10/29/2013

I Really Do Feel My Heart Swell

Heyllooo.

We just got back from our Zone halloween party aka a few of us dressed up and then we ate breakfast and then we wrote nice things to each other on a piece of paper. Here are just a few of the things written about me...

"I admire your honesty and sincere heart."
"We need more missionaries like you."
"thank you for your confidence and your smile"
"You are genuine"
"You speak your mind."
"When I see you, I see mother-like attributes"
Here are some weird ones...
"Sister Siswick" (siswick is one of our APs...Wagner and I were thouroghly confused by this and the Elders all refuse to explain it. whatevsss.) 
"You are always watching.." (I'm a stalker? lol)
"I like the way you communicate" (awkward)

hahahah. It was really fun. I really like our zone this go round. There are definitely some really great missionaries here. We lost one of my fave elders - Elder Olsen - to Argentina. He's really young but everyone of the Elders looked up to him and he was just a super genuine person. We miss him.

This last week was good! Had it's ups and downs for sure though. Good things about downs on a mission is they don't last long because the Spirit is just always so present. Anyway, last wednesday I gave a training in district meeting because our DL asked me to. It was on one of our mission beliefs "Build Trust". Which states: I create an environment of trust with members and fellow missionaries by respecting their spirituality and callings and by being true to my word. So I chose this belief because I think I am weak at it - as in respecting fellow missionaries aka Elders. So as I was studying it out I came to realize that we need to have respect for others as God's creations. In a gospel lesson all on reverence (idk one of the handbooks) it says reverence "is a feeling of love and respect for Heavenly Father, Jesus, and their creations" So then I realized that I need to reverence the Elders (even if they are young and dumb sometimes) just like I would reverence our investigators or our Stake Presidents or ward members we work with. That was really what I focused on in my training - reverencing others. So first I put up "How can we Build Trust with others?" on the chalk board and then we as a district listed ways we would do that. Some answers were like,"give food" " be honest" "make thank you cards" "fake it" "listen to them", etc. Then I read the part about reverencing God's creations and changed the header on the board to "How can we reverence others?" So obviously some of the answers were erased and replaced. It was great to see what each missionary took from it ya know? The Spirit works differently with each of us. I am working hard each day to reverence others and to have patience. 

The other night we had a lesson with the Elders (we were teaching a less active who wanted sisters originally, but is okay with meeting with Elders once we told her they were great). So anyway it was with Chelsea WHO IS AWESOME. We would be bffs in real life. Anyway she has been inactive for the last two years and got married to a LA guy too. Now she wants to come back - and it has been incredible teaching her. She is an awesome person and the Spirit is so strong every time we meet. She makes me cry because Christ's love for her is palpable and you just know how HAPPY He is that she is coming back. It is so good that it is before they have kids too, ya know? Anyway, we were supppperrr sad to give her to the Elders, but I trust them a lot (it's our DL and Elder Coronado who are like the best). She still wants to "hang out" with us though. Hahah. She is so sweet!

Could you guys specifically pray for Rae, Eric, Brooke, Sam and Mike and Candice??
rae - her parents need to accept or her desire to be baptized needs to overwhelm her desire for their approval
eric - just needs to quit smoking. He came to church on Sunday! YAY! His baptismal date  is Nov 9 so he's gotta quit this saturday..
Brooke - she is a less active who needs to feel more confidence in her knowledge and testimony and as a person in general.
sam - we told him our goal for him is going to the temple and he actually reacted really well to that! he finally got a job so hopefully his sleeping schedule will become more regular so then he'll go to early morning church. also just pray for his faith and desire to grow!!
Mike and Candice - they are a couple that is living together but aren't married. We met them last week. They are really cool. They just lack testimony/don't like judgy mormons. So they said we can meet with them but they don't wanna go to church. lol. that's good right?

On another note, I LOVE reading my scriptures like I want to read the Book of Mormon all the time. It's so unlike me. lol. I just really love them. I think it is because the blessings they bring and you know how AWESOME they are. I think it can be best summed up in 1 Nephi 15:24 SCRIPTURE!!

I love all of you and think about you all the time. I pray for you morning and night and I know that we are so blessed to be a family. I really do feel my heart swell when I think of you. I know that's cheesy, but it's true.

Love,

Sister Kingsford

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