October 20, 2014

Dear Family and Friends,

I'm glad that you had a good week and enjoyed your birthday Daddy:) Congratulations on your color guard competitions Maddy! I am so proud of you and your team:) You are all doing so well this year! Wow! Can you believe that it is already the end of October? Thank you for sending those instructions for pumpkin seeds and templates for carving pumpkins! I want to make this a really fun experience for Sister Hirro, since it is her first time celebrating Halloween!:) so thank you so much for doing that for me:) We have had a good week:) Sister Hirro and I feel very exhausted most of the time, but that's missionary work for you and good prep for being a mother I suppose:) Many nights have been spent pondering the individuals that we are working with because sometimes, I just don't know what to do to help them. You grow to love the people that you are serving so much so it can be hard when they don't understand or accept things we teach. But, we keep moving forward in hopes that something will click as we share those truths that we have come to love so much:)

We saw the Fs twice this past week. N is too busy at this time to commit to read anything from the Book of Mormon but he said that he would love us to continue to stop by and teach them. B and K had both started to read the Book of Mormon but they said that they always want to be doing what God wants them to do and they aren't sure that He wants them to spend their time reading the Book of Mormon. They are very strong believers in the Bible which is wonderful! They just don't understand the importance of the Book of Mormon yet. But we are really hoping that as they hopefully open their hearts in the future, that they will come to feel of its importance and truthfulness. They are very kind but have a lot of concerns and hurdles we need to help them jump through. I have high hopes for them though because I can see their potential and how much this message would help them if they would allow it to. Like I said, they really like Sister Hirro and I. They fed us dinner last Friday and sent us home with some pepsi's, a package of water bottles, and ice cream treats! Then they called us that night to make sure that we made it home safely:) They said that our church is lucky to have us because we share the message very well. For our age, we stand our ground despite accusations thrown at us. I don't take credit for any of that though because I'm just a 20 year old girl:) It's the calling of a missionary and through the strength of Christ that anything good comes from me:) I know that they can feel the Spirit when we are there though. They recognize it and they are very scared because of it. Please continue to keep them in your prayers. Our next appointment with them is this Friday:)

One of the less actives that we are working very consistently with is Angela Barber. She is so great! She is in her 50's and the only member of her family. Her husband isn't very supportive but she is so strong! She has come to church the last 2 weeks now! We saw her twice this past week. For one of the visits, we took her to see "Meet the Mormons". She is working on overcoming some struggles with the Word of Wisdom right now. Overcoming anything is a process, but as we work on them and just try to improve a little each day, those weaknesses that we have can be turned into strengths.   

A young women in our ward, Aleksy Peterson has been called to the Provo, Utah mission!! She will be serving in our home mission:) Pretty cool we are swapping places:) She reports in December I believe:) So keep an eye out for her!

Sorry my email is kind of short this week. I hope that you have a wonderful week! My thoughts and prayers are with you this coming week:) I love you!!

Sister Christensen