"I had a premonition that I needed to go to church, and then you called me."

That's what one of our friends said to us the other day. He is a member of the Church, but hasn't come in a while. He came to church last Sunday, and it was wonderful. We also had 4 of our friends who
are investigating the church come yesterday. It was an incredible day.

Well, this week, except Sunday, was pretty normal. Me had a zone conference with our president and his wife to say goodbye, because they're going to leave this next week. Crazy!

Okay, I don't have much to talk about, so I think I'll talk a bit about my friends here:
Mani is this amazing man who has a friend in Puerto Rico who told him about the Church. He's been coming ever since. He hasn't told us where he lives, so we just meet with him in the church building. But he really is awesome. And he started reading the Book of Mormon by himself, and has some really great questions...he's super cool.
Then there's Joe, who was taught by missionaries like 6 years ago, but back then he smoked and everything, and wasn't ready. We met him on the street and have been explaining everything to him...he's super awesome, and loves church and everything. My companion contacted Samuel in an exchange: they were walking in the park, and they saw a man sitting on a bench, and started talking to him. He's AMAZING... It's so humbling talking to him, because he has so many doubts, but he's so sincere and wonderful. He FINALLY came to church, so that was super cool!

I love and miss you all! Have a great week!
Hermana Jones

"That's the point--you don't have to be here."

This is a quote by Elder Holland, one of the 12 apostles. He was giving a talk to a group of missionaries in Frankfurt, and he was telling them about how, at any point in their lives, past or present, they have a choice. "No one is forcing you to serve a mission, no one forced you to come here to earth. But a long time ago, you made a choice to follow God and Jesus Christ, so here you are." I thought that was very profound...sometimes, when things are difficult, it helps to remember that we're here, passing through everything that we have to endure, because we CHOSE to come. And, we can stop. We can stop following Him, because we have the agency to choose what we want to do. But we also know the right thing to do--and that is follow Christ, even when it's hard, even when we're tired, even if we don't really want to, because that's what He did for us. This week I really saw God's hand here in Malaga. We were able to go on two exchanges, had a sister stay with us for a day, and go up to Granada for a stake conference. It was a FANTASTIC week. And there was a miracle! There's this guy here, Mani. He just showed up to church one day, but said he just wanted to watch and learn, and didn't want us to visit him or anything, which is fine. But one day we were sitting outside the church talking to him, and he said, "do
either of you know Adonai, who' s in Granada?" We said no. Apparently this Adonai person was a member of our church, and a friend of Mani's friend, and hey both live in Puerto Rico. His friend told Mani that Adonai wanted to meet him. WELL, we go to the stake conference this past Saturday, and GUESS WHO IS THE LAST SPEAKER. Elder Adonai, a member of the quorum of the Seventy! After the conference, Elder Adonai called Mani up to the front so that they could meet. Isn't that incredible??? It really proves to me that this work is the Lord's

I don't have much to write...it was a crazy week, but really fun.
Love and miss you all!
Hermana Jones

                                                                    Fuengirola in the morning!

"The best happiness is sharing the gospel with others."

The assistant to the president, Elder Phipps, said this the other day in church. It struck me, because it is so simple, but so true. A day before, my companion and I were talking with a family who had been
baptized almost a year ago, but right now, they're going through a lot of problems. We asked them how they're doing, and they explained a bit more. The mom asked us, "Well, how are you two doing." We said great, like always, and described the miracles that we'd seen that day. She joked, "You just don't have any problems. Life is perfect for you." I wanted to tell her that no, it isn't it's hard for
everyone, but in a way she's right. When we keep the commandments, our lives are a bit easier, because we won't have the problems that come as consequences of our sins. We'll still have difficulties, but God will help us, because we're doing what He's asked us to do.

As always, it was a great week. We went to Fuengirola on Monday, and ate kebab with the other missionaries. Then we had the missionary leadership council, which was a lot of fun. Then on Tuesday we did an exchange, and on Thursday we had weekly planning, and on Friday we had
Zone meeting (we had to give a talk, and before that we cleaned the baptismal font because there would be a baptism later), and then on Saturday we had a fun ping-pong championship. Everything went well, and it was an awesome week, but it has gone by SO fast. Hermana Giler and I have decided that the exchanges that we do every week make the transfers go by really fast, which I don't really like. But the exchanges are really fun, so that makes up for it. So, I don't rally have much else to say...so I think I'll explain a bit about the iPads. It's an iPad mini 2, and it's wonderful. We
have the Gospel Library app (that has all the scriptures, manuals, and talks given since like 1987, in English AND Spanish), Skype, FaceTime, iMessage, FamilySearch, and all sorts of apps to help us learn the language. So, basically, we can just carry around our iPad and not even need a bag! (Except for all the random things I put in my bag, like Kleenex and Chapstick and band aids and pens haha.) and we don't usually just take our iPads, because we work in some sketchy areas. There's actually some concern for the missionaries that, if it starts to get around that missionaries have iPads, we'll be followed and robbed to get our iPads. But I don't think that'll happen :)

Let's see...we don't have our Area Book (where we keep all the information about the people who are investigating the church and what we've taught them) on the iPad, because in Europe there are some
privacy issues that they're working out. And to make basically all the apps work, you need wifi, and we don't have it in our apartments...we go to the church. Or, as Hermana Giler and I did a few weeks ago, we got library cards! It was very exciting. I'm writing from the library right now.
I love and miss you all, and I hope you have great weeks!

Love,
Hermana Jones

cleaning the baptismal font

My companion and I getting our ipads!

"The blessings are arriving"

This is a quote from my previous companion, Hermana Herrera. She finished her mission a few weeks ago, and she came back to visit our ward here.

Well, our week started out interestingly; Hermana Giler and I were playing volleyball with the other missionaries, and the ball hit her hand and bent it back...long story short, we had to go to the hospital
and get an x-Ray. She's fine, it's just a sprain, but it was an interesting day. And then, the next day, we had a lesson with our investigator friend, and while we were talking about what happens after we die, this lady came up and started insulting us, saying that what we were doing was useless, that our church wasn't true...at one point, she said, "I bet you just come here to Spain to have a good time, and that nothing ever happens to you." And my wonderful companion goes, "Well, sometimes people come up to us and yell at us." And the lady was like, "Really?" It was pretty funny. But also really sad, because she wasn't very nice, and our friend was there listening to all of this.But it's all good :)

And then we got our iPads! We went to a meeting, and they handed out the iPads, and we set them up...but mine didn't work! So I got a new one on Sunday. I'm writing from my iPad now, yay!
And then on Saturday, we went to meet a new investigator friend, and he took us across the street to his evangelical church. It was very interesting, but cool. They were doing baptisms, so that was cool to see.

I love and miss you all! Have a great week,
Hermana Jones