September 26, 2017

I have so many things to write about I just wish I could throw them all up on the page haha because I know I am not going to have enough time to write it all.

Ok so first things first, mom could you ask grandma for some american girls doll clothes to send here to st. johns? That little girl keegan has one and I want to surprise her with some new clothes! 

I haven't got to watch the womans broadcast yet but hopefully at some point I will. 

 

Blitz week was crazy but so fun!! we will find out what district won tonight when they post all the transfer information on facebook. We found two new investigators this week! One is diane. she's 50 something and just loves us to pieces and I don't really know why haha. we ran in to her while we were walking down by the ships and she was so excited to have us over. The other one is Abhiram or abhi for short (pronounced as "abby" haha;)) and we met him at walmart. We went there to buy tie dye stuff to do for activity days ( we are going to tie dye pillowcases and then write pray on them to remind the girls to pray) and he was our cashier. He's 22 and is from india. He's been here for 2 years but has only gone to a catholic church once since he's got here but he went to a different church all the time in india. we asked him if he wanted to come to church with us (and this happened on saturday) and he said yes! so he came to church with us the next day and really enjoyed it and then we had a lesson with him later that day. He said that he didn't think it was a coincidence that we came to his till and that he had sunday off work and we told him that we didn't think it was a coincidence either:) I am so excited for him. 

this past week we had a district companionship study and it was on having faith to find. I kinda realized in that meeting that I didn't really have faith to find. I did want to find people to teach but I didn't really specifically have the belief that there are certain people out there who the Lord has prepared to here His gospel. I think just from hearing from other people "No im good" so much that I had started to become "good" with not finding people to teach. After that meeting though I just had such a strong desire to find someone to teach and literally the first person that we talked to when we walked out of the church, amanda, is interested in learning about the gospel 1 

and oh my gosh the transfers table just came out and I am going to amherst and I am a STL with sister nowlon!!!! and sister auvigne is with us too we're in a trio!!! hahah 

i'm out of time!

 

love sister wood

September 19. 2017

Hello everyone! 

The weeks are flying by! I can't believe that we are in week 5 of the transfer and that it is september 19th, what the heck! I am so so excited for general conference, I need to start preparing myself for it. I think it kinda works like prayer. We need to watch and listen with sincere hearts and with real intent, going with questions and seeking for answers. I know that the more we put into preparing ourselves for it, the more we will get out of it. 

Last wednesday we had our district meeting in bay roberts and it was my favourite district meeting yet. A question that was posed was "why do you want to the gospel to be true?" Some of you may have a firm knowledge that it is true but some of you may not. So if you don't have that firm belief, why do you want the gospel to be true? Another thing that we talked about was going into modes or putting on masks. It's a lot a lot easier for a missionary to just go into a "knocking doors" mode or a teaching mode than to actually allow ourselves to change. It's easy to go into a church mode and then for the rest of the week forget about what we learned and make no effort to change. When we're fake we see who we are and then who we should be and then for a certain amount of time pretend to be who we should be but with no intent to stay as that person and with every intent to just go back to being who we are. When we're real and don't go into a mode or put on a mask we acknowledge the person that we are and see who we should be. First we have to desire to become that person, then we have to believe that we can become that person and then we have to start making changes that will bridge the gap between who we are and who we can be. In district meetin we also talked about... Blitz week! haha so blitz week is this competition throughout the mission and it's usually just zone against zone but this time it's district against district, and abby will appreciate this, there's 13 districts haha;) we get certain points for doing certain things and before district meeting I was totally ready to just go into this blitz week mode haha and just go so hard because I'm competitive and whatever haha but I ended up having a blitz week change of heart. The spirit softened my heart and taught me. Of course I want to win still haha (we are in 3rd right now) but the things that we are challenged to do are really just things that we should be doing already and I've realized that the point of the blitz week is to aim for a lasting change. so it started on sunday and it will end this coming sunday. 

So something that is super super exciting is MARGARET GOT BAPTIZED ON SATURDAY!!! President Pratt called us last week and told us not to wait until her trial and to go ahead with the baptism so we asked margaret when she would like to be baptised and she said this weekend (which was last weekend) haha so that was crazy telling everyone about the date switch but that was not the craziest part. I keep telling myself that the next baptism will go more smoothly haha but somehow they just keep getting crazier. Most of saturday was spent in the font and it was nasty. The pump was broken and so instead of sucking up the water it was shooting out old water and a bunch of other things. In the end margaret was able to be baptized (an hour later than what the time was originally set as) but the baptism was so good:) During the talk talk that sister earl was giving before the ordination, I looked around the chapel and just had this "aha" moment. I'm starting to finally get it I think. These people have made such an impact on my life and I am just so invested in each of their lives as well. At the end of the days we are exhausted. Emptying out a font with bowls is not the funnest or easiest job haha, planning for and continually worrying about our investigators and the members is pretty stressful but at the same time I could just not imagine going through life without meeting these people. Their problems are my problems and what brings them joy brings me joy. It's taken time and I'm not fully where I want to be yet but slowly I am starting to have enough faith to put both feet fully in the mission.

One last thought. Last week in our lesson we had with margaret we talked about gifts of the spirit. sister earl came with us and told us how charity is the greatest gift. We read from moroni 7 (my favourite chapter from the book of mormon) and it says that Heavenly Father bestows charity upon all those who are true followers of His Son. Charity is a gift and is something that I am continually praying for. Sister earl then asked what charity is and we said the pure love of Christ and then she asked us what that is (this is why I love bringing sister earl to lessons). We said a few answers but then she had us read verse 45 and told us that in that verse were the 13 characteristics of charity. 45 And charity suffereth long, and is kind, and envieth not, and is not puffed up, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil, and rejoiceth not in iniquity but rejoiceth in the truth, beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. Charity is so many things! I am trying to just work on one characteristic at a time. 

Also, I am starting to say "Where's it to?" instead of "where is it" or "where is it by" haha and I love it. Oh yeah and It was exchanges this week so I got to spend friday with sister Moojalsky! (from mountain view, her family had been evacuated but they are back in their home now:)) And bailey nelson gets here in 2 weeks!

love you all<3

love sister wood

September 12, 2017

Ugh I just love getting emails and updates! sorry mine are not as long anymore, but I try to write the most meaningful things in them. That does sound like a dream, trey walking by and saying hi grandma haha that is just too perfect to be true! I am excited for your next projects! I just admire that so much about you, you are such a hard worker! I do play the piano for church, johnny low plays for sacrament meeting though which is nice haha. Jordan low told me about thae fires, that is so scary. I wish I could give you some of our rain! It rains most days of the week here but I love rain so I won't complain, especially when it is needed so badly in some places.

 The activity day girls are doing well haha I wish there was someone in our ward who had a big yeti van. We baked cupcakes with Dakota and Keegan and the YW lily amber and achol, for the potkuck and talent show we had saturday night. It was district conference for newfoundland this weekend so saturday there was a session from 4:30 to 6 and then we had the potluck and talent show after wards! The turn out was so great, sister fernandez and I were so happy! There was about 20 nonmembers there! Everyone's talents were so good and the elders and sister fernandez and I did that thing where you draw a face on your chin haha and just did I little skit about missionaries it was pretty funny, the yw were dying. So with conference we were on skype with cornerbrook and gander, and all of the members in newfoundland just went to the building that they were closest to. The session on sunday was really good, there was a focus on the Book of Mormon. After some talks President Pratt (he was in cornerbrook) called three people up to bear their testimonies :) one of them was me haha. I knew I was going to get called because I had that same feeling in my stomach that I did when I was called to give a talk in the MTC. It was a little nerve wracking but I love bearing my testimony. in the talk before the testimonies the speaker said "I'd like to talk about the piece of our religion, the book of mormon" In my head I heard "piece" but in my heart I heart "peace". There's a reason we are pleaded with to study from the book of mormon everyday. And if you're not I am pleading with you to start haha. Pray to know not just if it's true but to know if it's the word of God. I just love the Book of Mormon. I love the people that are in it, I love the people that wrote it, I love the people that preserved it, I love the people that brought it forth, I love God for intending it for US! READ IT! Not just so that you will be blessed but so that you can bless everyone around to too:)

I love you all and I miss you all<3

love sister wood

September 5, 2017

Oooo I am so excited for grandma's parcel!! Also I got your last parcel! I got it last tuesday right after saying I hadn't got it yet haha. I have not eaten any weird food yet really, awhile back I could have eaten this pickled pig tongue, but it was literally just this huge pig tongue in a pickle jar and I couldn't make myself do it . But you all know that I am not a picky eater so the next weird thing that pops up, i will try:)

Newfoundland is getting so cold! The past few nights have been freezing but hilarious. Saturday night we left our house to go knocking and when we left the house it was pretty nice, it was cloudy but that was it, but then 20 minutes later it was pouring!! the most it's ever rained since i've been out and of course me, being dumb, wore the only coat that I own without a hood hahah we were completely drenched, and we both had our glasses on and just couldn't see anything haha we must have looked ridiculous. We knocked on this one lady's house,  roselyn ( she offered me one of her jackets) and she was so awesome, we had a really great conversation with her, one of her friends years had been a mormon and had given her a book of mormon but she never got the chance to read it because she left her husband and forgot the book at his house. sister fernandez and I are out of book of momons right now, we have to wait for someone to bring more to us, so I ended up giving her my MTC one so I really really hope that she reads it.  Last night there was another crazy storm. We were at the university because we have our bible study every monday night, and we were trying to get more people to come to it. I don't know why but the elders always seem to find someone who ends up being really awesome and actually wants to investigate the church but it is never the same case for us. We always somehow manage to find the craziest people on campus. haha so last night we met melvin and this other guy(they were both from china and both couldn't speak very good english) but we convinced them into coming with us. When we met them we were protected from the wind and rain by this one building but we had to run quite a ways to get to the next building where the class was. So it was me sister fernandez and these two Chinese basically running for our lives hahah it was so funny, the one guy dropped out half way becasue he couldn't make it. Ugh I wish I could just be in person to explain to you all how funny everything was, it is just too hard to type. In the end after our class was done melvin asked if he was christian now... hahah I felt so bad for him, he was so confused, it turns out that he just got to canada a week ago. I'm laughing now but I really did feel bad. 

We are having a talent show with our branch this Saturday!! It is super last minute but that's how it works around here haha everyone is very spontaneous! Sister fernendez and I were really worried that no one would sign up but so many people have! It's awesome! We are still trying to figure out a talent that we can do, turns out we are not as talented as the people of newfoundland haha. 

I have kinda wrapped up my study on peace. My favourite scripture for it is still john 16:33 and I've  kinda just concluded that the gospel of Jesus Christ does not take away our trials, but it offers us a peace that our trails can't take away. And I truly do believe that. I don't know if my conversion in the gospel is strong enough yet for me to always have this peace but it is my goal to get there. 

Last friday we had our zone conference in Gander so we car pooled with the elders for the 4 hour drive on thursday. I had my interview with president Pratt thursday night and he talked a lot about training so I don't know if that means I am going to be training next transfer or not but I am super nervous and excited! But oh my I could not imagine leaving st. Johns!! especially all my girls here! We are teaching so many little 9 year olds right now and they just keep inviting more and more of their friends to lessons and to church! School is starting for them and I really want to start doing activity days with them after school once a week. I have to hold myself back from blowing money on craft stuff to do with them. oh also in gander we had this really cool experience. Sister stoker, sister cartright and I were knocking, it was almost 9, and we knocked on this one house and don answered( a mother probably in her 30s) she wasn't interested but her little boy who's 9 came down the stairs, he has autism. He had heard the name jesus and said " I want to learn about jesus" his mom said it was time to head back to bed but he was pretty persistent. I told him that jesus loves him and he just went quiet. The spirit was really strong in that tender moment. You could just tell that he knew. I think those who have disabilities are a lot closer to heaven than we think, God has a special place prepared for them:)

love sister wood