Christmas Zone Conference

Hi friends! 

This week has been wild! We had 2 exchanges and the Christmas zone conference!  

Tuesday I went to Mayfield with Sister Petersen, and Wednesday the sisters in Illinois came down to work in our area. I must tell you, Wednesday's adventure was pretty great. District meeting was in our apartment, which was fun. 

Thursday was our Christmas conference, so half of the mission got together and we got to meet Elder Redlund of the 70 and be taught by him. We also had a mission leader meeting afterwards which was special. The best part of it though was seeing Sister Jamie Lewis (recent convert from Sparta) along with all the other Sparta missionaries. I got to meet all 6 of them now serving there and hear about their many miracles. It was good to know they haven't completely forgotten me down there. I sure do love that branch. I also found out that their ward building is going to officially be started in May! Woohoo! Their branch attendance is now higher than what we are getting in the Paducah Ward! But don't worry, we had TONS of people at church this past Sunday. It was so great! Three different families came and loved it!

Because we are reaching the end of the transfer, I felt prompted to fast this Sunday and ask Heavenly Father who was going to be ready to be baptized. So do you remember Sandra? She had a date, but then she stopped keeping commitments and told us she wanted to go to a different church and didn't want to hear from us anymore. She was making some poor choices, and we also felt like we shouldn't work with her anymore. So, we stopped seeing her. A couple of weeks later, our Ward Mission Leader asked us to at least invite her to the Christmas party. We went to her house to invite her and she welcomed us in and sat us down, hungry for a lesson. We didn't feel good about teaching her for some reason, despite how eager she was. It was sad, but we just didn't feel right about working with her now that she had dropped us. So fast forward a month and what do you know, Sandra walked through the doors!! The congregation was shocked. They thought she was done! During sacrament meeting she leaned over and told us she is ready to get her life back together, and wants to get baptized!! WHAT? I would not have seen that coming in a million years. Heavenly Father knew Sandra was going to need time to feel the difference of when she did have the gospel in her life, and when she didn't. Now that she is realizing how much she needs this, we will be meeting her for dinner tonight at our Ward Mission Leaders house. So I guess Heavenly Father had a plan for us to have a baptism this transfer after all! 

I was also blessed with many lessons this week on the importance of seeking to understand concerns before trying to resolve them. If I had lots of time I would tell you all about it, but unfortunately this week has to be pretty short. Thanks to everyone who has sent me a Christmas card!!

I hope we can all remember to keep "Christ" in Christmas this year!

The Dembo family

With love, 

Sister Hochstrasser 

Write to me! (this address for two more weeks)

Sister Jennifer Hochstrasser

447 Hutchinson Ave 
Paducah, Kentucky 42003.