Hermana Kiser's Birth Week

 

Hello !

Hermana Kiser and I partying at Zone Conference!

This was a fun week because it was Hermana Kiser's birth week! We are also excited because we found out last night that we will be staying together in H3 (the area of Houston we are in) for the next six weeks!

We had an amazing zone conference this week! President talked to us about the importance of commandments.

(More pictures from the mission presidents blog can be found by clicking HERE)

I hope everyone has an amazing dia del acción de gracias!

Love,



Hermana Bettridge

Us with Carol! She is getting baptized next week!

 Us with Natividad

Hermana Kiser and I at Zone Conference

Our district at Hermana Kiser's birthday party!

Us at the ward Thanksgiving party with Natividad's son (he wanted to keep the party hat on) (we accidentally broke the turkey table decoration)


Here are a few more pictures of Carolyn from another blog:

(More pictures from Carolyn's mission president's blog can be found by clicking HERE)

"God will make America great again." - A church sign

Hello!

This was an awesome week for us because we got to go to the temple! This week we also had a big service project and a Spanish fireside. This upcoming week will be awesome too because we have Zone Conference and we have the service project again. And it is Hermana Kiser's birthday tomorrow!

Hermana Kiser and I!

Hermana Sheirbon and I (My mom!) 🎉 

My district at the temple

The week started out with the service project. The Houston Health Department and Project Saving Smiles teamed up to provide dental care to at risk second graders. Hermana Kiser and I got to teach the kids about dental sealants and how to take care of their teeth before they saw the dentist. I was surprised by the number of kids who had just moved here and did not speak English yet. (Thankfully we speak Spanish! 😉) We are going back this week too!

Natividad and Carol are doing great and came to church this week! Natividad's kids loved primary. We also started teaching a nine year old named Ivan. His grandma is a member. He came to church on Sunday and loved primary! He is excited to get baptized.

We had a Spanish fireside which is the coolest thing ever! All of the Spanish missionaries in the mission get together (so I got to see all of my friends!) along with our investigators, recent converts, and whoever wants to come! Recent converts bear their testimonies and talk about their conversion and the missionaries all sing. It was so powerful! President Mortensen also spoke (he served a mission in Puerto Rico and he still speaks really well!) He talked about finding peace. I know that the peace we seek comes from having a relationship with our Heavenly Father. We are children of God and He loves us. He truly hears and answers our prayers.

My old district at the Spanish fireside

Que tengan una buena semana!

❤️ Hermana Bettridge

Five Months

We decorated pumpkins with Deysi's kids

Happy November!

It's crazy that I have been a missionary for five months now! I absolutely love it though and the time has gone by so fast!

Us with Destiny and her siblings. We made day of the dead cookies my family sent us

My favorite moment of the week happened while I was on an exchange. I was with another hermana and we went to teach Carol. She asked Carol how she met the missionaries. Carol said, "They came and knocked on my door. They found me!" It was so cute! It made the 100s of doors I've knocked with no success worth it! Carol is doing amazing! She finished 1 Nephi this week and loves the Book of Mormon! She also came to church for the first time on Sunday and loved it! She cannot wait for her baptism on December 3rd! She is also super excited to go to the temple and be baptized for her mom and grandma.


Destiny and Natividad are also doing awesome and are preparing for baptism. We are also still working with Deysi and her family. I would appreciate if you would keep Deysi in your prayers. We fasted with her this week that her husband's heart would be softened so that she and the kids can come to church and be baptized.


We are continuing to teach our investigators, build the wards here, find new people to teach, and teach English classes. And we jam out to Christmas songs in the car in between all of that. I really hope Hermana Kiser and I stay together next transfer because we both like Christmas more than the average person and want to spend it together.


Today we are going downtown to go to the Houston Museum of Natural Science, so that should be fun! This is going to be a great week because we get to go to the temple and we have zone conference! We are helping with a big service project over the next two weeks. We will be spending several days working with the Houston Health Department and Project Saving Smiles to provide at risk elementary school students with dental care. Hermana Kiser is a nursing student, so maybe we will get to do something cooler than everyone else too! :)



Have a great week!




Love,




Hermana Bettridge

Our zone! (Texas Houston North Spanish!) We talked about how we are all the pistons of the engine at zone meeting.

Dia de Halloween

Hola and Happy Halloween!

Today was fun because it was dia de preparación and Halloween! Our P-day lasted until 4 today, we proselyted from 4-7, and now we are in our apartments.

This was a crazy week! We taught 23 lessons! (Which is a lot for us!) This week we saw a miracle with a new investigator, Carol. We found her knocking last week and taught her the Restoration on Monday. She loved it! When we came back she had read 1 Nephi 1 six times! So, we set a date with her to be baptized December 3rd! She is super excited to get baptized! We are working with lots of other awesome people right now too!

We were also able to set a baptismal date with our investigator, Natividad! She came to church this week with her kids and they loved it!

I know I talk about temples a lot and many of my non Mormon friends do not understand, so I will explain one purpose of temples. 

We read in the New Testament in 1 Peter 3: 18-19 what Christ did during the three

days between his death and resurrection.

18 For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the

unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the

flesh, but quickened by the Spirit:

19 By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison;

We read in this scripture that Christ went and preached to those who did not have the opportunity to learn about Him and His gospel during their lifetime. Everyone will have the chance to learn about Him! But, we read in John 3:5 that baptism is the key to living with God again.

These people do not have bodies. They are dead and are in the world of spirits. They can not be baptized.

In 1 Corinthians 15:29 we read about what Christ's original church did for these people.

29 Else what shall they do which are baptized for the dead, if the

dead rise not at all? why are they then baptized for the dead?

They were performing baptisms for the dead. Christ's church has been restored on the Earth today, and the temple is where these baptisms are performed. In the temple we can be baptized in place of our ancestors that did not get the chance to learn about Christ. They then can accept or reject the baptism after they learn about Him. I am so grateful for the knowledge that those who have passed on without ever hearing about Jesus Christ can learn about Him and accept Him.

I hope you all have a great week and a fun Halloween!

Love,

Hermana Bettridge


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Hello! 

It is crazy to think I am a fourth done with my mission now! This was an awesome week!

This week we got to go to a fun wedding/baptism! We got fed some really good tamales! Here is us with our investigator, Destiny. She is going to be 

baptized in a few weeks.

We started the week by working with the Houston Food Bank to distribute food. They gave us this giant box of chocolate and cookies for helping, so we had fun handing it out to homeless people on the street

The two most beautiful things in Texas: Taco Bell and he Hermana Kiser

This awesome, old lady in our ward gave us these dresses! (Look back at the picture, I know I look bald)

We do not have a ton of investigators right now, so we are going to be finding a lot this week! We are super excited because we know Heavenly Father has prepared a lot of His children and we just have to find them! I love my mission!

I hope everyone has an awesome week! We all have hard things going on in our lives, but we have a Heavenly Father who loves us! We can always turn to Him, no matter what!

Love,

Hermana Bettridge

Loving The New Area!

Hola familia y amigos,

Said goodbye to one of my favorite families in Bryan, the Faz family

The biggest news this week is that I am now serving in the city of Houston! I am serving in Houston 3rd Ward (Spanish) and Melbourne Ward (English.) I miss College Station, but I am really excited to be here. I love it so much even though it's sketchy! The other day the Elders' bags and iPads got stolen.


My new companion is Hermana Kiser (like kie-sir.) She has been out 8 months and was also trained in College Station! She is from Utah. She is funny and I can tell we are going to have fun and also have a lot of success this transfer!

At the "pit" that we turned into a park

My second day here we got to help build a playground at an elementary school. It was really hot outside, but we had a fun time and the kids are so excited to finally have a playground. While we were working on that we met one of the Elders' investigators. We helped him plan how he is going to propose to his wife so she can get baptized and they can get sealed next year. ❤️ He did it and they are going to get married Saturday morning and she is going to get baptized Saturday afternoon!

We do not have many investigators right now, so we do a lot of contacting. We spend a lot of the day knocking doors. We did find 7 potential investigators through knocking this week!


I love the ward and members here. On Saturday everyone we visited wanted to feed us. We were fed four huge meals in 6 hours. I don't know how I did it!


Have a great week and go do something to help someone else!


Love,




Hermana Bettridge

Our signs somehow helped the construction progress

My new address is:

Hermana Carolyn Bettridge

404 Oxford St #2206

Houston, TX 77090

Rosa, Alicia, and Jesus Fernando

Saying goodbye to our friend at the laundromat! One day he will get baptized!

(Technically) Done with training!

Hello!

This is a super cute old lady (she is almost 90) I met on the exchange in Madisonville. 

She served a mission in Mexico 70 years ago! We talked in Spanish, 

she still remembers a lot! She teaches an English class in Madisonville and is the sweetest!

This was a crazy week but it was great!


I will start with the sad part, Hermana Sheirbon and I are being transferred away from each other! 😭I am super sad, but we knew it was going to happen because my training is over. I am leaving College Station and Hermana Sheirbon is staying! I am sad to be leaving (after finally getting to know the ward!) but I am excited to go to a new area! We thought I would be staying since she has been here three transfers now, so that was a surprise, but I am excited to go to a new place and meet new people. I have no idea where I am going, somewhere in the Houston area! So stay tuned for next week!


This week we did see an awesome miracle! We were knocking and we found this man, Rigo. We taught him and when we came back we found he had read several chapters of the Book of Mormon. He prayed about it and said he knew it is true! So we set a baptismal date with him for October 29th! He came to church yesterday and loved it! I am excited to hear what happens with him!


I went on exchanges this week in Huntsville and Madisonville. In Madisonville it is so rural they have drive an hour to get to their next appointment. We were in the car for four hours that day! That night we went to the high school football game to contact people. It was fun! I forgot how crazy people in south are about football 😜

Here are some pictures from the week.

I love you all!


Love,

Hermana Bettridge


Hermana Sheirbon had a meeting in Houston this week, so we got to go to Bucee's! It was the best day ever! (Bucee's is the best gas station and so much more.)

Us with our (coffee free) Starbucks #whitegirlpic

This is Bianca from the ward. She is from El Salvador and makes the best food!

Our zone at zone meeting

Me with a member's cat named Blondie

Us with the elders and Kevin and Erick (they are going to be baptized October 29th!)