I'm "follow-up training." That just means that I'm her first companion after her trainer. But our mission president got rid of "senior" and "junior" companions so we are equal in responsibility! I like that better because we both are expected to do the same things instead of having one companion that is always in charge of having the last word on things. It will help us work together better and we will be able to learn HOW to work together better. That was repetitive, but oh well. :)

Sister Reeves is also getting transferred! She's going to the Springdale, Arkansas area. She'll be serving in a Marshallese Branch. We were super surprised when we found out that we both were getting transferred. When we got the call, our Zone Leader was like "You're both...." and we thought he was going to say, "staying in Miami," but instead he said, "getting transferred." I was like, "Are you kidding me?" He paused and said, "no." It was pretty funny. Sister Reeves video recorded the whole thing so I'm going to have her get it to me somehow when she goes home. She likes to video record lots of things and so that's one thing I've learned - to record, whether by video or picture - because it will last a lot longer and takes less time than writing something in your journal.

I want to point something out that came up this week. I already knew this but I think it is great for us all to remember. That is: Satan tries to make us feel unworthy of anything our Heavenly Father wants to give us. Cheyenne texted us this week with the concern that she didn't feel like she was worthy of forgiveness because of things she did before she heard about the church. It is amazing how well Satan knows us and knows how he can get to us. We all need to be aware of our thoughts and whether they are coming from God or from Satan. If we feel they are coming from Satan, then we need to work on getting those thoughts out of our mind! If we do this, we can become better people and better able to do what our Father in Heaven sent us to earth to do!

Thanks for all your support! I'll let you know next week what my address is! Love you all!

See you soon then!

Love, Sister Pahl

Another week gone.

Dearest family,

It's been a slow week but nonetheless, it's been pretty good!

For about a month now we have been volunteering at this recycle place. It is actually quite fun. Sometimes we sort through things that they receive and sometimes we load up a machine that puts all the stuff in a big package like thing that they send off somewhere and they get money for recycling. One time we unscrewed lids off of bottles so they don't blow up when they are being compacted together. It's really fun. I think I might like to volunteer at a place like this when I come home.

We had a pretty good lesson with James. We were thinking that we were going to drop him because he wasn't progressing a whole lot. It seems like every time we teach him, he says, "I already knew that." It is kind of frustrating because he told us to reteach him the lessons but now he is not super serious. So we were talking to the Bishop about it and he said to teach him a lesson on humility. So that was our plan and it was alright. He started crying. I'm not sure if he was crying because he was feeling the spirit or if it's because we were talking about his fiancee that passed away from cancer in August. Either way, he shed a few tears. He even had a different attitude about him. So we aren't exactly sure what we are going to do. I guess we will just continue to teach him for now.

On Friday we had a Zone Training that was pretty good! At the end, we talked about finding and then they had us do an activity: they gave us a few supplies and we had to go hand out the supplies in a half hour. It was pretty interesting! Sister Reeves and I ended up just going tracting at some houses around the Stake Center (I think most of us did that) and we were able to give a Book of Mormon to a guy named Randy. He has lived in his house since 1977 and they had to completely redo the inside of his house due to the tornado. He seemed pretty nice. The downside of this activity was it wasn't people in our own areas, it was all in one of the Joplin Ward's areas. So they got all the potential investigators. But it was still good. Hopefully they'll find some success from that activity. It was still fun! :)

On Saturday to Sunday, we did a mission wide fast for all the new missionaries that are coming out in the next few transfers. It was cool because our Mission President instructed all of us to pray at exactly 5 pm on Saturday night. So all of the missionaries in the OTM were praying at the same time to start their fast. That's pretty cool to think about all of us 200 missionaries praying at the same time for the same things, even though we are miles and miles apart from each other. I think it will allow our mission to be more united and hopefully it will bring tons of miracles as we have a TON more missionaries coming out to the OTM! This transfer we have 7 new sisters and next transfer we have 12 new sisters coming out! It is so awesome that so many sisters are taking the effort to go out on missions to serve our Father in Heaven. I'm excited to see what happens in the next few months!

Saturday night was pretty crazy. I experienced my first ice storm. It wasn't a super bad storm, but it still was crazy to wake up the next morning and have ice covering everything. We drove to Granby, MO to start our fast with our district and when we got home, the antenna on our truck had like an inch thick covering of ice on it! It was quite cold!

Well, I hope you all are going great! The work continues to go forward here in the OTM. It might be pretty slow moving right now, but it is still moving.

I love you all and hope Heavenly Father blesses all who read this!

See you soon then!

Love, Sister Pahl

Cheyenne's Baptism! :)

Hello Family!

We had a pretty good week this week!!

Cheyenne was baptized and confirmed!!! It was such a great experience and I was so glad to be a part of it! It was a really spiritual experience for her and she is going to be a great asset in Heavenly Father's hands! Her brother was able to baptize her. He was pretty nervous but he was able to do it. It was really funny, when Cheyenne came up and the witnesses confirmed that she'd gone all the way under, she stood up and was like, "I did it." She was kind of nervous about it too but they did it! Then she was confirmed on Sunday. The Bishop confirmed her because her brother had never done it before and so he didn't want to do it. But that's okay. It was a beautiful blessing. The Bishop is a talker and so I feel like the Spirit was really speaking through him. The Bishop doesn't really know the trials that she is going through but her blessing was perfect and mentioned things that I'm sure will help her as she embarks on this new journey.

On Wednesday we were able to go on an exchange with a girl in one of the Joplin wards. She is actually going to school in Provo but out there all the girls want to go on exchanges and so not everyone can go. She figured that while she was out here on her break that she'd see if she could come with us. So it was a good time! She is a really nice girl and is going to make a fantastic missionary! She was able to come with us and meet with Gail, then Brother Ash, then she took us to dinner, and then we met with Maggie. It was weird to have her with us almost all day because I'm used to it just being me and Sister Reeves. Nonetheless, it was great and I hope she does well on her mission! She should get her call this week sometime. It's so exciting!!

 As a missionary, I think one of the greatest things to see is the members being good missionaries and good fellowshippers, which is pretty much being a missionary. As a fellowshipper, they make friends with those who are investigating so they feel like they are welcome and feel like they have someone else to talk to them at church other than the missionaries. After the meeting when Cheyenne was confirmed, lots of people came and congratulated her and just were trying to be welcoming. One girl, Sister Gibson Jr. (there are 3 generations of Gibson's - Grandma Gibson, Gibson Sr., and Gibson Jr. we call them  ) has been a main fellowshipper. She comes to lessons with us sometimes and after Sacrament Meeting, she came up to Cheyenne and handed her a note and told her she wrote down some of the things that were said in her confirmation. That was so great! Now she will be able to always remember some of the things that were said to her when she was confirmed a member of the church! Then Sister Gibson Sr. invited her to have dinner at their house! So sometime we are going to have dinner with them and then teach Cheyenne one of the New Member lessons. The Miami Ward is so great and I'm so glad that I've had time to serve here in this area!

Nothing else too exciting happened this week but yet it was the best week I've had in a while.

I love you all!! Have a great week!

See you soon then!

Love, Sister Pahl