First Area Week 4...Have I Done Any Good in the World Today? (8-26-2013)

Friends and Family!

This past week has been a absolute blast! We have had our ups and downs, but who hasn't? 

Last Monday we went and visited a less active couple, Randy and Michelle, who are really low income. While we were there we discovered that their wild and crazy dog had fleas and ticks, needless to say we were severely uncomfortable. We went home and took showers and washed our clothes in a big fat hurry. But Randy and Michelle are great! They are good people and they try hard, circumstances have not been very nice to them. Michelle is trying to go back to school and Randy works about 3 different jobs and is a volunteer firefighter. 

Another one of our less actives that we work with needed some service, so we went to her house and helped her get some work done there. We were singing hymns and primary songs as we did it and she was just staring at us. She is not all there, so I couldn't tell if she was annoyed that we were singing or if she liked it, but we had fun!

It is interesting to be a missionary and see how wards work and don't work. There was a young man that fell off of a roof about a month ago while he was working. He fell really far and landed on his face, so his face is almost completely shattered and his back is all messed up. He had to be life-flighted to Columbus. Well, his mom and grandmother asked the Relief Society President to help them get someone to give him a blessing like 3 weeks ago. She passed it on to the Elders Quorum Presidency. They never did anything. Last Thursday, the Elders (missionaries) got a call from the grandmother asking for a blessing, her grandson was in our area so the Elders called us. They didn't know the grandson's name or where he was staying at in Ohio, he had been transferred from Columbus to a rehab place out here, so it was up to us to get all that information. We spent the next hour figuring out who he was, where he was, and getting a hold of to men from the ward to give him a blessing. It was really fun. We got to go with the brother's from our ward to give him a blessing and talk to the young man's grandma. It was really a sweet experience! I know that God loves this young man very much and is looking out for him.

I don't know how many times I have said this but, our area book is beyond worthless. We spend so much time taking information that other missionaries have put all over the place and putting it in the correct format. We have found about 5 different versions of an "area book" around the apartment and none of them are set up the way they are supposed to be and accurate in all of the information. So we spent some time working on that this week, we still have a long way to go.

Our investigators are all okay. Tammy and her mother have been pretty flaky the past couple of weeks. Brother Vanstone is slowly pushing through, he has a lot of tough stuff to get through, but his wife has a stellar testimony that really helps him. We did not get to see Susan, but we are praying for her all the time!

Saturday was the best day ever. The Elder's eternigator, Pam, finally got baptized. She finally quite smoking after two years of taking the discussions. It was such a sweet experience to be there at a baptism! It was at 8 ambecause Pam had to work, but people still came to support her. My mom always said that one of the places that she felt the Spirit the strongest has always been baptisms, how right that is!

Saturday we also had the chance to provide service for one of the members. They own a lot of land and animals and they were going to be baling hay! We got there to help and about 30 min in the baler stopped working! So we spent the next few hours trying to fix it. It was funny how we went to serve one thing, but ended up doing the other! Either way it was super fun! We also got to talk to them about their friends and inviting them to church and stuff.

All in all this week has been pretty great! Service was our theme and we loved every minute of each day!

Remember, The Lord Loves You and the Church is True!

Sister Nay 

http://www.mormonchannel.org/more-videos?v=1708170439001 

First Area Week 3...Another Glorious Week in Ohio (8-19-2013)

Family and Friends!!

This has been a great week for Sister Roberts and I. Heavenly Father has really helped us out this past week in understanding how to better teach our investigators. We are also getting more opportunities to serve and teach!

Tammy our strongest investigator has quit smoking all together! She has been smoke and cigarette free for 16 days! She has a bit of trouble going to church because it is a 25 min drive and she has a really bad back. So we are working with her on that. Otherwise her testimony is really strong. We also had two sisters from the ward ask about her and offer to come with us to our lessons with her!

Kurt is really great. He is investigating the Church because his wife is a member. They have been married for two years and he can't help but notice that she lights up when she talks about the Gospel. Last Monday we watched the Joseph Smith movie with him and we brought along the Finks, a recent convert couple that are totally awesome, to testify about their testimonies of Joseph Smith and the Gospel. We then went back a few nights later for dinner. It was then that we learned that he has never prayed in his life and he has never been super religious. We totally know that Heavenly Father had his hand in that conversation. We taught him how to pray and challenged him to pray about Joseph Smith.

Susan has proven to be rather difficult. She has grown up in the Protestant beliefs and is super strong in her faith in God and Jesus Christ. As we were planning to teach her this week, we got the impression to ask the Bishop to come with us to her lesson. After the lesson we had with her the week before, we thought she would have some concerns that having the Bishop there might help. Well, it ended up that having the Bishop there was totally inspired, but not in the way that we thought. She had an arsenal of questions and concerns that we did not see coming, but Bishop was totally right on the ball and really brought the Spirit. She had a lot of questions about the reading that we gave her in 3 Nephi 11. She really struggles with having another set of scripture added to the Bible. But we know that it was only with Heavenly Father's help that we were able to address her concerns and testify of the Gospel. Her husband also sat in on the lesson, he is a less active member with an awesome testimony, which has never happened before. He was able to bear his testimony about the Book of Mormon and I could see that his testimony really spoke to her.

So we provide service at one of the nursing homes here in St. Clairsville and we usually just play games and talk with the residents. One of my favorites to talk to is Mabelle. She is 99 years old and hardly looks a year over 75. She is probably one of the most spry residents I have seen there. She has really bad short term memory loss, like Dory status. But she tells awesome stories about her younger days and I just totally love her. Anyways, Thursday we were playing a game with the residents and she came in all confused. She thought it was nighttime and was totally lost. One of the nurses came and helped her and started her on doing a puzzle. When the nurse left Mabelle wanted to leave too, but I convinced her to stay and work on the puzzle with me. She ended up calming down and we finished the puzzle together. She told me about her experiences being a school teacher in a one room school house. It was really cool.

We also had the opportunity to provide some service to the Finks, a recent convert couple. They were baptized almost a year ago and Brother Fink is in the Bishopric. They are getting ready to go through the temple next month!! Anyways we helped them with their yard work on Saturday and Brother Fink taught Sister Roberts and I how to use a lawn mower. Now some of you might laugh at this, but I am from the desert! Our "lawns" are decorative rock and sand:) We also helped them prep their kitchen to be repainted. It was really fun. They are planning to move to St. George when they retire, they love Utah so much.

Well, that was pretty much my week. We had an awesome time doing the Lords work!

Remember, The Lord loves you and the Church is True!

Sister Nay

Quick Thought:

So I just had a thought about being a missionary here in the United States. Some people think that serving here in the States is really hard because there are so many people who are not interested in what we have to say. I would like to share with you my thoughts on that line of thinking.
Some missionaries are meant to planters that plant those tiny seeds of faith that will bloom years after their missions are over. Some missionaries are meant to be gardener who nourish those little seeds and provide that good example that some people need to see, they teach a lot, but never really see much happen. Then there are some missionaries who are meant to be reapers. These missionaries are the ones that baptize like crazy and make everyone green with jealousy. But none is better than the other. We are all meant to be a planter, a gardener, or a reaper. We just need to trust that Heavenly Father knows us well enough that he will assign us to be the one that will teach us the most on our missions. We are sent to teach the world the Gospel, but in that process we learn and grow ourselves. Our experiences on the mission shape who we are and will be in many years to come.

Love Always

Sister Nay

Remember the Lord loves you and the Church is True!

Funny Story:

Funny story. One of the guys in our ward prides himself on being able to tell the ethnicity of people, so I showed him a pic of Ken (who is half Samoan half white), he was stumped!

First Area Week 2...Hello From Ohio (8-12-2013)

Family and Friends!

It has been another great week here in the Pennsylvania Pittsburgh Mission. Like I said before I am serving in the Wheeling West Virginia Ward, but my area covers the half of the ward that is in Ohio. My companion Sister Roberts and I have been working really hard the past week. We have one investigator with a baptismal date and two more that are progressing. We spend a great deal of time working with less actives in the ward. The ward roster has about 300 members but only 125 come on a regular basis. So there is a lot of work on that front but we are super excited.

Last week started off with funeral of a medically less active member of the ward. Clady McGee was in the ICU and passed away two Thursdays ago, so her funeral was last Tuesday. She was an amazing African American lady with an awesome family. She was the only member of our Church so her family was very African American praise the Lord types. So it was way cool to meet all of them. She had a great influence on the people of our ward and all the people she came in contact with.

We have been working with Brother Vanstone, one of our investigators, lately. His wife and stepson are members of the Church and that is how he got introduced to the missionaries. We found out last lesson that he is struggling with his testimony about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon so we are teaching him the Restoration again tonight! He is super great and has lots of potential, he comes to church just about every Sunday. The only thing is he loves NFL and doesn't want to miss his team play to come to church...

Tammy is our golden investigator. She is absolutely amazing. She has been working on quiting smoking and has gone 7.5 days without smoking. We are way proud of her. She has a great testimony of the Book of  Mormon and Joseph Smith. Her testimony of the Savior is also way amazing! I can totally tell that Heavenly Father was working with her before we meet her.

Susan is our other investigator right now and we don't exactly know where she is. We found out this week she has a depression problem and other things and she really wants to know more about the Kingdoms of Heaven and also the Atonement. She is a great lady that can really use the Gospel in her life so I hope that she will progress. She also seems pretty sincere in her desire to know if the Book of Mormon is true. We will see where that goes.

Susan's husband is a less active member that just loves to be crazy. He is a Vietnam Veteran and he suffers from PTSD. He is just wild and out there but underneath it all he has a great testimony of the gospel. We are working on finding out why he isn't coming to church.

Heather is another one of our medically less actives. She is really great and we have seen her grow so much! Last week we went to go read the scriptures with her and she was really upset because of some of the events of the day. She said that she didn't want to read. After a couple of minutes though, she said that she thought we could read one chapter. Well one chapter turned into three and she also prayed for us at the end. She has been struggling with drinking tea and we got a text from her yesterday that said she had thrown out all of her tea! She is super funny and awesome. I am so proud of her.

We also had a great opportunity to go tracting. We decided to try service tracting. We dressed down in our service clothes and tracted that way. We ended up not getting any service opportunities but the people were way nice and we actually got a couple of service referrals that way. Some of the neighbors said that they didn't need anything but that old couple might want help, or that blind lady could use help and stuff like that. None of them where home though, but it was still a great experience.

We go to a nursing home for service every Thursday and that was super great. We helped the residents there paint pictures. It amazes me how much like children elderly people become. They need so much reassurance and kindness. We helped them mix their colors to get what they wanted and also gave them ideas of what to paint. They were all really cute. One of the residents, Mabelle, is 99 years old and hardly looks 75. She is super active and way fun to be around, she has the greatest stories!

When the sisters visited Clady while she was at the nursing home before she went to the hospital, they ran into a lonely old man named Joe Burch. He is the cutest WWII veteran that there ever was. He was in the 101st airborne division that dropped over Normandy. He has outlived all of his family including his children so he gets no visitors. We visit him as a service when we have open time. We visited with him on Saturday and I just totally fell in love with him. He sits outside his room in the nursing home and hands out treats to the residents as they pass by. He is just so giving!! It was so cute, he lit up like a little light bulb when he saw us round the corner. He found out that we didn't have a dinner appointment so he gave us money to go out to dinner. I can't wait until the next time we get to visit him!

Well, that is pretty much my week in a nutshell. My companion's name is Sister Roberts. She is from New Mexico and has been out 12 weeks. We have so much fun together and we are both totally dedicated to the work.

Remember the Lord loves you and the Church is so True!!

Sister Nay

First Area... Wheeling West Virginia and St.Clairsville Ohio (8-5-2013)

Hello Family!

Here is an update on my first week out in the field.

The flights... Both were good and longish so I got to sleep okay. They were uneventful and on time. There were 32 of us missionaries so it was kinda crazy.

I am in Wheeling West Virginia and St.Clairsville Ohio. The Elders cover WV, we just go to Chruch there. All of our areas are in Ohio. The Elders we share the ward with seem really great. The ward is actually really small even though the list is forever long. They have tons of inactives. Like more than half the ward... Zone meetings and stuff are in Pennsylvania. I am on the Ohio WV statelines. I am so excited to work with less actives, it is just getting a hold of them, we spent all day Friday trying to find them but they either didn't answer the door or yelled at us. There is a Rob Gardner song on We Must Sing about bringing Sheep to back to the Fold and it has always been one of my favorites!! I really am excited. I have always felt drawn to rescuing the strayed and weary. I just hope that I can do all that God needs me to do!!

Studying is good. There is a Sister in the ward that served in Brazil a while ago and she offered to talk with me. She is a resident at the Hospital here. And I am working mostly on grammar, I write out sentences and say them out loud. I also read from the scriptures a lot. I am in an English area with not even a Spanish speaker in sight. That is all in the cities and I am out in the country.

My companion, literally just finished training. I asked her yesterday if she would go through the training book with me when we had time, that’s about all I can do. They train you now so that you can train within 12 weeks, which is how long she has been out. Lots of people are training right when they get done because of how many there are...She was here for a transfer and her trainer was LAZY... so we are both committed to getting the work done and finding and stuff like that.

President and his wife are nice and great just not super welcoming. They had about a weeks’ notice before I got here so more could have gotten done to welcome me. They need a testimony of visa waiters and I don't know how to tell them about it. They are great and awesome to the assigned missionaries here. But being here definitely is trying my faith in regards to my testimony of waiting for a visa. Mission President... I meant that he kinda made me feel like a foster kid in the foster care system. Not really wanted and stuff. I am not getting trained, just threw me out into the field. There was one other visa waiter that came with me and it is the same with her. He assigned us our companions before we even got there and "his missionaries" he spent 24 hours getting to know before he assigned them their comps and areas. I didn't even get an interview (well I went into the office and he told me my comp), plus he had nowhere to put us the first night so we both went to  the other Sister's new area for the night because mine was way faraway.  They also keep saying that I am not supposed to be here. I AM supposed to be here. If I weren't I would have a visa. Heavenly Father wants me here for some reason so... Like I said it feels like being in the foster care system in regards to President. Foster parents "agree" to take these kids in and care for them, but really they are just in it for the money. I think president accepts us because he feels it is the right thing to do not because he wants to... He basically told me he didn't know what to do with me. TREAT ME LIKE A MISSIONARY, I AM. I WAS CALLED AS A MISSIONARY AND ASSIGNED TO BRAZIL!! The place is secondary. I really wish I could just throw all that at him, but he is my president and I need to be respectful... I know I am supposed to be here, it is hard to be told constantly by everyone else that I am not...

I am not getting formally trained which kinda irks me... But, the President was nice enough to let me come to his mission. Everyone keeps on saying that I am not supposed to be here. But I know that if I was supposed to be in Brazil right now God would be able to get my visa. I am here for a reason, I am supposed to be here. I have been trying to let that roll off my back.... Oh yeah I am in Ohio and West Virginia, I only go to Pennsylvania for Zone meetings and stuff right now.
It is amazing here in Ohio. So beautiful and green!! I am so excited to be here and get the work of the Lord out there and done!! It is super green and hilly here. I am actually getting really carsick every day because the roads are so twisty turny. The weather is super mild. I had hoped that it would be more humid, but it is hardly more humid than home right after it rains. I love it though. It is so beautiful and I have gotten to see some amazing views.

The ward seems great, they need a little push when it comes to member involvement though. My comp and I are working on that. My comp is great and I finally got up the courage to ask her to go through the training manual when we have time. I don't know why they aren't training me, what the heck. She said she would help me. We get along really well and she seems to be pretty obedient. There have only been a couple of times where I thought we could be doing something more productive. I feel really bad for her though. One of the inactives that she had been working with before I got here passed away Thursday and she has been having a hard time. The ward has really bad retention and stuff. They have like 300 on the list and only like 125 active. So we really are working on LAs in the area and making contact with them. We are also working on finding strategies. The Sisters who were here before wasted lots of time with the same 5 people and didn't even keep good records of what they did. So we are working on getting all that updated.

There are hardly sidewalks around here. It is like way out in the country, like where mom and dad but green!! The area book is crap. The area has only been open for a short time and the missionaries before didn't think it was important I guess. We are going down the ward list right now looking at less actives and stuff. We haven’t been super successful making contact though. We will keep trying.  All the finding techniques that I learned in the MTC are for Brazil and won't work here very well.
Friday we ate up a ton of miles visiting a part of our area that has never been visited by missionaries since it was opened earlier this year. All the Less Actives weren't home, but we did get to place one BOM when we were tracting. It was super beautiful out there. I would live there in a heart beat.
We had our one investigator come to Church yesterday, so that was way cool. There is a lot of work to be done so I am way excited to get busy!!

Funny story: So Friday we went to Jacobsburg and Shadyside, which are both at the edge of our area. We were driving down a residential road, now keep in mind all this area is like where mom and dad live but major green, and this pack of friendly dogs runs in front of our car! So my comp stops and asks me to get out and get them to move. So I did. They were all super friendly don't worry... Plus they were well cared for dogs, nicely groomed and fed. Anyways so I tried to throw a stick to get them to move, but all they wanted was attention so I walked away from the car and they followed. They were jumping all over me and were so cute!! But I was wearing a sky blue skirt and a light yellow shirt so I was covered in paw prints, Sister Roberts was laughing so hard. It was kinda funny, I will admit...

So I got on email from Church headquarters asking me to ask my parents to not intervene with my visa application. Does that include Brother Dink efforts? I really want my visa as soon as possible and I don't know if his intervention would cause a problem.

Every time I back up the car or go tracting, I have a little "Oh  my gosh I am a missionary!" moment.

I am reaching the end of my time on the computer!

Here is my address:

600 Trabar Dr. #23

St. Clairsville, Ohio 43950

Love you all and write whenever you can!!

Te-amo,

Sister Nay

Reassignment (7-26-2013)

Family, the time has come! I have received my reassignment!! It goes as follows....

Sister Nay:

At this time, we have not received your visa to travel to your mission. You will be serving a temporary assignment in the Pennsylvania Pittsburg Mission until your visa arrives.

I am leaving the Provo MTC on Sunday (July 28) evening at 8:30pm. I fly from SLC to Atlanta and then from Atlanta to Pittsburgh. I will be leaving at 1:05am, my layover is at 6:35am to 7:26am. I will be able to call you for those amounts of times before I fly!!

Love you!!!

Sister Nay

Week 5 MTC Email (7-23-2013)

Oi Family!

I cant believe that this is my last week! I am amazed by how fast the time flies around here. I have lots to say so hopefully I have enough time to get it all in, if not I will finish in a letter.

First hosting was amazing! I really enjoyed being able to help the new Sisters feel welcomed and comfortable. My host was so awesome so I am glad that I got to return the act! I got to host 4 new sisters plus I get to host again this Wednesday! There were about 800 new missionaries last week which means we were hosting about 100 missionaries every 15 minutes! The work is definitely moving forth!!

So we got to Skype for TRC last week! It was really cool. The original plan was for us to skype with Brazilians in Brazil, but in true South American fashion, most of them bailed so we spoke with returned missionaries instead. It was still a great experience. Can you believe that out of the six weeks I am here I only got to go to TRC twice? We have in-field training this week so no more TRC :(

Our investigators are doing really well. For a while we didn't really think Gabriel was grasping what we were saying spiritually. Then one of our lessons we just read Alma 32 with him about faith, and everything changed! He really has started progressing and he is super awesome, we only get to teach him one more time before we leave:( Nathalia is super awesome and really progressing. She has been kicked out of her house. She was living with her ex-boyfriend's sister. So we were able to find some members for her to live with. (Sister Huntington graciously played the part).  I love both Nathalia and Gabriel so much, I am sad that I will have to leave them. I am not looking forward to transfers in the field because if I get this attached to investigators played by my teachers then I have no idea what I will do with real ones!

I found a new music outlet in a really weird way. So we have this verb card that has all of the irregulars on it and in all the different tenses. What I have been doing is taking a tense and writing each verb over and over again and then adding the next verb. It really feels like practicing. I have don't present, preterit, and imperfect so far, today I think I will work on future! It feels so great!!!

 So the other night I forgot to turn on my alarm. I am like the mommy of the room because the other sisters don't have alarms and I have to wake them up. Plus they all forget their name tags and entrance cards all the time. I have to remind them to bring things frequently. But, I forgot to turn on my alarm one night which was not good. But the next morning I just woke up right before 6 and was able to wake up everyone else! I know Heavenly Father was making sure that we would be able to get to our allotted places on time and he was helping us follow the rules!

So on Saturday we spent 2 hours talking to Sister Peterson about her experiences in Brazil. She  told us so much, some in Portuguese and some in English, that I cant say it all. But one thing that I thought was cool is that cashews, the nut, grow on a fruit in Brazil! There is one nut hanging off of each fruit. Sister Peterson said to try the fruit just to say you did, but that it is not the best. Oh yeah and Tucanos is nothing like real Brazilian food, Brazil is soo much better, haha! And they pretty much always serve missionaries soda, FANTA is their favorite. YAY!!!

We had an awesome experince with Sister Peterson. She was showing us how to teach. She was the missionary and all  of us were investigators. It was super loud and rambunctious (on purpose) when she entered the room and slowly she brought the Spirit in and stuff. Then she recited the First Vision, and I was moved to tears. The power of the First Vision for anyone investigating the gospel is amazing. It was such a beautiful experience. Plus it helps that it is absolutely gorgeous in Portuguese. I have had it memorized since the 2nd week. I truly have a testimony of the Joseph Smith and the validity of his experience!

I got to pray in Sacrament meeting on Sunday! It was a little nerve wracking, but we are the oldest district now, so it was my turn. I really liked it.

I also got to watch mucsic and the spoken word again on Sunday, You guys should really start watching it,it is amazing. Both Corrine and Sara were in the horn section. Of course it was pioneer themed so it was awesome. They had guest artists Nathan Pacheco and Lindsay Stirling. Both were amazing!

The people I have seen this week at the MTC are Jordon Sparks from my ward (he works at the front desk) Travis Killian from the horn section, and Bryce Dawson from the horn section. Crazy that I see new people that I know all the time. Did I tell you Billy Loveless works here too? He is in the mail room. And I saw Jimmy at one ofthe Devotionals in the Marriott center. He is a tech guy there.

I love reading the BOM, or OLdM, in Portuguese. Because I am focused so much on the language and understanding , it feels like I am reading it for the first time! It is so amazing!!

Remember how I told you about the protestors on Sunday outside the temple last week? Well there were more this week. Man I can tell that we are doing something good, because Satan is pretty scared!! You know I feel bad for him sometimes, because he is so bitter... oh well he made his choice.

I have been reading the old testament for about 20 min everyday and it is amazing! I would really encourage it because it makes the Book of Mormon that much more cool when you understand their heritage!!

Love you!!

Sister Nay

Week 4- MTC Email (7-16-2013)

Eu estou a missionario por A Igreja De Jesus Cristo Dos Santos Dos Ultimos Dias. I can't get the keyboard to change to portuges so there aren't any accents, sorry.

My purpose is

Convidar as pessoas a achegarem-se a Cristo, ajudadndo-as a receber o evangelho restaurado por meio da fe em Jesus Cristo e em Sua Expiacao, do arrependimento, do batismo, de se receber o dom do Espirito Santo e de perseverar ate o fim.

I loved the TRC! It was really hard because they all spoke really fast and slurred their words together. But as a companionship we made it through and were able to teach what the people needed to hear. We are so good. After that one really bad couple of days we have become super close and I love them so much. We have tried so hard to listen to eachother and respect one another. We have so much fun together, I will miss them.

Guess what? I will be a host this week for incoming missionaries!! I am so excited! I only had one 'normal' week here at the MTC, last week. This week we host and then we will be doing in-field training and getting reassignments next week.

I loved Sunday as always and my comps are so awesome. I continue to learn so much every day and am so excited to get into the field.

I should be able to notify you when I get reassinged. Josh should be getting his reassignment soon, on Thursday or Friday... Almost all of them are from back east in Georgia Pennsylvania and Florida, they have a higher chance of getting it within the next week. A member of the Brazilan gov't just visted BYU and they said that he was super impressed and made some calls to advance the proccess fro missionaries. LA is super busy as a consul so I have a long way to go plus I turned my application in late. The people who have been getting theirs are from Georgia and other places back east. I could go everywhere from Idaho to Boston to New York. Anything is game. All of the portuges missions are full because so many of us are getting reassigned, but whatever happens, happens! My sister training leaders got reassigned to idaho and pennsylvania, so whatever

Remember the Lord loves you and the Church is always true!

Love,
Sister Nay