August 18, 2014

pics of us at suomenlinna

We had a good week. Last pday we went to an old fortress (Suomenlinna) as a district. it's a cool place and really pretty by the water. 

Sometimes I wish I could remember the quotes by our friends better, this week was fantastic. The gospel of Jesus Christ is real and the power of the Holy Ghost is real. Living the way God wants us to live brings us joy and peace. One of our friends explained how ever since he has been learning about the gospel he has "more peace throughout the day and even at night when I fall asleep". Wow. His friend describe the change in him as "a drum in a night club" and how he can feel the beat in his heart when his friend is around. Powerful changes that come through living the principles of the gospel! 

One of our friends was able to go to the temple for the first time last week and was extatic!! What a blessing temples are to us and to those who passed on without the chance of accepting the gospel and Christ as their Savior.  I was on exchanges with one of the sister this week and she shared something Elder Ronald A Rasband said. "Focusing on serving our brothers and sisters can guide us to make divine decisions in our daily lives and prepares us to value and love what the Lord loves." When we focus on others we become what Heavenly Father intended for us to become. 

We had dinner with our bishop and his family yesterday and during our spiritual message one of my companions share that "Members are very DIFFICULT in missionary work" we all stopped and started laughing really hard. Bishops wife laughed and just told her to tell them how she really feels! as my companion struggled to correct herself by explaining that she meant to say very IMPORTANT in missionary work. we all got a good laugh. I guess members can be difficult, but more important than that, they are very important. Missionary work can't go on without you all! 

I hope you have a fantastic week! love you!!

August 11, 2014

Good to hear you got some rain!!  We were on our way home the other day after a lesson when the windows of heaven opened and dumped a ton of rain on us.  5 minutes later we couldn't have been more drenched. It was fun. And we were glad to be going home so that we could change into dry clothes. The rain felt good. It has been really warm lately and the other day we decided it would be better to sleep outside instead of in our hot room. It felt nice but there were more bugs than I was wishing for! Mom and Dad, happy late anniversary!! Hope you had an enjoyable day! Tell Kaysie and Quinn happy early anniversary!!! Is this 5 years???? Weird. 

Dad I had to laugh about your fruit snacks. Glad you survived the long trip even without them. Ha what is Mo going to do with all those puppies? One for everyone! Seminary starting soon already? Summer always goes by fast. I saw my fleece lined tights this morning on my shelf and I’m not looking forward to wearing those again! The hockey season starts in 2 weeks. What?!?! 

We had an awesome lesson this week and our member shared how we must lean on the Lord for strength.. She shared how she became a young single mom of 4, all under the age of 10, still needed to go to school, feed the kids, clean the house, and keep a job. She said the first thing she did was get down on her knees and pray and ask Heavenly Father for help. She knows that that is the only reason she was able to do it. She wouldn't have had the energy on her own. Prayer is powerful. The answers we receive are powerful. We had a fun week. We went "survey tracting" in some student housing with our friend. It was interesting and people were more open than if it was the typical "missionary" approach. She had a ton of fun and can't wait to be a missionary. She has been a blessing to us since the day we met her and the gospel has been a blessing to her. I love the gospel. Stay strong in the faith. Have a great week!

August 4, 2014

You made it to Kansas in record time! I didn't know it was possible! 

The boys didn't come to church so we are going to have to find some more punk kids to play basketball with. That is way exciting for Brian and Annie's...branch? Ward? How big is it in Goodland? I'm excited for the coming pictures. Good things Trasie is old enough to stay home alone and take care of all the chores! I need to reply to her letters from my package. Never enough time in a day. 

Good to hear from Bri, I often remember the tricks he played on me especially when my companions try to play practical jokes on me. 

 . . . .

One of our friends committed to quit smoking!! We have had a few lessons on the word of wisdom and how our bodies are a gift and Heavenly Father guides us on how we can take care of them and last night she agreed. She is excited, we are excited. 

Another friend set a baptismal date and we were so happy to hear he had been praying daily. He said that he feels so happy whenever he prays, he doesn't know why but he's just so happy.  We had another lesson and we invited one of the members to come along. Her 10 year old daughter came with also and so we asked if she could participate in the lesson. She agreed and it was the best part of the lesson when she shared who Jesus Christ is to her. The spirit was so strong. 

It has been a good week. Fast Sunday yesterday was really good. It's always a challenge to be patient and loving on an empty stomach. I have always struggled with the law of fasting and finding the purpose in it. Over the course of my mission I have strengthened my testimony in fasting. One answer came when I was reading a general conference talk that fasting helps us to strengthen our self control, making our spirits stronger than our physical bodies. Yesterday I thought about how there were many times when Christ was probably extremely tired, hungry, or lonely and was able to remain completely charitable, patient, and selfless. Fasting is an opportunity for us to be tested, strengthen our spirits and come closer to Christ. 

I hope you have a great week! Love you :)

Rakaudella, Sisar Heggie

July 28, 2014

It has been really warm this week!! Everyone is enjoying the summer and sunshine. This morning we went to Porkkala Niemi, a really pretty place about 45 minutes from home. We went with the bishop’s wife. It was fun to drive out past all the fields and barns and trees. We enjoyed ourselves:) 

This week I had the chance to go on splits with some of the sisters. On our way to an address we saw a couple teenagers bouncing a basketball. I told them how one of my dreams was to challenge some kids to a basketball game in a skirt and get them to come to church. After we visited our address we went to find the basketball court and the boys were still there. I told my companions that if they were still there I would challenge them to a game. In a skirt. We walked over and started talking to them and agreed to a game to 5, and if I beat them they would come to church. We talked about who God is as we played.  5 to 0 :) we gave them our number on a pass along card before we left and one of the guys noticed that it said he could get a free book of Mormon so he asked if we had one on us. We just happened to have one :) unfortunately they weren't in church yesterday but we'll see where it goes! My dream hasn't quite been fulfilled. It's a good start though.

We went to do some yard work last week and invited one of our members to come with us. He invited his friend so we were able to meet him and talk about the Book of Mormon. He is coming to FHE with us tonight. 

Crazy that Emily is home already! I was just thinking this morning how Brighton is 5 months already.   Have fun in Kansas, tell Brian and Annie and Anbri hello.

Love you! Sisar Heggie

July 21, 2014

walk from the temple, Sisar Nielsen front, Cribbs middle

this is a fun game called mölkky. we played it with a family the other day, it was a lot of fun!

Thanks for your email last week I actually had a chance to read it really quick before we had to leave but didn't have a chance to reply. It's fun to hear about all your summer adventures :) 

Funny to hear the Kerrie was in Helsinki last week! We got a call from some of our sisters that ran in to some Russian missionaries at the train station, didn't even think about Kerrie possibly being one of them! There were 2 Russian missionaries that were at the temple that we ran into a few times. 

Saturday there were two baptisms. One girl was nervous to tell her parents, but invited them and they came and had nothing but good things to say. Everyone was so happy. Yesterday we asked the guy how he felt. He just put his arms in the air and with a big grin he said "YES!". So great. 

Yesterday we had a dinner appointment with a family who had relatives visiting. We had a cool discussion on missionary work and it's so awesome to see the members make plans on how they can incorporate missionary work into their lives. The families were a lot of fun and we had American bbq, it reminded me of spending time with family in Alberta. After that appointment we dropped by another family to share a thought and sing a song. We started the song (which sounded really good by the way ;) )and in the second verse I forgot the tune so I stopped singing which caught Sisar Nielson off guard that she was singing soprano alone while Sisar Cribbs was singing parts. So we all kind of stopped singing and weren't sure what happened. We started laughing. We couldn't stop laughing and the whole family was laughing. Eventually we got it together and finished the song. Sometimes we think we have too much fun. We have a lot of moments where we laugh uncontrollably, but try to control it in front of the members ;) they have to think we are somewhat normal. 

We have a neighbor who is our age. She has come to activities with us but we haven't started teaching her about the gospel. Saturday we found out she had a rough day and were thinking how we could brighten her day. We all marked our favorite scripture and wrote her a note and gave her a book of Mormon. She has started reading it now and hopefully keeps reading!

One of our friends gave us facials the other day, that was a lot of fun! It's fun to meet people from all over who have all different talents. We have some friends that have offered to teach us how to break dance. That might be difficult in a skirt :) 

We had a lesson the other day about the plan of Salvation. Our friend started drawing the plan out on the chalk board and the more we taught the more he added or erased from his picture. You could see him making connections and just lighting up! It's so fun to teach about the gospel, something so simple and familiar, yet so many people just haven't had the chance to hear about it!

Mom congratulations again on the calling. I'm excited for you. This is going to be fun! I love you and hope you have an enjoyable time at camp success!  Dad I'm jealous of the camping trip you had! We were working on Mt Moriah and hiked *almost* to the table. We ran out of water part way up and didn't make it all the way to the table, 10 more minutes would have got us there. But it was still a pretty view from where we were :) as I recall, our bath was REALLY cold. But refreshing after hot days and no showers. Sounds like a fun trip you had with the young men. I remember one of my professors at school talking about the importance of these spiritual experiences while they are young. he talked about a group on young men he worked with and the 2 that made time out of their summer work schedules had experiences that the other boys missed, because of placing priorities differently, were active and served missions while the others had nice cars but not these experiences. You could guess who ended up more happy and successful. It just shows how important these testimony building experiences are now. 

I have been reading and pondering about what it means to be perfect. I see too often the way Satan makes us get down on ourselves for feeling inadequate because we aren't "perfect". It is important to know our weaknesses as well as our strengths! Christ has given us the gift of His atonement so that we may become more like Him. It takes effort and patience on our part but what better time than in this life to develop patience :) He loves us. He knows us. He lives. He will help us help others. I love you all and I hope you have a great week! 

Rakaudella, Sisar Heggie