What's Up, Washington?: Arlington; Sunnyside Branch

17 February 2020

Yes, momma. To answer your question I am, in fact, still in Sunnyside...

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to all of you who are shocked because I told you I was being transferred, I am just as shocked as the rest of you. completely shook to still be here. Hahaha.

Tuesday I was super super sad to be leaving and really anxious about what was coming up next for me in my mission. I was finally feeling optimistic about it all when I got a call from Elder Martinez (the new assistant and also one of the Elder's that was in Sunnyside with me for my first 4 transfers) that went a little like this:

J: "Hey. This is Hermana Jimenez and Hermana Fuller... What's up? Why are you calling?"

M: "We have some news for Hermana Jimenez"

*long pause*

M: "Because of some last minute complications with transfers you will be staying in Sunnyside for another transfer. We've looked at all the options and it's the only way this shakes out."

*Loooooooong awkward silence*

M: "So thank you for serving where the Lord needs you."

J: *painfully* "mhmmm"

And then I hung up the phone and Hermana Fuller and I sat in silence for like 5 min.

Hahahahahaha. It maybe didn't go down that awkwardly, but it was quite a shock with a lot of mixed emotions. I love the people here in Sunnyside and i love my companion, but I've been here for a really long time and had finally accepted the change, so it was tough. After this transfer I will have served literally one half of my mission in my first area.

crazy. town.

But, I get to be here for Jairo's baptism and we have some really amazing things going on here in Sunnyside, so I'm excited to stay. On top of that, things have been really hard here for me medically the past couple weeks and I was feeling really sad to leave the area feeling generally deafeated and hopeless. So here I am, with a new chance to get back to the old me and reck this area one more time before I leave for good.

Hermana Fuller and I have named this tranfer "Rehab Transfer." We set up doctor's appointments and made a bunch of goals to maximize our abilities despite our situation right now. I'm pretty pumped, and so far it's gone really great.

Anyway, we took a bunch of random pictures of us throughout the week that automatically upload to my shared drive to totally confuse my momma and it worked. hahaha. Halfway through the week I got an email titled, "What the heck?!?" So that's fun, too.

Speaking of all the medical, I had a doctor's appointment for my lower back and they decided to take an x-ray and I have something called "Lower Lumbar Facet Degeneration" going on. I guess a couple of my vertebrae are thinning out and disintegrating... I'm not sure exactly, but it's just a mild case and the Tx is anti-inflammitories and PT, so pray that the few PT appointments I get are enough to get some relief from my dissapearing back. haha. I guess all of that has caused some inflammation in my pelvis as well, so that explains all the discomfort I have been in. I really didn't want to be on muscle relaxers, so I've just been on ibuprophen, icing my back like crazy, and only sitting in comfortable positions and I've made a lot of progress, so that's really good.

As far as migranes go I only had 2 this week!!!🎉🎊🎉🎊🎉

I'm basically cured. Hahah.

OKAY, an amazing experiece from this week:

We also went to visit a family on Wednesday. We heard they had moved to a trailer park temporarily to save money to build a new house. When we showed up we realized that we had no idea which trailer was theirs, but we knew what Hermano's car looked like and when we found it...
it was the smallest trailer in the lot.
We were like there is no way a family of 5 is living in that right now.
We were unsure if we should knock or not and we were going to text him to see if we could come over and leave, but we decided to just do it and see how it went. We pulled back in and knocked and the Hermano answered and with the kindest voice said, "Hermanas! Gusto de verles! Come in! Come in!" And sure enough. There was a family of 5 living in a trailer that couldn't have been bigger than an apartment kitchen. crazy town. But you know what? That was the happiest I have ever seen that family, if not any family here in Washington. The family had been going through some hard times earlier on the year, and they made a plan and there theey were - together and stronger than ever
1. living within their means
2. paying their tithing
3. praying fervently and having faith and patience in the Lord.
It was awesome to see how much can change when we graciously accept what we have and work hard for a better future. Honestly amazing.

Another one:

The other day we were out tracting in a neighborhood and we came across a Lady named Olga. When she opened the door she seemed super disinterested and with a blank look about her as she asked us what we wanted. There were kids running around the house and a Dog who was on a mission to make Kansas hear him barking. We explained that we were missionaries and that our purpose was to help people come unto Christ. Still nothing. Then we asked if we could share a scripture and we whipped out 2 Nephi 32:9 (pray always) and a light lit up in her eyes. She goes,

"You wanna just come in right now and say a prayer?" and we were like,

"ahdfjkhafhadjsk, yeah!"

so we go inside and she's like, "just give me a second to round up the kids."

she starts yelling, "Vente! Vente paraca! Vente!" And then she was like,

"one second let me get my kids and their friends."

And she walks up to this door of a tiny room, rips it open and just starts yelling at them to get into the living room to say a prayer with the missionaries. They start coming out and there were like eight teenagers in this tiny little room all laughing and stuff. They all came out and she just starts yelling at all of them to hold hands in a cirlce. One kid was straight up dancing on a bag of Taki's and she just screamed at him until he came and joined the circle.

mind you, in the meantime, the dog is still goiing crazy in the kitchen.

She finally gets everyone together and then asks, "Where's Joe?"

Her kid was like, "Joe's Catholic."

she goes, "It doest matter. We're praying to God." In the most "I'm so done with this" kinda voice ever. She took a big breath, yelled at the dog one last time to shut up and then looked at me to start praying.

So I did. And it was crazy town. The spirit came so strong despite all of the noise and chaos going on. It was the best. She invited us back next week on Wednesday and we left. hahaha. We were pretty shook. Olga is a legend.

Anyway, Jairo's still going strong out here. He is such a missionary. He comes with us to lessons and gives some of our other friends rides to church. A legend.

We had another lesson with Francisco y Manuel and we taught them the Word of Wisdom. We felt really impressed to teach it, even though we had only taught them the restoration and they didn't know a lot of the doctrine. It was a really amazing lesson. The spirit was so strong as we stood under the little cover of their roof on their patio in the 40 degree weather and Washington rain because we can never go in. We were all cold and wet, but happy to be there feeling the spirit. Francisco y Manuel are the best.

I think there is a real power in trying the word of God. If you want to know if God is there, if he loves you, if he's given us His gospel to be happy, just do it. Start following His teachings and watch what happens. Read your scriptures, pray unceacingly and watch God pour out His blessings upon you. I dare you to try God, becuase guess what's going to happen? He'll prove you and you will understand the doctrine. You will be more converted and that's a promise.

I got to listen to a General Authority yesterday named, Jörg Klebingat. The man is a legend. He talked about how God really is our father and we will all be astonishly overwhelmed with how familiar the features of His face are to us when we meet again becuase we know him because he loves us. It was really good stuff. He said the biggest mistake we make as saints is put these mortal characteristics on God. Like how he doesn't love us or is dissapointed in us even when we are trying hard and giving it a good go.

These aren't exact quotations, but he said something along the lines of this, "Shame on you, for believing that the Atonement of Jesus Christ can't make you completely whole. shame on you for believing that God loves you less for who you are and past mistakes.

"When you understand who God is and His characteristics as your Father and who Christ is as your literal perfect advocate, you will love yourself, you will smile more, you will be kinder, because you will understand that what the atonement of Jesus Christ has healed, has healed."

No nicks, marks, dents about it. We are not damaged goods. God takes our best, our imperfect repentance, and forgives us perfectly and if we but just believe in that. When we stop putting mortal limitations on God we can be and feel whole again.

It was really good stuff. Anyway, food for thought. He has a Conference talk called "Approaching the Throne of God with Confidence." I strongly encourage all of you to read it.

I love you!

God loves you a whole lot more,

Hna Jimenez

Here are pictures from Sofia this week to drive me crazy not knowing why she was still with Hna Fuller!!!