One of the Greatest weeks ever!!

What an amazing week. Everyday miracles!! Man, I'm just so happy! It's going to be hard to only pick one or two experiences to share!! I want to tell you about Stefani though...she is the mother of a recent convert and she has learned with the missionaries on and off for about 2 years now. She has never prayed about the message or felt that she should be baptized. We started visiting her last week, but we were on splits both of the times we planned to teach her so i wasn't able to come. We visited her on Saturday and we just had the impression to just ask her about her life and her experiences instead of jumping into the lesson. Long story short, she just opened up to us and cried as she told us about her life and how she really felt. We just felt the impression to ask her right then if we could kneel and if she could pray and ask her Father in Heaven if this gospel is what her and her family need. If it is the truth. As she did, the spirit just came into the room and all of our eyes were filled with tears as she offered the most sincere prayer I have ever heard. When she finished we didn't way anything, she knew that Heavenly Father had heard and answered her prayer and she wants to be baptized. That just strengthened my testimony of the power of the Holy Ghost and the power of prayer. Ibu Lussy is still really progressing, and Laura and her three kids came to church and also came to the baptism after and loved it! The primary sang a song in sacrament and her son Darrel and daughter Daniella went up and sang with them! We love that family so much and can't wait to see them become members of the church and continue to blessed through the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I just can't express enough gratitude for the blessings the Lord has poured out upon us this week and throughout my mission and life! I know when we give our WHOLE selves to Him...heart, might, mind, and strength, He can make us into someone so much better than we could ever make ourselves. I am so thankful the Lord has allowed me, with all my weaknesses, to help Him in this great work of Salvation. There truly is nothing better. Love you so much!

Sister Reilly

Shout out to the greatest dad in the UNIVERSE, Keith Reilly! Happy 32nd Birthday! Also can't forget my Gma Gail, Happy Late Bday!!

Jakarta is amazing! Such a great week!! We have some awesome people preparing for baptism in January, including Laura and her son :). They were on a different island for Christmas and New Years, but are back now. We also had our favorite investigator, John, show up at church yesterday and my comp and I were so excited because he lives like 2 hours from the church and wasn't able to come last week! He's 70 years old and the coolest guy ever! He has 6 kids who are all still not married and living with him and his wife. He was looking for something to help his family..the gospel of Jesus Christ is the answer! He has a baptismal date for January and is hoping his family will also want to follow his example. We have seen too many miracles to count this week. We have met some of the most prepared people ever, it is amazing how the spirit will just lead us to these people. One is Ibu Lussy, her husband and son died 13 years ago and her life has not been the same since. She was active in the Catholic church but nobody from her church bothered to come by and help her or even call. She was alone to raise two kids by herself and a hate just grew inside her for people around her. She stopped going to church and just goes on Christmas and Easter now. She let this all out to us after we taught her about the restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. She said without the Lord she wouldn't have been able to endure all these years. She normally let nobody into her house (she actually has a giant pitpull in front) but she let us in and felt the spirit through our message and how through the gospel of Jesus Christ families can be together forever. I just has this love for this women even though we just met her. I know this is what she needs and is looking for in her life. I know the Christ lives and that only through HIM we could feel free of feelings of hate, anger, sadness ect. He is the answer. He knows us and knows how to help us in our struggles AND in our successes. His atonement is not just for the sinners, but for the pure in heart. I cannot express more gratitude for the gift that out Heavenly Father has given to us all, the gift of his only beloved son, Jesus Christ. I love Him and I love you!!
Sister Reilly

 

Go Cartingggg! You already know I destroyed all :) (Elders & Sisters)

 

Me not liking the Jakarta motto...coffee before everything! 

 

New Years! (Don't tell pres. D we woke up) :)

 

 

Joy to the world!

Great week! I got to see the greatest fam in the world, and hang out on google :). Great things are still happening in Jakarta! For the second time in my mission I saw the Elders in my ward get a baptism yesterday, so sweet! Great way to finish this year. Our mission has seen so many miracles this year and will see even more next year! And it's because of FAITH! Our bishop called on Saturday night and asked if I would give a talk in the Indo ward the next day so I ended up giving a talk in the English ward, teaching gospel principles, and then giving a talk in the Indo ward! I never thought I would be so excited about giving talks..but on a mission I love it because it's an opportunity to get the ward more fired up about missionary work. We have got some super awesome member referrals this last week which we are so grateful for. This week we had a really cool experience. I met a man on the bus and talked for a bit about our purpose and message and then we exchanged numbers and got off. Anyways we ended up meeting at the church a few days later with him, his wife and his son. He is Muslim and just told us that he sees something different in followers of Christ and wants what we have. The lesson was really powerful and at the end the member who was fellow-shipping with us offered the prayer and asked if we could all hold hands, something I've never done before on my mission. The spirit was really strong as she offered the prayer and the mother just had tears streaming down her face afterwords. The spirit is real and the only way for someone to feel of the truth that the Son of God came into the world, atoned for mankind, and that in and through Him we can receive peace in this life and eternal life in the life to come. This year my testimony my Savior Jesus Christ has been renewed again. I feel closer to Him than ever before. I love Him. His truly is a plan of HAPPINESS. I am Happy because of His gospel and the opportunity to share it with my bothers and sisters in Indonesia. I could not have asked for a better year. 

I love you all and pray for you all!

With all my love,

Sister Reilly

No email from Sid this week, since she gets to Skype on Thursday for Christmas, but here are some pictures she sent us :)

Christmas

Merry Christmas! :) Nothin like the Christmas spirit! We have some super sweet investigators right now. One is Laura..she has three kids and her husband just left her. She was looking for something to give her hope and she found it...the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. She is just eating up all the lessons and her and her oldest son will be baptized the week after Christmas. I will skype next Thursday, so this may be short, but I just want to give my testimony about TRUSTING IN THE LORD! I have learned over the last few weeks especially how important it is to TRUST AND RELY ON THE SAVIOR. As long as we are trying to go through our days on our own strength, we can never succeed, but as we rely on our Savior to literally guide our every action, WE CANNOT FAIL. I have never felt the power of prayer so strongly in my life. HE HEARS, HE LOVES US, HE WILL HELP US, and he expects us to help our brothers and sisters. I hope this Christmas we can all reach out to help the lowly in heart. I know that I am literally nothing without Jesus Christ on my side and I can do anything WITH Him. As I have helped others grow A testimony of Jesus Christ or grow IN their testimony of HIM, I feel that MY testimony and reliance in my Savior continues to grow, and I couldn't be more thankful for that. Thank you for your prayers, I love you from way over here :) 

Sister Reilly

Christmas Spirit

Such a good week! Just want to give a quick shout out to MUM for the mini Christmas tree, it brings the Christmas spirit to our little Jakarta apartment :). From a pretty tough week last week we had some amazing things happen this week and we felt sooo many blessings poured out upon us. Jakarta is different than my first two cities, the people are busy, not as friendly, and not as open. The same things I did in my other cities aren't as effective here and we have had to find innovative ways to get to the people here. EVERYONE thinks we are Johova's Witness here and it's sooo frustrating. If they give us the chance to tell them we aren't they usually are WAY more open. So this week with our proselyting time we tried just talking about Christmas and asking if we could share a Christmas message. Then we would share "The Living Christ" with them and we saw way more success! 

The sad thing about Christmas here is that Christ..THE REASON for Christmas is completely taken out of it. Because it is a Muslim country, they still love the Christmas tree's in the malls, Santa and buying gifts, but you will never see anything about the real reason for Christmas...Our Savior Jesus Christ. 

I am glad we get to share about HIM, the reason. I love my Savior and feel the enabling power of His atonement in my life everyday. 

I want to tell you a little bit about Patrick. He is an African working here and we have been teaching him and his girlfriend with our WML in the English ward who speaks French. His ex-wife was Mormon and there was always missionaries at his house before, but he never wanted any part in it. He recognized us on the street and invited us to meet with him my first week here. Yesterday he was supposed to come to church but didn't show up and we had a feeling we should just go over to their place. He told us he was out partying all night and woke up at 12 and he that he wanted to change his life. He told us his life story and about how he has always had money to do whatever he wants, but he is not HAPPY. He has A LOT of changes to make and it will be hard, we told him that, but we know with the Saviors help he can. 

I still cannot describe seeing the change take place in people we teach. There is nothing that compares to seeing someone change there life through the gospel of Jesus Christ. We had some really awesome investigators attend church this week and we are planning to have a few baptisms on the 21st...no better Christmas present than that! 

Please pray for: 

Laura and her kids, Desti, and Patrik this week! 

I love my Savior. He is the greatest gift the world has and will ever received. He is the LIGHT. 

With Love, 

Sister Reilly 

one more funny experience from this week..we have now joined an old mens tennis group every Saturday at 6am. haha. They love us and this week I was playing with my usual 70 year old doubles partner and we had an awesome comeback and won 6 games to 5...anyways, during this game just about everyone outside of their apartment started gathering around to watch the game and the old guys kept saying..Sister Reilly, stop looking so serious...smile! it was so funny and Sister Akaiti was just cracking up the whole time hearing what people were saying. good times. there is actually a ton of potential with a lot of them and they are always asking us tons of questions about our beliefs and what we do.

VIDEO: HE is the GIFT

THE RAIN HAS STARTED!

Well, Jakarta definitely tested my patience this week! The raining season has started and I thought there was a crazy amount of traffic here last week...I was wrong. The streets flood like crazy and you can literally be in traffic from the afternoon until late at night. The work here is definitely harder than any of the other areas I've served in, but I know that no matter where I am, the Lords work will move forward! I'm glad my comp is up for whatever because I often just get up from the bus and say, "lets walk, this is crazy." haha! 

So a pretty cool experience from this week...we were proselyting in a shopping center type place and I just got this strong impression that we needed leave to go get on the first bus we saw. I turned to Sister Akaiti and asked if she trusted me and she said YA! So we left and got on the fist bus and we were just both praying that we would know what to do next...nothing came. We ended up just riding and talking to people on the bus and nobody seemed interested. It was getting pretty late so we decided we needed to just go back. I was feeling pretty confused at this point because I really felt like I had got an impression from the spirit. Anyways on the last stretch coming home a guy got crammed into the overly crowded bus (at night, the buses are like animal stalls) He saw the Book of Mormon and started asking me about why I was here. I explained and answered his questions and then I didn't say anything else. After a few minutes he turned to me and asked..."could I hear that message that your hear to share?" Long story short, he took the Book of Mormon and he's been reading and super interested! We are giving him to the Elders because he lives alone, but I just thought that was pretty cool :). Listen to the little promptings! 

We are still working like crazy here, trying to find people to teach, we are seeing miracles each day and I am so grateful to be taking part in the Lords work here. We will see amazing things happen in these to wards, I know it is true! There are so many people hungering and thirsting after the truth and we have and will continue to find them. 

I know that me Savior lives. 

I am grateful for this time of thanksgiving. I am so grateful for my Savior, my family, and my mission. I have SO MUCH to be grateful for, I can't express my gratitude for the many blessings my Heavenly Father has given me. I love you all and I am grateful for YOU! 

With so much love, 

Sister Reilly 

Jibs and Shefson going home and Thanksgiving!!!