Week 14

"In many of the uncertainties and challenges we encounter in our lives, God requires us to do our best, to act and not be acted upon (see 2 Nephi 2:26), and to trust in Him. We may not see angels, hear heavenly voices, or receive overwhelming spiritual impressions. We frequently may press forward hoping and praying—but without absolute assurance—that we are acting in accordance with God’s will. But as we honor our covenants and keep the commandments, as we strive ever more consistently to do good and to become better, we can walk with the confidence that God will guide our steps." Elder David A. Bednar, The Spirit of Revelation April 2011

Hi everybody! 

First of all, sorry about the mix-up last week. I guess I forgot to hit the send button or something. But I suppose now you get the pleasure of reading back-to-back emails, which is always great. : ) And this email feels somewhat scattered to my brain, so also sorry about that.

Also, apparently the Week of the Missing Camera was enough time to lose my picture-taking habits, so I apologize in advance for the lack of relevant pictures. But that's why we can repent, right?

So!

Tuesday was awesome-very likely the best day I've ever spent as a missionary. I think I say that every day, but this was really super rewarding and awesome and we were able to see results of time and work and it was GREAT! Our Ward had planned a Relief Society activity  (Johnny Lingo, 8-cow-woman themed) for that evening, so we spent a lot of time trying to make sure people would come. That morning we stopped by Kim H's for a lesson, as well as to renew the invitation to that night's activity. We ended up watching "Loving Others and Living with Differences" by Elder Dallin H. Oaks, from October's General Conference, and it had the answers Kim was looking for. And during this visit I received greater insight as to why the Lord needed specifically Sister N and I to be Kim's missionaries--I shared my knowledge that the Lord and the Ward are there to help her through this hard time, and Sister N opened up to Kim about how hard it was growing up when her Mom wouldn't go to church. The Spirit was there testifying and teaching, and we all cried some, but it was the good kind of crying. : ) 

Since Brian works at Burger King we stopped by to "grab a snack," but really just to say hello in the middle of the week (See Alma 18:22-23 for a scriptural example (tee hee)). I strayed from my favorite Hershey Pie to try the Reese's example. It was good, but I'm definitely getting my favorite next time.

We had a couple hours before the Relief Society activity, so we tracted some cute houses below the University. It's actually been very warm here this week, especially considering we're in North Dakota in January. For instance, usually there's at least a foot of snow outside, and it's usually so cold that the air in your lungs begins to freeze as soon as you inhale. Not super pleasant, but a fun experience. However, this week it's been warm enough that we can wear 1 coat! And tracting is super nice, because people don't mind opening their doors and talking. :) But Sister N would rather it was cold, just so she didn't keep getting Spring Fever while knowing that it will still be freezing for at least 3 months. But for the day, it was very nice. And then we went to the church, decorated for 20 minutes (It was slightly stressful to decorate that fast--felt a little like Prom.), and then had our activity. The opening on the left of the tables was filled with a projector and screen, where we watched Johnny Lingo. :)

And it was so awesome! Kim H came with her daughter Brittaniee (there was babysitting so that was a nice break for them), despite her broken elbow. Melissa came and had a good time with the Ward, and quite a few sister ended up bringing friends from work. Afterwards Kim pulled us aside and said, "Bishop is going to give me a Priesthood blessing. Do you want to come?" We wanted to scream and jump up and down, but we held it together and agreed (and then danced a little bit in the bathroom :D ). It was a powerful experience, and it is so amazing to witness Kim's journey. She was promised powerful blessings, and we'll do our best to make sure they happen.

Friday was ZTM (Zone Training Meeting), where we learned how to more effectively Role Play, or practice sharing the lessons. It was super helpful, and I'm excited to see the progress within myself personally. I know that practicing will help me share our message with greater clarity. We had our transfer exchange with our Sister Training leader right afterwards, and this time I got to stay in Fargo/Moorehead with Sister W. My goal, or "exchange focus", was to increase my ability to teach with clarity (and to learn what I can do to improve that), so it was great that we ended up having 5 lessons during our time together. Also, I had a surprise interview with President Anderson since I was in Fargo while he was, and he gave me some super helpful advice on teaching.

 

Brian left this note on his door--I was with Sister W in Fargo, but Sister N took a picture and I thought it was pretty cute. ("My Mormon friends" : ) )

 

 

 

It's a blurry picture, but the gas price still stands out: $1.84/gal! I never imagined I'd see it so low!

We had an exciting Sunday--Melissa was finally able to make it to church, so we were helping her with Madison and Brooklyn during the meetings, as well as making sure she had her interview with Bishop. And then Kim H's family came, so we made sure to sit by them, but they left before we could really talk! And then a huge family of more-elderly brothers/cousins/sons? came in, and as missionaries we got kinda' stuck talking to the new people. And then (!) Brian and Rose showed up when we were setting up for the potluck! Our missionary minds were exploding with excitement and anxiety by then--we hadn't asked anyone ahead of time to sit with them and make sure they felt welcome, so we just tried to do it all at once. But I think everyone had a good experience, and hey, it's not my, work it's the Lord's, and He always makes sure our best efforts aren't wasted. Since Brian had had to cancel his lesson on Saturday (see the picture of the Doorknob Note) we met after Potluck and had a 2-hour discussion on the Plan of Salvation. It's so hard to make sure the lessons don't go way over because Brian gets super excited about the information we're bringing, and he has a lot of comments and questions. It's awesome, because he's actually taking in and applying what we're talking about, it just can get really deep and takes time. We started out the lesson with an invitation to be baptized, and while he's still not sure, once we talk about the Gospel and clarify the role of the Priesthood he'll really understand.

And that wasn't even the craziest part of Sunday! 

That night at around 7:00 we got a forwarded text from our District Leader saying that as Monday was a holiday and people would be home, we'd switch Monday to a normal proselyting day and do our preparation day on Tuesday. Sister N and I were shocked at the news--at first, we were sure it was a joke. No one would gives us news like that so last-minute, right? But we found out that the schedule WAS going to change. The only problem was, we already had 6 appointments scheduled for Tuesday, and we'd planned to spend Monday with the Pet family, and it was going to be REALLY HARD to be obedient on this one. During our nightly planning session we actually planned Monday as a preparation day, but as soon as we ended our closing prayer I was pretty sure we'd made the wrong decision. We were waiting for President Anderson to call us back, to see if we could get permission to keep our normal schedule, but when I asked Sister N if we should pray about our plans. Was our decision to have P-day on Monday the wrong one? I'd felt a growing sense of unease all during that evening, and during our prayer there was basically a pit in my soul that just kept sinking and sinking. Sister N looked up at me, I said it didn't feel very good, she said she'd gotten the answer that we needed to change our plans, so at 9:45 we went back to the planner and figured out how to reschedule our day.

It was really hard to be obedient to leadership that time, especially since it had seemed so unreasonable, but that night we both knew that we'd made the right choice. Sometimes the Lord gives you answers that you definitely don't want or expect, but He always knows better. And I'm very grateful now that we listened, especially since yesterday when we stopped by Kim's house she invited us over to make coconut oil products, and since today is P-day it worked out perfectly. : ) 

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Mission News: 

-As many of you have already heard (in fact, it seems like most people knew about this before the missionaries did), the South Dakota Rapid City Mission's boundaries will be reorganized in July. Our Zone Leaders addressed this during our monthly training meeting, but all they said is to keep working like normal and worry about it when it's happening. : ) So that's the plan.

-To end their service with a bang, President & Sister Anderson announced that our whole mission will be going through the 12-week missionary Training program over their last 6 months. I just finished training and was basically heartbroken to see that resource leave my day, so I'm very excited for these next months.

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This week was a good week of growth for me. Ether 12:27 comes to mind; "And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them." Ether 12:27.

I love you all! 

-Sister Fin

Week 13: The Lord is the Perfect Planner

"Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths." Proverbs 3:5-6

 Good week, everyone? I hope so.

So... ; ) ... what I'm trying to hint at with this week's headline is that this week, though it didn't go exactly according to plan, was a very good week. We found 2 new investigators in this first week of this transfer, for example, after having spent many hours finding 0 people last transfer. And our lessons have been amazing as I've been constantly trying to improve my Christlike teaching skills (The more I study the more I see I have a long ways to go.).

All I really have to say about last Monday is Sister N made cinnamon rolls. When I was Sister W's companion, I made the life-changing/foundation-building decision that if I could only have one type of dessert for the rest of my life, it would be cinnamon rolls. So I definitely love those. And it was super excellent because Sister N's recipe is cheap and fast. I will definitely be adding it to my collection for all the Fin posterity. Well, actually we also had a good first visit with Shannon Hill. She grew up in an LDS home in Idaho, but when she moved to Jamestown for college she drifted off the gospel path as is so easy to do, and just sort of ended up staying here. But yesterday, Bishop Garr let us know that her mom called him and said she wants to have the peace the Gospel brings again (sorry about the confusing sentence, but I'm too lazy to edit). So what you can take from this is she's basically very ready to come back. : D

On Tuesday we got to have Kim S, who has been back from her mission in Brazil for officially 1 transfer (6 weeks), drive us around all day and come to lessons. Working with her is basically every missionary's dream, because she knows exactly what a lesson with a member should be like. She's super in tune with the Spirit, and she knows the Preach My Gospel outline. So great. Not to mention her crazy fun personality (crazy things happen to her all the time). Like usual, most of our appointments fell through, but she was with us for a surprise visit to Brittaniee, a spunky mom of 1 autistic toddler girl and 1 super-calm baby boy. (Her Mom fed us dinner on Christmas, if you remember.) We shared the mormon message Mountains to Climb, and it was really good. It was funny because we head 4 girls all sitting together, trying to inconspicuously wipe their tears and not wanting to be the first one to talk because that would probably lead to crying. : ) Ahh, 'tis good to be a Sister Missionary. Sadly, I left my camera in Kim's Jeep, so you'll have to wait for pictures. Wednesday night, Kim drove back up and we had an epic lesson with Bob. Or maybe it was the same for everyone else, but I just had an amazing experience because I was so much more in tune with the Spirit, I had so much more focus and understanding than I've ever experienced in a lesson before. Bob said that he knows what we've shared is true, he's just scared of change. He could really use some prayers right now, especially for strength. : )

Thursday was the day that really inspired this week's focus. We woke up to 30+ mph wind with snow (so it was about -20 with windchill). We were supposed to have gone to Carrington, but our appointment ended up being cancelled on the other end, and then it was so crazy outside we decided we'd better just stay in Jamestown. But we totally needed to be here because the Lord had already planned out our day perfectly. We found out last Sunday that Kim H, the one who fed us Christmas dinner, had slipped on the ice and broken her elbow, so we offered to help clean. She refused our help as we were "in skirts" (! Since when did that make a difference?), but she did let us share a message. We read Helaman 5:1-12 and concluded with the Mountains to Climb video. She already has such a strong testimony that the Gospel of Jesus Christ gives us the power to overcome and endure all the hard things in life, and it was a blessing for me to hear that. I know that she's had to overcome some major obstacles, and I was once again given the opportunity to know that I'm here in Jamestown not because people need me, but that I am strengthened by them. She's going to start reading scriptures every night with Nathan. : ) Then we went to Easter Seals/Goodwill for some service, which took a couple hours, and right after our scheduled time was over Sister K called to see if we had time to help her friend move. She also bribed us with Knefla soup. (! Every missionary wants this phone call!) We "definitely had time," so we drove right over and I can now say that I've not only assisted someone in using a public school bus to move, but I've also done so in blizzard weather. (I really wish I'd had my camera for that.) We were just finishing up then when Sister V called to see if we could come over and teach Daniel a lesson. Yeah, that happened. So we went over and had cocoa and taught him the 10 Commandments, and then we went to Sister K's and ate her delicious knefla soup. : ) (Sister N and I will be making some today.) All this happened, and with the last hour of the day filled with Weekly Planning, we were super glad we'd been in Jamestown. Thanks Heavenly Father! He's a perfect planner and we are not. Therefore, when your schedule goes crazy, just go with it.

On Friday we helped Kim (with the broken elbow) clean her house. (Funny enough, I used to kinda' hate cleaning bathrooms, but now that I'm out here in the field, I have a constant yearning to scrub me some tile. So I volunteered to clean her bathroom and it was super rewarding. I even got to use a "shark" mop, which is basically a vacuum/type steamer mop that plugs into the wall. I don't know. It was really fun.) That really helped us strengthen our relationship with her husband Dale, which is super good. (Pray for them too! Pray that Dale will want to learn more about the LDS faith.) The Elders had a baptism we attended that night, which was really neat. After the baptism we had planned to stay at the church and practice for our musical number that's coming up, but we decided to go across the street and visit Liz & Tom W. Liz has an LDS sister in Utah, which is why she let us in to visit last time. She's super inquisitive and has an excellent sense of design--her home is really beautiful, as is her wardrobe. But she's also quick to joke and laugh. She's basically really fun. : ) But anyway, this time when we visited she started asking us questions right away about the Gospel, and the Book of Mormon, and church, and every good thing. We never know what she's thinking, because she always just says, "Ahh, that's very interesting," and then moves right on to the next topic. She loves having us over, though, and even mentioned that she'll feed us dinner soon (so far they've given us leftover steak and lefsa, and she also loads us up with cocoa and candy). And we left with a prayer, so that was great. : D Lots of smiles!

Saturday was good. We found at at 9:00 am that there was a baptism at 1:00, and through an orderly series of miracles we were able to get Melissa, her three kids, and the three kids she was babysitting to the church in time to witness this sacred ordinance. It was great! Melissa hadn't seen a baptism before, and since she's on date for the 25th now, we wanted to make sure she's really prepared. So that was good. But our highlight of the day was definitely meeting with Brian. I'm not sure if I've talked about him yet, but a couple weeks ago when we tracted through a trailer park we met him briefly before he had to go to work. We rescued one of his cats from the outside, which was good, and he was so seemingly out-of-the-blue friendly and interested that I knew we had to to back. So we went back on Sunday night and talked on his doorstep for about 15 minutes, and even though it was way too cold the Spirit kept us warm, and we set up an appointment for Saturday at 2:00. He's super intelligent--apparently somewhat socially disabled because of his high intelligence--but he had a ton of good questions. Since it was the first lesson we focused on the Restoration of the Gospel, and he basically directed the lesson in the PMG order. It was so crazy! He has such a strong testimony of prayer--in the years he spent homeless, so many miracles happened that led to him being where he is today. We can't wait for next Saturday. Also, that cat we saved ended up being from an "ancient race" of cats that has 8 toes on each paw. It kinda' looks like it's wearing mittens; slightly weird, but also elegant.

And then Sunday was yesterday, and we had the super rare opportunity of meeting with Bishop G for a whole hour (we were pretty lucky to get that much time with a bishop on a Sunday). We basically just coordinated everything that we're doing and figured out what he wants us to do to help the ward, and he's super missionary minded and it was awesome. For instance, he's going to start coming with us to our lessons with Nathan G (the one whose mom's elbow is broken). He lives 45 minutes out of town, and he's starting up a dental office and he's a bishop, so this is really a big sacrifice of time. So, good day.

I know that if missionary work wasn't so important, it definitely wouldn't work out so well. But the Lord helps those who try really hard, especially when they're inviting others to come unto Christ by helping them receive the restored Gospel through faith in Jesus Christ and His Atonement, repentance, receiving the Gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end. : ) I love this lifestyle so much! I find myself having to consciously keep the phrase #blessed out of my vocabulary, just because it describes each moment so well.

Thank you for the prayers and support. Keep up the good work!

Love,
Sister Fin

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Whoops! I thought I sent this last week--I guess the internet wasn't working or something.

Week 12: In Which We Practice Being Joyful

"The sluggard will not plow by reason of the cold; therefore shall he beg in harvest, and have nothing." Proverbs 20:4

Hello everybody! (If anyone has any good ideas for a greeting, please share. I feel like I say this every week.)

As you can see by this week's scripture, it has been cold; and, as such, the work has been pretty slow. I'd expected that when I learned I'd be coming to SDRCM (South Dakota Rapid City Mission), but I didn't realize just how frustrating it is to be a missionary with nothing to do. This has led me to be even more grateful than I was before to be Sister N's companion, because even though we're struggling with finding people to teach and our appointments keep falling through, we're still happy!

On Tuesday it was pleasantly warm outside--around 30 degrees? We mostly drove around trying to visit members and potential investigators other missionaries had found through tracting efforts. And we found Thandi M, who was baptized 3 years ago and then seemingly fell off the charts. She's from South Africa, and was taught by, guess who, the Br.s! It turns out she works on Sundays, but we're going to start visiting her every week. : ) She can speak English, Spanish, Zulu, and is working on Russian--hopefully she'll teach us something cool!

Tricia's plates are the same as our plates at home! I love it so much!

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We were going to meet with Angalyn the next day, but she was sick with the plague. We're going to have to start meeting with her every day if we can meet her current baptismal date for January 17th--it'll be interesting to see how everything works out. She's just so excited to be baptized! Fortunately, we were able to see Melissa and make sure her baptism is still good to go. Since she was sick, we just watched The Testament, a super cheesy yet super excellent movie about 3 Nephi 9-11. Tricia fed us Nachos for dinner, and here is the picture. ->

 

We also switched Sister Nielson to our Designated Driver so that she can get really comfortable with navigating Jamestown. It's weird to overcome my habit of checking for the keys every time we leave the apartment. I love being able to look out the window and take pictures again!

Sister Nielson was finally able to Skype her family on the 1st, and it was super fun to be the one on the sidelines. They're way cute, and I definitely want to go to one of her family reunions some day. (Her parents were on a cruise during Christmas, but they promised to take her next year so it's all good.) Our appointment with Karen & Richard fell through (noticing a pattern?) which was super sad, but we went through our potentials list and found another couple we can try next week, so that balanced out pretty well. Also, we became super good friends with Liz and Tom, a couple that lives across the street from our church. They fed us Lefsa and gave us leftover steak and soup, and we made plans to call them in 10 years and tell them about how life is going. : )

It was thankfully warm enough to tract on Friday--it was a special treat to only wear one coat and feel the sun shining on our faces. (That said, I realized I should probably be taking Vitamin D supplements.)

 Norway meets Fake Mexico in our dinner creation--steak breakfast burritos on Lefsa tortillas (potato-based and rectangular). It was actually really delicious.

 

Saturday morning, we looked out the window and saw a howling mess. It is now officially a North Dakota winter--definitely colder than -30* with windchill. It's strange to see how the snow will act and blow like sand when it's so cold and it can't stick to anything. All of our appointments fell through (bleh), and we couldn't tract, so we visited potential investigators and members and basically used about 30 miles. But! Our crazy was not wasted, because we found the Wan. family. The missionaries had tracted into them in April, right when their mom had been diagnosed with cancer. She passed away in October, and we're going to meet with them and talk about the Plan of Salvation. It's amazing how as missionaries we're able to be there exactly when we need to.

Sunday was also very cold, but fortunately they didn't cancel church. : ) That would've been exciting, and apparently it happens sometimes. Our appointments fell through again, as was almost by then 100% predicted. Slightly frustrating. But Tori stayed strong, and we got to visit her and Darryl! We've been worried about Darryl since we haven't met for about a month, but while he kept the TV on, he listened and prayed with us, so all is not lost. : ) Heavenly Father will definitely take care of him.

After Tori's we had an amazing experience with a potential investigator. It was really cold yesterday, but we'd gotten out of our lesson with Tori early and we had a few minutes. We were right by the trailer park we'd tracted last week, and there was one gentleman we never could seem to catch at home. Driving by we saw his car was home, so we stopped and knocked on his door. And we learned his name is Brian, and he told us about what it's like to be homeless in North Dakota, and he's SO ready for the Gospel! The Spirit kept us warm for about 10 minutes, and then we really had to go warm up so we scheduled an appointment for Saturday. It was so great! Feeling the Spirit on a doorstep is pretty amazing. ​

Afterwards, we went to the amazing Pet. family's home and they warmed us up with homemade hot chocolate. : ) We'll be spending our 3rd P-day this month with them, ice skating! ​

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Training is inspired and I miss it already. Every day this week (and the last 12 weeks), we've learned about what we needed to learn about for exactly that time. The amount of time we had always worked out perfectly with the amount of material we needed to go over. And now it's over. During my first 12 weeks out, I've gained a STRONG testimony of the power that comes from 12-Week Training. We had an amazing experience each night this week as we watched the District and received inspiration for each of our investigators--we're now much closer to directing the investigator to teach 50% (a goal from President Anderson)! I'm definitely going to miss that extra hour of study each day, but I'll do my best to keep the booklet in my daily studies. :) ​

Thanks for all of the prayers and emails and letters. We can all do hard things, but it's much easier with the amazing support group I have back home. : ) ​

Love,
Sister Fin