Longmont, CO
January 19, 2015
When we saw the Hermanas on Sunday they asked how our week had been. Not
bad, we said, we only got asked out about three times, that is a record high for
my mission!
In completely unrelated news, a family that we ate dinner with this week
ordered pepper spray for us to carry around!
This week I got to go to the temple with some of my favorite missionaries!
We had our departing temple trip early because the Denver temple is closed and
will be for the next month so I am so glad it was able to work out! There is
nothing like being able to feel the peace and the joy in that building. Not
because of the architecture, which is great and the beautiful design, but
because it is a place which is dedicated and consecrated to be the Lord's house
on the earth. I was reading in Doctrine and Covenants section 109, which is the
dedicatory prayer of the Kirtland temple, and these verses stand out:
22 And
we ask thee, Holy Father, that thy servants may go forth from this house armed with thy power, and that thy name
may be upon them, and thy glory be round about them, and thine angels have charge over them;
This really is the work and hand of the Lord going out to all of the
earth, to tell all people of what they can gain a personal knowledge in order to
receive all of the blessings of God in their lives. Not only is this for
full-time missionaries to do though, everyone who has entered that sacred house
has been blessed with the responsibility to invite all to come unto
Christ.
On a lighter note, at lunch after the temple President and Sister Brown were asking about our plans for after our missions, so I asked them about their plans (they just passed their halfway mark on January 1st), lots of visiting family and such for them :) Then I asked,
"President Brown, can I come to your homecoming?"
"Of course you can. Will you bring your husband?"
Touché President Brown. Well if I am married then I will and if I am not married yet they will be invited to the wedding!
Have you ever been with someone when they see snow falling for the first time in their life? That has been kind of a secret wish of mine and Hermana Hansen, being from southern California, just happens to be one of those people who had never seen it before. Her comment when it started to fall, "It's all white and fluffy and not at all horrible like I thought it would be" :)
There is a man named C______ who is visiting from Haiti and works with Brother Seyfi who also had never experienced snow, he isn't much a fan of the snow. The Seyfis have been doing their utmost to introduce C______ to the gospel of Jesus Christ and send those missionaries in Haiti a golden referral. If we can get one in time, we will be sending him back with a French Book of Mormon.
More exciting news of the week! We got our commissary! Which means that we have copies of the Book of Mormon again! It is rather uncomfortable to walk around as a missionary without one of those to share, so I am happy not to have to be doing that anymore :) Oh yes, and we are walking around again. We made it through last week when we thought we were going to lose our car, but Elder Holley picked it up after the temple trip so we are hoofing it again.
This gives us the great privilege to talk to everyone though! Even all sorts of people who are in their cars while we are on the sidewalk, whatever it takes :) Seriously, we have had some great experiences as we simply invite everyone who we see to experience the power of the Atonement of Jesus Christ more fully in their lives. That has made this week go quickly, despite the fact that all of our investigators cancelled our teaching appointments.
However, B_______ did come to mutual! She is in high school and knows a few LDS kids and discovered when she came to the activity (glow-in-the-dark volleyball, so fun!) that she knows several more. This is something she is really looking for in her life, even though her family isn't that in to church. Though apparently her brother picked up and was reading some passages out of the Book of Mormon we gave her :) This has been a week of youthful miracles I guess, because we had a girl who is a senior and preparing to go on a mission come out with us on Saturday night (what better thing to do on a Saturday?) and we were able to get in to teach a 21 year-old less active sister who was baptized three years ago and have a great lesson where she shared with us how she felt so happy all of the time when she was going to church and reading her scriptures, and how she wants that back.
I love this work. I love the temple. I love the gospel and the decision which I am making to live to be with God forever. Sometimes people say that we are brainwashed and that our Church makes us be something that we aren't. That is a twist of the truth. The truth is that I want to be like my Heavenly Father, and to do that I have to make some changes and some sacrifices, but there is no part of this which I did not agree to fully and knowingly, both in the premortal life and now, and there is nothing which I give up that would make me as happy as I am through what I gain for doing so.
These are true principles that anyone can test and discover their genuine nature personally, and I am so blessed to be here inviting others to do just that.
I love you and hope you have such a great week!
love, Sister Emily DeFord
p.s. Just for fun, one last quote, from my dear companion, "I never read the serving sizes on chocolate because they are always wrong" :)
23 And from this place they may bear exceedingly great and glorious tidings, in truth, unto the ends of the earth, that they may know that this is thy work, and that thou hast put forth thy hand, to fulfil that which thou hast spoken by the mouths of the prophets, concerning the last days.
On a lighter note, at lunch after the temple President and Sister Brown were asking about our plans for after our missions, so I asked them about their plans (they just passed their halfway mark on January 1st), lots of visiting family and such for them :) Then I asked,
"President Brown, can I come to your homecoming?"
"Of course you can. Will you bring your husband?"
Touché President Brown. Well if I am married then I will and if I am not married yet they will be invited to the wedding!
Have you ever been with someone when they see snow falling for the first time in their life? That has been kind of a secret wish of mine and Hermana Hansen, being from southern California, just happens to be one of those people who had never seen it before. Her comment when it started to fall, "It's all white and fluffy and not at all horrible like I thought it would be" :)
There is a man named C______ who is visiting from Haiti and works with Brother Seyfi who also had never experienced snow, he isn't much a fan of the snow. The Seyfis have been doing their utmost to introduce C______ to the gospel of Jesus Christ and send those missionaries in Haiti a golden referral. If we can get one in time, we will be sending him back with a French Book of Mormon.
More exciting news of the week! We got our commissary! Which means that we have copies of the Book of Mormon again! It is rather uncomfortable to walk around as a missionary without one of those to share, so I am happy not to have to be doing that anymore :) Oh yes, and we are walking around again. We made it through last week when we thought we were going to lose our car, but Elder Holley picked it up after the temple trip so we are hoofing it again.
This gives us the great privilege to talk to everyone though! Even all sorts of people who are in their cars while we are on the sidewalk, whatever it takes :) Seriously, we have had some great experiences as we simply invite everyone who we see to experience the power of the Atonement of Jesus Christ more fully in their lives. That has made this week go quickly, despite the fact that all of our investigators cancelled our teaching appointments.
However, B_______ did come to mutual! She is in high school and knows a few LDS kids and discovered when she came to the activity (glow-in-the-dark volleyball, so fun!) that she knows several more. This is something she is really looking for in her life, even though her family isn't that in to church. Though apparently her brother picked up and was reading some passages out of the Book of Mormon we gave her :) This has been a week of youthful miracles I guess, because we had a girl who is a senior and preparing to go on a mission come out with us on Saturday night (what better thing to do on a Saturday?) and we were able to get in to teach a 21 year-old less active sister who was baptized three years ago and have a great lesson where she shared with us how she felt so happy all of the time when she was going to church and reading her scriptures, and how she wants that back.
I love this work. I love the temple. I love the gospel and the decision which I am making to live to be with God forever. Sometimes people say that we are brainwashed and that our Church makes us be something that we aren't. That is a twist of the truth. The truth is that I want to be like my Heavenly Father, and to do that I have to make some changes and some sacrifices, but there is no part of this which I did not agree to fully and knowingly, both in the premortal life and now, and there is nothing which I give up that would make me as happy as I am through what I gain for doing so.
These are true principles that anyone can test and discover their genuine nature personally, and I am so blessed to be here inviting others to do just that.
I love you and hope you have such a great week!
love, Sister Emily DeFord
p.s. Just for fun, one last quote, from my dear companion, "I never read the serving sizes on chocolate because they are always wrong" :)
The serving sizes on chocolate ARE always wrong!!!!! ;)
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