The Most Important Thing

#1 - The Fairfield Sisters - all the sisters that have served in Fairfield for the past year (taken at transfer meeting) me, Sister Funk, Sister Brown, Sister Ostvig, and Sister Possin

#2 - SuperFaye Day!!

#3 - Sister Ostvig and me, lying in a pile of stuffed animals in the church parking lot...:)

#4 - Alice's baptism :D

Hey y'all!

Sorry I didn't email yesterday... we ended up having a special zone conference where Elder Corbridge of the 70 came and spoke to us.  So our p-day is today, instead of yesterday.  But more on the zone conference later. :)

We've had a crazy busy week, as usual.  It seems like every time I see President Mortensen he tells me to keep the work going - apparently Fairfield was pretty dead before I got here... which I don't understand, because it is definitely busy busy busy now.  In ward council we discussed who the ward wanted us to keep teaching, because our evenings are so busy that we've actually had to start cutting down on how often we see certain people... We are SO busy, and I don't think we really have time to breathe... but the work moves on, so Sister Ostvig and I are biking our little hearts out to keep up.  It's basically the best feeling ever. 

Happy Halloween!  We had the ward trunk-or-treat activity on Wednesday night that had a great turnout of members, less-actives, and non members.  And then Friday night we had to go in at 6pm to avoid being confused with all the trick-or-treaters, so we ended up doing a lot of planning for the next week.

We had an... interesting... church headquarters referral this week.  His name is Austin, and he requested a Book of Mormon on mormon.org.  We dropped it off on Tuesday and asked if we could teach him more about it, and he said sure, so we set up a time to come back.  So on Thursday we went and told him about the Book of Mormon (briefly, because we didn't have a lot of time...) and he seemed super interested!  He told us why he had requested a Book of Mormon - he's in college and working on his masters project and is using religion as a part of it.  Pretty normal- I've run into people like that before.  Just one strange detail... he's a computer science major (or something like that - he wants to create video games for a living.) ...interesting... but cool.  For his project he's creating a 30 minute video game for a selection of religions, and mormonism made the cut because it's different enough from all the other christian churches.  At least he's going to the source (the Book of Mormon) and not just researching on the internet!  And we're hoping to get him to church this Sunday. :)  So who knows, maybe there will be a Mormon video game out there in the future.

We had a great lesson with John and his family - he's still working toward his baptism on November 29th.  They are starting to read the scriptures consistently as a family, and when we followed up with them last night both he and his wife told us of the awesome spiritual experience they had while reading the Book of Enos.  Let me just say - I am SO grateful for the Book of Mormon.  It is such a powerful tool in conversion, and I know (because I have seen it in my life and in the lives of so many others) that if you read it EVERY DAY and pray and ask God if it is true, you will KNOW that it is true.  The Book of Mormon is amazing.  I love it!

We also saw Melody and Chris again - we had a bit of a scare where Melody didn't text us back and we didn't see them for a week and a half... which is like a lifetime for us missionaries to go without seeing our investigators... but it turns out that they've just had a crazy week and a half with Skyler (Melody's daughter with severe handicaps) who has taken to sleeping at day and being up all night... not exactly the best sleep schedule for Melody and Chris.  They came to church on Sunday, and we were able to have a lesson with them later that afternoon, and we'll see them again later this week.  So no worries there. They're still working on all the steps they need to take to be an eternal family. :)

And now, back to where I started.  We had a special Zone Conference with Elder Corbridge yesterday.  We were at the stake center for pretty much all day - 8:30am to 4:30pm - receiving counsel and training from a general authority.  The most important thing that I took out of his message to us is, well, the most important thing of our missionary work.  He posed the question to us - "what is the most important thing?"  The most important thing is that we invite others to come to Christ by helping them receive the restored gospel, so they can receive a remission of their sins and be endowed with the power of the Holy Ghost and prepare to inherit eternal life.  That is the most important thing.  That is why I am on a mission.  I am SO grateful to have this opportunity to share what I know to be true with the people of Houston.  SO grateful. :)

I love y'all so much! Thanks as always for the love and support. :)  Y'all are great!

Sister Ririe

3 Nephi 5:13