Dear Montgomery
Fam,
Since when do we
have a dog?? She sounds great!
This
week...man..this week. It's been crazy.
We had exchanges
with some Sisters this week that doubled into their area three weeks before,
where elders had been serving. They even moved into their apartment, and I
think they felt bad for taking the time to clean and scrub something’s. So they
didn't. They were sisters living in an Elder's apartment. And it was bad. Both
had been experiencing a lot of stress, their area had been doing good, and
they'd been working super hard, but they had put their sanity, apartment and
companionship on the back burner and it was starting to weigh on them. I went
to their area and was talking to one of the sisters. She's a very good
missionary, so funny and has a good head on her shoulders. She talked quite a
bit about the stress of things and at one point after studies we just started
cleaning. There were dishes from the elders on the counter still, and trays of
food on top of the cupboards. She vacuumed while I scrubbed baseboards and
even pulled out the fridge to sweep and mop the floor. It was nasty. But
talking to her in the car afterwards she said, "I can't even explain how
good it felt to just VACUUM." Family, sometimes, we just got to take the
time to vacuum. That day, even though stress had been hard on me before
the exchange, I felt so peaceful. I think God knew how to calm the storm in me
so that I be of help to that Sister that day.
Part of the calm
came while reading an article in the March 2014 Ensign entitled Trials,
Tribulations and Trust in the Lord by Elder Bradley D. Foster that
morning before I showered. It told the story of a mother and father who lost
their first child, Preslee Jo, who was 18-months-old in an
accident where she fell into a canal and floated a little ways downstream.
The article was about how they were able to start recovering from it and
helping others learn of faith. The mother had a blog and wrote and updated
people while the experience was happening. The parents’ response of
faith was incredible to me, and over 7 million people read the story of
their faith and trust in the Lord through her blog. Something about the
article and message really struck me, and just helped me feel at peace,
somehow.
One thing that was
written said "While she was in the hospital, Preslee received a
blessing in which she was told that countless people would be drawn to her
story and that she would continue to influence others for good. When Ashley
heard this, she thought her daughter would recover. 'How else could she
continue to influence others?' she asked."
I think I was part
of that blessing. I don't know that I have had an Ensign article effect me so
much. Something about it made me realize again that God really is in
control. That it will be okay, even when things look black.
The sweet wouldn't
taste so good if we didn't know what sour was.
One of the quotes
that Elder Foster used was from a book called Why Did This Happen To
Me? by Ray Pritchard, it said "Sometimes we will face things
for which there is no earthly explanation. In those moments we need to
erect a sign that reads, ‘Quiet: God at Work.’ Meanwhile, hold on, child of
God. Keep believing. Don’t quit. Don’t give up. Let God do His work in you. The
greatest tragedy is to miss what God wants to teach us through our
troubles." I liked this so much I wrote it out and stuck it on my
wall by my desk so that I could remember. Elder Foster also added on to a
quote by Elder Worthlin in his talk Sunday Will Come (Ensign,
Nov. 2006, 30) that said "'When the universe itself seems shattered and
the shards of our world lie littered about us in pieces,' the Savior’s
power and assurance can still make it possible for us to experience joy and
peace. " I loved this article, a lot actually, and have been thinking
about it all week. I'll put a link to it at the bottom so y'all can find it, I
want to share it with you.
This week we also
had MLC (Missionary Leadership Council), and the Director and Assistent (I
think) Director of Missionary Prosalyting for the church were there
actually. Talk about intimidating. We even had to role-play in front of them. I
should have brought my notebook with me to email so that I could write more
about it, but alas, I'm left to my memory.
They had a Q/A and
we talked about our concerns, and then they taught us about things that we
could "tweak" in our mission to increase the vision and faith. One of
which was using the pamphlets that go with each of the lessons differently,
focusing on the pictures in them. The Director of Prosalyting was actually a
Visual Media guy so it was right up my alley. So using 1 Nephi 11-14 as a
guide, we practiced using the pictures in the pamphlets more in a "what
beholdest thou?" or in modern language "what do you see?" He talked
a lot about having shorter lessons (10-20 minutes) and coming back to our
investigators more frequent, instead of having hour-long lessons once or twice
a week. It was really hard to try and teach the whole restoration in seven
minutes, but it made me throw our things that had become rote in my teaching
and stick to the doctrine that the Spirit could testify to. Sister Regan and I
have been trying this and we've been having more lessons, we even set someone
with a Baptism date yesterday on the first lesson (20 minutes), which hasn't
happened while I'm teaching a whole lot. It was neat :)
They also talked
about "The District" Movies (https://www.lds.org/callings/missionary/the-district and ttp://www.mormonchannel.org/the-district)
that we use for training new missionaries. They pointed out that these weren't
just for missionaires in training, they were suppose to be like game film that
we would go back and watch and rewatch and then do it again, pointing out bad
things and high points and what was good and what could have been done better.
Brother Hemmingway (Director) was actually the director of the District 1 and
gave insights to it, and Brother Donaldson (Assistendt Director) President for
the District 2 and he gave insights to that as well. It was really rather
interesting to get some inside scoops of things that happened. So, Sister Regan
and I have been watching the District videos every night since Thursday,
and we'll be using those a lot more.
We're having a
Sisters Conference tomorrow! All of the Sisters in the whole mission are
going to go to the Temple and then we're having a conference afterwards with
President and Sister Slaughter. Sister Regan and I suspect it'll be mostly
about handling stress better since there are many sisters who have been
struggling. But WE'RE GOING TO THE TEMPLE!! That always makes things better.
What was interesting was right before we got the phone call, I asked Sister
Regan how many times she had been to the Temple, and we had both been at least
twice, so it wasn't likely we would go again. Point: God knows what we need
before we ask. So that's good.
Anyways, I love ya
fam. I start 90 days tomorrow. Strange world this is. Thank y'all so much
for your letters and stories; I love the play by play updates.
Love always,
Hermana Cheyenne
Montgomery
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