Curve Balls

3/4/2013

Well we had a few surprises this week.  Sister Little and I found out that we will no longer be over 17th ward next transfer, it will be taken over by the District Leader. I was quite upset at this information because two of the people that I feel a very strong connection to and I feel have made the most progress since I have been here are in the 17th Ward.  But two of our investigators are male and it will be a lot easier for the Elders to get in than us.  Plus as we have been trying ti figure out what will help them the best we both agree that they need priesthood holders to help them progress...so overall it will be good.  I know that President Nicholas was prayerful about this decision and this is what the Lord wants.

Next item that we were not expecting this week....training calls.  Sister Little and I are both training.  One of us will be purge training....they didn't tell us who.  Most likely it will be Sister Little, but anything can happen.  So...in mission terms I'm going to be a mom on March 13! Yikes. I knew that I would be training this upcoming transfer due to the amount of Sisters coming in, but after the Assistants told us I just felt a weight of responsibility come down on me.  I have been worried about training and Sister Little has helped me a lot.  We've been going over the trainer's manual and if I have questions about anything she has given me suggestions.  I did get a blessing from the Elders yesterday, which helped me a lot.  It is amazing at how much the Lord is aware of us.  There is such power in the Priesthood.  I still am nervous about training, but not enough to distract me from other things.  I don't feel it as much as I had before. (When I get stressed I tend to feel the tension in my back and it's gone, which is super nice). A bonus to training...we get our own specialized Sisters Trainers training meeting this week!!!! Every companionship but two will be there.  It will be such a blessing to see Sister Hoyt and Sister Garner (Sister Rice won't be there :( but I did see her last week on P-day!)

Last week was pretty great.  We had a combined Zone P-day and Sister Little drove us through Canada Olympic Park yeah! There is a development that is literally right behind the Park, kind of crazy! It was super fun to be able to see Sister Rice and her companion, Sister Beasley.  It was a nice relaxing P-day. We caught the Bates again, did a short lesson on the Plan of Salvation in their doorway.  Hockey championships are just about over, so hopefully we can meet with them again soon.

We had an amazing lesson with Barb.  We went over the Tree of Life and the interpretation of it.  Barb told us that she is loving reading the Book of Mormon. It is coming to life to her more than the Bible! We are going to ask her to pray specifically about if the Book of Mormon is true. :) She also has agreed to let us come over twice a week! Ah! I just love Barb; she is so great!

We had quite a few lessons with less active members - two of them we have been trying since January to get in with. We also had a get together with some of the less active/part member/investigators in Arbour Lake ward.  It was a chill meet and greet plus movie. Justin and Lorena came and they had a good time.  It's nice for people in the ward to meet them so they can help us with fellow shipping them into the ward.

Random fact:

Canada no longer has pennies. They did what I believe the United States has threatened to do. We shall see how this goes.

Best story of the week:

We were running home late after an appointment...yes, after "pumpkin time". And as we got on the main road home there was a huge line up of cops.  We thought there has been a terrible accident or shooting so we were going to have to figure out some other way to get home. Our district leader called as and as we approached the cops I saw a sign that said "Alcohol check point". The officer motioned for us to pull over and we told our district leader we would call him back.  The Officer asked if we had been drinking or if we had any alcohol in our possession.  We told him no and he let us drive on.  We busted up laughing and called our district leader back. Only as a missionary when you are running home because you are late for "curfew". Good time, good times.

Yesterday we had a huge storm hit. I bet it will be coming down to Utah today. We got about 10 inches of snow dumped on us.  One of our wards was canceled, but we made it to the other one.  We were told not to do any unnecessary driving.  We were able to watch the CES Broadcast, which was spectacular, you should watch it if you didn't get a change to see it yesterday.  The entire time Elder Bednar was speaking Sister Little and I kept thinking that Barb needs to watch it.  He talked about Elder Maxwell's quote, "It is better to not shrink that it is to survive." Elder Bednar was asked to give a blessing to a young man and Elder Bednar asked the question, "Do you have the faith to not be healed." Interesting question.  It made me think about where my faith in the Savior is right now and how I am approaching a stage where I am probably going to have to rely on the Savior like I have never had done before.

Life is great and I will let you know how the trainer's training is next week. Next week is transfers so we will be emailing on Tuesday.  Also, we are going to Banff again...(I know...we are spoiled) but we will be emailing first.  We shall see which one of us is purge training - eek!

Lots of love!

-Sister Douglass

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