Monday, February 20, 2017

Greetings from KFalls!

February 20, 2017

It's been yet another great week here in K Falls. There is a lot that I could report about but I will just be like the people in the Book of Mormon and "write upon these plates (my weekly email) a few of the things which I considered to be most precious" - Jacob 1:2. So even if my weekly email isn't very long, I hope you find the precious things that I do decide to write about to be of great worth to you (:

Last Monday for Pday we were able to go and play a little bit of disc golf... and I didn't know what disc golf was before I went. And the whole disc golf course was covered in ice and snow... so I walked very slow and was one of the only people that didn't fall at all! I also found out that I am very bad at frisbee and learned this is why I don't do sports!

This week we had a lesson with a young boy who just turned 8 whose mom is a less active. He has been coming to church for awhile now with some members and he loves it. Well we decided that we were going to teach him about prophets, and he just soaks up anything and everything that we tell him. Well while we were talking about prophets he suddenly started to sing follow the prophet and Sister Gregory and I just decided that it was the most adorable thing ever and we started tearing up a little bit. He loves the gospel. His mom doesn't want him to be baptized until he is a little bit older, so we will just keep teaching him. Seriously it is the best.

This week I met someone in our Ward who is doing some amazing things with missionary work! He has been in the scouting program for years now, and here in Oregon they have 20 non members coming to their scouting program. He told us that in the last 4 years he has been able to baptize 7 of those boys/families! How amazing is that, I can see the importance of the scouting program, it works wonders!

This week I was able to go on exchanges with some sister from Lakeview. Basically as STLs for our training we just go on exchanges, which form 24 hours means we go into mine and Sister Gregorys area and do missionary work. So I was with Sister McClellan who is from Arizona. She and I were able to go out and do a lot of tracting which meant we had a lot of time to talk and get to know each other. We were able to find 3 new investigators that day, and 2 families! It was super awesome. It felt so good to be on our feet doing the work that our Heavenly Father has called us to do in this area. It taught me as a leader I need to be able to listen to the people around me. I think I thought I was a good listener before my mission but as I have grown in my mission I see that I struggle with it sometimes. I am grateful for all of the little instances that our Heavenly Father shows us to be able to help us learn and grow as individuals. 

Is week we were able to have interviews with President Russell and it was so nice to be able to spend some time with him and Sister Russell. We were able to have some training before hand and so we were able to learn more in depth about the Plan of Salvation and a little bit about men's and women's roles in the Plan. It was all so interesting to hear about. I then was able to go into my interview and we talked a lot about the area and such and he made it sound like Sister Gregory is going to be leaving. I'm not exactly sure but that's what I took from that! So it is time to know the area!!

On Sunday we woke up to a surprise of like 2-3 inches of snow outside! It was amazing! But then by the time we got out of church almost all of it was gone! Crazy weather here in Kfalls!

Yesterday during sacrament meeting, one of the speakers spoke about love. The love that we need to have in this life in order to over come all of the evil that surrounds us. In Matthew 22:36-39 we read:

36 Master, which is the great commandment in the law?
37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
38 This is the first and great commandment.
39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

Love is all that really matters in this life. It is important to love God obviously. He is our Heavenly Father. And he loves us so much. But it is also important to love our fellow men. I know that I have began to love missionary work, that I have been happier and I have found more joy in the work. It helps me to be able to love the people more. It helps me through my trials. And I know that the same can come in any stage of life that you may be in. As you begin to love God and love the people around you, I can promise you that you will find more happiness then you can imagine. I am so grateful for every person that I have met on my mission. They have changed my life and continue to do that. 

This is probably one of the worst weekly emails I have sent in awhile, but I am so grateful for the opportunity that I have to be on my mission sharing the gospel with the people of Oregon! Thank you for all of your love and support and each of you give me. I hope you have a great week!

--- Remember who you are and who God expects you to become ---

Love, Your Favorite Sister Missionary,

Sister Harrison
 I woke up on Valentine's Day and made ❤️ pancakes. I topped them the Corvallis, peanut butter, applesauce & syrup. Don't knock it till you try it!

 These are some matching leggings that my mom sent to us. We thought about wearing them out proselyting but then decided against it.
 I look like a giant next to Sister Gregory, it's fine.
 This is my desk, I hung up the banner that I got in the mail!
When I finished getting ready I walked into the study room and found this ❤️ of nice things that Sister Gregory left me! She is awesome!
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We got a ❤️ shaped pizza for lunch. We were feeling very festive!
So one morning this week I woke up and said my prayers and then laid on my bed for a minute when suddenly I heard a ribbet. I thought there was a frog under my bed and I made Sister Gregory look under my bed and everything. She didn't find anything until late that day, when she saw a frog on our light switch. The real frog was probably outside our window.
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Monday, February 13, 2017

We are in the Splash Zone 🌊

Hey fan club! This week has seemed like such a long week. But it has gone by really fast so that is always nice! Last Monday Sister Gregory and I drove over to Medford to sleep at the STLs apartment over there for the night to then head up to Eugene the next morning for MLC. It was fun to go on a little road trip as a missionary, but at the same time I was really excited to head back to K Falls on Tuesday night. When we got to Medford we were able to go tracting for the sisters over there for an hour, and guess where we tracted?!?! Bailey Ave!! Super exciting. I was pretty happy about it, although there was no one there who was interested in hearing about the gospel. But it was good to go out and do the work. Then we had a sleepover at the sisters house in Medford, which is always fun although sleepovers in missionary time is the same as real time in the fact that no one gets sleep because we are usually up talking all night. But don't worry we were in bed at a semi descent hour because we had to leave at 6 in order to get to Eugene at the right time. 

It was fun to be able to drive up with a bunch of sisters, because I was in Brookings and was around no missionaries for awhile, I don't know many missionaries. So it is fun to get to know more people for awhile. So in Eugene we went to a meeting called MLC which stands for Missionary Leadership Council. Basically we go to a meeting with all the Sister Training Leaders, Zone Leaders, Assistants to the President and the Mission Presidency, then they are able to teach us concepts and principles from the gospel. At MLC this week we were able to talk about How to Begin Teaching for the majority of the meeting. President Russell has made a goal for baptisms up until the time he leaves the mission, and so as we are talking about how to start teaching it will be able to help us get our investigators to the Baptismal font. We also talked a lot about prayer and how we are given the commandment to pray to our Heavenly Father. But really, why would we turn down an opportunity to pray to our Heavenly Father? He knows each and every one of us personally and is ready to help us with anything that we may be struggling with, all we have to do is pray. President told us, "you will not baptize without praying!" Sounds pretty simple but I think some missionaries haven't understood that yet, so just remember to pray everyone!

Also at MLC I had the amazing opportunity to see Sister Nowell, she literally hug attacked me as I walked into the cultural hall. And I don't think she ever stopped hugging me. But I love her and it was awesome. Also she had a sticky note of things to talk to me about, I'm glad that I get to see her at ever MLC from now on. Mother and daughter reunion!

After MLC we ended up not getting back to Klamath Falls until 10:15 pm so we were exhausted. But on the way back we stopped by in n out and got a shake so don't worry it helped us stay awake. 

This week I have been thinking a lot about obedience and how Heavenly Father wants us to be as obedient as possible. But Satan doesn't want that. Satan is literally not on our team. He is waiting for us to fail. But our Heavenly Father and our Savior are cheering for us, so it is so important for us to be able to continue on the right path!

So on Friday I was able to teach in my first Zone Training Meeting. It was terrifying but I think it went very well. We were able to stay on topic and the Zone was able to keep up a discussion, so that of course made it better. I think I also learned a lot that will help me for the next time that I have to teach. But it was pretty successful!

The other exciting news from the week was that on Saturday Sister Gregory and I just went to work really hard and we were able to find 4 new investigators, we didn't really actually hit our goal because we weren't in K Falls for part of the week. But it felt good to be out in the world sharing the gospel. This next week we will go on our first exchange with the Lakeview sisters, and I am scared but excited. We also have interviews this week!

Oh and then guess what happened on Sunday. Well we got a call 2 weeks ago asking if we could bear our testimonies in sacrament meeting. Of course we said yes. Well glee got to sacrament meeting on Sunday and we found this:

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So we might have freaked out and spoke in the spot in sacrament meeting. We quickly scrambled something together and Sister Gregory went first. Well she shared the same story from the Bible that I was going to share. And she quoted the SAME TALK. We were doing very well on companionship unity. And suddenly I had nothing to say, I honestly can't remember anything that I said, so the spirit for sure took over. But a lot of people thanked me for my testimony so it must have been good!

Well the scripture that I was going to share in sacrament meeting is found in John 21 when after the Savior has been resurrected he appears to the apostles, who were back fishing in the sea. When they came to dine with the Savior, he asked to Peter 3 times, "lovest thou me more than these?" It is an interesting question to get from the Savior, for him to ask us if we love him. Peter was probably taken back by this, but of course he said yea lord, I love thee. But then the Savior responded, then feed my sheep. There is a talk for Jeffery R Holland called The First and Great Commandment, in this talk he talks about this story. And this is a quote from his talk that I wanted to share:

What I need, Peter, are disciples--and I need them forever. I need someone to feed my sheep and save my lambs. I need someone to preach my gospel and defend my faith. I need someone who loves me, truly, truly loves me, and loves what our Father in Heaven has commissioned me to do.

Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ need disciple to be able to go forth and share his gospel. To be a disciple means to be a personal follower of Christ, we need to strive to be that.

I am so grateful for the opportunity that I have to serve in Klamath Falls, and to be a missionary at this time. Thank you so much for all of your love and support, I hope you all have an amazing week!

---Remember who you are and who God expects you to become---


Love, Your Favorite Sister Missionary,

Sister Harrison 
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 As STLs we are basically the mothers of the Zone, so we made ❤️ cookies for Valentine's Day tomorrow, Happy Valentine's Day!!!
 This was when we Skype in for new STL training last week. President was sitting in the top left but we were having a break for a few minutes.
We were tracting in Medford on Monday night and we tracted on Bailey Ave, so our know we have to take a picture.
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These are the pictures from Brookings, so they are old but a member emailed them to me just this week. In Brookings they take a picture of the missionaries serving there then they have you sign the back of the picture with your testimony when you leave. So this is Sister Datwyler and I!

 I got to see Sister Nowell on Tuesday at MLC! So we took a picture (:
 Then she decided to squeeze my face... 😐

A car full of STLs heading to Missionary Leadership Council, or as we call it MLC! From the left to the right: sister Harrison, Viiga, Figueroa, Lunt, Hansen & Gregory

 It was super windy here the other day, I tried to take a picture, 
you can't really tell but it has been a lot of fun!
Then Sister Heaton and I. Don't comment on my outfit lol 
didn't know the picture was been taken that day.
💕

Monday, February 6, 2017

Sister Gregory Brings out the Giggles in Me

February 6, 2017

Hey my dear fan club! It has been yet another great week here in the field. I know I talked about being transferred last week but I just wanted to remind everyone that I am now serving in Klamath Falls instead of Brookings and I am actually loving it a lot. Klamath actually reminds me a lot of Utah. We are in a valley here and we have snow, and I don't know what it is I just think that this is the most Utah part of Oregon. They had a lot of snow when I first got here. But now that snow is basically gone, which is very very sad. But we hear that there may or may not be another storm coming in. I had to buy a new coat and some more tights, because they are a necessity here! But other then it being cold here I am really loving it. And also, no one really told me that Sister Gregory and I would be white washing (starting out new) in the area together. So you know that has been fun. We are striving to make our area the model area since as STLs, that is what we are supposed to be doing. So we did a lot of contacting this week. Since I mentioned Sister Gregory I guess I should tell you about her just a little bit. She is about 4' 11", so you know, really short. But she is amazing. She actually is going home in 3 transfers, basically she goes home the beginning of June, and is in denial about that as well. She asked President this week if she could extend for the rest of her life and President responded, "Sister if there was an extension for the rest of your life, Sister Russell would have already done that." So you could say that Sister Gregory is not ready to go home. But one thing that is great about Sister Gregory is that we are just laughing all the time. Doesn't matter if we are our tracting door to door, driving going to a meeting, or sitting down for lunch. Seriously there is always something to laugh about. She is from Preston, Idaho. She likes potatoes. She is pretty great and we are having a fun time here in Klamath. Basically the Klamath Zone is in banishment to the rest of the mission, so we for example haven't gotten supply orders in months. Like we literally have no Restoration Pamphlets, every time we find one it is like finding a pot of gold. But it is really cool because we are so far away from other missionaries we all get super close so we are the K Falls Fam Bam. It is pretty stellar.\

So this week had to do a lot with getting to know every one in our Area Book because we are both new to the area. But funny story. The STL area two transfers ago used to be in our ward, then it was moved, and now it is back. So Sister Gregory actually has served here before. But it was 7 weeks ago. So there is a lot more to learn and a lot more to do for us here. We also have Elders who are white washing the area as well. So together we are trying to make our area glowing again. You never know, maybe one day there will be a Klamath Falls 3rd Ward Stake! Just kidding, but you never know!

So here in Klamath we do service at a Thrift Store 2 times a week, and it is actually a lot of fun and all of the missionaries serve there. All of the proceeds from this thrift store go to hospice which is super awesome. It was pretty cool because I was able to find a coat there for only $10, so no more worries here in Oregon, I am very warm now.

This week we did quite a bit of tracting and we were able to find 6 new investigators. And there was one really cool experience that I wanted to share. One day I decided that we needed to make a goal of how many investigators we were going to find that day, we decided on 3. Well that night we tried to contact a new investigator, and of course he wasn't home. It was about 4:40 pm and Sister Gregory and I had almost decided just to take our dinner early and head home. But then we both really felt prompted to tract down a street named Perry. Well we went to one house that had a scary fake Puma outside (I might have jumped okay, and yes Sister G laughed at me.). Well we knocked on the door and a woman answered and told us to come inside. We were able to share with her and her family Because of Him and they are now our New investigators! God is so good. And I know that as we have faith that we are able to have miracles happen in our life.

On Friday we were able to do a power hour after district meeting. Power hours basically means that everyone in the zone goes to one area and tracts a street to help out missionaries. Well they did a power hour for our area for the Elders. Well we were tracting and we met a young girl named Nevaya. Well she told us that her mom wasn't home so that we could come back that night. So when we told the Elders that she was a young girl who we found they told us to keep her, awesome right? Well we went back that night and her mom invited us in and said we could teach her. So we started teaching her about her Heavenly Father and about how he can answers our prayers. We asked her how she thought she would receive prayers and she said, "Well through the Holy Ghost." So then we asked her how she can receive the Holy Ghost, "Through Baptism" At this point we thought she was golden and invited her to baptism. So we did and she said she had already been baptized in our church.... Awkward. So she is less active, but her mom and her younger brother is not a member!! So basically we now have golden contacts. Then later that night we were looking at our Area Book and we had actually planned on going and seeing her that night!! God is so good. Miracles are happening her in Klamath. And when that happened we knew that we were sent there for a reason.

So once upon a time, Sister Gregory and I didn't really know what was in the apartment last week before we went shopping, so we went in blindly and just got the essentials. Well when we got there, there was basically nothing. So we just decided that we would survive and that we would just not be eating a lot. But the thing that both of us was craving was Peanut Butter. So this week we got a text from a member asking if she could take us to lunch, we said sure. Well we went to lunch and she told us that she had gotten us some groceries. Um no. She did not get us some groceries. She got us all the groceries that we needed, and she even bought peanut butter. You could say I was a happy camper. I love members.

As a Sister Training Leader, one thing that we get to do every week is go to New Missionary Training to do role plays with the new missionaries and the Zone Leaders. Well we have a new missionary here in the Klamath Zone and her name is Sister Allen and she actually played soccer for Weber State! So cool. Anyway it was kind of awkward during the role plays because there was 4 of us and one of her. But she is already so prepared that she just took it like a champ. I am excited to be able to work with her more, we actually went over and did studies with them this week and as we were leaving she said "You sisters should come over here more, it is fun!" Sister Gregory and I were excited that she likes us already! 

We were also able to go to Stake Conference this last week and that was a lot of fun. President and Sister Russell were able to

A Scripture that I wanted to share with my fan club this week is found in Alma 37:40-41 which reads:
 40 And it did work for them according to their faith in God; therefore, if they had faith to believe that God could cause that those spindles should point the way they should go, behold, it was done; therefore they had this miracle, and also many other miracles wrought by the power of God, day by day.
41 Nevertheless, because those miracles were worked by small means it did show unto them marvelous works. They were slothful, and forgot to exercise their faith and diligence and then those marvelous works ceased, and they did not progress in their journey;
I was studying this week in Preach my Gospel under the Christ like attribute Faith. And one thing that really stuck out to me was how we need to have trust to be able to have faith. And it is interesting how growing up one thing that I learned was that trust is hard to build up but that it is easy to be torn down. And so this week during my studies I was really able to ask myself if I trust my Savior as I am doing his work. And I think that is something that we all should be striving to remember. It is important to trust our Heavenly Father and our Savior in all aspects of our life, and that shows our true faith. Then I read this scripture, and how it talked about when we have faith that we are able to see miracles. So I think that it goes in this order 1. Trust 2. Faith 3. Miracles. Then it also talks about how miracles cease when we forget to exercise our faith, stop being diligent and we become slothful. It is important for us to continue doing what our Heavenly Father wants so that we can to see miracles. And it is also important to remember that Heavenly Father wants to give us miracles, so we just have to put in the work! I love this gospel.

Well time is now coming to a close for the week. I am loving it here in Klamath Falls and I am so excited to see all the miracles that Heavenly Father is going to give to Sister Gregory and I this week. I hope that you all have an amazing week! Thanks for all your love and support Fan Club!

---Remember who you are and who God expects you to become---


Love, Your Favorite Sister Missionary,

Sister Harrison
 

Sunday, February 5, 2017

STL!

She is going to be AWESOME!


Transfers!!!

January 30, 2017

There are so many miracles that have happened this last week, but with a lot of miracles also comes a lot of changes. Right now as I am writing this email I am in the car leaving Brookings, and I am so sad about it! I have been so grateful for all of the people that I have been able to meet while serving on the Oregon Coast. And I am excited for my next adventure in life, but more on that later!

This week we had the amazing opportunity to put 2 more people on date, which means here in Brookings they have 3 people on date for the next two months. One in Shelly and she is on date for February 18th, then there is Ginny who is on date for March 18th and then Danny is on date for March 25th. We had an amazing lesson with Ginny, she is an investigator that Sister Datwyler and I actually found, and we haven't been able to meet with her since then! But on Tuesday Ginny, after 60+ days of not meeting and us calling 3-4 times a week, texted us! And said I have ovaltine, come over on Thursday at 1! What a miracle. We met with Ginny and had a member with us, everything was going super great, then randomly the member started talking about baptisms for the dead.... okay no that's not okay with new investigators. Anyway we changed the subject and brought it back to the Book of Mormon and the promise that it gives us. In Moroni 10:3-5 it talks about having a real intent when looking for the answer, meaning that whatever answer you receive, you have a real intent to act upon it. So we asked Ginny, if you found an answer to knowing that the Book of Mormon is true, what would you be willing to do. Well she said she would want to be part of it! So BAM!!! We put her on date for March 18th, I am so freaking excited for her! Then we were able to have a lesson with Danny just last night, the last night of the transfer. We talked about baptism and the promises that we make with our Heavenly Father at baptism and ways that we can and have received blessings from these promises. We then shared Mosiah 4:27 which says:
27 And see that all these things are done in wisdom and order; for it is not requisite that a man should run faster than he has strength. And again, it is expedient that he should be diligent, that thereby he might win the prize; therefore, all things must be done in order.
This week we had received a phone call from Catherine, Danny's wife who is also a recent convert. And she told us that since we were able to teach Danny the word of wisdom last week that his issues have decreased significantly. And Sister Heaton and I knew at that point that we needed to put Danny on date. So then in the lesson we started talking about how we are so excited and we recognize the steps that he is taking in progressing towards baptism. But that Heavenly Father wants him to continue to progress towards a date. We had been praying about March 25th and so we asked him what he thought about that date, and he told us it was his grandmas birthday so it was meant to be! We were over joyed. Seriously so excited for Danny and Catherine! Missionary work is so awesome.

The other exciting thing about this last week was we were able to have our worldwide missionary broadcast, which I am sure by now everyone and their dog has heard about. Everyone kept maki a big deal about the new mission schedule but really, they are just making it so we can exercise our agency, which I am pretty excited about. It shows the difference between the higher law and the lower law and how they are beginning to have us stretch ourselves in beginning to show our Heavenly Father that we are here for the right reason. They gave 4 reasons as for why they are changing these things, 1. Be more productive 2. Set inspired goals and plans 3. Be healthy 4. Use agency. And I really think that is going to happen with this new schedule. We basically have a little bit longer time to get ready, then we are able to pick when we do companionship study so we can get out and do more work. Then we are able to plan in the mornings now so when we get home for the night we can just go to bed, so we have the opportunity to get more sleep. It has only been in place for a few days but I am excited to be able to see the changes it brings into the mission. We also had changes in what numbers we report now, so we are able to focus more of our efforts on teaching repentance and baptizing converts. We are focusing our efforts in on baptizing, finding and putting people on date for baptism.

So funny story, this week we had a mission wide conference call to discuss the new changes to the schedule and to see how it would effect our mission. Well President Russell was going through and answering a lot of questions and then at the end he said, "I would like to invite Sister Harrison to bear her testimony." Um what??? He gave me no warning! So I might have freaked out. But really I have gotten a lot of compliments and thanks yous from other missionaries so I think it was good! Luckily I really don't remember what I said so I know that the Holy Ghost really guided that testimony!

So after President asked me to bear my testimony I really felt like I wasn't going to be staying in Brookings, and every time I would say something about it to Sister Heaton she would tell me to stop, but really I wrote about it in my journal and everything. So once I got the call on Friday night, I really wasn't that surprised. I have been called to be a Sister Training Leader in Klamath Falls. My companions name is Sister Gregory, and I have only heard good things about her. I am a little nervous about my leadership position but I am excited for the new adventure that my Heavenly Father has for me out here in Oregon. I was so sad to leave Sister Heaton but I am excited for her and her new companion. She is getting Sister Wilson who I actually came out to the field with. So it will be awesome!

On Thursday we got a call from the Elders asking us to teach District Meeting. Um okay, thanks for the heads up since District meeting is on Friday. But it was good, and I think since I have been a missionary I have been able to find things to teach about a lot easier. I was able to talk about our purpose as missionaries, helping people prepare for baptism, daily Contact and establishing the church. And out of all of those topics I spent a lot of time talking about Establishing the Church. Whenever anyone talked about establishing the church before I studied this I figured they were talking about less active work and helping people become active again. Well that is part of it but it is also a big part in missionary work, helping people become established in the church by going and teaching repentance and baptizing converts. During the missionary broadcast they talked about establishing the church more when you are off your mission because you will get married in the temple and begin to grow and establish your family and that will establish the church. Well that was really weird to talk about and it made me think about the future and my head starting hurting soooo I stopped!

For my spiritual thought this week I wanted to share a scripture that Sister Heaton shared a lot this week that has to deal with how we can understand when the Holy Ghost is speaking to us. The scripture is found in Galatians 5:22-23
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith,
23 Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.
When we feel these feelings and emotions we can know that the spirit is speaking to us. This last week during the broadcast Elder Bednar talked about how some young missionaries, and I feel like anyone can be put in this situation, don't know when the spirit is talking to them. And he told us that when we have a good thought, don't question it. Just do it. I know this is true, and when I have a thought that I think might be coming from the spirit that I should be listening to it. I am so grateful for the spirit in my life and I know that the Holy Ghost is always guiding me through my missionary work.

Well, we are almost to Klamath so I guess I will send this off! There is a lot of snow, and I am sure that it is cold outside. Pray for me! Thanks for all the love and prayers!! Have a fabulous week!

---Remember who you are and who God expects you to become---

Love, Your Favorite Sister Missionary,

Sister Harrison
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Customer Appreciation Day

January 23, 2017

It has been a pretty good week here in Brookings! Everyone in their emails to me this week talked about how much snow Utah has been getting, well here in Oregon we have just been getting buckets and buckets of rain! I seriously don't know where it all goes, I feel like we should be flooding by this point or something. But the other night Sister Heaton and I woke up to the rain/hail/wind/thunder/lightening storm. So it has been kind of crazy, but the work still goes forward! We might be soaking wet at times but we still keep going (:

So many miracles happened this week! On Tuesday we were able to have a lesson with  this AMAZING lady! Her name is Shelly and she had met with the missionaries about a year ago but then she was diagnosed with cancer and said she couldn't meet with the missionaries anymore. Well a few months ago she started coming to church with a member in our Ward. And on Tuesday we were able to put her on date for baptism for February 12th! And Sister Heaton and I are so excited for her and her decisions that she is making. A few weeks ago she was going to go in for a scan to look for the cancer and the member offered to give her a blessing, and we she went in for the scan there was NO cancer found. We are so excited for all of the great things that are happening in her life!

I would just like to point out that I had cod multiple times this week so I am a very happy sister.

On Wednesday we were able to Coos Bay for Zone Conference. I was excited for Zone conference because Roseburg was supposed to be at our Zone Conference too! Well on Wednesday we had to wake up at 4:45 am 😑we were just a little bit tired. Also, we were having car inspections so we were trying to keep our car SO clean. Well we were driving through a storm so our car was not clean on the outside what so ever. It was not very great. And when we finally got to Coos Bay we found out that Roseburg wasn't going to be able to make it because there was a mud slide, which was pretty sad, I was excited to see them! But all in all Zone Conference was so great. We were able to talk about the Priesthood Authority that is found in our church. And I think that is something that a lot of us take for granted in our church. We forget that the men who hold the priesthood that is can be traced literally from Jesus Christ himself. That this power is real and that it can work miracles. We also talked about repentance and about how we as missionaries need to be continually repenting so that we can teach our investigators to the best of our abilities. We learned about how repentance is a continual process and it isn't something that just is a check list. President Russell gave a step by step process for us to teach Repentance to our investigators with a couple of extra steps then what we usually learn in church:
  1. REDEEMER. remember the Savior always through out the whole Repentance process.
  2. RECOGNIZE. Realize the things that you have done wrong and the thing that you need to stop doing and the things you need to start doing.
  3. REMORSE. feel sorry for the things that you have done wrong. And not just sorry, but Godly Sorrow.
  4. CONFESS. it is better to choose to confess and to repent rather then being compelled to confess.
  5. RESTITUTION.
  6. RENUNCIATION/FORSAKE.
  7. REDEMPTION.
  8. RESPONSIBILITY. It is important to take the responsibility for the things that we have done wrong and be able to fix those things. The Savior suffered for us to be able to be made new again and to return to our Heavenly Father someday. I am so grateful for the repentance process and for all of the blessings that have been made possible through our Savior.
But yeah, Zone Conference was awesome. I always love the times that we are able to sit down with our Mission President to be able to learn something new. Our mission right now is very focused on the baptism goals that we made for the mission as a whole and is trying to put in all of our efforts to make those goals a reality. This next week we have our world wide missionary Devotional on Wednesday sooooo there will be some changes so we are excited to see what comes from that.

On Friday we were able to have New Missionary Training over Skype, which usually isn't a big deal. When I was in training I hated having to do the role plays. I gave it the nickname of New Missionary Torture. Well I think this week kind of felt like torture for Sister Heaton. It is really hard to do a role play with someone over a Skype Call. you can never tell if they are actually listening because they aren't looking at you and they just don't give much feedback. I think this is something that I am going to talk to the Zone Leaders about just because she did really good when we were practicing during the week but then it was really hard when they tried to do it over Skype. Other then that Sister Heatons training is going really really well. She is teaching me something new every single day.

On Saturday Sister Heaton and I were able to do something very special.... it was CUSTOMER APPRECIATION DAY AT DAIRY QUEEN! So we were able to get 1/2 priced blizzards, we had been working hard so we rewarded ourselves 😌

This week we were able to do quite a bit of tracting even though there was a lot of crazy weather. I decided that all missionaries should come together and put a book together of all the excuses that we get as missionaries. I am telling you it is hilarious. The other day we knocked on one door and this lady was like "well you know I have found Jesus and I go to my own church, and you know I am a cancer survivor so I am not interested" and closed the door. Like what the goodness. It just keeps us laughing as we are tracting. But we were able to find 3 new investigators during our efforts, so the work is still strong here in Brookings!

The best compliment I got this week is that a member of our Ward asked me if I am losing weight! Woo hoo! I don't think that I am actually losing weight but it really did make me feel good!

Last night we were able to teach a lesson about the word of wisdom to a man who has told us in the past that he has no desire to quit smoking. Well yesterday he told us that it is going to be hard, but he didn't tell us no either! He said that once he gets done with the stress that he has right now that he does want to be baptized and that he is going to quit smoking! Seriously this was such an answer to so many prayers that have been given lately!

This week President has been telling us to study D&C 58:26-28

26 For behold, it is not meet that I should command in all things; for he that is compelled in all things, the same is a slothful and not a wise servant; wherefore he receiveth no reward.
27 Verily I say, men should be anxiously engaged in a good cause, and do many things of their own free will, and bring to pass much righteousness;
28 For the power is in them, wherein they are agents unto themselves. And inasmuch as men do good they shall in nowise lose their reward.

We have the power to choose to act for ourselves. If we wait for the Lord to tell us everything we should do, we will lose our reward. If we use our agency to do things that bring righteousness, we will be rewarded! And the reward is going to be eternal life, and as a missionary if I use my agency correctly the reward is going to be seeing other people accept eternal life. I love love love this scripture, this week I would like to invite my lovely fan club to adapt it for themselves and see what you can do better!

The work is going forward here in Brookings. I know I said I was going to go on a fun adventure this week, but because of all the storms we couldn't go. Everyone always talks about this place called secret beach and all the missionaries want to go. Apparently it really isn't a secret, but we don't know where it is! So hopefully I won't get transferred next week and I will stay another 6 weeks so I can go!!

I love you all, thanks for all your love and support this week (:

---Remember who you are and who God expects you to become.---

Love, Your Favorite Sister Missionary,

Sister Harrison
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The Week of the CRABS!

 January 16, 2017

This week Sister Heaton and I had a pretty "stretch yourself" goal of having 30 lessons in one week, then something horrible happened. Every single person in Brookings got sick. Okay so maybe not everyone is sick but we had so many lessons cancel this last week, and at times it was a little discouraging. We ended up having 17 lessons, and we tried our hardest to try to at least get to 20, but not so much. Oh well, so the cookie crumbles sometimes!

Something really weird happened this week. But it was more like a cool kind of weird. Sister Heaton and I were in Correlation with our Ward Mission Leader and he gave us a referral to someone who he knew in town. So the next night we went and tried to contact her and she told us to come back in a week, well that's fine, we didn't think much of it. Well that night while we were syncing our ipads at the church we got an email about a referral from the church, it had the same exact address of the referral from Brother Johnson, but a completely different name. So we decided to go back there first thing the next morning and sure enough the referral from church headquarters was the other referrals roommate! But the one from church headquarters referred herself! I had never seen that happen before. Apparently she is a member of the church and has recently decided that she wants to come back to church. We are so excited for her!

This week we were able to meet with some new investigators who we found last week! It is a cute little family, a single mom and her 2 girls. And man I love them so much already. They were so excited to be able to learn about the gospel and so involved in the first lesson. When we invited them to come to church they were SO excited. Then on Saturday night we got a text from the mom saying that her and her girls were sick and they weren't going to be able to come this week. Sister Heaton and I were so sad. But we are excited for them to be able to try and come next week. We are going to be talking to them about baptism this next week and hopefully be putting them on date! We are stoked!

This week Sister Heaton and I were able to spend a little bit of time in Gold Beach, which is about an hour north of us, to do some tracting for the Senior Couple who is living there. We were able to find a few people who were interested in talking with us, and honestly it was a beautiful day so Sister Heaton and I just soaked in the sunlight as we were walking around tracting. Although we did meet one interesting fellow. I don't even remember his name, but he had some interesting views on the missionary work aspect of religions. He told us that it was like we were an NFL team drafting our players into our religion. Interesting notion that he had there. As you can tell, he really didn't want to talk to us!

This next week we are going to be going up to Coos Bay in order to have Zone Conference with President Russell, which we are super excited for. The other exciting thing about it is that we have car inspections. But this isn't a normal car inspections because the mission is getting a bunch of new cars, and so the cleanest car in every zone is getting a new car. Soooo you could say that Sister Heaton and I spent a good hour and a half today really deep cleaning our car. It looks very very nice.

The other night, Sister Heaton and I were really struggling. We were trying to contact people and everyone that we could think of we went to and they were sick. So we stopped and said a prayer at one point and I decided to try and call a recent convert, who we have been trying to get ahold of for weeks. She went out of town with her husband, who we are also teaching. And we had called them every day for 2 weeks, and nothing had happened. So reluctantly we called, thinking we would get the same response, but NO! This time she answered and she was SO excited to talk to us. We were able to talk to her about her trip and then she decided to invite us over for dinner because we didn't have one that night, and guess what they were having? CRAB. So we were able to help her finish making the crab, she taught us how to cook them so that they don't scream in the pot, and then taught us how to crack the shell open so we wouldn't have food flying. It was a good night at dinner. I liked the crab a lot, Sister Heaton didn't really liked it, they kept offering her more and more and she kept trying to find excuses until she finally said no, lol. But it was a good night and we were able to teach them a little lesson. It was perfect!

Yesterday during my studies I was really struggling, and I wasn't sure why. I was trying to figure out what to study and just nothing was feeling right. So I decided to open up to Preach My Gospel and it referenced the scripture Mosiah 3:19 which reads:

19 For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a childsubmissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father.

When I went on to continue to study what a natural man was and who a saint was I realized that a natural man took on the form of a man who is of the world, or a sinful man. While a saint is a man who is set apart from the world and who is trying his hardest to become like God. Obviously we can't reach that point on earth, but it was an interesting thought. But then, it is interesting because we aren't all perfect. But it says we can become a saint as we use the Atonement of Jesus Christ every day. Then it lists a bunch of Christ like attributes. It is important that we take upon ourselves the atonement so tha
t we can become the saint that we know our Heavenly Father wants us to become. 

I was thinking about this a lot yesterday during sacrament meeting, and then we had an AMAZING sacrament talk by a lady in our ward. She got up and showed her vulnerability, and told us that she had felt like she shouldn't prepare anything for the talk she was about to give, but to trust in her Heavenly Father and that the spirit would direct her. And I am not kidding, this talk was fantastic. She was able to bear powerful testimony about how the spirit has directed her in her life. About how receiving revelation from God is his way of trying to get a personal relationship with him. About how Heavenly Father truly is her best friend. About how we can have personal conversations with our Heavenly Father through prayer. And how prayer is the way that we can call home. Sometimes on my mission I have had moments that I have really just wanted to call home, just for 5 minutes, how can that hurt? Obviously I haven't done that, but I am so grateful for the knowledge that I can ALWAYS turn to prayer. I can kneel down and pray to my Heavenly Father in seconds, and he is willing to answer because he wants to have that PERSONAL relationship with me. I love my Heavenly Father so much, and I was so grateful for that talk yesterday!

Thank you so much for all of the love and support from my fan club, I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week!

---Remember who you are and who God EXPECTS you to become.---

Love, Your Favorite Sister Missionary,

Sister Harrison
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I love how HAPPY she is!!
and how BEAUTIFUL, inside and out!
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