So

Hi everybody.

our friend from Iran is  getting baptized in two weeks.  we found out from president Leavitt that after looking into all the rules and regulations and guidelines and after having met with Him via skype and learning some things about him and his circumstance, he decided through revelation and prayer I'm sure, that as a child of God, our friend (name removed for privacy) can be baptized.  he is glad.  in his own words he said that he is speechless.

so it's kind of funny, so I'll tell a little bit about what happened with all that this week, because as you can assume it was an emotional roller coaster, and I'm glad that I survived it, and that my companion can just be happy now.

I'm going to name him Michael because I can't keep referring to him as he.  Michael had his conference call with president Leavitt on Tuesday, and when we got to talk to him about it he pulled us aside privately and asked us if everything was alright.  to which we asked the same question and he was like "well, we talked and it was good, but sometimes I was uncomfortable.  it was like an interrogation, lots of questions, and some of them were upsetting."  apparently President Leavitt accused his parents of hiring an assassin to kill Michael after his baptism.  haha good times.  Michael thought we were all crazy and that we had terrible misconceptions.  so we talked, and asked him if things like that don't happen and he was like "they do, but I'm not important enough for that."   hah.

he also didn't understand why it would be a higher consideration ( considering the whole church) and so we explained to him that his baptism is a private affair, but people tend to hear about things like that and blow them out of proportion.  take the whole Jewish people in temple work for example.  it's a matter of not offending anybody who could ever possibly be offended, because if they can, from experience they will be, mostly because they don't understand. 

so all in all, things are great, because Michael knows and understands his savior Jesus Christ, and is excited to follow his example and now can be baptized.  yay for happy endings.

also the missionary broadcast was great,  if you guys didn't get a chance to see it, I encourage you to look it up because it was awesome.  (sometimes a bit corny, but who doesn't love happy families?  it kind of is part of the whole meaning of life.)

so basically i should stop writing so much and let the other sisters have a turn, because today's a holiday and apparently everything and it's outhouse is closed on holidays in Newfoundland, and we're emailing on the church's one family history computer.

I love you all, I promise I'll write letters today!

Hey all!

I've gotten a lot of mail this week, the district leader and some other Leadership peeps went to Halifax for a day and came back with my mail!  so that was good to see the things that you'd sent before I learned my NF address.  I'll work on replying to those today so that you can stop thinking I'm a terrible person, who never replies to her mail.

oh man what a week.  can I just say, sometimes I get stressed? I didn't think it would happen out here, but I realized that it still does.  I just hope that I'm justified in my worries, because man oh man, my stomach's in knots.

so then there was this one time when we were teaching two really awesome and interested children of god.  each were found separately and each is learning and growing in their knowledge and testimonies of the gospel at their own rate.  they both have a Muslim background, both are insanely smart, have PhD's in pharmaceuticals and masters in nanotechnology and whatnot, and both happen to be from Iran.  this was all fine and good until one of them brought up the concern when we asked him if he was considering baptism, that if he doesn't get permanent residency in Canada and has to go back to Iran, (which in all honesty would happen because his family lives there) then he would almost undoubtedly be shot and killed.  Martyrdom is great.  haha just kidding no it's not.  so then we asked our other investigator what his knowledge was of this and he was like "yeah, I know the consequence. Death. But it's not about You.  it is about you're responsibility to God."  so we asked the mission president what to do.  because we have no intention of sending people to their death.  he called up the line of church authority and found that we are advised to not even teach people from Iran, because we're not supposed to baptize them, and just waving the benefits of the gospel in front of their noses while withholding the ability to participate would just be cruel.  

so now we have an investigator who has a solid testimony that Jesus Christ is his savior, keeps the commandments, and is ready to hop in the baptismal font without us, and we aren't even supposed to be teaching him.  like at all.  and President hasn't yet told us what to do.  so I'm stressed.  it's great.   and he hangs out with the YSA Girls. and Victoria is openly flirting with him.  and he might not be able to be baptized.  and I don't know what to do.  I'm hoping that something will happen, somehow they'll be given a route to citizenship or something, because everything I've learned about Christ so far would suggest that he would not prepare the hearts of these people so well, without having a plan for their happiness.  so that's happening.

but on another note, we had a pretty cool experience in church this Sunday.  one of the former investigators from mount pearl came to church, and sat in on the Gospel Principles class on baptism.  she's been coming to church off and on and her parents are Mormon, but she was never baptized.  toward the end she had an epiphany that was better described later in relief society.  she'd said that she had been having a lot of trouble trying to make ends meet, and last night that from a little extra money she had she could have gone out for a night of dancing but instead decided to stay in and read (later revealed that she'd read her scriptures.)  the next morning she woke up in time to make it to church which apparently never happens (and also had time to get a Tim Horton coffee on the way which she then sipped through sacrament, but little steps.) while waiting in the parking lot she had the money that she had the night before and decided that she should pay tithing.  as she decided how much to give, she came to an amount that gave her peace, knowing that she wouldn't have enough probably to pay bills. and turned it in.  as a result she gained a spiritual witness to an answer that she'd been looking for for more than 25 years.  she said and I actually found it quite profound, "I get it now!  I've always had concerns about the authority, but now it makes sense.  Women were given the ability to create life, and Men were given to cleanse it."  of course she was much more dramatic than the text sounds, because she's got more blackitude than most Mississippians.  but it is always cool to see someone else's testimony grow, and gain that witness yourself as well.

so basically, life is normal, I guess?  I'll write everyone back as best I can today, and hopefully you will get letters soonish.  and by that I mean a couple of weeks.  the post is slow on the rock.

Love 

Kelsey

Hello!

I don't really know what to talk about this week.  the work is going well.  I'm fine.  apparently there was a hurricane I didn't know about.  ...yep.

I don't really know if anybody's reading my letters at this point, but that's all fine and well, as it's helped me focus a little better on what I'm doing.  I now get up on time every morning, and work my hardest to to what is right.  we went running three times this week, and I think my companion doesn't hate me for it?  I don't really know  wish we could run for longer intervals than five minutes, It seems like we just barely start to hit cardio range and I look back to see she's walking.  but at least she's running.  that's better than it was.  

Yep.  I'm still waiting to learn things about her that aren't annoying or backwards,  it seems our personalities are built like yin and yang, and though we are headed in the same direction, we go about it by completely different means.  they aren't either one wrong, but the fact that they're not the same path makes it pretty confusing at times.  it's like being back in chemistry and the forest of confusion.  only now it's my companions feelings and not equations I'm balancing.  huh.  weird. it also seems like she takes everything that I say and tries to put some meaning behind it that isn't there.  because of something about a communications major.  I'm pretty sure that you couldn't get farther from my understanding and personality, so we pretty much just go about not understanding each other, and usually that includes me offending her, all the time.  

but that doesn't mean that she doesn't have great strengths.  she cares a lot about how people think by focusing on how they talk, and that shows the deeper need to understand through words.  her intentions are gold, and I can see her trying to improve every day, to be a better missionary who can help the people here to the best of her abilities.  she also treasures up the spoken word, or the teachings and talks by the prophets and apostles of our day.  which is something that I haven't put too much emphasis on in the past.  I need to do better at looking past the little things to the heart.  for god judgeth not as a man judgeth, but looketh upon the heart.  or something like that, I don't remember that reference exactly.

anyway, 

send me mail!

otherwise I don't know what your addresses are and cant send you anything, try as I might.

Love, Kelsey.

Hey all!

this week flew by.  it seems like I was here just a couple days ago doing the same thing!  missionary work is weird in the fact that its all consuming, but it seems to take no time at all.

This week the theme seemed to be obedience, which, surprise surprise, I'm not the best at.  sometimes getting up on time is just not going to happen.  It's my Achilles heel.  And it seems my companion finally ran out of patience.  so that's cool.  But I've come to know that no matter what anybody else thinks, including myself, there is power in following the rules.  It keeps us safe, it keeps us prepared, and the lord will bless us for doing what he asks.  President Monson's talk about it last conference was amazing, and if you haven't had the chance to go over it  again, here it is for future reference. http://www.lds.org/general-conference/2013/04/obedience-brings-blessings?lang=eng

So, we went on exchanges this week with the other sisters, to look up some of the Branch's less active members.  (A branch is like a ward in that it's a church congregation, but smaller in numbers.) It was a lot of fun, and we got to put some faces to the long list of names that haunt our rosters.  We met a guy who hadn't been to church in years, but said that recently he'd thought about taking the steps back to activity.  His remark was that whenever that happens missionaries magically show up on his doorstep.  to which I laughed and said, "we come when we're called!"  and it's so true.  so many times we seem to just be in the right place in the right time to catch somebody, or to spread hope where it's needed.  Sister Olson did a great job talking with him, and letting him come to the realization himself by talking about things what it was he needed to do.  and the answer hasn't changed.  we need to continually be building our faith by studying the scriptures, praying, and keeping Gods commandments, one of which is coming to church. 

And then there was this one time when we got a new investigator because he decided to come to church on his own.  I thought he was someone that the elders were working with, but no, he came to church all on his own.  it turns out that he'd met missionaries in France, and actually attended church there in a branch for a while, but had moved to Newfoundland to go to graduate school ( and PHD it sounds like?  His grad is in physics.  He's amazing.) he had a French Book of Mormon once, but lost it some time during the five years since he's investigated.  He loves the feeling he gets around church, and constantly talks about the feeling of tranquility that prevails.  He's great.  the spirit is working on him.

The greatest thing I learned this week though is that the Atonement of Jesus Christ is constantly working in our lives.  Someone told me once that it is impossible to stand still in the Gospel, once you've entered the gate of Baptism you're either progressing, or regressing, and it all hangs on how much you do the little things, with real honest intent.  Every time you do something that brings you closer to God you're using the atonement, every time you pray to know, every time you study, every time you turn toward god you're erasing that separation that sin creates. Of course, there are steps of repentance for a reason, but the way to stay on the path is in enduring, in keeping in remembrance those things that we need to be doing every day and every week, to continually change ourselves to be better.  And I'm still not perfect, I've got a long way to go, but it's comforting to know that God will always be there for us, we need only to turn towards him.

I love you guys and I have to go!

have a good week. 

Sunny Day!

Hey All!

I'm sorry the past few weeks I haven't had time to write to individuals, I'll try harder to write fast today so I can get to some of you I haven't written yet.

I am doing great! the sun decided to come out and grace the north Atlantic with it's face, so good times. people here actually do not like the sun, despite the fact that they act happier and hang outside all day if you ask them they'll likely say they prefer the winter and cold. weird right? there's also a ton of dandelions here, apparently when the ships came over from England they brought dandelions to eat because they basically grow everywhere, and now they basically grow everywhere. oops. (invasive species what's that?) here's some pictures. there's also a picture of MUN, the University in our area. and some pictures of clouds. because we're right on the coast, they're huge and move really fast and low, it's kind of like living in a time lapse photo.

so I know there are some of you out there who don't have a crystal clear idea of what Missionaries do, whether we're members of the church or not. I know I didn't realize a lot of things about what we do before I got out here! so I'll take some time to explain in depth the life of a missionary.

we wake up at six thirty (about, anyone who knows me knows that I struggle with mornings.) we then do thirty minutes of physical exercise, and, because you have to stay within sight and sound of your companion, you're suddenly very limited as to what that could possibly entail. due to personal preferences my companion prefers not to run, therefore I usually do things like yoga, sun salutations, some pushups, and unweighted squats and or lunges. and usually not all at once. I'm going to have to ease into this waking up and exercising within five minutes thing.

then we eat breakfast, take showers, and get ready. once we do that we, have an hour of personal study, when we read our scriptures, and study Preach My Gospel, the Church's guide to missionary work, (lovely book guys, I've learned a ton about the simple foundational doctrines from studying chapter three and it's scriptural references) and prepare individually for teaching lessons. this includes taking questions that an investigator might have and studying the scriptures for answers, or reading a section from the scriptures and applying it to yourself/ your investigators. I could really spend about three hours doing this, but after about an hour we switch to companionship study. at that point we share what we learned in personal study and role play lessons and read and discuss together out of preach my gospel, as well. it's fun to share what you thought about a scripture and learn even more from hearing somebody else's insight.

then at eleven we go out proselyting. this is the bulk of our day, when we do anything from service projects to teach lessons, to meeting together with other missionaries in your area for further study and training, to searching for people to teach. mostly searching for people to teach, or at least, that's what we've mostly done so far. and that my friend is when we knock on doors. or talk to people in parks, but mostly knock on doors. I've already had a lot of varying experiences with this, from people who ask for a book of mormon themselves, to people who call us a cult and yell us off their lawns. mostly the reception is somewhere in between, people who have some understanding of god and appreciate our dedication and could potentially enjoy a discussion with us and be uplifted from our message, but are disinterested from the moment they open the door. nice people. I love them. I wish I could spend some time getting to know them. but that's virtually impossible on somebodies doorstep, and you have to respect their agency. with the knowledge they've been given everyone has the right to chose . the best we can do is bear our testimony, and share simple truths, and hope for the best. and then ask for referrals. (referrals are thus, "who do you know who would benefit from a message about Jesus Christ?" usually they say something like everyone could, or that they don't know anybody.)

if you're lucky, you'll find someone who's interested in our message. if you're really lucky they'll be your same gender, or lots of other people home, and have an hour with nothing else to do but have a discussion and talk about their soul and how the restored gospel of Jesus Christ can help them. (There's a rule that you have to have three sisters or elders to teach someone of the opposite gender who's home alone. which so far, is all of our investigators. good times.) otherwise you schedule a time to come back, which fingers crossed is within the next day or two, and that when you get there they're actually home and weren't just being nice.

on that note, we've gotten two new investigators this week, and they're both really cool! one is a student going to the university here, he's a pharmicist getting an additional business degree, and he's from Iran. when we met him he seemed to think that we were missionaries for every church, but over time in our lesson we talked about the book of mormon and our identity clicked. he has a real interest in sharing the things he already knows about God, and asked us for good principle scriptures in the Book of Mormon he could share with the people he meets. his heart is in such a good place, he wants to be the best person he can be, and that charity he has for his fellow man is admirable.

Zhong Wu is another Universtiy student we met at the university. we have a booth that we set up and play mormon messages and give out pass along cards and books of mormon to those who are interested, and he actually came to us, with questions about our fundamental beliefs. He's searcing each denomination right now, trying to find the one that has the most truth, but when we asked if he thought that there was one who contained the full truth of Christ's gospel he said "I don't know if that could be." in our lesson he brought a video produced by a baptist organization about a "discussion" between a Baptist minister and his "scholar" Mormon friend. yep, he brought anti-mormon literature to a lesson. we didn't end up watching it, because as it started I felt the spirit leave. instantly. and so we tried to explain to him that the way to find the truth is by learning of each message, and then asking the lord in prayer what is right. James 1:5. we invited him to learn more of what we had to share, and thankfully he agreed, although whether he'll read the Book of Mormon or not is still yet to be seen, he seemed like he was really interested in hearing our opinions rather than doctrine. sigh. I just hope and pray.

And that's basically it. as missionaries we invite others to come unto Christ, by helping them receive the restored gospel through faith in Jesus Christ and his atonement, Repentance, Baptism, Receiving the Gift of the Holy Ghost, and Enduring to the end. the rest is expounding upon that simple and strengthening phrase.

feel free to write, I always love mail, and have lots of stamps waiting to be used! My new mail address is

1a Chimo Place

Saint Johns NF, A1A 3P7

Canada

If you've written a letter to the office address, I may not get it for a while, since it has to travel in a missionaries backpack to Newfoundland, but I will write back as soon as I can!

Hey everyone!

I'm writing from a library in Mount Pearl Newfoundland!  look it up, it's fairly remote.  And not in Halifax.  yeah. 

so first I have to apologise somewhat about my poopypants letter last week, I should have taken time to write separate letters, but the MTC is a confusing place and what can you do.  I'm really thankful and somewhat indignant about all your responses, I hope I'll have enough time today to get back to everyone.

So Newfoundland!  It's actually pronounced new-find-LAND and you'd better say it right or the newfies will look at you weird.  if you're too lazy to look up where it is, it's an island off of Labrador above Nova-Scotia, which is about as big as Washington state.  how'd you get there you ask? well it took a long time, and it's a good story.

I should probably start at the beginning.  so Tuesday, we woke up at the crack of too early for vampires got dressed and drug all of out luggage to the travel office at the MTC.  Which is pretty hard when you have three backs a coat and a purse and no one to help you, I think I dropped the carry on like three times.  my MTC companion sister Lewis wanted to take one last minute to go look for her lost camera twenty minutes before the bus was supposed to leave, so you know me I'm a pushover and we ran to the building we were going to look through.  it was locked.  no surprise.  we ran back.  everyone was loosing their minds because they'd turned in their keycards and the travel guy hadn't given them tickets.  so I go in there and he hands me an envelope with instructions to check in at the keyosk.  not really surprising to me, and I tell the ducklings to get on the bus.

The Bus ride was weird because we were driving on streets and following the same path I had already driven like eight times last semester with no intention of a return trip.  then I fell asleep against the window because it was three thirty in the morning.  at the airport we got out bags and I directed eveyone to the American Airlines counter where I see a familiar sight of lots of people waiting to check in and only two attendants on shift.  it's probably lucky that we even had two that early.  so I start to check us in and there's a bunch of elders listed on our reservation.  "are we supposed to have elders?" I asked the air, since, I wasn't there when the travel guy gave out instructions to the group.  Sister Lewis provided an insightful "I don't know" to which I replied "well, if they're in this airport, we need to find them."  she disapppeared for a little while and then reappeared towards the end of my check in with a Canadian and a weepy elder from Tahiti.  so I had to start over.  then the attendent came by and told me that we all had to check in separately to pay for baggage fees as individuals, so I started over again.  sister weaver was on a separate reservation altogether, and I had her check in beside me at the same time.  so we go through this long process of swiping passports and using credit cards to pay for bags, (haha bring cash for bags my foot)  and then Elder Thounot from Tahiti has to re enter all of his passport information field by field and all of this ended up taking about an hour and forty five minutes.  sometime before everyone was done I started sending sisters to go through security because I knew the line was going to be long.  it was.  needless to say I was praying so hard with a half an hour until boarding and 200 people in front of me at security.  but by some miracle, the lady who was working the front check in was there when we scanned our tickets and got on the plane, and all of us got on. 

the rest of the airports was fairly non-eventful, we rode a train around the terminals to get to the next gate in dallas, and half our group acted like they'd never heard of trams before.  I didn't really get an oppertunity to be a missionary on the flights, either because I wasn't sitting next to anyone, or because the missionary next to me had it covered.  and I also can't hear.  that probably factored into it.  In customs in Toronto we went though smoothly, except my companion somehow got the wrong code on her claims card and the customs lady she got threw a minor fit.  I just stood back and held my hands up because woof.  also poor elder thounot spent probably 30 minutes talking to a guy when for each of us it was closer to five. even sister Echoles, who was deported from canada under suspected tax evasion at 19. (apparently it was not her fault.)  note to self, don't be from tahiti. 

Then we had to check back in somehow, and sister Echoles decided to take over our group and lead us on a goose chase to the terminal check in counters one floor up and half a terminal over with three bags each, to find out that we could have just checked in where we'd been spit out by customs.  le sigh.  and then we called home.  that was fun. and then elder Fortier from Quebec bought us doughnuts.  and then we flew to Halifax, and met out mission president and his wife gave us all hugs, and we rode home in a van driven by a french elder who drove like a maniac.  on the way we found out that it was Elder thounot's birthday.  at which I felt bad that he'd had such a rough birthday.  but at the same time it's a good way to start out your mission.

the mission home was nice.  they fed us, gave us beds, and we had a day to go to the temple and learn mission rules and get bank cards and everything else.  it was also that morning that I found out where I was going.  the interview was simple, basically he told be it would be rough because everyone's either anglican or irish catholic, and that my trainer had only been out three months, just long enough to be trained herself.  so we would be whitewashing an area, and I'd be teaching myself the ropes as much as she'd be teaching me.  good times.  also It would take about 24 hours to get there. 

we drove a truck up through nova scotia to north sydney, which took about five hours.  we were following elders and had a GPS, and she spent most of the time asking questions and asking me to ask her questions.  we got to the ferry two hours early, and I tried to figure out how to make my bank card work, called a number and got no answers.  we tried to talk to a few people, got shut down a bunch, and were shamed by the elders who taught a guy basically the whole first discussion.  good times.  we boarded the ferry at about nine, which was interesting but we did it without backing up more than once, to my relief, and then promptly found our cabin and went to sleep.   I sort of slept.

then we drove for two and a half hours to what I think was corner brook ate lunch breakfast at subway, the guy didn't know what provolone cheese was which was okay because they didn't have any.  my comp paid for lunch because I still thought I had to activate my card somehow and only had American cash.   I also killed a mosquito.  then we called and found out that my card was already activated.  and then we drove for nine hours across swampy pine tree wilderness past moose signs and through rain and fog.  at one point we stopped at a gas station and I tried to buy chocolate to find that my card still didn't work.   I to this moment have no idea if I'll ever be able to buy food.  the story of kelsey in another country without money continues.  and after naps and conference talks and Mormon tabernacle choir we got there at about six thirty in the evening.  

everything since has been trying to follow newfie thought process (they talk a million miles an hour and in a million directions)  and follow my new companion, Sister Miehe (Mia)  with the conviction that I know what i'm doing.  today we're supposed to go knocking on doors, hopefully it'll be better than the first round, as we ran into a catholic lady who basically told us she respects us, but she's too set in her ways and to get off her porch because we were wasting our time.  nice poeople really, very polite, and I'm not being facetious.  I love the people here, and can't wait to find someone who's interested to listen to our message.  in fact the other day during personal study I ran across a scripture that felt like it was meant for me "...Yea, blessed is the name of my God, who has been mindful of this people, who are a branch of the tree of israel, and has been lost in a strange land; yea, I say, blessed be the name of my God, who has been mindful of us wanderers in a strange land." (alma 26:36) I know that he's looking out for us, and that he knows the people of this city and cares for them a great deal.  I'm so glad that I get to be a part of missionary work, that I get to try to share what matters most for them, (and for everyone.) 

sorry I forgot my camera guys, I'll have lots of pictures next time I promise. 

Love you all,

Kelsey

http://www.newfoundlandlabrador.com/