Dear family & friends,

For those who don't know, a missionary in this mission lost his life Wednesday due to a car accident.  Please pray for his family, friends, and his companion.  This truly is a tragic time for all involved.

It's also opened the door to a lot of different thoughts this week.  For one thing, Sister Barnett and I had never met this Elder, yet it was really hard for both of us to hear about his passing.  Every missionary in the Pocatello Idaho Mission is a member of this big family, and our spirits were connected by this purpose we share to invite others to come unto Christ 24/7.  We also took some time out of our day to visit some of the Sisters we cover; three of them were in the same MTC district with him and were having an especially hard time.  As we talked, we spoke of the Plan of Salvation a lot.  Knowing that he and his family can be together forever through the Gospel is a big comfort.  We know he's in "a state of rest, a state of peace, where [he] shall rest form all [his] troubles, and from all care and sorrow" (Alma 40:12).  We know he's in a better place, so we don't mourn for him.  We mourn for us; we miss his presence, and we sorrow for those he left behind.  However, we also talked about how that's ok--we each can have our own time to grieve.  We don't need to force things back to normalcy, but just let them ease back in their natural time.  Through the Atonement of Christ, we can feel the comfort and strength we need as we put our trust in Him.

Moving on from feelings, though.... we're having a baptism this Saturday!!  It kind of came out of nowhere.  We really don't know what we did to deserve such HUMONGOUS blessings, but hey, no complaints!

Her name is Adriana.  She's a student at BYU-I and has been married to a member for a little while, has been going to church with him pretty much every Sunday, and has already taken the discussions from missionaries before, but backed out because she was nervous of change.  However, she decided that before they started a family that she needed to decide if this is true.  At the end of the lesson, we asked her if she knows the Book of Mormon is true.  Yes.  We asked her if she knows the Church is true.  Yes.  Then she burst into tears and said she didn't want to wait anymore for baptism.  We normally set a goal with people for when they can be baptized by, but we let her set it.  "Would this weekend be too soon?"  *blank stares*  ....We said that would be fine, after we came to our senses.  So we're meeting with her every night this week and she's getting baptized on Saturday.

Which brings about another theme we've seen on our mission!  This week was the lowest number of lessons we've taught since Sister Barnett and I have been together.  Things fell through, people just weren't home this week, and of course we were more emotional than normal.  However!  We have seen that when things go horribly wrong, something absolutely wonderful is right around the corner.  And so it is with life: it's hard, and sometimes it feels like it's just dang awful.  But these trials are preparing us for something incredible.  Divine, in fact.  As we remain faithful through trials, whatever they may be, we grow and become more like Christ.  As we become more like Christ, we prepare to enter into His presence, where we want to be forever!  Sometimes life seems full of sacrifice, but when we think of what's to come, it's no sacrifice at all.  It's a privilege to be trusted with trials.  They help us reach our eternal goal: living with our Savior, our families, and our Father in Heaven for eternity.

This week, read Alma 40, 41, and 42.  It's a lot of great doctrine on the Plan of Salvation.  In fact, just study the Plan of Salvation.  It's beautiful.

I love you all more than I can say.

-Sister Jacobson  

P.s. Sorry for the solitary picture.  Sister Barnett and I bought comp shirts on her birthday!  Three bucks at Walmart, no big deal.