Sierra's Baptism!

Heyoooo!

Another great week has flown by! The days seriously go by so fast! So guess what happened on Saturday?? BAPTISM!!! Sierra got baptized on Saturday! But seriously, the events that led up to her baptism that Saturday night are pretty insane, you'll all love it! So Sierra's baptism was scheduled for 7:30 Saturday night because another baptism was already scheduled for 6. The other sisters serving in Bend in the Cascade Crest ward had a baptism for their investigator Danny. Cascade Crest is the area Sister Munford was serving in before she came to LaPine, so she had been teaching Danny before she left that area. So since Danny was sister Munford's investigator, we went to his baptism as well. So just before Danny's baptism was about to start, Sister Griffin (Cascade Crest missionary and Sister Munford's last companion) checked the font and it wasn't full! They had forgotten to plug the font! And the font takes two hours to fill! Panic. The Cascade Crest sisters were panicking and Sister Munford and I were panicking because we had Sierra's baptism in an hour and a half! So since there was another baptism scheduled, we couldn't postpone Danny's baptism because Sierra's was later that night. Soooo...we definitely had a problem on our hands. Between Danny's missionaries, the Cascade Crest bishop, and the former Cascade Crest bishop, it was decided that Danny's baptism would be moved to a members home and he would get baptized in the hot tub. THE FLIPPING HOT TUB! So Sister Munford and I plugged the font so that Sierra would have water, and then we drove over to the member's home where Danny would get baptized. It was actually an amazing experience, because everyone who was at Danny's baptism, as soon as they heard the baptism was being moved, they didn't even hesitate to get up and go. The amount of love in that room was awesome! And let me tell you, the spirit was incredible as the baptism talk was given in the living room of the member's house. And then...I kid you not we all moved outside and witnessed the baptism of Danny in a hot tub. The Elders would not believe us that he got baptized in the hot tub! So after Danny was baptized, sister Munford and I booked it over to the church and got there just in time to help Sierra get her jumpsuit and take pictures. She had over 50 people at her baptism! That little girl is loved by so many people in the ward. The baptism was awesome and spiritual and everyone who had a part in the program were the people who have taken her in and made her feel so loved. It was unforgettable, that's for sure.

So we have this incredible investigator right now named Nick! He's 16 years old and he's good friends with one of the families in the ward. Anyways, we had our second lesson with him yesterday and he committed to be baptized on November 21st! When he described to us how he felt when he prayed to know if the Book of Mormon was true, there was no denying that his answer came from God. When we told him that the steps he is taking to be a part of Christ's church was exactly what his Heavenly Father wants him to be doing, he got the biggest smile on his face that he tried to hide. But he couldn't. We saw it, and it was awesome.

For the month of November, the Bend zone has a goal of reaching 90 new investigators! Which means that each companionship has a goal of 3 new investigators a week. Sister Munford and I are so pumped and excited to reach this goal. It's definitely going to take a lot of faith, and especially a lot of OYMing, which is opening your mouth. I'm still not the greatest at that, but now I need to be. I can't wait to see all the miracles that will come from this!

A scripture that I have really come to love is D&C 6:34-36. Verse 34 is actually the Oregon Salem mission scripture. Read it! It's awesome :)

I love you all!

Love,
Sister Hanna

PICTURES: We were doing service at bishops house and sister Munford forgot to bring a change of shoes. We couldn't go back to the apt because we were being picked up for dinner at the church. So she wore these out to dinner and then the rest of the night, it was awesome ~ Making popcorn balls with Carolyn (ward member) ~ Decorating their apartment for Halloween ~ cupcakes for district meeting ~ Sister Munford's mom sent Halloween treats!

Text from Bishop Russell

Doing Service!

I went to the Temple!!!

HELLOOOOOO EVERYONE :)

This week was fantastic! My favorite thing that happened this week was...THE TEMPLE! All week last week up until Friday was all anticipation and excitement! Any time I would think about the temple I would squeal or yell or slap my companion on the arm because I was so
excited! I kid you not, that Friday morning was the fastest I've ever gotten out of bed when hearing the alarm go off. It's about a 3 1/2 hour drive from LaPine to Portland, so we left at about 8:30 and got there at 12. We were doing the one o'clock session, so I had time to go over to the visitor's center and see Sister Ramsay! When I walked in, there was some other sisters there and I asked them if sister Ramsay was working. Then they asked me if I was Sister Hanna (the Elders had already gone in and Sister Ramsay was asking them about me) and then told me to hide behind a wall while they went and got Sister Ramsay. When Sister Ramsay came in the room I came out from behind the wall and she started jumping in circles! I was so happy to see her! I had missed her so much. And the awesome part is this was all recorded. The video is much better than the way I just explained it. So we got to talk for a few minutes before Sister Munford and I had to go back to the temple. When the missionaries do temple trips, they go by zone. So it was my zone, and the Redmond zone who were at the temple. The session was almost all missionaries! It was so cool, and the spirit was amazing! And the Portland Temple is SO beautiful! It felt so good to be back at the temple. It's was a spiritual boost that I definitely needed. I felt such peace and comfort and I knew that the temple I was where I needed to be. I can't wait until I get to go again in 6 months!

So I can't remember if I talked about this last week or not, but we have two new investigators! Dawn and Nick. We taught both of them this week for the first time and we asked both of them if they would be baptized. They said yes! Dawn is in her 30's and Nick is 16. The awesome part about these two people is that we met both of them through members! Sister Munford, Bishop Russell, and I have been working hard to get the members here in LaPine to get involved in missionary work. And it's working! Yay!

Last Wednesday Sister Munford and I felt that we needed to go see Jason, which is the guy that we met when the two of us first went on exchanges last transfer. Anyways, we went to the garage where he worked and he was there! But for some reason, both of us were so nervous and afraid to get out of our car and go talk to him! It was the weirdest thing, because Jason is a really nice guy and we had no reason to be afraid to go talk to him. So we said a prayer and we were like, Heavenly Father do we really need to go see Jason? Of course, He gave us a big fat yes. For some reason we were still freaking out about talking to Jason, so finally, Sister Munford was like, "We just gotta have faith!" So we pumped ourselves up and got out of the car, haha! And you know what?! He was excited to see us! Seriously! He said, "I'm so excited to see you sisters!" Can you believe that! Anyways, we had a really good talk and we shared a quick message with him. And that was it! Sweet and simple. It just goes to show that Satan is trying his hardest to stop anyone and everyone from sharing the gospel. But like Sister Munford said, you just gotta have faith! Faith that Heavenly Father will let everything work out in the way that it needs to.

This last week I've been studying Alma 47. In this chapter, the king of the Lamanites sends Amalickiah with a part of his army to go and find a group of Lamanites who ran away so that they wouldn't have to battle the Nephites. Well, we know that Amalickiah is a sneaky little turd and is trying to become king of the Lamanites himself. So when Amalickiah finds the runaway Lamanites, he sees that they have positioned themselves atop a mount in order to protect themselves. Amalickiah tries to convince Lehonti, the leader of the runaway Lamanites, to come down off of the mount so that they could talk. But Lehonti is like, "Dude no. I'm not coming down from here, I'm safe up here." Amalickiah tries four times to get Lehonti to come down, but Lehonti refuses. Finally, Amalickiah tells Lehonti that he can bring his army to surround Amalickiah's camp so that the two of them can have a chat, but at the same time Lehonti will still be protected by his army. Lehonti agrees. But like I said earlier, Amalickiah is a sneaky little turd and he has one of his servants poison Lehonti. Once Lehonti is dead, Amalickiah takes both armies back to the king of the Lamanites, where he then kills the king. From this chapter we learn that we all have our own spiritual "mount" that we need to stay atop of. But Satan will always be there to try and pull us down with enticing words and false promises. We can't come off of our mount, or else we'll end up flat on our face in the dirt! We can't let Satan kill us spiritually. We have to always be atop the mountain, or for my Mesa High homies, BAM!

So today while sister Munford and I were leaving the grocery store, a bee flew in our car and landed on sister Munford's lap. I was like, yo sister, there's a bee on you. She then screamed bloody murder! And our windows were down, and everyone in the parking lot could here us! She then sped out of the parking lot because she was embarrassed for screaming so loud, and I just sat there in my seat unable to breathe because I was laughing so hard! 😂

I love you all so so so much! Have a wonderful week!

Love,
Sister Hanna

Text from Kaitlin

Another Baptism!

This week has been AMAZING!!!!! To start off we had 11 investigator lessons!!!! We taught so many people this week! It felt SO good to be so busy! We have three investigators on date! Audrey and Kyle Newton are on date for November 14th. They've already got family planning to fly in for the baptism! And Sierra is getting baptized in two weeks! Sister Munford and I are planning on asking 3 more people if they want to be baptized this week!

Yesterday, we had 13 nonmembers at church! Six of them were potential investigators and we have set up a time to meet with most of them this week! I also spoke in sacrament. Bishop Russell asked me to speak on technology. It's a good thing the missionaries are given so many manuals on how we can effectively use our ipad to fulfill our purpose and help us stay safe from temptation. A quote I used in my talk was by Randall L. Ridd, and he said "the divine purpose of technology is to hasten the work of salvation." It's so true! Throughout time, God has given His children tools that they can use to help further the work. The Liahona was given to Lehi and his family to help them travel to the promised land. The Urim and Thummin was used to help translate the word of God. And today, Heavenly Father has given us the internet! It's so cool to think that technology has a divine purpose.

Probably the best thing that happened this week was that Kaitlin got baptized! Her baptism was SO spiritual! The room was filled with people. She didn't even know most of them, but they were there because they all loved her so much and knew that she is a very special person. The ward has scooped this girl up like none other! She seems as if she's been part of the ward her whole life! It's awesome! So funny story, Sister Munford and I forgot to tell her to bring a towel...sooooo she had to dry off with another jumpsuit! It was so funny, but hey! We're both still new missionaries, it was inevitable that we would mess something up! And the good new is she's not moving back to Florida! WOO!!! Kaitlin told us that she received the revelation that if she went back to Florida, she wouldn't be able to progress in the church as well as she would here. So she's staying! Yay!

Today was zone pday! Again! We went to Bend and played kickball at the park. And the best part...President and Sister Samuelian were there! President played kickball with us and there were a few times when he almost got nailed in the face! He's a good sport though, so no one is getting sent home for kicking the ball too hard! Hahaha! I'm funny :) Just kidding, I'm the only one who laughs at my jokes. We also had interviews with President. President Samuelian is a spiritual giant! Talking with him today is definitely something I needed.

OH MY GOODNESS I ALMOST FORGOT TO TELL YOU! The missionaries are going to the temple on Friday! I. AM. SO. EXCITED. I can't stop talking about it! Guys, I haven't been to the temple since June 23rd! It's going to be so awesome and spiritual and uplifting! I can't wait!

Missionary work is the BEST! I can't even describe how happy and how joyful it is to be doing the Lord's work.

I love you all!

Love,
Sister Hanna  

Spiritual Overload!

Hola!

Can we talk about conference please?!?! It was so amazing! I loved every single speaker! I seriously LOVE conference! And guess what? Our investigator Kaitlin watched 3 out of the four sessions! She is SO amazing! She's getting baptized this weekend and I am so PUMPED! She is seriously incredible. She loves the gospel so much and is so prepared. So, back to conference. I think my favorite talk was by Jeffrey R. Holland on Saturday afternoon. It was about moms and their divine nature and role in the kingdom of God. He talked about how a mother's love is the closest we can come to in mortality to comprehending the love that the Savior has for us. He said, "Mothers are saviors on mount Zion." AH! I love it! I think why I love it so much is because it reminds me of you, mom. Thank you, mom, for always loving me, even when I acted like a turd.

So Sister Munford is my new companion! But I'm pretty sure I already told you all that. Anyways! She's from Ogden, Utah and has five other siblings. She's been out just 6 weeks, but she has seriously got this missionary thing down already! She's incredible. We teach really well together and I'm pretty sure we share the same brain because we're always thinking the same things. Comp unity, yay! A lot of people have told us that we look identical if we're standing far enough away. So we decided that we're going to dress up as each other for Halloween! It's gonna be good haha.

We are so busy here in LaPine! We've got about 10 investigators, and the best part is that a lot of those 10 are families! Teaching a family is awesome because you get to witness the difference that the gospel and the spirit makes within the home.

We've also been doing a lot of service for our ward mission leader, Brother Rothrock. He's been repainting his house, so we've gone over a few times and have helped him repaint his deck. The Rothrock's are seriously the best! We love them so much! Plus, he's got a fridge stocked with Dr. Pepper, so that's a bonus haha. On Thursday we brought our investigator Kaitlin over to paint with us. She gets along so well with Sister Rothrock, so that was a really neat experience to see Kaitlin getting along with the ward members.

Miracle of the week. On Sunday Sister Munford and I went to the church to watch the afternoon session of conference. LaPine is small, so only like 5 people actually watch conference at the church. Well, this time it was just us and another older sister who came to watch. But, the weird part about this, is that no one showed up to set up the projector! Luckily, we were able to watch it on our iPads. The reason this is a miracle though is because if Sister Munford and I didn't go to the church, which we almost didn't, the sister who was there with us wouldn't have been able to watch conference! The church was the only place she could go to view it. Yay for tender mercies! They're awesome.

So the weather up here in LaPine has been CRAZY! Two days ago it was 40 degrees and raining and now today it's sunny and 70. What the heck Oregon, get it together! How are all of you Arizonans doing? Still sweating? Lol!

Sooooo if you didn't watch conference, watch it! It was amazing and I know that it will answer your prayers and build your testimony.

Sending my love all the way from Oregon!

Love,
Sister Hanna

PICTURES: With Sister Pearce who fed them breakfast and watched conference with them Saturday morning ~ Painting the Rothrocks house with investigator Kaitlin