Look to the Lord and Live!

2/25/2013

Again Sister Little and I were blessed with a pretty busy week. I cannot remember if I told you about the Bates family or not...so I will just do a quick reminder.  They attended the Calgary Temple Open House and their daughter was the #100,000 person to attend.  They have been wanting to meet with the missionaries since then and due to scheduling conflicts...still have not met with us.  Our appointments on Monday fell through so I suggested that we stop by the Bates - and they were home.  We asked them why they thought it would be important to meet with us.  They said they hadn't really thought about it before.  We were able to give most of the first lesson and they just nodded in agreement the entire time.  They are searching for a church to join and they are so prepared to hear the gospel, but Satan is causing such opposition when it comes to meeting with them. We set up a return appointment and even a back up appointment and their kids got strep throat...so we couldn't meet with them.  Please pray that we will be able to get in and teach them soon.

We also had a really good lesson with Barb this week.  She is loving reading the Book of Mormon and we encouraged her to visit lds.org and listen to some Conference talks.  Barb said that when she is doing research is when she usually gets answers from God. We asked her to pray out loud and to pause after the prayer and listen to what God would say to her.  She did and Barb said "trust, trust, trust" was what she heard.  She is having a really hard time accepting God's will right now.  We shall see what our next lesson brings, what the Lord has told her to do. :) She is so great! Once she gets over this trial I feel that she will progress to baptism quickly.

We had some other pretty fantastic lessons this week. One was with Edward, the man from China.  We focused our lesson on the nature of God and prayer.  Edward didn't want to say the closing prayer, but he said he would think about what we have taught and would consider giving it next time.  Although it kind of seems that he just wants to meet with us to practice his English, I think what we have taught Edward he really has been thinking about.

Other exciting news - three of our investigators came to church! Hopefully they will be progressing towards baptism soon! We are having a get together this week with some of the part member/less active/investigators in the ward.  It's going to be amazing! Also, we got permission from President to watch the CES Broadcast this Sunday!!!!! I am so stoked because I LOVE CES Broadcasts!!!! Yeah!!!

Things are going great! Hope you all have a wonderful week!

-Sister Douglass

Insert Interesting Subject...

20 Feb 2013

 

Dear Family,

 

I am really confused about where this last week went.  It just flew by, but then again last Monday seems like it was ages ago.  I do not understand.  This week was pretty busy, which was fantastic! We had four investigator lessons, which I believe is the most I have had in a week.  We are hoping one will get baptized soonish- but he and his girlfriend need to get married.  They want to stick with their original wedding date of June.  And we need him to gain his own testimony.  He has told missionaries that he is just doing it for his girlfriend.  Our lesson with Sam was alright.  We had been planning to have it on Wednesday, but his day off got switched so we had a quick lesson with him on Tuesday.  Apparently he believes in the trinity and there is a bigger language barrier than we anticipated.  At least when it comes to talking about the gospel.  Hopefully we can get him to church on Sunday and get him to read from the Book of Mormon.  Wednesday was great fun because we had to go on splits. Not because we hate each other, because we had too many teaching appointments for the evening! Woot woot! I went with a return sister missionary and Sister Little went with a less active sister that is coming back to church.  Annelisa and I taught Barb, and she had read from the Book of Mormon! We went over Chapters 1 and 2 of 1 Nephi and read Chapter 3 with her.  Barb liked 1 Nephi 3:7 and she wants to do a self evaluation of the Ten Commandments to see what she need to work on.  We talked a little bit about the Sabbath Day and she told us that she is having a mini rebellion against God right now.  She is really trying to accept His will, but is having a hard time with it.  She has been very religious her entire life, so going to church is very familiar with her.  She is very excited to meet with us again.  I am praying that she has an incredible experience with the Book of Mormon and she will just feast upon it! We had a quick lesson with Sharon and she is feeding us tonight.  Her ex-husband is a member and Sister Little started teaching her when she was in the other ward (right next to our ward). Due to the ward boundary changes we now have Sharon in our ward, yeah! Sister Little bought up a really interesting point.  She was convinced that she would be leaving this transfer and when she didn't she told me, "Oh, yeah. We were suppose to be together during the temple open house, so we would have served two transfers together.  Also, we must need to teach someone in Arbour Lake area because Arbour Lake was a part of Royal Oak, which we would have been together for." Interesting how God works things.

 

Friday was my year mark. Yikes. I don't want to talk about it- but the sister I went on splits with sent me a very nice text.  It was Zone Conference and it was amazing! I just love being spiritual fed.  I was reminded about when I get a prompting, just follow it.  "Revelation is pouring down like rain, are we open to receiving it." I have decided that I need to refocus my thoughts and recommit myself to the Lord. Not that I have been doing bad, but after a reevaluation, that's what I came to a conclusion of.  President Nicholas asked each of us, what are we still willing to sacrifice for the Lord.  So I have been thinking a lot about that lately.

 

Sunday was a little crazy.  We have to try to figure how to attend two wards that start at the same time that are in two separate buildings (they are about 10 minutes away from each other).  We had the chance to teach Young Women's, which was fun.  It was interesting seeing the new curriculum. Good stuff.

 

Any who we have another busy week ahead of us.  Hopefully we can get our investigators to progress and come to church!

Love you all lots!!

-Sister Douglass

Short Little Note

Please forgive me for sending such a short note.  The members we live with offered to take us to Banff again today.  We just got back in and we have about twenty minutes to email before we are heading off to dinner.  I am amazed at the Beauty of Winter.  We did a short hike in Johnston Canyon to the Lower and Upper Falls.  We drove up to Lake Lousie and since it was mostly frozen over we did a short hike on the lake.  It was pretty nifty-wifty.  They had a few ice sculptures in front of the huge hotel (The Chateau...something like that) and one of them was an ice castle.  It was pretty fantastic.

This week we continued to face some opposition.  We had twelve investigator lessons set up, but we ended up only have two.  And those two were sort of last minute things.  We stopped by a less active's house and her daughter is twelve and not baptized - so we are teaching her off and on and she told us we could come back later and have a lesson.  Then the other one was we were having dinner with the former bishop and his son is good friends with Barb's daughter. So we asked him to invited Barb over to dinner as well.  He didn't really get back with us, he's reply was "sure".  So, we didn't know if she was officially coming or not.  But - Barb did show up to dinner, which was pretty fantastic.

We finally got some information regarding transfers that happened last week - Sister Mazzolini went back down south and is opening a new sister's area (Sterling).  Sister Batty is training, Sister Egbert from Nevada.  Sisters are now in Cochrane and Banff, Sister England and her trainee, Sister Long.  It was really interesting to see that the Sisters we thought would train didn't and those that were set up to move are now training.  Thankfully the Lord has everything in control.  Thank goodness.

Highlight of the week: we stopped by a girl who should be attending the YSA ward, but she wants to keep her records in the family ward.  She is contemplating going on a mission- and we of course are encouraging that.  She got baptized...two years ago...I think.  We were able to catch her at home and we had a good visit/lesson.  After we left we decided that we needed to go back and heart attack her.  Now, this was tricky, since we knew that she was home and on her laptop in the front room. :) We started to attack hearts to her door and I went to go fix one when we hear her gasp and then start to laugh her head off.  Come to find out, she had started to watch "The Grudge" and she looked up and saw the shadow of my hand through the window.  It was pretty funny.

We shall see what marvelous miracles the Lord sends our way this week!

lots of love!

-Sister Douglass

Update

Well it looks like Sister Little and I are serving together for another transfer.  Apparently we are going to be sharing our area with another set of sisters.  We are not sure what that all entails, so we shall see what tomorrow brings. There were many unexpected changes with this transfer.  A lot of the sisters who are training we were not thinking they would train again.  I'm sure Heavenly Father knows what He wants President Nicholas to do, but it's just interesting.  One thing that we do know is that all of the older sisters will be training next transfer since there are fourteen sisters coming out!

This week was pretty good.  We were a little bummed since we had four investigator lessons yesterday and three of them fell through. We did service with someone and we were not able to have a lesson before some company arrived.  We did pick up a former investigator, but having consistent lessons will be a concern.  Story of this transfer - or maybe this area.  I don't know.

It was really interesting going to the Arbour Lake ward - it about quadrupled in size.  Our ward mission lead suggested that we each get up and bear our testimony.  I hadn't slept well, plus I had a cold, plus fasting = headache and praying that I was making coherent sentences. :)

One of our potential investigators that we were suppose to get in with yesterday - but rescheduled for Thursday - is a referral from the Open House.  Their daughter was the 100,000 visitor to the temple open house. :) We feel that they are ready to receive the gospel and they are very open.  We just need to have a lesson with them...and we found out that they are moving. Bummer, but if we can get missionaries in with them that is all that matters.

Sorry this is a shorter letter. I only got three hours of sleep last night and I took so Dayquil.  I hope everyone has a good day.  Also - if you have written me a letter I promise I will write you back soon.  I am still playing catch up from Christmas...:)

Have a fantastic week!

-Sister Douglass

Then Sings My Soul!

1/28/2013

Dear Family,

Well we have had some gorgeous weather up here.  Today is the warm before the storm and the temperature plummeting. Thankfully it should stay in the teens, but with the wind chill it will probably be close to -20. Yuck, but another tender mercy - we have quite a few appointments set up for this week.

We had our big stake meeting yesterday and technically we no longer have one of our wards.  They dissolved two wards and created one.  They dissolved one of our wards and one of the Elders wards.  We are pretty sure we are going to be over the new ward since it was most of our "old" ward plus some of the Elders ward. There is a lot of work to be done.  We feel that in the March transfer they will probably split up our two wards between two sets of missionaries since there is so much work to be done up here.

We continue to see lots of miracles. We were able to pick up two new investigators this week - and both are looking pretty promising.  I'll start with the sad news. We will probably be dropping Heather this week.  We stopped by her house and she told us that it again was a "bad time". We are going to try by one more time this week and if she is unwilling to meet with us we will officially "drop" her.  Which is sad.  When we stopped by I asked Heather if she had read from the Book of Mormon and she said no. I told her that she should and started to promise her blessings and she gave me a forced smile and practically shut the door in our face. If only she knew what she could have! But - we had an amazing lesson with Barb.  We talked about scripture study and read the Introduction to the Book of Mormon, the Testimony of the Witnesses and Joseph Smith.  Barb told us that it made a lot more sense this time around when we read it together.  She is so sweet and we both feel good that she will progress quite well.

We were trying to get in with a part member family this week.  The wife is less active and her husband has been taught.  We finally caught the husband when he was home, but it was bad timing.  We will try again next week, but since we had exercised our faith and had another sister with us we decided to stop by some male potential investigators and we would be able to get in with them right then.  We stopped by Edward and he invited us in! The Spanish Elders originally found Edward and gave him to the Mandarin Elders, but Edward wants to be taught in English no Mandarin.  Okay...I guess we'll teach him. Edward and his family is from China. I think they have been in Canada for at least 8 years or more.  He has four daughters and his wife works.  I guess he is too old (he's probably in his 50s) and no one wants to hire him.  Also, he says his English isn't that good.  (He speaks English very well, but he may have a harder time comprehending). We will have to take things slower for Edward, but he's great.  He has been to a Catholic ESL class and the Jehovah Witnesses have taught him, so going over the Godhead was interesting.  His face was priceless when we told him we believe in three separate beings. "No, no, three in one, three in one." Oh my he is hilarious.  It's going to be great teaching him.  Especially when we found out that the word "Mormon" in Mandarin means something like "devil" so the Book of Mormon translated in Mandarin reads like "the Devil's Book." Oh boy....thank goodness for having a Elder from China who can help us with these concerns.

One more great story.  So we went over to a less actives house.  She has had depression, but she is getting motivated and is heading on a good path. She needs continual encouragement and positive influence.  Erin is living in a house with five male roommates. I know, it sound interesting, but what can you do.  Last week when we stopped by we decided to have an opening hymn and we sang "I am a Child of God". One of her roommates decided to record us on his phone and apparently Erin has heard him listening to it throughout the week.  Another one of her roommates paused his video game to listen to us. And others have commented on our singing. :) We are going to try create a singing lesson for her this week. :) I thought it was great. haha.

I hope you are staying warm and all is going well!

-Sister Douglass

Continuation of a Chinook - yes please

1/21/2013

Dear Family,

We have had a few days of cooler weather, but it still is not bad.  I'm still waiting for us to reach -40, but I will not complain.

The highlight of the week was definitely going to the temple. Oh my it had been way too long - nine months to be exact.  Yeah for having the temple in your zone- you can go every other transfer.  Any who, I had an overwhelming feeling of peace and comfort while I was in the temple, just what I needed.  Sister Little told me she was worried that she would not be able to get me out of the temple.  I could have just spent the entire day there.  Thankfully I was able to get the boost that I needed and I am so grateful for that.

We have been doing very well at establishing weekly visits with people, especially less actives, which is super nice.  We finally were able to get a hold of some less actives and we tried to set up appointment with them.  The most common response: please call me and then we will set up a time.  Okay...we will do our best to get a hold of you.  Or "we will call you back." I wish I believed people when they said that.  Our weekends still are a little empty, but we are working on it. 

We had a lesson with a former investigator.  We were hoping to bring a member with us, but the member fell through.  The man's name is Tesfa and he and his wife are from Egypt.  I do not think his wife knows much English.  Over a year ago Tesfa had gone down to Temple Square and had a good experience.  When Sisters had taught him before he had concerns regarding almost every point of doctrine in the first lesson.  Our plan of attack was going to be to watch "Between Heaven and Earth" and talk about his experience at Temple Square.  Well, that did not go as planned.  He had a question for us about priesthood authority and that's what we pretty much spent the entire lesson about.  We did point out the scripture about baptisms for the dead - which he had never noticed before.  (Tesfa is very knowledgeable with the Bible). It was also interesting trying to teach purely from the Bible, he would not let us use the Book of Mormon.  There doesn't seem to be very much real intent or interest with him at this point.  But Tesfa said that he would do some research about how men receive authority from God in the Bible and we will follow up next week.

We also contacted another former investigator, Barb.  She is a sweetheart.  Barb has a really good friend who is a member and her daughter took piano lessons from her.  Barb attended a baptism in the fall and then no one has been in contact with her since.  She is undergoing chemotherapy and has cancer related fatigue.  She is more than willing to let us come over and visit.  She doesn't like to ask for help, but she is willing to let us doing some light house cleaning as needed.  Sister Little also asked if we could come over and read the Book of Mormon with her.  Barb loved that idea and admitted that she really has not been reading it.  That is the key - you need to read the Book of Mormon in order to know that it is true. (And pray about it....)

Other exciting news - the ward boundaries will be changing on Sunday.  There has been so much speculation going around, it's kind of funny.  It's sound just like the missionaries trying to do transfer predictions.  It's a little strange thinking that we will be having a new area next week - losing some people, gaining some people.  I'm trying not to be stressed out about it, because there is nothing that I can do, except to just accept the Lord's will.  So, you shall be hearing about that next week.

That's about all I can think of for this week.  Hopefully we will help Barb to progress and continue to help bring people closer to Christ!

Have a fantastic week and don't freeze!

-Sister Douglass

Now Comes the Snow

1/14/2013

Dear Family,

 

Our trip to Banff was amazing!! Of course my camera is in my other bag at home, so hopefully I will be able to send pictures next week.  Banff is a very mountainous area that was cover with snow and packed with pine trees. We drop past Two Jack Lake, stopped at Lake M or W something (haha) and took a few pictures and then we went to Johnston Lake.  Sister McIntyre's daughter drove us and she brought her family.  While we walked on the lake and around it the children went sledding.  Yes, I did walk on a lake. :) It was frozen over, but it was still neat.  We then headed over to the Banff Springs Hotel.  There is a little ice rink in front of the hotel, so the children continued to sled and ice stake while we checked out the hotel and took many pictures. :) Sister Little warned everyone that we were going to look like tourists while we were there.  It was so peaceful and nice not to be rushed going places.  We walked up to a castle looking restaurant that over looks the ice rink and it was so pretty! It looked like a very classy winter wonderland puzzle or post card with all of the people ice staking and giant snow covered mountains in the background.  We did drive to the main street in Banff and spent a little bit of time looking at some of the shops.  We got fudge at this famous candy store.  I've been saving mine since I am still working on the mountain of candy I got for Christmas. ;) I am looking forward to going back in the summer time.  And...we would like to go again.  We shall see what we can arrange.  There is this hike through Johnston Canyon to some waterfalls and I think it goes up to Lake Lousie.  I cannot describe how wonderful it was, but it was probably one of my most favorite p-days ever.

 

We stopped by two potential investigators and we talked about families.  They both said that we could come back on Saturday.  We did and neither one of them were home.  Yeah for people having lives and wanting to do things with their children.  No worries, we will catch them another day.

 

Okay my mind got blown TWICE this week.  We had a zone meeting and the zone leaders told us about the projected numbers for in coming missionaries for the summer.  The elders will increase by about 40, there will be two more Mandarin Elders, I think Spanish missionaries will increase by four - two of which will be SISTERS! And...are you ready for this? There are saying that there will be SIXTY sisters by the summer. I just about had an ulcer when they said that.  I could feel my blood pressure rising.  Then we had interviews with President Nicholas and he said that five sisters will be coming out next transfer and there will be FOURTEEN coming out the following transfer.  Yikes.  It's super exciting, but it most likely means that I will be training two sisters at the same times.  President asked how my Spanish was....yeah...I am going to pray that I will not train the Spanish sisters (the two come out at different transfers).

 

We had a lesson with Heather.  We went over the Restoration and we really tried to emphasize on priesthood authority and how the gospel blesses families.  It was kind of hard to concentrate because her child was watching a movie and the volume was very loud.  I will be better about asking people to turn off all distractions or at least turning the volume down. After our lesson Heather told us that she sees a lot of parallels between our religion and her culture so she does not see a need for her to change. :( I was really bummed after she told us that.  She did schedule an appointment for next week....so we shall see what will happen.

 

Thursday was Sister Little's Birthday.  Thursday is when we do our weekly planning so we thankfully spent most of the day inside.  I'm trying to remember if that was the day we had a big snow storm or it was cold.  I think it was rather cold that day. It was really funny that the weather said we would have "flurries for a few hours".  Yeah...it was near white out conditions at times and we ended up getting close to 5 inches of snow in two days.  It was great.  It is snowing again today, but we have a Chinook coming our way.  It's suppose to be in the 40s later on this week.  I'm trying to brace myself for when we get our week of -30 to -40.  I think every one's prayers are working if it hasn't been to bad yet. Thank you! :)

 

We were invited over to Binithi's house the day after her birthday.  One of the family friends were over and she asked us a lot of questions about being a missionary.  It's great when people think that we are nuns.  She many of her questions were about mission rules, so we tried to help her understand that we don't live these standards for the rest of our lives.

 

The baptism went well.  I think 1/3 of the ward showed up. :) We had the service in the chapel because there were so many people there.  We did have joint baptism with a child of record.  I am so grateful for all of the ward support we had.  It was a little crazy, but everything worked out. Hopefully it will be a day they both remember.

 

Hopefully we will be able to get in with the rest of our investigators.  Scheduling seems to be our challenge right now.

Love you lots and I hope you don't freeze down there!

-Sister Douglass