Week 4!

Hello lovely people!

MADE IT TO TEXAS!! I got my area assignment on wednesday and im in lubbock first transfer! Im in the lubbock north zone which encompasses Texas Tech... the temple is just outside my zone BUT its close enough that were still allowed to go i think or at least we did and no one said anything hahaha. Sister Adams is my trainer and shes sick! Shes been out for a year, loves musicals, does brazilian jiu jitsu, and just tried dr pepper for the first time a couple transfers ago.

This week has been the longest week of my life I am not going to lie. The MTC did not prepare me for real missionary life because the MTC was easy and basically a social hour all of the time hahah. Coming to the field and starting to work was a serious wake up call and it's been kind of tough adjusting. BUT I feel so blessed to be here!

I met a cool lady named connie on the plane ride to Lubbock and I talked to her for a while. She gave me her number and address and told me that I should come visit her when I get settled in. When I got my area assignment, I checked to see if she was in my boundaries and she was!! I was able to visit her and leave her with a book of Mormon that she said she would read over... were following up with her on Wednesday so pray for her! But just the fact that she happened to be in my area is INSANE! truly a tender mercy : )

My district and zone are dope. Sister Adams and I share a ward with elders and they're super cool too. We got lunch with and had a dinner with those 2 elders and the social media APs and they remind me SO MUCH of some friends from BYU (shout out Ryan and Davis and Josh and Sam). Speaking of BYU, everyone who went to the game on Saturday I am so jealous... the pictures made me smile and cry at the same time (shout out ty). Catch me at the first home game of 2024!

I've had some good food since being here and it's been less than a week... the bishop had us over and grilled THE BEST ribs I've ever had. Another night we had homemade pizza with homemade herb crust. And another night we had spicy spaghetti and garlic bread... I'm gonna need to be good about exercising or else im gonna come back unrecognizable. But also we had a super limited budget this first week so all we were able to buy was Ramen and stuff to make PB&Js so lunch and the night we don't get fed have been a bit bland... a good friend of mine made some beef Ramen with scrambled egg for me one time (shout out elder power) and it was the first instant Ramen I've had that was good soooo we've been doing that to change things up.

Other fun facts: texas stoplights are sideways like left to right instead of up and down... weird. Also THEY HAVE CIRCLE K HERE!! I got a polar pop one day and it was so wonderful I felt at home for a minute. Gas is less than $3 a gallon here God bless texas but we don't have to pay for gas so doesn't really affect me just thought yall should be jealous.

We've had quite a few member lessons this past week in order to get to know the ward and a common theme in our lessons has been tender mercies. I shared one earlier about connie and i could list off so many more. Sometimes I think it's easy for us to get caught up in things NOT going our way, asking God why certain bad things are happening. A mission is hard, school is hard, friends are hard, work is hard, life is hard. But i have realized that, even though it's harder at first, focusing on the good is WAY better. We have challenged many ward members to think every night of small ways they have seen God's hand in their life and write it down, compiling a whole list by the end of the week. This changes the mindset to get caught up in the things that ARE going our way, THANKING God for all those things that happen to us. I challenge you guys to do that too!! I've been doing it and it has helped me so much this week : )

Ew this is so long im sorry hahah BUT last orders of business.. i can no longer use facebook messenger to talk to anyone besides my family so if you wanna reach out to me either email me or message me on Google chat. ALSO I'll add my address to this email as well... feel free to send me anything! If you write a letter I will try my best to write back quickly!

You guys are awesome and I love you!!!!

Sister Sage Johns

ADDRESS

Sister Sage Johns

6310 114th st

Lubbock TX 79424

Pictures!

1. Pretty sunset

2. Facebook work at the park

3. The cutest baby boots at a garage sale :,(

4. Me outside the temple

5. texas lubbock mission in one picture