Hei Hei!
Drum roll
please......I LEAVE FOR NORWAY ON TUESDAY AND I'M SO EXCITED SO I'M
NOT EVEN GOING TO BOTHER TRYING TO HIDE ALL THE EXCITEMENT!
I got all my flight
information this past week so I leave the MTC at 10:15am and then my
plane doesn't leave here until 2:10pm...I fly from SLC to Amsterdam and
then I fly from Amsterdam to Norway..I'm supposed to arrive in Norway at1:27pm on
the 27! I forgot to check the layover time so I don't have a clue how
long I'll be waiting but that's the plan! I'm flying by myself so that
will be quite an adventure but I got an e-mail from my mission president
telling me what to expect when I arrive. Him and his wife will be picking
me up at the airport and then they will take me to the mission home and I get
to take a nap! Hallelujah! Then they feed me dinner and I visit
with President Hill and then they tell me where I'm going! Then the next
day we talk about finances, visa, all that jazz and then I'll leave early
afternoon to my assignment! He's already told me that my companion is
amazing and I'm so incredibly excited...like I seriously can't even put my
excitement into words! That being said I bought a call card so that I can
call from the airport...I know you guys will be in different places at those
times so I'm just planning on calling your individual cell phones so if you get
a call from a random number than please answer because it's probably me!
I'll probably be calling in between 11:30 and 1! Can't wait to talk
to you! Also...P-Days in the mission field are Mondays I believe so it may be a
little bit until I can write again!
So after I e-mailed you, I
went to the Provo Temple and it was the greatest experience ever! Going
to the temple as a missionary is the greatest thing in the world! I
absolutely love it and I get to go again today at 1! Today will be my
last time going to the temple for a while because there is no temple in Norway...still
hoping that they're going to announce a temple when I'm over there because how
amazing would that be?! Mission miracles right?! We taught our
investigator Lin the third lesson and then she pounded us with questions about
why Nephi had to kill Laban and we tried answering all her questions, but I
just ended it with that we can pray to Heavenly Father and address the concerns
and to ask Him why it needed to happen and that she would receive an
answer. The rest of the lesson went really well and Elder Janotti invited
her to be baptized..and she said that she had doubts and wasn't sure if she was
ready so we tried resolving her doubts and taught her about faith and that
baptism is a step of faith, but it quickly turned into an argument and all
three of us felt the Spirit tell us that we needed to end the lesson so we did
and then left. She now has other missionaries teaching her because she is
a TRC investigator and they got switched on Monday.
Sunday
I know I said this
last time but...SUNDAYS ARE LITERALLY THE BEST IN THE MTC! The Spirit is
always present at the MTC,but Sundays you can feel the difference. It’s
incredible! Sister Koon and Elder Devouro spoke about recognizing the
Spirit and then Brother Pearson (Branch Presidency) spoke about faith...they
usually have the departing missionaries speak. I was also studying Norwegian
today and I had just read Preach My Gospel like mom said, and let me just say
that the gift of tongues is real...even if you already know the language!
I understood so much more than I usually do and it was amazing! OH!
And in sacrament meeting one of the sisters sang, "Savior, Redeemer of
My Soul" and it's the greatest song ever! Go look it up and listen
to it! One of my favorites! Later we talked about faith in Relief
Society and how baptism applies to the atonement in our district
meeting. We had a temple walk and so I'll send those pics and two elders
just jumped into the picture and I had no idea who they were...but I met one of
them this past week who's name was Elder Fuchs so there's a random story for
you! We went to choir and practiced the songs for the Nashville Tribute
Band and it was a blast! Choir is so much fun...especially when the choir
is like 500 missionaries! After choir we had
our Sunday Devotional and we watched "The Character of
Christ"...it is PHENOMENAL! Go look that up to and watch it!
UNBELIEVABLE! As soon as the devotional was over DAVID A. BEDNAR HIMSELF
WALKED IN THE DOOR! We had an hour of just questions and answers about
The Character of Christ and it was AMAZING! When can you have a Q&A with an
apostle!?! Then here's the greatest part...he left an apostolic blessing
on us before he left! The greatest experience ever and I will never
forget it! BEST SUNDAY!
Monday
We had service this
morning and Sister Temakei and I had to sweep all 8 bathrooms, sweep all the
stairs in the entire building, vacuum all the landings, and clean the windows,
and sweep the outside BY OURSELVES! That was insane and we were hustling
to get everything done but we finished! Hallelujah! Then we went to go
and teach our new investigator, Kylee...yes that is actually her name and she
spells it the same way and she's like me in a way so we get along great!
She said the closing prayer and accepted everything we taught her about the
Restoration! Then we taught Diane (our teacher role play) about the Plan
of Salvation and she committed to read 2 Nephi 2 and it was great! Then I
got your package! The wonderful package with all of those treats..I'm
pretty sure that was inspiration because the food here is getting worse and
worse so those cookies have been a life saver! Thanks for following the
Spirit! Then I also got a letter from Quinn which was so fun!
Handwritten letters are like gold!
Tuesday
We had TRC with Kylee
again today and we were going to teach her the Plan of Salvation...before we
even began teaching her she already starts talking about how she thinks we all
have a purpose in this life and how there is more to life than just working and
being a busy bee...I almost wanted her to just teach it to me! It was an
incredible lesson! Then we went to choir practice so we could sing in the
MTC choir for the Tuesday Devotional and it was so awesome!
There were probably 600 missionaries in the choir and we sang Sweet Hour of
Prayer and it was amazing! Then Don R. Clarke from the Seventy spoke and
he talked about how to become effective missionaries! He had said that the
happiest missionaries are the ones that love others more than themselves and
that we need to be happy always, content never. We should never think
that we have done enough, or that we've worked hard enough...always stretch
yourselves and work hard because the Lord will make up the difference...ALWAYS!
Wednesday
We were studying as a
companionship this morning and we saw our investigator Kylee and talked to her
for a little while and then talked to another TRC investigator that we had
never seen before! Then we talked in class about inviting people to come
to church and that was the commitment that we wanted Kylee to make as we went
and taught her today! I have never been so excited in my life to tell
someone about church! I could feel the Spirit just running through my
entire body..I felt like I was on a cloud! We taught her the third lesson
about faith, repentance, baptism and the gift of the Holy Ghost and then
invited her to think about baptism because we felt that she wasn't ready for that
invitation and we weren't prompted to ask her...so we started teaching her
about church and she committed to going and said she was excited! Ahh
missionary work is the greatest! Later that day we taught Olivia for like
10 minutes because the Elders went over time, but we get along super well and
taught her that God loves her and we love her already! She's the greatest
and has a sincere desire to learn!
Thursday
Today we had in-field
orientation which is where you learn about the doctrine of Christ some more,
goals and planning, finding people and then working with members! I
learned so many new things that I can apply when I get to the mission
field! One of the biggest take away was to not let other people's doubts
hold you down...others tell you that you might only have 3 baptisms, or that
you won't have any..and although I'm in a hard mission I have faith and I trust
that God has prepared people for baptism and all I have to do is let Him lead
me to them! Everyone talks about numbers...but another thing that I
learned is that although there is so much focus on numbers...they're all people
and they all have a name and God knows each one of them individually so why
only help 1 when you can help 50? It was a 9 hour meeting so it was pretty long
but it was good! Then we had class with Sister Bain and it was the
greatest class I have had in my entire MTC experience! We studied from
the Book of Mormon as a District and then talked about teaching people and not
lessons...Sister Bain talked about her mission president and how the key to
teaching the gospel is to love...if you want people to come unto Christ you
have to love...the gospel is love. The Spirit was so strong..and then we
did role play with our teacher. We had 8 minutes so Sister Temakei and I
decided to just teach that we have a Heavenly Father who loves us and it was
the greatest lesson ever! We all felt the Spirit so strong and we were
both getting teary eyed and Sister Temakei said that she could tell that the
Spirit was speaking through me...I could feel it too! It was
amazing! We were both so excited and felt the Spirit so strongly that we
were shaking! I wanted to go tell every single soul that God loves them
and that He provided a plan for us to be happy! God's love is REAL!
If you haven't felt it...then pray! It is so real it almost feels
tangible! By far one of the greatest experiences of my life...that's why
I'm on a mission! It's to let other people feel that love and to share
the gospel that brings it! AMAZING!
Friday
Today...writing
e-mails, going to the temple later today and that's about it...but this past
week me and my companion have been reading the Book of Mormon together and
discussing it as we read and I just want you all to know that the Book of
Mormon is the greatest book in the entire world and that is has so much
power! There is POWER in that book and I KNOW that it is true! It
testifies of Christ, His life, His ministry, His life, His tender mercies,
HIM! I have never developed so much love for the Book of Mormon in my
life and I'm incredibly grateful that my mission has showed me that!
My challenge for this
week is to love! Pray for charity, look for ways to serve, feel God's
love for you but more importantly feel God's love for His children! There
will be blessings that comes and miracles that are manifested! God's love
is the greatest power, the greatest convert, and there is nothing in the world
that comes even close to the happiness that it brings! Share it!
That was the longest
e-mail in the entire world but I needed to tell you about all of it...also I
got the coolest shirt ever that has a map of Norway and says my mission and
I'll send pictures!
Love you all so so
much and miss you! Please please write e-mails!
I'll let you know new
addresses and things when I get to Norway!
Pictures:
1.Kylee and Sister Temakei at the Provo temple
2. Kylee with Sis.Buchanan, Gowans and Vermeeren all going to France
3. Them with some random elders
4. The sisters in her zone
5. Kylee with her roommates....she said they're "hilarious and they have a blast together."
6. Their shoes:)
7. Kylee by the map
8. Kylee in her "snazzy" shirt!
No comments:
Post a Comment