Well, I can hardly believe that it is P-day yet again! But, alas, here it is.. so, here is another update! :)
On Monday this week, we drove to MONTANA (I put that in all caps because I've never been there before last Monday, so I thought it was pretty awesome! :) ) We met up as a District (2 of the Elders in our District serve in Troy and Libby Montana) and then went on this SUPER COOL HIKE called Swinging Bridge. I've never been on a hike in the snow... it was pretty interesting.. let's just say we took it slow, but it was such a cool experience. I've attached a picture of the scenery because it is seriously so breathtaking. I am so spoiled to be able to serve here in this truly magnificent area right now!
Tuesday proved to be a wonderful day, AND I officially hit my 5 month mark as a missionary. How is that even possible? I feel like just yesterday I was getting my tag in the MTC. It's crazy how fast time flies, and that in just a short month I will have completed a whole entire third of my mission.. Wow. Remember a couple of weeks ago when I was telling you about tracting those indoor apartments? Well, that day we had met a man named Eddy who said he wasn't interested at all in the Church, but that his wife might be. So, we went back on Tuesday to see if she was home so we could talk to her, and we saw this lady doing a puzzle outside. She was doing a puzzle with Native Americans on it, and so, we were just talking to her about the Restoration and when we got to the part where we talk about the Book of Mormon, we were testifying of how Jesus Christ visited the people in the Ancient Americas (pointing to the puzzle, "those people"), and the spirit was so strong when we told her about that and about how He taught those wonderful people His gospel so long ago and how that same gospel is here on the earth today. She was interested in learning more, and you want to know the best part? That lady just so happened to be Eddy's wife, the one we had come to see in the first place. Aren't the Tender Mercies of the Lord just amazing? He seriously loves His children so much. I am so grateful that I get to catch a small glimpse of that love here on my mission. :) Tuesday night I got to go on Splits for the first time (where my companion and I split up and go out to teach with 2 other sisters in the ward so that we can visit twice the amount of people in one time). It was such a wonderful experience, and the spirit was so strong as the sister I was teaching with was able to bare her testimony of the power of CPR (Church, Prayer, Reading (the scriptures)). This life is so amazing, no doubt about it.. I am so blessed!
Wednesday morning after studies proved to be an interesting experience. We were closing our studies with a prayer and getting ready to go out and work when I hear this loud, deep, "RIBBIT! RIBBIT! RIBBIT!" Confused, I turn to Sister Rogers and ask... what is that? (Obviously I knew it was a frog, but I didn't know where it was coming from..) She turned to me and said, "It's the frog in our basement. We have tried to find him and we can't. I just assumed he died, but apparently not." So, that was super funny. We named him Baxter. How funny is that? Who would have thought we would have a frog in our basement. Oh, the experiences of missionary life.. never a dull moment. We also took Amie (a girl in our ward who was recently baptized) to a lesson with us with a member who is less-active. We walked in and he gets on his bookshelf and dusts off his old scriptures and says, "these are yours now. they were given to me when I was baptized." that was such a tender moment. Amie was so excited and the spirit was so strong. Do we each cherish our scriptures and see them as such great worth like Amie did when she received that gift - her very first own set of scriptures? Such a wonderful moment.
Thursday was a really neat day. We had a Zone Conference in Sandpoint, and we learned a lot about how to be better missionaries. I was asked to put together a musical number for it, so me, sister Rogers, and another sister and two elders sang "Joseph Smith's First Prayer" I love the power of that song. It is true. Joseph Smith really did kneel in a grove of trees and see God the Father and His son, Jesus Christ. What remarkable and eternity-changing knowledge that is. Our mission President also invited the ward missionaries, ward mission leader, and bishops and other leaders to the end of our conference so that we could all talk about missionary work and how members and missionaries can work better together to further this great work in this part of the Lord's Vineyard. What another testament to me of the power that comes when members of the church and missionaries unite to bring more children of God closer to Him and His perfect Son, Jesus Christ.
Well, the rest of the week was good too. We had a snow day and couldn't drive except in town, so we updated some records and had a few appointments. We taught this beautiful little 9-year-old, Tamica. She knew so much about the Plan of Salvation (where we came from before this life, why we are here, and where we will go after we die) and she was so cute! She knew all of the answers, in depth, and knew all about her purpose here on this earth. She taught me so much about how this life is a test and how we need to be happy in this life and try our best to love others. At the end of our lesson, we gave her a Book of Mormon and she almost jumped out of her seat. She said, "THIS IS FOR ME!?" We said yes and she said, "How many pages does it have?" We told her it had "531" and she said, "OH GOOD! Then it will keep me reading for a while. THANK YOU!" It was the cutest thing. Yet again, do we treasure the scriptures like this? What a tender moment. :)
The most amazing thing I learned this week was in my personal study. I was reading a talk my Kevin W. Pearson of the Seventy - "Stay by the Tree" (
https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2015/04/stay-by-the-tree?lang=eng). This is what I learned about the tree of life. We know that the tree of life represents the love of God, but what does that mean? I have wondered that my whole life... and this week it finally clicked while reading this talk. What is the greatest evidence of God's love for us? His son, Jesus Christ! The Tree of Life is Christ.. and the fruit? His Atonement. When we are asking people to partake of the fruit, we are asking them to partake of the Atonement, which is the sweetest taste above all other fruit. How amazing is that!? I love the teachings of the Holy Ghost. Isn't that amazing? I bet a lot of you have already figured that out, but I hadn't before a few days ago, so I thought I would share it with you.
Well friends and family, I love you all. My time is up, but just know that you are loved by a perfect Heavenly Father and that He knows you so perfectly and loves you so much that He sent His perfect Son, Jesus Christ, to this earth to live and to die for you because He wants you to have the way that you can get back to Him because He wants you back so much. Hold on to eternity when times get tough. Love you! :)
-Sister Rogers and Me at the Swinging Bridge Hike
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