Scriptures

"And this is not all. Do ye not suppose that I know of these things for myself? Behold, I testify unto you that I do know that these things I have spoken are true. And how do ye suppose that I know of their surety? 46. Behold, I say unto you they are made known unto me by the Holy Spirit of God... 48. I say unto you, that whatsoever I shall say unto you, concerning that which is to come, is true; and I say unto you, that I know that Jesus Christ shall come, yea, the Son, the Only Begotten of the Father, full of grace, and mercy, and truth. And behold, it is he that cometh to take away the sins of the world, yea, the sins of every man who steadfastly believeth on his name. 49. And now I say unto you that this is the order after which I am called, yea, to preach unto my beloved brethren."
-Alma 5:45-46,48-49
"Come unto Christ and be perfected in him and deny yourselves of all ungodliness."
-Moroni 10:32

My Address: (I LOVE MAIL!)
Sister Zhenya Plumb
California Arcadia Mission
614 W. Foothill Blvd.
Arcadia, CA 91006-2030

Monday, December 26, 2016

Christmas Temple Lights with Richard



Christmas

I promised myself and others that this email was going to be better
than last weeks, which will be easy to fulfill since I am not going to
copy and paste my companions..... boy not worth the heat lol. I'm
kidding I love you all.

Oh boy I loved this week. It was like everything I could ask for and
more. So we met back with Jose on Monday with sister catherman and she
bore him a beautiful testimony about prayer and how we receive
answers. Jose has a lot to figure out in his life still, which is ok.
We told him that he is still welcome to skateboard in our parking lot.
On Tuesday we went to the temple! Finally! Finally, because it took us
forever to get there! Don't ask me why, twas a frustrating experience
BUT we got there and it was worth it :) we got to see the temple
lights and performance and build Richards testimony in prophets from
the wonderful sister missionaries at the temple. And what's even
better is that Richard has decided to go to the singles ward now! So
we are sad we won't be there for his baptism but we are excited for
him to meet new people ;)

We taught Black every night this week in preparation for his baptism
Christmas Eve! Oh my goodness y'all that was spectacular. I don't
think I could've asked for a bigger blessing than seeing someone who
I've taught be baptized and confirmed on Christmas Eve and Christmas.
What makes it better you ask? Neil Liu. I think I've mentioned Neil
only a couple hundred times to y'all. Neil is a recent convert as of
October and he is classmates with Black. Neil lives with our member
Sister Davis who is everything I want to be when I'm older. She asked
black one day if he would like to be baptized like Neil, and Black
said yes! So we have been teaching and Neil has been translating and
Sister Davis has been pushing us along. So this Saturday Neil baptized
his friend black :) they both were so happy and that was just one of
my many favorite gifts.

Oh ya cool side experience! We had asked Jessamyn, one of our recent
converts as of March to speak in Chinese at blacks baptism on Friday!
And she was freaking out just a little because she works night shifts
and she was working that night, but she still said she would do it!
She then told us that as soon as she accepted to speak, her boss
called her and said she didn't have to come in for another week! So
she had time to prepare her talk! Heavenly Father definitely watches
out for us once we apply our faith.

Now to what happens Christmas Day. We woke at our usual time and made
Sister Martin (the member we live with) French toast breakfast :). We
went to church, which I especially loved because our Ward showed off
its musical capability... it's funny though because as a congregation
we always sound a bit off.... BUT the last song we sang (angels we
have heard on high) we were all on key and sounded literally like
angels. I was so proud :') after church Sister Zollinger and I played
santa with Sister Martin and we dilivered Christmas cards and gifts.
THEN I SAW MY FAMILY AND YOU GUYS GUESS WHAT???? THEY ARE ALMOST ALL THAN ME. WHAT IS UP WITH THAT? WHY DID IT HAPPEN? Hahaha no no
worries, I love my family so much, it was so good to see them all
despite the heights. My mom and dad are the most loving and inspiring
people ever and I'm so grateful to have them as parents. After that
nice skype session with them, we went to the Regazzi's for dinner and
had delicious steak and potatoes.

So Sister Zollinger and I woke up this morning and we were super
disappointed because.... no more Christmas. What do we count down to
now? What do we look forward to? How else are we going to be able to
continually bring the Christmas spirit into our lives now after that
great Sha-bang? Well guess what! It's not over. Something that I'm
going to be doing to keep the light of Christ still continually
burning is using the light of the world challenge throughout the rest
of this year and the next. Picking one to do each day will increase my
faith, help me develop Christlike attributes, and help me lift others
even more. Really all it is is using the atonement. Christ's
atonement, his pure love for all of us is what can help us through
anything :)

Happy Christmas,


Sister Plumb

Monday, December 19, 2016

Merry Christmas!

Today y'all get a lovely email from my companion sister Zollinger because I was too lazy to write one and I do not have as good of eloquence as she does. So enjoy this week from my companions point of view :)

... also I'm out of time. Merry Christmas 
Sister Plumb

Hello from California, which from what I hear is much warmer then
where y'all are.

This week... lots of biking, but that's not new!

Tuesday we had our Relief Society Christmas party and that was nice. The theme was angels among us and we got an angel ornament at the end. Wednesday we biked our legs off again and burned every calorie we'd ever eaten. I would tell you where
we biked but since y'all aren't here it wouldn't be as impressive. We
biked up all of the hills and then back to the bottom, then back
to the top, then halfway down, then back to the top, then to the
bottom where we live. And we hiked up the Wall again. Why someone
would live up there....well, it has an amazing view but other
than that.... it is a frightening road.

Thursday we helped a slightly crazy former investigator tract for his
phone. Apparently he had accidentally thrown it on the roof, and he
needed our help to figure out which house it was and ask them to get
it down. So we helped! It took us a couple house but we found it. Then
we biked  to the stake center and practiced singing away in a manger
for our zone conference the next day. Then we did some weekly
planning.

Friday was zone conference! And our sort of Christmas party. That was
fun. For the first 2 hours President Villanueva and his wife talked to
us, as well as our stake president. Then we had lunch. Then we read
luke 2 and each district took turns singing Christmas songs between
the verses in the languages of each district. Mine speaks Spanish and
english. There was one who had people who spake Armenian, English,
Korean, and Spanish.

Saturday...we had a lesson with Black, one of Neil's friends, who's
getting baptized on Saturday! He's doing super awesome and his English
is getting a lot better. As is my Chinese. I learned how to say merry
Christmas this week! shèngdàn kuàilè!圣then we met this guy named
José in our parking lot, and we taught him a bit and got his number.
Then we did some more planning. Taught a few lessons. Then we went to
dinner and helped them decorate their tree. Then we went back to the
church and met with José again. He seems super cool! Except he says
he's always really busy on Sunday's. We'll have to work on that.

Sunday was great. We went caroling that night with the youth and
stopped by a lot of less actives. The. Cool things. So, we have been
trying to contact this less active but that hasn't been working, but
we got a hold of a less active member's son and last week he had invited us to come back.
We showed up last night and he was super awesome! We taught the
restoration and he gave us presents! Who does that? They were in gift
bags and there was one for each of us and the member that came with
us. They were selfie sticks:P then he gave us each a pastry. It was a
good day.

And today, I'm talking to y'all, so all in all a good day.

I love y'all and hope you are doing well! I know that this is the
season of miracles and as we open our mouths the Lord will fill them
and we will be able to be his tools in bringing the children of God
closer to His love. This week, we were just going to leave José to his
skateboarding, but we stopped and talked to him instead. Because of
that, we are now teaching him the gospel. We wouldn't have found
Joseph if the name Joseph hadn't been stuck in Sister Plumb's head. We
wouldn't be teaching him if we hadn't shared our message despite the
fact that we had been looking for someone else. I know that in our
lives as we have the faith that God has placed people in our path so
that we can touch their lives, we will find those who are being

prepared to receive the gospel. Every member a missionary!

Sister Zollinger and Sister Plumb



Monday, December 12, 2016

Strive                                                                12/12/16


Hello, hello, hello!

Well this week was amazing! Of course, because how can you not have a
good time when you're on the Lord’s time? Course there's those hard
times that come, they come to everyone in different ways, but there
are always two things we can do about that. And I choose to smile
through :)

So getting to this lovely weekly email......

I'm just super pumped for the next month and a half because
1.Christmas
2. Sister Zollinger and I are staying together
3. I get to be in Rowland Heights
4. Christmas
5. Black is getting baptized on Christmas Eve
6. Christmas
7. Richard lakers is getting more and more pumped for his baptism each day
8. Christmas
9. Oh New Years I guess,
and
10. Christmas, of course.

You just can never be too grateful for such a wonderful time of year.
It was a great week this week. Mainly because we went to two Christmas
parties. Last Monday we went to one that was special for the more
seasoned members of our Ward, and we had a good time hearing Christmas traditions, having laughs, and downing sugar free crystal lite.

We biked. Surprise. Then we had OUR Ward Christmas party! It was, in a
word, legendary. Brother Dushane in our Ward made all the food, and it
was some of the best roast I've ever had. Sorry Dad. And Black, Siv,
Black’s sister, Amanda, Richard, Dukes and Demarcus came! And it was so weird because they all knew each other! I sat by Demarcus and Sister Z
sat by Black, Siv, and Amanda.  Then Richard came over and gave a bro-
hug to Demarcus. Sister Z and I were so confused. And then Dukes walks
in and sits across from us and Demarcus and Richard knew Dukes too! It
was like a get together for them through the church! The gospel unites
people, I'm tellin’ ya.

So with all the hustlin’ and bustlin’ that comes with the season, I just
want to take a few minutes of y'alls time, and share my testimony. A
word that has really stood out to me this past couple of weeks is the
word, Strive. I really like this word because it means more than
trying but yet it's not quite doing. A lot of the times I get
overwhelmed by all the things we have to do and accomplish, and the
people we have to help. I know that I can't do it on my own, and I
know that I can't just hopelessly rely on someone to do it for me. So
instead I have been striving to do my best in all the aspects on my
mission and knowing the parts that I lack in, and my weaknesses are
taken care of through the help of my Savior, Jesus Christ. It's so
fulfilling to be working side by side with Him, though he has carried
me a lot. It's a joy in learning and improving each day. And it's been
a Joy in Striving.

Love y'all :) have a good week.

Sister Plumb

Oh ya! It was President Villanueva’s birthday this week! Here's a
picture of my zone. It's a small zone.