Birthday, smoke, and 3 miracles

Thank you for all of the Birthday gifts! They were awesome! The Raspberry bars turned out delicious despite the look on my face. But we did have to squish them into the one corner of the pan because thats the only pan we have. The food is greatly appreciated because we are running out!! And thank you Mom for the extra tabernacle choir cd's. We just met someone the other day that teaches music at the University of Idaho. I think they will love one!

Here is a picture from our apartment window of all the smoke that's been in Moscow. Its crazy. If you spend a few minutes outside then your clothes smell like you've been sitting by a campfire. And yes we like to doodle on our window. Its actually super helpful.

3 awesome miracles this week!

1. Gregory. 11 year old boy, Supposed to be baptized a few weeks ago but didn't, was having second thoughts about baptism. We met with him on Wednesday and he said he wasn't sure if he wanted to be baptized because his Dad is a little Anti and he was afraid that if he got baptized his Dad wouldn't want to be with him as much. It was pretty sad to see the situation. But we invited him to pray and find out what God wanted him to do. On Saturday he said that when he prayed he felt the Holy Spirit before, during, and after the prayer and so he wants to be baptized! Still working on a date.

2. Angie. Angie is a former investigator here in Rolling Hills ward that we have never met. But we had a challenge in our district to invite someone to be baptized over the phone so we looked through old records and decided to call Angie. I introduced myself as Elder Johnson and she just went off and started talking about a bunch of random things. She wasn't very decisive about the invite to be baptized but we also invited her to our Ward Social. And crazy thing is that she showed up! She met lots of members and apparently liked it because she came to church too!!! Even crazier thing was that we didn't even know that she came until we had 5th sunday meeting 3rd hour in the relief society room and she was sitting in front of us! "What are you doing here!?!?!?"

3. Danya. We had a super powerful lesson with Danya on Saturday. Our Ward Mission Leader came with us. He is a convert and also had some similar struggles in his youth that she has. He bore his testimony about her divinity and also about the importance of finding out if the Book of Mormon is true. The spirit was intense. There were tears in both of their eyes. If you are willing, please pray for Danya to receive and recognize an answer to her prayers regarding the Book of Mormon.

Growing up I always learned that faith is more than believing, it's acting. But I've learned on my mission that faith is more than just acting, it is also believing. Using our agency and choosing to believe, to have faith, empowers us and destroys Satan's power. Satan would have us use our agency to fear. Fear limits us. And it doesn't feel good. Believing feels awesome! Choose to believe over and over again. Its key for feeling the spirit.

Love ya!

-Elder (Andre) Johnson