Monday, January 25, 2016

A Day of Miracles Indeed!


monday- we went to niagara falls as a district again. it was so cold outside! and the mist fom the falls wasnt helping! but it is a really beautiful place and when im not here i know ill appreciate living this close to one of the seven wonders of the world:). we went to he macjanets for dinner. i love them! their hilarious! their house is so huge and nice too! sister macjanets cooking is heavenly!

tuesday- a day of miracles indeed! we taught a returning member sister h about prayer. she ahs a strong testomony of prayer but has limited understanding of the rest of the gospel so were working with her on that. we went to visit a less active family the a family. they dont make it to church often because they attend their kids sporting activities. it makes me sad when people dont make church a priority. our recent convert j actually answered us today. he seems to feel uncomfortable with sister missionaries so he usually ignores us. but this week he responded and it was indeed a tender mercy. a potential named kristin who we were supposed to have a lesson with had to go to work so she left us a note of her door. it was so nice of her to do that. so we wrote her back  a note with our next appointment time. we taught some ysa potentials named avi and davis. they had so many questions that we basically taught them every lesson in one sitting. it was really fun! we even got avi who is jewish to sya the closing prayer! our recent convert emily treated us to some delicious cashew chicken and some raspberry cupcakes for dinner. we love her! i found out that s one of our returning members speaks french so i can practice yay! a day of tender mercies indeed! 

Wednesday- today was the worldwide missionary broadcast. it was so good! elder bednar, oaks and anderson talked. what really stuck out to me was that we are to be vessels of the spirit so that the holy ghost can teach people and touch their hearts through us. 

thursday- we met and taught kristin and her daughter sierra and they just accepted everything witout any problems. she said that we can come back and visit them whenever we want. 

friday- we had district meeting and went over what we learned during the broadcast. it was in hamilton. then we went to a mall in hamilton and ate some lunch together. its so nice being around other missionaries!  we went on exchanged with the stls! sister cook and i went to hamilton mountain east with sister price! shes a ginger yay! i love it! 

saturday- we met with george whos getiing baptized next week in hamiltona ndhes such a quiet hmbke guy and hes so excited!

sunday- the sabbath day is so great! i got alot of questions answered during the meetings.president clayton called us and gave us counsle on how we can plan our lessongs around commitments to help those we teach with their concerns. oh and chuck our returning member came to church after two months of working with him wooohooo! life is good! i love it! and i love al lof you! :D <3 

sister mansfield

Week 11 in Field



Even though Transfer Meetings have been discontinued...Thank goodness we have to get our visas renewed!!
My entire MTC District met up for the first time in 10 weeks! That's longer than we were in the MTC together for!!!
It was so fun to catch up with everyone...
Too bad we missed our chance to get a group picture all together!





Zone Conference - Bangkok East Zone!








Little Devil and Doukeyy are the new additions to our district! 
They are taken care of by two wonderful Daddys who took them to Zone Conference!



At Srinakharin....there has been a Room of Requirements...
This room had been piled high to the ceiling with stuff that the members have kept at the chapel from past activities...and even some personal belongings.
Since the church building belongs to the Lord and not to individual members...my companion and I decided to do some service and clean out this room...
In the process..we had this nice little encounter...SNAKE SKIN!!!
Weeks ago, Sister Hayes and I walked out of a lesson with a member and saw a snake slither its way into this room...
As it turns out...it was in there long enough to shed its SKIN!



We were too scared to stay in that room and organize things...(just in case the snake came out!)
So instead, we decided to sort and wash the two huge boxes of toys that we found cooped up in there and put them in primary room~





As it turns out...Our fate this week was to do a LOT of washing !
We washed out everything possible at Sister Phan's house with the help of Nen. 
If there's one thing I'm getting really good at in Thailand...it's squatting!
I can't Thai squat well yet (with my heels on the ground), but I am becoming pro at balancing in a regular squat!!



Inviting with the Youth! 
The future of Thailand is in wonderful hands with these youth at the forefront!
These future leaders of the church have such wonderful Spirits, full of so much light and love for the Work of Salvation! 
These beautiful children of God are going to help the church grow and thrive here in Thailand!
I am so privileged to spend time with them!



The Youth's innocent, most pure love for this LA brought her to tears!!







The package that my family friends sent me FINALLY ARRIVED!! 
(after about 12 weeks...)
Thank you so much to the Choi Family for taking care of me!!


Elder Hilton in his 20th Birthday Jammies! :P


Sister Blaylock on the morning of her 21st Birthday!


And just like that...I've hit my QUARTER MARK in my mission! 
The time has flown by~~~







Monday, January 18, 2016

So I Met Donnie Osmond Sunday


well its been an awesome week here in st. cats! we went
monday - zone sports for the last day of the transfer woohoo! our recent convert em came with us and loved it! sister bell spoiled sister cook and i wish some subways. yumyum! we always do fhe on tranfer mondays with the rigbys and the currys. we played mafia and i actually won! reminded me off all those werewolf games in ysa! goodtimes! 

tuesday- we drove to bodacious brampton zone for transfers. it felt nice to be in my old stomping grounds. sister monnie is so fun! shes actually bestfriends with the ap in the wisonsin milwaukee mission elder larsen. i actually met him during the twenty four hours that i spent in that mission. i love Heavenly Father's sense of humour! small world! sister monnie is from a town called greschan in oregon. sister cook was sliding all over the place getting used to driving in canadian snow haha. we lived though! 

wednesday-we went to the womens shelter that we volunteer at in the kitchen. we had dinner with the drowmeys who are an older couple from england and their so cute! 

thursday- we finally were able to visit with our investigator jen. shes progressing really slowly but she is progressing! we went to visit the burtons and brother burton showed us some of his old band stuff from the 80s. it was cool to see him and brother lipiec back in the day. their so cool! 

friday- district meeting was too legit to quit! we focused on teaching in the lords way. President Clayton received inspiration that we should teach shorter lessons so that the spirit can be there the whole time. weve really seen lots of blessings as weve applied his counsel. hes so inspired! i love him! we watched the first video of the twelve step program with our retunrning member chuck. and he promised us that hed be at church this sunday! and he never makes promises he wont keep. norma the lady who is in charge of the kitchen at the womens shelter invited us over for dinner. she asked alot of awesome questions about missions and stuff. hopefully she becomes a new investigator! and her families awesome too! we want them all to join us! 

saturday- we found three new investigators today after tracting near referrals. one actually lived where a member used to live again. we really do see miracels as we hearken and apply the counsel that president Clayton gives us. another miracle! a ls member named jesse actually let us visit him. hes super hard to reach because he does shift work. and usually doenst answer calls or the door but he invited us right in when we dropped by!

sunday- so donnie osmand and his friend jerry williams were at church today. that was both awesome and random! apparently he did a show in niagara falls or something! i aint complaining! we went over and chatted with him a bit. i was a little stractruck i cant lie. he was super sweet though. he snuck out after sacrament but a couple people still got pictures. we were relieve that jen accepted the wow without any issues! repentance is the best. i would like to challenge everyone yto take a question into every church meeting. i promise you church will become a revelatory experience! and it will help you pay attention! the book or mormon and humility are the keys to being a successful missionary. i love you all! :D <3

Week 10 in Field - Faith Brings About Miracles!



This transfer in Srinakharin has been "slow."
It was not uncommon for my companion and me to be stumped at what to plan for the next day...
We needed to find people to teach, but we knew that contacting was neither of our strong suits. 
Thankfully, the Lord is merciful and somehow, we still had a handful of investigators: a referral, a walk-in, someone that the Elders turned over to us, and someone from English Class.
Unfortunately, two of them were dropped not too long after.
My companion and I knew that we had to change something if we were to be more successful in finding people. 
As we discussed how to find people, I remembered the 40-Day fast that our YSA branch had done back home for missionary work!
We decided that it would be a great way to get the members more involved, to have more unity in missionary work in Srinakharin and to show our faith to the Lord.
We also decided that it would be a fantastic way to get referrals from each of the members who fasted! 
So, with the help of our Relief Society President and Elder's Quorum President, we launched off our 40-Day Fast.
We asked members to sign up for one day to fast, and prayerfully consider one person that would be interested in learning about the gospel. 

This past week was our first week of fasting, and already we have seen more miracles than I ever hoped for!

On Friday, Brother C (from last week's blog post) spent an entire day out with the Elders! 
He went to go serve Sister Phan again, went to go visit an RCLA, came to Book of Mormon Class AND helped teach an investigator! Then...
For the first time in a year, he attended church with his son!! 
He is a completely different man than the man that I first met at his home, two months ago.
He is a man filled with light again! 

Also on Friday, we decided to prayerfully consider where to go contacting.
Sister Blaylock felt that we should go to soi 31, so that's where we went. 
It was a short soi, with a dead end in sight...
It didn't seem to look like much, and there weren't very many people. 
But, at the very end of that soi, was Fai. 
She had been to a different Christian church before, for activities, but agreed to come to ours on Sunday. 
And she did come!! With her 2 sons, her sister and her daughter! 
I could not explain the amount of joy we felt seeing them at church! 
They had a great time and stayed all three hours.

Other miracles that we saw on Friday came in little bundles of 2 year olds. 
While we were contacting, we invited a grandmother and her little grandson. 
We gave them an inviting card with the picture of Jesus and some children. 
The grandmother turned to the little boy and pointing to Christ, asked, "Do you know Him?" 
The little boy had been studying the picture, pointing to the little children as if out of familiarity, and when his grandmother asked him the question, he answered without hesitation, "YES!"
Another little girl who was walking by stared at the picture I gave her, her eyes glued to the Savior. 
As her mother tugged her along, the little angel turned back to look at us, eyes wide.
I have absolutely no doubt that these little children still remember Christ from their pre-mortal life. They were just there with Him after all! 

It's crazy to think that we all had faith in Christ before we came to live here on Earth. 
We all watched from above as Christ atoned for our sins in Gethsemane. 
We had absolute faith that He would be our Savior, and we stood on His side during the Great War in Heaven. 
We were strong enough to stand up to Satan. We won once before. 
It's really sad to think that so many people have lost their faith somewhere along the way. 
That's why I am a missionary now. 
I am missionary so that I can help even just one soul remember what they already know. 
The gospel rings familiar to anyone who is humble enough to accept it because it's the truth that we all knew before we came here to Earth. 
It saddens me to see so many people struggling in Satan's grasp here in Thailand, but there are also so many beautiful people who are ready to hear the gospel!
It is my most sincere prayer that I will be able to find them, and help them return to Christ. 

By Sunday, the first week of our 40 Day Fast was overflowing with miracles. 
The day before, on Saturday evening, Sister Blaylock and I decided to set up 12 extra chairs in our chapel with faith that those chairs would be filled.
To our utmost delight, we saw almost all of those seats filled with LAs and New Investigators who came flooding through the doors of our chapel! 
And to add the cherry on top, our 40 Day Fast Board was complete with at least one member signed up for each day! 
I know that this work of Salvation is only possible because our Lord is at the helm.
He knows who to seek and who is ready to accept the gospel.
And this work is not possible without the help of the members! 
Missionaries are only here to assist in teaching investigators.
Without the faith and help of the members, the work cannot progress! 
We need the members to stand up for what they know to be true and share the truths in the their hearts with those around them! 
I am so very grateful for the opportunity to witness the amazing miracles happening here in Srinakharin right now! 
When Saints are joined together in fasting and prayer, mighty miracles are brought about!







The story of the travelling hat: