Dudley, Emma

I can't believe we're already here and I am finishing my last week of training. I am so blessed to have learned from Hermana Midence. She is a humble, dedicated, obedient, loving, powerful missionary. She has a love for the Lord and a love for other people that blessed everyone around her. I have learned so much from her & will be forever grateful for the way she's helped me to grow and to begin to become the missionary & disciple that God needs me to be. I will definitely miss her but I am excited for the next transfer (tomorrow) & my new comp! And my new companion is… HERMANA YOUNG, my MTC comp! I was so excited when I heard the news. Hermana Young is so sweet and kind. She has a big heart and a big testimony. I feel so grateful that she will be my companion again. She will be such a blessing to our friends & our area (Cerritos). This last week has been so special and we've been blessed to continue to see miracles here in Cerritos.  ☆We had a really sp...

It was such a good week here in Cerritos! Each week just gets better and better! Highlights ☆Went to the Aquarium in Long Beach with the zone for P-day! ☆We had follow-up Zone Conference with the WHOLE mission. We sang the EFY medly together and it was so powerful. ☆We went to a tri-stake FSY kickoff event (an activity for a few hundred youth in Cerritos, Brea, Anaheim, and Yorba Linda) and as missionaries we got to teach the youth how to teach lessons/be missionaries!  ☆Brenda came to Church, paid tithing, AND went to the temple with us! Miracles ☆Members came to THREE of our lessons with friends this week (Brenda, Yarita, y la familia Perez). We definitely saw the blessings of the members sharing their testimonies and creating friendships with our friends :) ☆One day, we had lessons set up all day and they all canceled BUT it was clear that God had something else in store because we were able to find Norma, a young mom who loves God and is excited for us to come back and teach he...

I can't believe we're at another p-day already. This week we've had a lot of crazy experiences (I got bashed for the first time) and some hard experiences (one of our favorite friends who we only taught twice doesn't want to be taught anymore) BUT through it all we saw the hand of the Lord.  HIGHLIGHTS!!! ☆Zone Council! It was so good this week. The ZL'S enacted a whole proposal & wedding and related it to baptism. But they taught us this really cool Conversion formula that helped us to see how we can help our friends progress more: Spiritual (spiritual experiences) + Intellectual (understanding of doctrine) + Social (friends at church) - distractions = Conversion ☆We went to Anaheim to do service at Salvation Army! We passed out food and we made friends with a few people that are interested in learning more about the gospel! ☆I went to my first Spanish Ward party! The music was so loud we had to yell to talk to each other and all these cute Hispanic grandma...

Another great week in Cerritos! We've been focusing on finding and teaching families. The Lord has revealed that "an eye single to the glory of God" qualifies us for to be missionaries (D&C 4:5). We know that God's work and glory is to "bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man," (Moses 1:39)  which means for us to return to live with Him and our families. The Lord is truly working miracles in Cerritos to gather families. We were walking back from a lesson with Conchita when we saw a couple, Daniel y Marciel, and their toddler standing outside of their trailer. We stopped to talk with them and turns out they had just arrived from Mexico! We were able to teach them from the Book of Mormon and are going back this week.  We had a lesson with Andre's family (the Gonzales family)! They were taught in the past but we were finally able to have a lesson with them and have dinner with them. We are so glad we get to start teaching his parents and d...

The longer I'm here, the more I love Cerritos, our friends we're teaching, the members of our ward, Hermana Midence, and most importantly the Lord and this work He is doing through us. A LOT happened this week. Like all missionaries, we experienced ups and downs but we saw the hand of the Lord EVERY DAY.   HIGHLIGHTS Zone Conference! This is one of my favorite meetings. Once every six weeks, we get to go to an 8 hour training with half of the missionaries in our mission. We learn from our mission leaders and the Spirit and walk away inspired and empowered to be more consecrated missionaries. This time was no exception. We learned so much and that night, we were blessed to find 3 people! Miracles really do come from following the guidance of God's chosen leaders.  Exchanges! We did exchanges with the Sister Training Leaders (for real this time haha). It was my first time away from Hermana Midence and I missed her so much. It really made me so much more grateful for her and...