Week 46 & 47

Week # 47

Hello mom! 

Mother's day: We're pretty sure we get to skype. We'll be doing it from a member's house but she has to skype with her son on a mission so we're not sure what time it's going to be at. We don't get out of church until 2 and then we have dinner with those members at 5. So I'll probably just have someone text you in the middle of the week to get it all figured out. We're three hours ahead here. 

Glad things are going good! That is really scary about the shooting. I can't believe that happened! Good thing it wasn't in the school. Sheesh.

 

Well we had the busiest week this week. So much happened! 

Let's start with Tuesday. It was HOT. And of course when we left it was all rainy so we were dressed to be warm. I was dying. So hot I could not stand it. And we couldn't just go home and change because we were in the next town over. But we found a lot of people! We met this super nice catholic priest who lived in Utah for 4 years and was invited to have dinner with President Hinckley! He was so cool. He said that if he dies and Brigham Young tells him that the church is true and people did his work in the temple he would accept it. haha WHAT?! Pretty cool guy. Then that night we had a tornado warning. "Take shelter now". Uhhhhh.... Alayna told me once that the bathroom is a pretty safe bet for shelter if you have nothing else. It was pretty scary. Super stormy. You should have seen those lightning bolts. Crazy! 

Wednesday a lady from the other ward called us to tell us her friend's barn blew over from the crazy wind/tornado the night before. So what did we do? Went and helped him tear apart the barn. Everyone was like um I don't think that's work for the sisters to do. So I told them that I tore apart a trailer once and I just went straight to work. I think they were in shock. Thanks for making me do labor even if I hated it at the time! We were knee deep in mud. This Saturday we're going back to help him rebuild it. I think I'm going to buy some rain boots or something. Also I wish I had a picture of our goat lean-to thing to show him because his barn was teeny and it was all patched together with random wood. 

Karen tried to cancel our appointment this week but we said no way and went anyway. We bought her some church clothes from Goodwill last Monday because that was her excuse last week for not coming to church. Molly Collins said Karen came in to her office and was so excited and showed her what we got her and was really touched. She said nobody had ever done something that nice for her. She is so cute. She's now working towards May 31st. Then we saw the McHattens and we had a really good discussion. 

 

Friday the zone set out to break a mission record for finding. It was really fun and exciting. They would text every time someone found and we kept a tally. We 2-2-5'd and I had this feeling that no one was going to be accepting but to keep knocking. Finally we got to the end of the street and turned back to walk to our car. There was this kid walking towards us and I asked him for directions and gave him the whole "we're not from here, we're missionaries from our church" shpeel (spelling?). He was way interested. We talked about the Book of Mormon and he was like "yeah my mom would actually probably really want one of those. She says we don't go to church because it's all corrupt and things have been changed." Whoa. So we got a return appointment. We went back Sunday afternoon and he was really excited about his own copy of the Book of Mormon. He is the nicest kid. He went to go get his mom and guess what? SHE IS A MEMBER. I almost fell over. What the heck? She left the church when she was 18 because when Orion (the kid we're going to baptize) was 2 he was in the hospital with a heart condition and in a coma. She asked someone from her ward to come give him a blessing and he scoffed and said no because Orion was born out of wedlock. I want to find this man. Who denies a 2 year old a priesthood blessing?! I was just kind of in shock for the next 5 minutes as she continues to tell her story. Here's the best part, though. She still has a testimony and we asked if we could come back and teach her family the discussions and she said yes. We have an appointment with them next week! We met her husband. He is so nice. And you can seriously just feel the spirit so strong around all of them. Heavenly Father truly leads us to his children that are prepared. We found them! It's insane. 

Also remember Heather from a few weeks ago? The one that we had that awesome lesson with where the spirit was just super strong and then she was like ummm I'll just stick with my baptist. We went to see her again and she's thinking more and more about coming to church! We also talked about how the Book of Mormon talks about things from the Bible since Lehi's family had the first 5 books of Moses and she was like what? I want to read that! Super cool. Then after we left her apartment we helped some random people move furniture up to their apartment and then we saw Mickey and stopped in to say hi to Vickie. All of these people live in the Shelby Villas and everyone knows us there. It's actually really cool. We're just part of the family now and everyone in the villas loves us. We are literally their local community missionaries. It really is all about building relationships with people and slowly but surely their hearts soften. 

Transfers are in a week and half. This transfer has gone by so fast. I feel like the last 6 months of my mission are going to fly. I'm really sad about it. 

Oh and Liz Deemer wants to get baptized! 

Well I just love you! 

Sister Clark 

Week # 46

Okay here's the update on Brazil. The transfer there is May 6th. I will be going to the MTC for 2 weeks. I would have had to leave last week to get there in time for the transfer. But Sister Sender says a lot of missionaries come in the middle of the transfer. They won't tell me when I'm leaving. So I'm sure that when I leave they'll let me email your or call you or something so just tell everyone that asks that I don't know until about 3 days before I'm supposed to leave. It's all just up in the air and I just have to wait.

Well this week just flew by. It feels like I was just emailing. I don't really know why it went so fast. Not a lot happened.

We had dinner with Sister Engh Monday. We couldn't play tennis :( but I could tell she really misses church. It's just hard for her with her husband since he's catholic and she doesn't like going to different churches. But she has had so many callings and we just really need her in the ward!

Tuesday we had a lesson with the McHattens and we extended baptism and they accepted! Of course it was conditional, life "if you came to know these things were true would you be baptized and be a part of it". But it was crazy she immediately said yes! Her heart is doing some serious softening. Then we had dinner with Liz. Chicken Marsala mmmm but I don't think the wine cooked out all the way.... woops.

Thursday we had a surprise specialized training. A day of repentance is what President called it. Or rather, a mission intervention. I'm guessing the mission is slacking. It's pretty sad they have to keep bringing these things up. But it was really good! We went over a lot of basic stuff and then it was just all motivating quotes from there. President said if you're not working your heart out, you do not have faith. Whoa. And then Sister Nilsen said on a mission we have to adapt or die. That was a big wake up call for me. Sister Hibbert of course thinks we're perfect and there's not a lot of improving we need to do but there are little things that we do need to fix in order to be more obedient so we can receive those blessings. And I'm at the point where I only have 7 months left and I just want to go, go, go. And we haven't been working as hard as we should be. So I am going to change.

Friday we saw Karen. She is on track to get baptized! Except for the part where she didn't come to church this Sunday so now we have to push her date back. But she's tired of putting it off and she just wants to do it. She's been through SEVERAL sets of missionaries. It made me think of all the people I've come in contact with on my mission that didn't get baptized while I was there or just flat out rejected us. The Lord continues to reach out to them no matter how many times they say no until they finally say yes. 

 

We watched the Prophet of the Restoration with Liz Saturday night and she really liked it. She doesn't understand how people can be so intolerant. And then we talked about that for a very long time. Finally we brought back to praying and gaining a testimony and Sister Pederson with us. She told Liz that she hopes she'll come to the knowledge that this is all true and Liz said she hopes so too. That she's searching for something. And she came to church with us on Sunday!!! I was so excited. And everybody from the ward just swarmed her (like we told them to) and she was really happy about that. She said she would be back! It's just a slow process with some people and I get so impatient because I want to be here to see them get baptized. We have some really progressing investigators though so it's just a matter of time and getting them to church before they accept baptism.

Well I love you! Have a great week!