Who died and gave me a name tag?

Dear Family,

 

This week I have had the overwhelming desire to get under my covers and hide.  If I stay still enough then I maybe everyone will solve their own problems and I could get a nice nap in the mean time. Just bacause I have a name tag does not mean I know anything.  Okay- I little background.  We have had a great week.  Lots of fun and lots of lessons.  Its just more lessons means more people.  People stress me out.  But its been a great week.

 

So starting from the beginning- Wednesday we had a lesson with an investigator named Mr Yu.  He is a 77 year old Chinese man. I may have said this before but for a man who doesn't speak English he talks a lot.  Or last lesson with him Sister Campbell prayed that we would see opportunities to speak and I thought that was very appropriate.  Anyway we brought a poster with the steps of the gospel and scripture references.  He really liked it excepts he thought repentance should be before faith.  On Saturday when we called to ask him to church he asked if we had any colored pictures.  I had no idea what he was talking about so we said we would talk to him a bit more about it on Sunday, which of course we forgot to do.  Well we had a lesson with him again yesterday and he had made his own poster with steps of the gospel (I did notice that he had conveniently listed repentance before faith on his poster.)  Anyway he had found pictures representing each step and pasted them on.  He said that because he had pictures his was " rather more beautiful" then ours.   Thanks Mr Yu.  Thanks.  Anyway he was so excited because that day before his lesson he had been at the senior center and taught 5 seniors about faith in Jesus Christ using his poster.  It was pretty adorable.  I'm not sure about his commitment level but at least he used book of Mormon scriptures on his poster.  I'm happy with that. 

 

Thursday we had a lesson with Alex and Maria.  I love them to pieces but they stress me out.  Mostly because I love them to pieces.  On the plus side- they made us a pancake breakfast!

 

We also had another lesson with Eduardo and that went really well.  I told him how excited I was that he had come to church on Sunday but sad because I didn't have a chance to say hi to him.  He said that I am always talking to people-  okay that's true.  Anyway I asked if next Sunday we would stay long enough for us to say hello to him.  He said he would but then on Sunday I'm pretty sure he left before the closing song because there is no way someone can move that fast!  At least he came to church.  Our ward mission leader is catching on because he was walking out side with his baby at the end of sacrament meeting and tried to walk around Eduardo's car.  Brother Zachirson just isn't as fast as a  Dodge Durango. 

 

We had another great lesson with another of our investigators, we just recently picked up.  He is really ready and just feels like he wants to learn a bit more before making any commitments and change his life.  The thing is- he is planning on getting baptized!  I'm so excited about that.  He is really wanting some clear direction in his life, and I know that the gospel can give it to him.  (On a side note- I would like to mention that this man is gorgeous enough to be a model and I think it is very funny of Heavenly Father that we started teaching him exactly when I started to embrace the sister missionary frump.  Very funny Heavenly Father.  Very Funny.) 

 

Sunday was very stressful.  None of our really progressing investigators came to church!  Why?  I don't know why- or at least I didn't know why when I was sitting in sacrament meeting.  The only investigator who came was Mr. Yu, and I'm pretty sure he was afraid we were going to take him hostage because church just never seemed to end.  Anyway I was sitting in Sacrament felling stressed and concerned and remembering how on my mission, church used to be a place of revelation for me.  I missed that time.  Then I remembered that those were the times that we didn't have any investigators.  I did have the thought "Maybe I don't want any investigators anymore."  Then I realized what I thought and almost slapped myself.  I am so grateful for the people that we have to teach and worry about.  I am grateful that the lord is blessing us with people and that those people are opening up to us about their concerns.  I wouldn't have it any other way.  The fact that I am meeting all of these people is just making me grow so much and I never knew I could love strangers so completely. 

 

On Saturday I got to opportunity to go to the temple because someone from my last area was going through the temple. I never taught this guy before but he wanted to have people around him and so he invited some of the missionaries he knew.  I don;t know how he got permission to let me go but he did and I was so grateful.  It was wonderful seeing him progress in the gospel, and in his faith.  While I was in the temple I just had this calm feeling that everything would be alright with those I was thinking of.  I just can't forget that the Lord has been taking care of these people a lot longer then I have and he knows what they need. 

 

Anyway I'm glad to hear about all of the adventures of going to Utah.  Take lots of pictures so that I can see them later.  Tell everyone that I love them. 

 

Love Sister Allred

My one year mark

Dear Family,

 

It's official.  I have been a missionary for more then 1 year now.  I entered the MTC one year ago last Friday.  I'm not really admitting that to many people yet but it has been a big shock to me.  One comfort is that I still have more then 6 months left.  My release date isn't until March 6th so I still have a few more weeks before I hit that downward spiral.  Anyway in commemoration of my one year mark I have embraced the the sister missionary frump.  Meaning I haven't worn any make-up for about a week now. I held out for a long time- but I just don't want to put on make up anymore.  Especially because we are in the hottest time for our mission right now and the make up just sweats right off.  Pretty soon I will have the desire to stop brushing my hair in the morning.  The sister Missionary frump is happening.

 

This week was kind of long.  We had a bit of a hard time getting our lessons, (But we got them!) and I pretty sure that because of the heat people are staying inside- hiding.  It has been hard to find any one to talk to.  On the plus side we have been outside a lot and my sister missionary tan lines are really looking good. 

 

I think my favorite lesson this week was with a less active that we have been working with named Eduardo.  We are trying to help him prepare to receive the priesthood, but first regular church attendance might be good.  Anyway, I just love Eduardo.  He is this really quiet middle aged guy who is just so sweet.  He just feels stuck must of the time.  Anyway, he likes us as well- or at least we told him that he does- but sometimes he is hard to catch.  We had dinner with his mom this week and he was there and the lesson about faith in Jesus Christ was really good.  We scheduled something for the next day, to talk specifically about preparing for the priesthood.  I don't know why but the spirit was there pretty strongly.  I know that Eduardo was feeling something to.  Well anyway, Church on Sunday I look back on the overflow and Eduardo and his mom come walking in!  I was so excited that he came.  The only down side was that he only stayed for sacrament.  Eduardo is a slow mover generally- but I have never seen him more so quickly when he bolted for the door as soon as sacrament meeting was over.  His mom told us after the meeting that next time he comes we need to stand guard at the door when we start singing the closing song.  Oh well.  Its a work in progress.

 

We also had a couple lessons with another less active family.  When I first came into the area I wasn't quite sure how I felt about them- but now I am really growing to love them.  I think that by the time I leave they will absolutely be in my top 5 favorite Del Mar families list.  This family is very VERY health conscious.  I mean- after having dinner with them I'm pretty convinced that the world, especially the food industry, is bent on making me personally die a horrible cancerous and toxic death.  Here I was thinking the world is a happy place.  WRONG! 

 

Another super exciting thing is that Alex and Maria, the ones with a baptismal date, came to church on Sunday.  Alex usually works on Sunday but he took today off special. I think he enjoyed it.  Anyway after he said he didn't want to get baptized we pretty much dropped the subject.  Sister Campbell and I always mean to recommit them but something else comes up and we never teach about baptism.  Well at our missionary correlation meeting one of the ward missionaries came up and said "So I here Alex has a baptismal date."  I looked at him suspiciously and said, "Who told you?"  The poor ward missionary looked a little confused and said, "Alex told the elder's quorum that he was getting baptized next month when he introduced himself." 

 

This is how all of our invitations go.  We asks him to read the book of Mormon- he says no- then the next day he has read 3 chapters.  We ask him to pray- he says no and the next day he is volunteering to say the dinner prayer.  I'm considering not talking to him about baptism at all and just holding the baptismal service with out telling him.  I'm pretty sure he will just show up on his own.  How can we do the baptismal interview without him realizing it?

 

Well, it has been a really good week.  It's been long but I have really seen the Lord's hand all day.  He gives us so many small blessings and quite a few big blessings. I'm grateful for all of you.  I love you!

 

Sister Allred

Work Work Work

Dear Family,

 

This week has been so fast that I'm more then a little shocked that I am sitting at the computer writing again.  Sorry for writing late today.  We just got back from the  temple.  We have been looking forward to going to the temple for about 2 weeks now and it wasn't a disappointment.  I'm really grateful for the temple and the sweet spirit that is there.  Sister Campbell and I were talking about it this week when we left a lesson with a less active.  She was way to concerned with how everything was created and whether or not we came from cavemen.  I have no answers to those questions but I just kept wanting to say "Just go to the temple.  You'll understand."  When I said that out loud I realized that in actuality I understand very little about the temple.  It hasn't dramatically increased my understanding of the universe all that much.  The difference is that when we were talking to her about her theories there were so many fuzzy lines and unanswerable questions-  almost this feeling of  mist.  In the temple I still have a lot of questions but I also have a quiet assurance that, "Yes this is right." 

 

Anyway a ton has happened this week. On Tuesday we picked up a new investigator, and I'm really excited about her because I really think that she will do so well in the gospel.  She needs what the Savior has to offer.  Well, I guess we all do.  Then, we had a lesson with our couple with a baptismal date.  The husband said he wasn't sure if he wanted to get baptized or not.  I could tell that this really hurt his family, and the house has been tense since then.  Anyway, Sister Campbell walked out of the lesson not to worried.  We really do know that he will be getting baptized.  I'm just sad because it seems like everyone else is worried more then they need to be.  As a result we feel like we have been running around the ward doing damage control, giving diplomatic answers about their progress and trying to politely ask people not to randomly call and give spiritual advice.  This is a very loving ward.  Anyway, we have  had a few lessons with the couple since then and they are still really interested in learning more.  They are progressing, and we are excited about them. 

 

Okay so embarrassing moment if the week!  We had a  lesson with a girl in the ward that we meet with every week.  I love this girl and she is like one of my best friends but I think we have reached a whole new level of familiarity that is now inappropriate.  So Thursday we had a lesson with her and then we left.  We walked down the street to talk to a family and about 10  minutes later we got to the car and I realized that we had left the keys in her house.  We stood at her open window for a little bit calling her name. Then we started knocking.  Then we called and texted her.  We had to go and so finally I thought, "Well she did say whenever we need something and she isn't there- just come on in."  The door was unlocked.  So, like the creepers that we are we walked into her house to  quickly grab our keys at the precise moment she came running out to yell at her dogs for barking in not much more then her birthday suit.  We didn't see anything but still I think we probably should have walked to our next appt.  I'm just really glad we weren't elders!

 

Sunday was very weird day.  Our Sundays are turning into these really intense marathons where we sprint around greeting and directing and who knows what else.  It's actually a pretty good thing because that means that there is work to be done in the area. Anyway we started out stopping by a few of our investigators to make sure that they were coming to church, only to find out that none of them were coming for various reasons ranging from- "My dad just died" to "I don't want to go today and I'm going to be stubborn about this."  So we got to church already exhausted and feeling kind of low because none of our investigators we at church.  Then as I sat down I was absolutely amazed to see a part member family sitting on one corner, a former investigator sitting in the back, a nonmember son of a dear sister in the ward and then a man who had just walked into church last week wanting to know more!  Holy Cow!  we were just so busy all day.  

 

We had zone conference yesterday that it was great because it was all about faith.  Usually we talk about techniques or skills but yesterday was, "What is faith and how do we help it grow."  I loved it.  Then we had a family home evening with some investigators.  Geesh.  It has been a while since I've done a family home evening and it was exhausting!  Our investigator said he wanted to do it right, even having a song in the beginning and so we sang a very bad rendition of battle hymn of the republic.  Then our lesson and game was utter chaos.  I really do think that he experienced a real family home evening. 

 

Well I love you all.  Thank you for the emails and the prayers.

 

 

Sister Allred

Miracle Week

Dear Family,

 

This has been a great week.  I have really been seeeing the Lord's hand in our work. 

 

Thursday we had a new meeting.  Zone Meeting.  So up until now President has held these special training meetings called Leadership training.  All the leaders in the mission we trained on specific topics and then our assignment was to go out and teach the other missionaries through our exchanges.  Well the problem is by the time it got down to the very last missionary it had gone through so many filters or interpretations.  Kind of like the apostasy.  Well leadership meetings are done away with.  Now every month after zone leader council the zone leaders hold a meeting and teach us the skills or doctrine that  president wants the mission to know.

 

Anyway,  Thursday was our first zone meeting and it was amazing.  on Wednesday the zone leaders asked if I could share my testimony on what it was like to have an investigator baptized.  I said yes but I did not want to AT ALL.  Mostly because i don't get super overjoyed when an investigator gets baptized.  I get doubly worried.  I worry that they will be taken care of when I leave, or that something will go wrong.  Anyway I sat down at Zone meeting dreading the day, especially when the zone leaders wrote the schedule on the board and all the elders were going to give their testimonies to the beginning.  I was going to be the closing remarks of the whole meeting.  The meeting was nice and the training was good, but I kept dreading bearing my testimony.  Mostly because I knew that what I had to say was not what they wanted me to say. 

 

Right at the end the zone leaders were talking about setting our vision higher and that we can't settle for anything less then our best.  Our best can only come when we rely whole hearted on the Lord.  I honestly don't have any idea what they said that really touched my but I really felt the spirit strongly.  When I got up to bear my testimony I had no idea what I was going to say.  When I started talking I pretty much immediately started sobbing and expressing how much I knew Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ loves us all.  I knew that our goal was not to get our investigators baptized, but to get them to the temple-- to get them to the celestial kingdom.  But that goal is to heavy for us.  We can't do it, and we are not expected to.  The Savior's is the one who is going to take care of our investigators and we can't pretend to hold onto that control.  I felt so grateful for the savior and frankly I felt a weight lifted.  We left the meeting and I knew that we were going to invite our investigators to be baptized that day.  Before our lessons I knelt down and asked heavenly Father for help to know how to invite them to be baptized. I thought a little about the temple, but I also just had this feeling that miracles were going to happen that day.  

 

When we left I grabbed the temple magazine just in case.  Our first lesson was with Maria.  Up until now she has felt like she can't really convert because she would be betraying her past.  This lesson she started asking why she was only baptized by sprinkling of water, when the savior was baptized by immersion. She said if we used to amount of water to clean her car, that they used to clean her soul then it really wouldn't work well at all.  We completely agreed.  We invited her to be baptized and she said she didn't want to until her husband Alex was baptized.  Alex was sitting right there- but he said no.  I really didn't feel like we needed to push it and so instead we started to talk about the temple.  What we do in there and why it is so important. Maria liked the idea of being together forever.  

 

We left the lesson feeling super good, and had a bunch of other appts that we were running to. Then at the end of the day we came back to Alex and Maria, because it was Alex and sister Campbell's birthday and we told Alex if we came back and had a lesson with him we could also have a small birthday party.  Anyway we sat down and were teaching the beginning restoration and then our ward mission leader randomly showed up.  He knew we were having a lesson then but he wasn't planning on coming.  I know that he was sent by Heavenly Father. 

 

Brother Zachirson is one of the best ward mission leaders I've had.  He is new in to calling but he is great.  He is almost rudely pushy but he does it in the nicest way possible.  I feel like I have a lot to learn from him.  Any way he started talking about baptism and I invited Alex to be baptized.  he said he still had a ton of concerns.  It was just so cool teaching with Brother Zachirson because the spirit was guiding our words and we were all teaching in unity.  Finally Alex interrupted and said, "Okay, I've made up my mind.  Yes."  It was so cool.  Maria, who I think was a little more concerned about having time to eat cake then baptism also said she would be baptized.  It was just amazing to see how the Lord has helped us out so much.  I thought it would be much longer before they got baptized.  Wow that was a long story, but I haven't written it in my journal yet so I think this was more of a journal entry then anything. 

 

This week we also picked up 2 new investigators.  One of them was so open to learning it kind of freaked us out.  We almost weren't prepared.  He also came to church on Sunday.  I just kept thinking, "What are you doing here...Oh yeah we want you to be here."  We had a lesson with another man named Mr. Yu.  He is an old Chinese man who frankly is a little more interested in keeping up his English.  Which meant half his lesson we discussed the "proper" way to say things.  It is use or usage.  Then the other half of the lesson was him telling about his family remaining true to their christian faith in communist china.  It was fascinating.  Absolutely amazing.  We are going to wait to pick him up as a new  investigator until our next lesson when we actually teach something.  we know what to expect now. 

 

Anyway it has been a great week.  I am so grateful for all of the blessings that Heavenly Father has given us. I love yo all so much. 

 

Sister Allred