Monday, August 31, 2015

Exchanges, and meetings and miracles oh my!

Dear Friends and Family,
This week was awesome!! We saw many miracles including a family of six get baptized into the Ward, we worked hard, we laughed a lot, and we met some really cool and some really crazy people.

The week started with an exchange in Mountain View. I once again got to go to one of the prettiest places in Arkansas and spend 24 hours with the lovely Sister Pemberton and Sister Arnold. We had a really good exchange together. These sisters are on fire! And I feel like I learned much more from them then they did from me. One of the best parts of the exchange was I came home with new used skirts from Sister Pemberton. She goes home tomorrow actually so she was packing a bit during the exchange and gave me a few of her skirts. Score!

After spending a day in Mountain View we met in a little town called Heber Springs to switch back. Unfortunately due to some miscommunication our driver didn't realize she had to take us back to Searcy after driving us to Heber. So we were left stranded an hour away from home in this little tourist town for a little bit before a wonderful Ward member was able to come and pick us up.

That same day we had a very interesting lesson with a crazy lady. The lesson included fast talking, some singing and dancing,  Jesus in a white robe spinning around in a circle, and ended with us being blessed with eagle wings. It was definitely one for the journal.  On Thursday we got to go to a special mission leadership council meeting with two members of the executive missionary committee. It was such a great meeting! We learned a lot about how to be better missionaries and to be more effective missionaries. I left feeling super excited to get to work.  So of course I woke up really sick the next day. Fortunately Sister Mathison was a good nurse and made sure I got lots of rest and I was feeling much better by the next day.

On Sunday we found some really amazing new investigators. Jenny was a referral that we contacted over the phone and invited to church. And she came with her husband. We saw her afterward and she has actually been investigating on her own and through missionaries on the Mormon.org website. She is super awesome and has the cutest little baby girl. We also found a little family. We met this little girl named Kamia earlier in the week and she decided that we were going to be friends. We saw her Sunday and she wanted us to come met her mom.  Unfortunately her mom wasn't available. So we talked with her and her brother for a little bit and made some videos of them doing the nay nay. Then Kamia's brother went into the house and came back out and told us that his mom already knew Jesus and didn't want us to come over. We were a little sad but said ok and left for our appointment.  But both of us, Sister Mathison and I, felt like we needed to go talk to this mom. So at the end of the night we decided to go back and try her. Turns out she has been looking for a church to take her kids to and she is really interested in learning more about our church!  Thank goodness for the Holy Ghost prompting us to go back to talk with her!  I can't wait to go back and teach this family.

I can't believe tomorrow is September! Time is flying by faster and faster. I am so grateful to be a missionary. I love getting to see God hastening his work and getting to be a part of building his kingdom. I love this work!
As always thank you for everything y'all do!

Have a great week!
Love Sister Aase



Monday, August 24, 2015

WhiteOut

Dear Friends and Family,
We had another really great week here in Searcy!

So I have always had a love for office supplies but since my mission there is one particular office tool that I have come to love.....white out. One of my companions used to use it all the time and I confess I totally judged her at first for being a perfectionist. But then one day I made a mistake while writing in my study journal and it was really bothering me. So I humbled myself and asked if I could use some.  And it changed my life.  Now I can't imagine studying without my whiteout. I use it nearly everyday because I tend to make a lot of mistakes (especially spelling mistakes) but it is good to know that I have a way to fix them.  Sometimes my mistakes require a lot of whiteout and sometimes just a little itty bitty bit but no matter the mess up, it can always be fixed. I am very grateful for whiteout. 

Whiteout is a little like repentance which is something else I have learned to love on my mission. Because of our Savior, we don't have to live with our mistakes. We can change, mistakes can be whited out. Sometimes our mistakes are big, sometimes they are itty bitty, but they can always be fixed. Like it says in Isaiah "though your sins be scarlet, they will be as white as snow" We taught this principle to two men we have been teaching from Kenya named Alex and Edward. They had a lot of question about repentance and forgiveness and the process of it all. It was so amazing to testify to them that we can repent. We can repent every day. And as often as we will repent God promises to forgive us. What a wonderful message and blessing that is. I truly love repentance. I love that we can always change and become better. And I love getting to help people as they go through the repentance process themselves. I love getting to see others change for the better.

We are excited for this upcoming week. We are going on exchanges which is always lots of fun :)
As always thank you for all that y'all do! Have a wonderful week!

Love
Sister Aase

1) Arkansas Sunset
2) Me and my young women
3) Sister Captain America



Monday, August 17, 2015

God's in the Blessin' Business!!

Dear Friends and Family,
This week was AWESOME!! We were talking to this older black lady this week and she told us that "God's in the blessin' business!" Yes ma'am he is and we were definitely blessed this week!

Our week started with a baptism. Which is the best way to start a week, I highly recommend it. Morgan was baptized Tuesday and confirmed yesterday. She has been investigating the church for almost a year and was finally able to get baptized. The devil was working hard on her all week long but the baptism happened anyway and she was so happy.  She was glowing afterward and just said it felt so good to be clean.  I'm so happy for her!

The week continued to go well. Sister Mathison and I were determined to reach all of our goals this week and we came mighty close thanks to a few miracles and blessings from the Lord. One such was Francis. We found Francis early this week. She just moved into the home of a potential investigator we had met at Walmart and never have been able to get a hold of again. We were driving past the house and saw a car and so we quickly turned around and instead of the Walmart lady being there we met Francis. She is so elect and let us right in and we starting teaching her. We set a baptismal date with her for September and hopefully all goes well!

We also saw lots of little blessings this week like a member taking us to chick-fil-a for dinner, and a member bringing us brownies, and having an investigator come to the baptism, and having an awesome leadership meeting, and seeing someone come back to church.  Truly the Lord is always showering us with blessings. Sometimes those blessings are easier to recognize than others like a baptism. But even when they are in disguise (like when all of our appointment fell through but we were able to have time to help drive a sister missionary to Heber Springs) we are still constantly being blessed. May we all have eyes to see all the ways that the Lord is blessing us this week. After all he is in the blessin business :)

As always thank you for all that you do!
Have a great week!
Love
Sister Aase

Monday, August 10, 2015

Right Place, Right Time!

Dear Friends and Family,
We had a great week down here in Searcy. We weren't always doing what we had originally planned but we were doing the work that the Lord needed us to be doing at the time. Something I've seen many times on my mission but it still amazes me is how we can be exactly in the right place at the right time if we follow the Spirit. Likewise if we aren't following the Spirit it is very easy to miss perfect opportunities to teach or serve. That's why the "spirit is the most important single element in this work." -Ezra Taft Benson

For example we were in the right place at the right time to be able to deliver groceries to a family in need. And to be with a sister who needed someone to listen and feel the Spirit in her home. And to vacuum someone's home who is having some health problems. And to teach when everyone was home.  We were doing our best to listen to the Spirit and so even though the week didn't go as planned we were in the right places at the right times for the Lord to do his work. And hopefully this next week we will continue to be so.

Transfers are this week and I'm staying in Searcy with Sister Mathison. Yay! We are getting 27 new missionaries this week. Holy Guacamole! That like a whole zone! Areas are going to be opening and there will be lots of people training. It's so exciting!!  Tomorrow we are having a baptism for our investigator Morgan. Morgan, who just graduated and has been investigating the Church for a while now and is finally getting baptized! She is so excited and so are we :)

As always thank y'all for everything that you do, but mostly for who you are :) have a wonderful week
Love,
Sister Aase

PS.  To my friends in Minnesota, bet you've never felt a 'wind chill' of 109 degrees.  What the what????  Thank goodness we have a car and AC.


Monday, August 3, 2015

Joy!!

Dear Friends and Family,
This week was really great. Sister Mathison is feeling better and we are ready to get back to work. We had some really fun/amazing/joyful experiences this week.  We got to go to the temple on Wednesday. I love the temple. It is such a peaceful place and going to the temple brings so much power in our lives. It was so much fun to get to go with the whole MLC. It was also lots of fun to get to road trip to Memphis with a bunch of missionary friends. Waking up at four in the morning to get to the temple on time was less fun but worth it.

One of the highlights of the week was getting to be reunited with some of my favorite people. My trainer Sister Mecham made a surprise visit to Searcy this week. It was SO good to see her and catch up for a little bit. This week was also the 40th year mission reunion which brought back a few other old missionaries including Sister Kalahiki and my original mission president and his wife, The Petersons. It was also fun to see lots of people from the Pinnacle Mountain Ward at the reunion as well. I was asked to conduct the mission choir at the reunion. I was told that the choir needed to sound like the Mormon Tabernacle Choir #nopressure.  I'm not sure we sounded quite that good but I think we did a pretty decent job.

Prior to the reunion fireside, a very special and much prayed for event occurred. Sister Maggie Davis is a bit of a legend to the missionaries in the ALRM. She lives right across from the mission home and she comes and bears her testimony to all the arriving missionaries. Maggie starting investigating the church about three years ago and has wanted to join the church for about that long but hasn't been able to. I met Maggie my very first day in the mission field. She was at the airport with the Petersons when I arrived in Little Rock and gave me huge hug when she saw me, I was inspired by her testimony and her story. I got to know Maggie even more when I was serving in the Pinnacle Mountain Ward. She came teaching with us and would sit by us a church sometimes. She was a great example to me. Well right before the fireside started, Maggie was finally baptized! I've never seen anyone so happy to be baptized. She was just glowing. I can't even express how happy I am for this girl. She is amazing and is finally able to experience all the blessings of being a member of the Lords church. 

I am so grateful to be a missionary here in Arkansas and to help people like Maggie to enter into the Lord's church. I know that this Church is true. I love that this Church offers absolute truth in a world where truth is hard to find. I love this gospel and I love this work!

As always thank you for everything and have a wonderful week!
Love
Sister Aase
 
Sister Kalahiki & I
Sister Mechan & I
 

Sister Mathison & I
Sisters at the Memphis Temple