Walking in Memphis

Dear friends and family,

Another wonderful hot humid week here in the south. This week we went to Memphis. We spent Tuesday through Thursday working with our sisters over there. Memphis is a whole other world. I don't exactly know how to describe it but we crossed the ridge and we both could definitely tell we were not in Arkansas anymore. One thing that is really cool about serving in Memphis is that these sisters get to work super close to the temple and so when describing what church they are from they often refer to "the white building with the gold man on top" aka the temple. They get to talk to lots of people about the temple and describe to them how it is a place where families can be sealed for time and all eternity.

 

Speaking of the temple, this week for our Mission Leadership Council meeting we get to go to the temple. Sister Mathison and I are so super excited! Also this week is the 40 year mission reunion celebration. All the past mission presidents will be coming back along with lots of returned missionaries from this mission. It should be a really neat experience.

After we returned from Memphis on Thursday night Sister Mathison got sick which meant we were stuck inside until she got better. Being sick on your mission is the worst. The next worst thing is having your companion be sick on your mission. Luckily she is starting to feel better and hopefully will be 100% healthy by the end of the week.

 

As always thank for all your prayers and support. Y'all are the best

Have a wonderful week!

Love

Sister Aase

 

Photo - this is what you do to not go crazy while your companion is sick in bed.  Here are some of the other things I did to keep myself occupied.

- read scriptures

- read Jesus the Christ

- organized the area book 

- watched "together forever" which made me laugh and cry my favorite quotes "chance of a life time jack" and "you bet your life"

- cleaned the house

- wrote letters

- made cute things 

- ate food because what else are you suppose to do when you are bored

- danced

- did a puzzle

- took a nap

- ate pie

- started transferring all our records into the iPad.

 

Where in the World is Sister Aase?

Dear Friends and Family,
This week was crazy! I have been traveling all over the place and I'm exhausted. But I have gotten to spend time with lots of awesome people and see some really cool new places. I'll recap the week with something I like to call "where in the world is Sister Aase?"

Day: Monday
Location: Searcy, AR
Details: normal p day stuff

Day: Tuesday
Location: Paragould, AR
Details: drove two hours north to go on an exchange with the lovely Sister Pochop. We almost got caught in a HUGE rainstorm but fortunately the investigator we were trying to see let us in and we were able to teach her even though she thought she was too busy.  Sometimes God has to send a thunder storm to get people to listen to the missionaries.

Day: Wednesday
Location: Paragould, AR Jacksonville, AR Memphis, TNDetails: we had specialized training in Jacksonville. It was awesome. I got to recite The Living Christ in front of our whole zone. It was powerful! I know that Jesus is the living Christ. After the meeting we headed to Memphis to do it again the next day.

Day: Thursday
Location: Memphis, TN Searcy, AR
Details: specialized in Memphis! I reunited with my MTC zone. We saw the temple. And we got peach milkshakes on the way back home. #yum

Day: Friday
Location: Mountain View, AR
Details: drove two hours north west to get to Mountain View which is one of the prettiest places I have seen in Arkansas. So beautiful! I spent the day with Sister Sanders who is bold! We walked all day long out in the heat and humidity but it was awesome!

Day: Saturday
Location: Mountain View, AR Jacksonville, AR Searcy, AR
Details: returned home and taught one lesson then went to Jacksonville for a blitz with the sisters there. We found a cool new investigator. Then we went down to the river for the Elder's baptism. Their investigator was baptized in the Little Red River.

Day: Sunday
Location: Searcy, AR
Details: spent the day back in Searcy after a long week of being away from my Searcy home.

This next week we are going to be in Memphis again! Yay for being a sister training leader! But as tiring as it this week has been I have loved it. President Wakolo likes to say he is happily exhausted. After this week I am happily exhausted too.
Thank you as always for all y'all do!
Love
Sister Aase

Smells like Salvation

The subject line is a quote from one of our investigators this week

Dear friends and family,
We had a great week here in Searcy. We are finding new people to teach and helping our investigators progress and I'm getting to know the Ward and this zone more and more. This week I not only played in sacrament meeting but I also gave a talk. Life is good.  On Wednesday Sister Mathison and I instructed at our zone meeting. The topic we were asked to speak on was "Priming the Pump" which is something Elder Kopischke spoke about when he was here. The term priming the pump comes from a really old church video that Sister Mathison and I wanted to show as part of our instruction. So we searched and searched for this video. And finally found that it was on an old family home evening supplement video that our church library happen to have. We were so excited until we tried to actually play this old VHS tape. We tried two different VHS players but the tape was
not going to work. Then we ejected it and it broke completely. We panicked a bit and called everyone we knew to try and find this video. No luck. Until the very end of the night the very last person we saw happened to have the family home evening video supplement on DVD. Yay!  It was a miracle and our instruction the next day was a success.

I also got to go on a very fun exchange with Sister Armstrong in Jacksonville this week. Sister Armstrong and I served both served in Conway a year ago at the beginning of our missions so it was fun to get to get to be together again. Jacksonville is great area. We got to have dinner on an air force base which I thought was super cool!  The rest of the week was pretty normal. Finding and teaching and helping and serving that what we do as missionaries. This upcoming week is going to be lots of fun. We are exchanging and going to Memphis for a meeting. Road trip!
As always thank y'all for everything and have a wonderful week!
Love
Sister Aase

PS Detrick got baptized in Pinnacle Mountain this week. Yay! This is an investigator that I was teaching while I was there. Pictures next week.

Sister Training Leader

Sister Training Leader

Welcome to Searcy!

Dear friends and family,

Hello from Searcy Arkansas! Transfer was this past week and I am in a new area, in a new stake, in a new zone, with a fabulous new companion. Sister Mathison is awesome! I just adore her and am so excited to get to serve with her here in Searcy Arkansas.

This is only my third area on my mission and this week I was reflecting back on what I was like when I transferred to Pinnacle Mountain or when I arrived in Conway. And it dawned on me that I have changed a lot!

There were many things that happened in the process of this week that made me think that, but one stands out. Here in the Searcy Ward they don't have anyone who plays piano. So one of the very first things they asked me when I was being introduced to people in the Ward was "do you play the piano?" Flashback to 13 months ago and I'm being asked this same question in a district meeting, my response "I can but I really don't play very well" flash forward to this week and my response was a very confident "yes I can play"  Now though I have had many opportunities to play the piano on my mission at baptisms and district meetings and such, my piano skills really haven't improved that much. So what did change? Well my confidence for one thing and my willingness to share my talents. So guess who played piano in sacrament meeting this Sunday? And in Primary? And in Relief Society? This girl who just a few months ago would have never ever EVER had the confidence to do something like that. As I was pondering about this change during the sacrament a scripture came to mind it's in 3rd Nephi 15:3 and it is the Savior speaking:

And he said unto them: Marvel not that I said unto you that old things had passed away, and that all things had become new.

In other words marvel not that you have become a changed person Sister Aase that is one of the reason why you were sent on a mission to become new, to become better. 

I am so grateful for the opportunity my mission has given me to change and become better. And I am so excited for the changes and growth that are sure to come in this new area! Miracles have already started to happen. We had a random investigator show up at church and we have people getting baptized soon. I am so excited!

 

As always thank you for everything y'all do! Have a wonderful week!

Love,

Sister Aase

 

 

Sweet Letter from Sis Kafoa