Sister Swenson spreads the word to California!: First Area and Trainer!

Holy Cow does the lord know exactly what i need! He is so aware of our struggles and challenges and just wants to make us happy and boy has he blessed me! :) I received the BEST trainer EVER!!! Her name is Sister Hoffman and she is from Pennsylvania! she is so cute and we get a long so well! Oh man i hope we never have to be transferred!!! Anyways she has only been out six weeks and she is already training so that just tells you how awesome she is! we are just relying on the lord more than ever thats for sure! She is seriously the greatest! Well this week seems like it went on for a whole year and a half haha :) But it was pretty good! so the first day i got here last monday we got here and we went straight to work! Sister Brown the sister training leader took me out knocking doors in down town north hollywood! holy crap it was so scary! the first door we knocked on the man just opened up his window and growled at us hahah i was trying so hard not to laugh! Then the next 10 house we knocked on the people just got mad and told us not to ever come back! people are so angry! so after that i was pretty discouraged and i just prayed that i could see a miracle! right after that i turned the corner and there was a man standing in his yard so we went up and talked to him, and told him about the restoration and i gave away my first Book of Mormon to him! it was so cool to really testify of how much the book of mormon has blessed my life and how it could bless his! :) Then on Tuesday i Met my wonderful Companion and we are assigned to serve in the santa clarita valley in the YSA wards!!! ITS AWESOME!! After we went straight to our apartment and un packed and then went to work! The president received revelation to do this thing called knock out from 4-6 everyday where we knock on peopled doors and oh man i am trying to love it but it is so hard for me! its scares me so bad! some people are soo scary and rude! But i can definitely feel the lord strengthening me every door i knock on! That night we went to a girl named Valaries house for dinner! she is a convert to the church and she is awesome! :) After dinner we went and taught a guy name Omar! He never really believed there was a god and now he does and he is progressing so much and is keeping his commitments! :) The other day we were teaching him and he was like when i read the book of mormon and pray it just feels those empty holes and gives me so much peace! i almost started crying because really that is what this gospel does, it feels those holes in our soul that nothing else can fill up! He is the most loving person ever and the only thing holding him back from Baptism is his god mother and he doesn't want to loose his relationship with her! so keep him in your prayers! :) Then we have another investigator name Jeff! Jeff is so awesome! He wants to be baptized so bad but his girlfriend won't let him because she has grew up catholic but we've just been paying really hard that her heart will soften and she will support him during this time in his life! So the other morning me and sister Hoffman were doing companionship study and we were deciding what we wanted to teach him and we were trying to think and i just had this thought to look at this new era i brought with my so i opened it up and there was a talk called which way do you face. It seriously fit perfectly to his needs! So we met with him later that day and shared with him this talk and it was just silent for a a minute and we just thought that he was going to say that he just think it isn't going to work out for him, but he was like yeah i need to be baptized and follow Jesus Christ! It was the coolest thing ever! i wanted to just scream in happiness but don't worry i kept my cool! So He is getting BAPTIZED ON SATURDAY!!!! WHOOT WHOOT My first baptism on my first week in the mission! keep him in your prayers though he could use it! :) I'm so flipping excited!!!! it will be great!

so the other day when we were out knocking we met these two older people on the street and oh man were they some crazies! hahah so we were teaching them about the restoration and this lady is just crunched over in her walker and her mouth is just opened wide the whole time and while we were teaching her about how joseph smith saw god she was like OH WOWWWW OH WOOWWW NOOO WAY hahah i was dying! and then her boy friend is just standing there and he has this huge pot belly and is caring this blanket and flowers in his hand and he was like oh man oh man do you guys know about the prophecy and thats all he kept saying! some people are pretty funny! :)

Oh man it has been raining soo much down here! its crazy!!! the streets have been flooding over! its awesome! and its been nice and cool so I'm loving it!! :)

on saturday we were knocking doors and we went to this house and the guy who answered the door was catholic and we just started talking about Jesus and how everyone needs him in their lives and then his wife came up and was like what do you guys believe in the godhead? and so we told her how we believe that they are all three separate beings with the same person and boy she did not like that haha she was like no you guys are so wrong it says in the bible that they are one and we were like yeah one in purpose hah but she just wouldnt have it. it makes me sad because there are so many scriptures in the bible that show they are three separate beings! it just make so much sense!

So on Friday me and Sister Hoffman went out to visit some people sister hoffman and her former companion have been trying to contact and they have tried for a couple of weeks but they have both just never been home. And on friday they were both home! it was such a miracle!! they both want to start having lessons with us so we have a lesson with them on Wednesday! I'm so excited to see how it goes! Well i love you all so much! I miss you guys and hope you're all doing well! Missionary work is the best! and you should all try to do reach out to one person this week :)