Email February 2, 2014

Dear Family,

WOW! Sounds like Florida is the place! I'm so glad that you all had an incredible week and DAD your wallet was found. MIRACLE that is a huge tender mercy.

We saw a pretty big miracle this week, not with missionary work but with the priesthood power. Sister Ward and I were roll playing during district meeting and honestly it wasn't that great of a roll play, I looked at Sister Ward and her face was BRIGHT red, I thought that was odd, but kept looking at our district leader while he was giving us some advice. and then sister Ward grabbed my arm, fell on her knees and started screaming "I CAN'T SEE!!!!" my head, my head! She started convulsing....I pretty much held her the whole time, I think maybe her head hit the ground once but I don't know, it happened so fast. Elder Carballo, our district leader and former assistant, he  ripped off his suit coat, laid his hands on her head and in the name of Jesus Christ commanded her to be healed. Immediately Sister Ward stopped shaking and came to. I was pretty shaken up, she's never had anything like this before. We called our mission nurse and she was pretty concerned about it, we kept having little black out attacks so we spent our day in the ER at the Hackensack hospital, they didn't really find anything wrong so we went home. But the next day we were roll playing at home and it happened again, we went to a Dr. and then on Thursday we were sent to an ER in Newark... I was WORRIED. She got a blessing in Newark Hospital and has been doing so much better. WE were there 2 nights and 3 days and I am so grateful to be back home. 

 

I learned a couple of things in the hospital, One, hospital chairs aren't too bad to sleep in, two, hospital food is nasty, and three, there are a lot of really prepared people in the hospital. We found a man from Liberia who wants to hear the gospel and a woman from Ghana :) We were in the Newark Hospital (always kinda wanted to serve there so I guess I got my wish?) When we were in the ER, a fight broke out down the hall with a patient and some nurses, welcome to Newark.:) 

 Heavenly Father has really blessed us, even though we weren't in our area at all last week things are still progressing, the work goes on! I'm very, very, grateful that Sister Ward is feeling better, it was hard to see her like that, but things are better now. 

Sister Casilen...from the Philippians and speaks almost no English...she kissed us because she loves the gospel!

 

This is Angie, her mom was in my last branch and she used to come to church, and now she's in this ward! she has been through a lot but realizes the importance of church. I love them!

 

Thank you for your love and prayers, the gospel is TRUE! This is his work. Let's go spread the word. 

I love you all! 

Sending love from Joisey

Sister Heather Sue Houghton

 

P.S Tell Judie I love her! 

P.P.S. ON Saturday we were driving home from the hospital and I got lost and took some wrong turns and ended up RIGHT At the Super bowl stadium...ha,ha-- oops. It really was an accident but it was pretty cool to see how they were getting everything ready. 

 I cut my hair.





email from January 27th 2014

Hello from the East Coast!

This last week was filled with meetings, exchanges, and bitter, bitter,  cold. My respect for missionaries walking in the cold is through the roof this week.

Tracting for hours in the cold does this

  

Snow shoeing to people's doors

 

We taught the 4-6 year olds in primary...and let me tell you it is A LOT HARDER to teach 4 year olds than I remembered, but also really fun. I drew a picture of Christ on the board, a little Asian boy raised his hand and said "Jesus looks like a demon!!" (Obviously I could work on my drawing skills). Right after he said that chaos broke out in the class, kids were jumping off tables and walls, we had some escape and bolt down the hall (Sister Ward was on permanent door duty after that) I was trying to entertain the kids and sing songs but they didn't like my voice and covered their ears....a little girl was laying down moaning...some were dancing, we also saw lots of crying, and ninja moves. I have a new RESPECT for all of the SUNBEAM teachers in the world. BLESS Them.

We met with Christian in a Dunkin Donut's and talked about getting re-baptized. It's a huge blessing that he will have this opportunity to be washed clean again and he told us that he wants to get baptized! He is preparing himself for February, and we are praying that he will be ready. We found Christian street contacting, you never know who is ready/prepared OR even a former member of the church. Heavenly Father puts people in our paths and its our job to open our mouths :) So grateful that we sort of ran him down in the street in the pouring rain. 

We had one of the most spiritual lessons talking about the Book of Mormon with a less active. We read the simple but BEAUTIFUL promise in Moroni 10:4-5. It was powerful and they both pointed out how they could feel the spirit. POWER in the SCRIPTURES! In the words of Omni "I would that ye should COME unto Christ, and Partake of his Salvation" (Omni 1:26) It is our choice to follow him! What will we choose this week?? 

I love you all soo very much! I hope you have fun in the Florida like sun!  Keep up the incredible work! 

Judie, I love you! Thank you for everything you've done for me and my family! God be with you till we meet again. 

Sending love from Jersey! 
Sister Houghton