November 24, 2025

From Abby: Holiest Highs

Guys not the past two emails being titled after Josiah Queen songs 

blame sister Williams shes DJ :) 

HOW can I EVEN explain this week enough to do it justice. 
I genuinly don't think its possible 
all I can say is that God is a God of MIRACLES. Pure sweet miracles of everlasting joy 

Last monday (Nov 17) 
we had a cute lil district lunch at Zupas 

a certain teenage girl walks by past the WHOLE table of Sisters and goes "Bye Elders ;)" 
PLEASE. It was criminal 
Also Zupas gave me two strawberries :)b

pday night theres NOTHING in the calender. After knocking a couple doors Sister Williams Sr goes "Lets go to the Boulevard" (Apartment building? Complex? Idk)

after knocking a couple doors it just felt SO uninspired.. We see someone moving furniture so of course we walk over to see if we can help! The family is spanish speaking and right as we offer someone named Mario (a member of the ward) walks by and is like "Let me help you" and assists the person moving the furniture.. We look at eachother and in my brain I'm like "clearly we're meant to be here.. But not for the furniture" So we walk up the stairs of that building and decide to pray 
We call it a "Big Mighty Prayer of Faith" when we genuinly need help and call down the powers of heaven. 
As I pray, I ask God to guide us where we need to go, and that we trust that he has a plan. I felt peace.. My eyes open to Victor standing 8 feet away on the stairs watching us pray!! (Victor is our friend who's baptism was scheduled for November 22nd.. and he had cancelled on us so we were debating MOVING his baptism.) also keeping in mind that Victor works NIGHTS and we've only ever met with him in the morning or afternoon,
 Victor comes up and asks what we were doing, we told him we were praying for guidance etc.. He invited us to come and teach a lesson right then. 
In the lesson I said a lil prayer in my heart to know if Victors baptism should be moved.. and as I watched victor make us hot Choclolate I felt the spirit whisper "He is my son. It is his time. Why would you prevent him from coming unto me?" and THAT was our answer
When we came out Sister Williams said she felt the same! 
I can't help but think about how much God loves him to have led us to the Boulevard, To the furniture, to Mario GRABBING the furniture, to us stopping to pray, to Victor having a feeling that he should stay home from work so that we could be with eachother that night so that Victor could be baptized as soon as possible. 
AH. Its so sacred. 

ZONE CONFERENCE 
as always my heart is bursting with joy to see all my missionary friends. 
I love being in the same conference as Sister Lord because right before it starts she's playing the piano, and I get to sit at the stand and be beside her again and listen to her play 

Oh how I love her
I just want to claim her as mine... Is that allowed? 

There were SO many inspired messages, thoughts, roleplays, scriptures.. I'll pick 3 highlights to put here. 
1)President Brown shared with us that EVERY area could have a baptism by the end of December. He shared his personal mission experience where he had the BEST miacle filled christmas of his life. Christmas eve his four pad prayed for a white christmas and the next morning there was 2 feet of snow, the elder that had prayed for it RAN and BELLY flopped right into the snow in pure joy and celebration 

as president brown told the story all of us missionaries were laughing in literal second hand joy 

he invited us to participate in a forty day SPRINT to have a baptism by December 31st, a white christmas :) 

2)There were inspired roleplays on the plan of savation, Elder Cease was running them and  after his spiel of what they were supposed to look like he FLUNG his chair in front of the first companionship of elders and goes "What is the purpose of this life?" RIGHT into it. Being a missionary is so epic 

3) The mission highly encouraged flu shots and if you wanted you could go get them for free at this conference! It was fun because over a year ago in the MTC Sister Christiansen and I were getting shots together, and then for zone conference we went together, just like old times :) Its always criminal when the person giving you the shot starts to make small talk and you're like "Bruh I know whats about to go down but sure I'll tell you how long i've been out and what I plan to do for school after.." all is well! And I got a walmart bandaid so score. 

After zone conference Sister Williams almost DIED fainting, we got culvers for dinner, drove the Sisters home, and once we were back in our are Sister Williams sr goes "Thoughts on still grinding?" Girl of course. 
We ball 

Our friend Victor's Baptism was NOT prepped for since bro has been sketchy with the meetings 

I kid you not we were SCROUNGING for a pianist until an hour and a half before.. Gotta love last minute planning.

Wednesday morning during our personal study Sister Hethcote runs upstairs and into the room and says "Sister Williams how would you feel about coming to the temple with me this morning?" She shows her phone with a big grin which reveals the permission granted to baptize by proxy her Dad who tragically passed away in a car accident two months ago.. I felt like crying 
We rejoiced with her in this special occasion to go to the house of the Lord and sent her with our greenie XD 
Sister Williams sr had a dr appointment to see the results of her heart moniter which happened to be FIFTY THREE PAGES of different graphs and readings of her heart. all the Cardias that you can think of where somehow documented, and they still don't know whats wrong.. Referred to a cardiologist yesss. 

10 minutes after we got home Sister Hethcote bursts into the house and says at the top of her lungs "HEY What you know about ETERNAL FAMILIES" she's absolutely glowing as she tells about the sacred experience it was to do her fathers work, and the miracles she saw at the temple (running into the first family she told about her fathers passing) 
I can't explain how much i feel Gods love when I think about proxy ordinances, how loving is a God that proclaims that you must be baptized to enter into the kingdom of heaven in the bible, and then doesnt require it of his children? Not very loving, or consistant. 

I think its the greatest testimant of a loving father, that he has pprovided a way for EACH of his children to have the CHANCE to accept him, whether in this life or the next. 
I didn't know my testimony of the temple could grow more until now, and I'm sure it will continue to. 
I also think sister Hethcote is the strongest person I've ever met for still being her, working hard on both sides of the veil. 

During our weekly planning after lots of debate and council and prayer we set a goal of NINE baptisms by December 31st. Greenie me's mouth would be on the floor.

I've realized that I'm basically a skeptic and 9 times out of 10 my key indicator goal will always be a little bit lower than my companions XD That's okay, I just need to work on my faith :) 

We did some LAST minute exchanges with Sister Whittler and Hutchinson, got to see TRISH (A sister that goes out with the missionaries every single week since Ortiz and Ellis were in City Center) She has a pink mowhawk and is actually an absolute legend. 

Had a ball of a time listening to a young women tell us all about her boy drama.. Etc
At the end of the night we knocked on this EQP's door who let us in, his family was there and we made some good conversation. At the end I asked "You're the Elders Quorum president right? What can we do for you and your stewardship? Who can we visit right now?" and he looks at me and says with the STRAIGHTEST face "How about I get you some bread and you can leave us with a prayer, how's that?" HUH? Bro was NOT down to talk missionary work.. But hey we got bread. Its just not his time.

THAT night we went from an exchange to an exchange. I got to be with Sister Ortiz in her area Cascade and Orem! We swapped at 9:00pm and I can't tell you how much I LOVE this girl. We talked about everything and anything, worries about going home, missionary life rn, being on bikes.. She also invited me to join her family in San Diego in March?? Hello? We're both super excited to be friends forever. 

The whole exchange was so fun biking around Orem together. I got to see some old members that I worked with, the Crandells of COURSE, as well as a wml. 
She kept me accountable to my goal of talking to everyone, whenever we would bike past someone she would side eye me and start slowing down XD 

Had a big warm purry cat lay on me for 20 minutes while a sweet recent convert old lady testified of Jesus Christ 

We convinced the other Sisters to do another night exchanged so that we could switch back at morning sports and we spent another night reminiscing, reading through journals, and laughing together

Us at morning sports

YULY (Julie) 
October 28th Sister Williams FIRST night in the feild we walked by a lady who exclusively speaks spanish. We complimented her vest and whipped out google translate to chat. 
In that conversation she told us that she used to meet with missionaries and that she would love us to come back .. WHAT? 
3 weeks go by of trying to coordinate with spanish elders, showing up to Yuly not being home, ghosting us through text etc.. 
Nov 21 (This week) We decided to go by with the spanish Elders to see if they were home and if we could visit with them. 

We circled in fervant prayer outside her apartment, and while we prayed I felt the spirit tell me to look to my left, right when I opened my eyes I turned my head and saw a man walking and in that moment I thought I would DIE if I didn't follow the thought, so I told Sister Williams and she turned in an instant to track him down. We ran from the confused Spanish Elders to see what this prompting meant! When we finally caught up we had a great chat with him, he wasnt interested but we told him with all our hearts that God loves him SO much. 

When we got back to the Spanish Elders (Elder Temple and Elder Zazueta) They told us they had chatted with Yuly and she agreed to let us in! 
To preface this whole visit, Sister Williams, Williams and I were all entirely guessing based off the tone of peoples voices and body language (NOT Spanish speakers) what was happening XD
After Visiting for a bit, learning more of Yuly and her families story (Her husband Edgar, and daughter Adrianna joined) The Elders began a conversation about the word of God, pointing us to The Book of Mormon. 
The thought came to my mind "Talk about Baptism, they're ready." I pulled out my phone and wrote out in my notes app "Do you think we could soft launch baptism?" I showed it to my companions and both with excited eyes nodded with confidence > All three of us turn to Elder Temple and say "Soft commit to baptism." and he looks back and whispers with a smile "Absolutely... But VERY soft" 

This whole convo about baptism is happening while Elder Zazueta is CHATTING it up in Spanish about the BOM 
In an instant Yuly tells us to wait, after a moment rummaging in her out of sight bedroom, she walks out with a hard cover Book of Mormon with more than 5 colorful tabs sticking joyously out the side. I think all of us missionaries jaws were subconsciously on the floor although our demeaner showed calm smiling faces as if we'd expected it :) 
She asks us if she could share one of her tabbed verses and shared with us 

Mosiah 24:13
"And it came to pass that the voice of the Lord came to them in their afflictions, saying: Lift up your heads and be of good comfort, for I know of the covenant which ye have made unto me; and I will covenant with my people and deliver them out of bondage."
As she's reading in spanish, Elder Temple turns to us and says "They're ready." 
THEN the most powerful witness to me that the spirit surpasses languages, Elder Temple began to teach, holding up a picture of Jesus Christ being baptized, I felt as though the Holy Ghost walked into the room, a calm peace flowing through the teaching of those Elders.
We hear Elder Temple say "Cuatro? Cinco? Sais?" Yuly says "Cinco" 

all three of us in our minds are like "five.. Five pm? Five days from now? Five months?" THEN they say "27 de diciembre." and we KNOW that they're on date for BAPTISM, 5 weeks from now. 

Long story long we came out of the lesson rejoicing, we said a prayer of gratitude with the Spanish Elders right then and simply were filled with gratitude that we were persistent with Yuly, and that we found her again so that she could enter into the waters of baptism with her family :)

CHANCE AND VICTORS BAPTISM (Nov 22)
Yess I got to go to my old YSA are for Chance's baptism, who may foever be known as hot podcast guy XD 
I got to meet his non member parents and invited them to the temple open house, see my beloved Sister Lord who I LOVE to be a missionary with. We were both semi stressed because Chance wasn't changing into his white jumpsuit and iterally waited until the last second to do so.. Per the usual it all works out in the end 
It was special to see so many people from the 27th ward and rejoice over the fact that I get to be part of something so special. 

I gave Chance a solid handshake goodbye and realized that this was the last time I would see him for who KNOWS how long. Cray. 

Got drivetheough Culvers and then ZOOMED to Victors baptism. When we walked in there were 3 old people sitting right in the front row, one is Victors SUPER old lady friend named peggy who was wearing christmas pajamas under her polkadot skirt, and beside her was a lil ratty chiwawa with a sunflower harness on... Although we were confused we figured there was no time to waste, we patted the pup and pulled out the mangled cardboard box that holds all the jumpsuits for the suncrest Stake. and after decent amount of rummaging we found one XL adult size and a sickening plethora off youth sizes but NOTHING else besides that. We turn to Victor, and the person baptizing him named Mitch, only to see two scrawny people who DEF would drown in an XL size HELLO??! The stakes excuse for not having enough jumpsuits is that they haven' t had convert baptisms for years.. Bruh. After some brainstorming we called the Orem Park stake Sisters, who gave us thie HCOMS number, who got us to drive to his house to get the key, so that we could go to THAT stake center and get jumpsuits. Running down church hallways with white jumpsuits was never something I thought I'd do but here we are :)
 We were only 7 minutes late to the baptism and all is well. 
Everything always turns out in the end I dont know why we get so stressed all the time 

It was sweet to watch Mitch baptize Victor since mitch recently came back to church. Victor only has one arm so that was cool to see him supported extra by mitch. When Victor came out of the water, Mitch patted him on the back and said "Welcome home." AH crying. 

KAUGE 

After the baptism we had our first lesson with Kauge. 
Kauge grew up with family friends in the church (*Coughs* the RSP and her husband) a couple months ago Sister Hall (RSP) wakes up at 3:00 AM after a vision of Kauge getting BAPTIZED?? Hello? Of course he ran into sister missionaries that day and ever since has had run ins and almost lessons with missionaries, Sister Williams has been praying for him for MONTHS so this meeting meant the world.

The moment we sat down with Kauge in the Halls home everything felt bright. We talked about everything Gods love and his plan, and what Kauge wants in his Discipleship. Kauge probably has the kindest eyes and most contagious laugh i've EVER seen in my whole life. I can feel how much God wants him to join his fold. Kauge shared with us that his Dad passed away almost two years ago December 24th, the moment I heard the date my mind had December 24th BOLD in the front. 
I invited Kauge to be baptized on Christmas eve the day his father passed and everyone in the room agreed. AH so powerful. White Christmas here we come :) Another one we walked out skipping 

LOUISE 
THEN somehow through a LOT of coordinating my beloved Sister Atwood and I got together and abandoned our companions to go to LOUISE. GUYS Mind you i met Louise November 21 2024 and this appointment we set up was November 22nd 2025. 
We walked into that small old smokey room with that small old smokey lady, ploppled oursleves down on that couch with BIG smiles on our giddy faces and start visiting with her like old times. At first Louise expressed concern about staying in touch, she made us write down our home addresses and give her our moms phone numbers XD as we talk she ays the phrase "I'm no use to you missionary girls" At this point my heart starts to sink bedcaue this is something that he used to say one year ago when we could barely bring up the church. In an instant I don't know if the spirit took over or if I just am comfortable with Louise but I said "Louise I don't know why you say that because since I met you I've had the strongest feeling that you need to be baptized, and that is RIGHT on our missionary purpose" Sister Atwood says with all she could muster "ME TOO."
Then Louise looks at us and says "Well that's why I wanted your home addresses, so I could keep you posted." 
I say "Louise, for you BAPTISM date??" and she says "Well, yes"

You would not BELIEVE the joy that bolted into my chest, Sister Atwood and I grab eachothers hands and start squeeling and jumping up and down just LAUGHING. 

She told us to stop fussing because she hadn't even told her daughter..Etc. 
at some point she had to call Echo (her daughter) because she couldn't remember her email and before we knew it she was TELLING ECHO, Who RAN downstairs and stood in complete shock while we filled her in. 
All I could do was laugh and smile and sit in complete wonder as Louise explained how she KNOWS she needs to be baptized, that more than anything she wants to see her family again, and that God has told her it's time. 

After Sister Atwood and I gave both of them BIG hugs we went outside only to literally tackle eachother in the biggest hug with the biggest laughs, and all we could say was "I'M SO HAPPY" "I LOVE YOU SO MUCH" "SHE WANTS TO BE BAPTIZED" 
Jumping up and down, linking arms, wanting to shout with joy AH 
I can't explain to you how insane it is to me that Louise wants to be baptized. 
D&C 18 doesn't lie. Bringing souls to Christ has been the most joyful experience of my life. 

Found someone to teach on bread visits. One of the old ladies we visit with says "You sisters are the Secret Sauce" and she says it with the most seriousness. I love Sister Jacob 

GUYS 
The length of this is criminal but its not even the smallest part how I feel, I can't even give you a tenth 

Alma 26:16
Therefore, let us glory, yea, we will glory in the Lord; yea, we will rejoice, for our joy is full; yea, we will praise our God forever. Behold, who can glory too much in the Lord? Yea, who can say too much of his great power, and of his mercy, and of his long-suffering towards the children of men? Behold, I say unto you, I cannot say the smallest part which I feel. 

Truly the Holiest Highs. 

Until next email!!

-Sister Smith