Nov 21 2011
"WoW!
The past few weeks have been crazy!!!!!!!! I’m not even kidding you, crazy! Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!! Let us give thanks to our Savior forever!!!!!!!!!
Every day is a crazy day in Vegas. It’s hard for my letters to be 100% spiritual, because our days are so random!!! Every day is epic...epically hilarious moments, epic spiritual lessons...EPIC EVERYTHING!!! And I am epically TIRED!
We have had 4 more investigators sent to us by Heavenly Father this week!!! THIS MAKES 20 Investigators!!!!!!!!!!!! Heavenly Father is crazy! This is sooo awesome!!!!!!!!!!!! In my last area we had TOPS 4-5 investigators. My mind is blown away by the Trust Heavenly Father has for us! This is Big! This is HUGE!!!!!!!! This is SO much WORK!!!!! It’s amazing though! Missionary work is COMPLETELY led by his holy spirit!!!!!!! With our every action and thought...we listen for the spirit and follow its promptings!!
I am sending pictures, so my words this week are few. This week, we pulled up in a new hood we found in our area to contact a referral, and across the street the door was open to someone’s shanty house, and they were making meth, and on the contrast, we had a beeeaautiful baptism on Saturday!!! There’s no greater feeling then helping someone become clean. The man who was baptized is so awesome and when he was getting the gift of the Holy Ghost on Sunday, in his blessing it said he would serve a mission! AHH! :) It makes me so happy!!! His family was all baptized last year, and so they each came up to us and looked us in the eye and thanked us. "Thank you for everything you have done for my brother." .... really though, it’s all Heavenly Father! We barely did a thing.
We had 8 investigators at church :) Yay!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Love love love!!! Next weeks letter will be so bomb! I promise!! Tell 10 people in person WHY you are thankful for them!
I am thankful for LIFE!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Nov. 28 2011Everyone! I am being transferred to Fallon, Nevada!!!! Probably for my last 7 months too! We shall see! 8 transfers down, only 4 more to go! I hope you all had an amazing Thanksgiving!!! My heart is so full. I can't even explain it. These past 6 months in this area has been EPIC. As I looked Bishop in the eyes on my last Sunday, he was crying. He said "I don’t want to see you go. You have no idea how much you have done for this ward." I told him "Bishop, it’s been the best 6 months of my entire life!!!" Family, I can’t explain it to you. My heart is so strong. It is so filled with love. I've never experienced anything like this before. I've never worked so hard for anyone. Each person we teach (which is sooo many!!! 30+), I love them! I have sacrificed for them! I have tried to serve them to the fullest I could! We pray for them, and encourage them along their path... WE love them. Along the 6 months investigators have come and come...more and more we have taught! Heavenly Father has sent them flocking!
Our little herd has grown and flourished into a beautiful flock, grazing in green pasture in the sun. Before we (Heavenly Father, Sister Dillistone, and I), have helped them enter this green pasture, we have tried to be there every stormy step of the way towards this green pasture. Our family (investigators) is now feeling peace! They are basking in the sun of the Holy Ghost. Let me tell you, passing through the storms with them to get to this point has been hard. I know I've written about how unbelievably HARD the past few months have been....and I feel this past week, saying goodbye to everyone, I have had the chance to graze in this peaceful pasture alongside them! What a breathtaking moment. A moment of true never ending peace.
I never knew my personality, my hope and love for the people made such a big difference. Most importantly, I haven’t done anything at all ....it’s all been Heavenly Father. So I sit here writing, about people I really never had the time to write a ton about! That’s unfortunate...so I’ll try to make more time. Sister Dillistone and I had a tiring week. We had to crash in the beginning and take a nap.... we had 2 non-proselyting days...(PDAY and THANKSGIVING), and we stilllll got 23 lessons!!!!! What a blessing!!!!!!!! We also accomplished our goal of shooting for 100 lessons for the transfer! yippppie!!!! We are leading our whole zone in lessons, and are area is the busiest in the mission. WHY do I have to go?? OH well, I am truly verrry excited to go to Fallon!
Because there are more people for me to LOVE!!!! To find! To sacrifice for!! My understanding of missionary work gets more complete and complete with each transfer...especially when you move. Everyone HATED saying goodbye to me this week! It was so sad. I will write of what they have said/done for me...not that I am anyone special...its just Heavenly Fathers spirit they must feel....A Brother came up to me crying 3 Sundays ago at church. He is the Gospel Principles teacher that teaches the class all of our investigators, recent converts and less actives. He said, “I won’t be here in 3 weeks, and I just KNOW you will be transferred." He looking down and then back up and said "Your spirit will be missed. You bring such a light into a room.
You emulate Heavenly Fathers love. I will miss you. I don’t want you to go." A less active Sister we have helped re-activate just balled last Sunday. And yesterday when I asked her to please sign my transfer journal, she couldn’t even write in it she said, because she couldn’t see through her tears.... She is someone I love! I can just go and sit on her lap and hug her! I did it at the end of Relief Society 3 weeks ago, it was so funny! I said" Sistttter!!! Can I sit on your lap??“ and she said "certainly!!" So I sat on her lap, like I do my moms, and I squeezed her and just felt her soft skin against my cheek. Some of the woman looked a little confused. They don’t understand the REAL relationship I have with all those we teach. It’s True love. Its Christ’s love. A couple from Africa said “NOOOO sister!! Why do you have to go? You can’t leaveeee us???" We spent Saturday morning with them. We shared an aweeesome Book of Mormon story and in the closing prayer the guy said "We tank dee Heavenly Father for sending us the sister missionaries.
(Ugh I am crying now...all the time spent bearing their burdens is SO worth it!!!), we thank they for them bringing us to you. To see the light and the truth. We thank dee for Sister Sprouse. Please bless her in Fallon that she will be kept safe, and will be led to many other families to help teach the gospel. We are thankful for her. Please bless Sister Dillingstone and Sprouse, with a peace of mind, knowing that they have done their best at brining us closer to you. We know you are the way, the truth and the life. And we thank dee for all of our many blessings. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen." :( The finally came to church on my last Sunday and LOVED IT!!!!!! Everyone loves them!!!! We sit in the third row from the front with all of our investigators! Good publicity to the ward that they can TRUST us, and then they see WHO our investigators are and come up and say hello! It’s a blessing to have just one investigator.
We have 20! Even though it’s been so hard to help everyone at the same time, my joy is just as great...and its soooo much!!!!!!! Joy x30!! I think missionaries get a little sneak peak of what heaven is like...when people will come up to you and thank you for doing their temple work....Missionary work BRINGS heaven on earth. I’ll be part of it for life!! EVERYONE we said goodbye to didn’t want us to go! They poured their thanks out to us! On Friday, we had 10 lessons set, 6 kept their appointments, and we had 7 on Saturday. 5 on Friday....After I said goodbye, they begged us to come back so they could say goodbye just one more time. "Cant you just stop by again tomorrow?? What time do you leave on Monday??" It was so hard; I had to tell so many no...(No time!!! Still need to pack!!!!). Some are even making us cookies so we will come back. :( MY HEART IS FULL! I feel so happy, so lifted! Missionary work makes SUCH A BIG DIFFERENCE. I NEVER KNEW such joy until this past weekend! My transfer journal is FULL of thankful letters...it’s so sweet. My friend and her family of 7...we said goodbye last night.....ugh we were there for 40 minutes...the whole time they were saying they didn’t want me to go! "What? You are leaving?? Why do YOU have to leave? FALLON! Are you for real?
Sister Sprouse, we love you, you can’t leave us. Sister Sprouse you cant go." ....... I will miss their baptism...that is okay. Dillistone will be great at planning it!! They love me. And I love them. Her family wants to be baptized by the New Year to start out fresh! YAY!!!!!!! They also gave me an early Christmas gift!! A less active family who is now at church!!! JOYYY!!! Their 2 children are being baptized Dec 17th!!! They are soo happy!!!! I loveeee them! They are Hispanic!!!! Another black woman who came to church on her own! On Saturday Sister Dillistone and I taught her the 2nd lesson (plan of happiness)...at the end she started to cry. She looked sincerely at us... "I don’t know why I cry when you come. You bring me so much joy." Her closing prayer- "Please help me to stay in contact with the sisters even after they stop ministering to me..." Afterwards we told her how much we loved her and how great she is doing. Then I explained that sometimes missionaries get moved around, and that I was being moved. "What?" she said with sincere eyes. “You are being moved? Why do you have to go? You are really leaving?"
She is looking forward to her baptism on Dec. 17th. AHH emotional week, but I have stayed strong. (Surprisingly) A new investigator we have .....in her 70’s and has terminal cancer. We have only met her 3 times and the elders have given her a blessing. She is 84 pounds and from New Jersey. She loves life. She cried because she finally feels she has some faith. I hated looking in her eyes and telling her I was being transferred. "Wait, you are leaving?" she made a pouty face and frowned.. I quickly said "NO!! We are going to stay in contact forever! I am going to write you letters!!!!' She hasn’t even been to Fallon....she has just worked all her life. Man, with all of these people I will stay in contact with forever! And I told them all I WOULD!!!!!! Not only our investigators…but the ward members in both wards cant wait to meet my family and for me to visit next summer. A family, who we had dinner with on Friday, gave me an awesome hat with 2 penguins on it, on Sunday, and a scarf and mittens! Another Sister gave me a present too!
And this one family gave us presents and clothes and blankets and food!!!!! The father of the family we live with wrote in my journal "My wife and I spoke the first night you got here and told each other, 'It will be hard to say goodbye.' You are the type of missionary that Mission Presidents, Bishops, and ward members pray for." We went to the Spanish ward last night at 7pm... My friend signed my journal in Spanish! ....I said "donde esta su esposo?" Her boyfriend was at work! She was soo sad to see me go...she frowned and just took my hand and gave me a million hugs..... I sat in the pew and looked back at her. Special moments never to be forgotten. Despues de capilla we went to find her boyfriend! I had to find him! I remember knocking on his door...He is the one who answered and we talked in Spanish! ...We went into CiCi’s pizza and asked for him. It was 9pm. He came and was SOO happy we were there! He asked if we were with his girlfriend and I said No! He was even more joyed. It was only a 2 min visit, but I said to him across the counter how amazing his family is, that I loved them. That whenever they look at the picture I took of their family, they should remember how much the missionaries love them, and how much the Savior does. He said "You’re going to make me cry." I said, you’re such a great man, and you’re making such a difference for your family. Goodbye for now!" He was crying as he looked into my eyes. I haven’t even talked about everyone we taught and said goodbye too! And I am leaving my companion!!!! I love her!! My companion is training after 3 months!!! This is BIG! The prophet and Apostles have introduced a 12 week training program to the field....12 weeks ago. The whole purpose of the program is "train to train"....train a new missionary to become an immediate trainer. So when transfer calls came, president black said, "we are putting this training to the test." Sister Dillistone is the first sister to train to train in this mission.....and only 1 of 5 to do so!! My daughter!!! I am so proud!!! I have 3 daughters and 2 granddaughters now!! (Mission lingo..) My posterity is growing!! So Fallon I will be with Sister Badger to polish her (finish training her)..... She’s been out 3 months and is awesome! She has 20 investigators and a ton of recent converts and less actives to visit.....baptisms to plan…..(we've had 5 baptisms in this area !! YAY!!), and is training. GOOD LUCK DILLISTONE YOU WILL ROCK IT GIRL!!!!!!!!!! Fallon is farming country and there is a naval base and Indian reservations too!! I AM EXCITED!!!! LOVE YOUUUUUUUUUUU tonight will be busy! Picking up dillli's new comp in 6 hours!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!\ ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
