Happy February!!!
Well this week has blown in with a snow storm that white washed
to whole town!
yesterday
our church
The weather also dropped from 30 degrees to 9 degrees :P Gotta
love Minnesota! The roads have been fun to drive on haha my companion is glad
that I'm the one driving seeing she's from Arizona and never driven in the snow
before. She was happy though because she hasn't had a real snowy winter yet! Now
she gets one and wants to go out and shovel everyones driveway!
Man, this week seems to have gone by so fast. Last Monday we
went bowling with our district and that was fun (: we also had our volleyball
night and it just ended up being us missionaries, Megan, and one of our
investigators show up. We ended up playing basketball and playing with play
dough and eating fruit snacks and animal crackers from the nursery, it was
actually really fun! She also told us she really wants to be baptized!!
(and no, it was not because we have play dough and fruit snacks) We are super
excited for her!
We've had some really great lessons this week. Most of the
lessons, were actually lessons that I learned. That's one thing that I
really love about a mission. You are by no means the only person teaching. In
fact, you do very little of the teaching. It's kind of cool how it works.
God is teaching you, while you teach others what God teaches
you, and then the people you are teaching are teaching you at the same time and
they don't even know that they are teaching you valuable life lessons! It's one
giant circle of teaching and learning.
I've learned that I am very very grateful for the opportunity to
serve a mission. Although I still don't know everything, and won't ever know
everything in my lifetime, I've learned so many quality life lessons from
others that have changed my whole perspective on how I want to live life in the
future. And forever for that matter.
I've learned that I've been blessed with so many things that
I've taken for granted and now I really treasure them. The gospel of Jesus
Christ for example. I've grown up my whole life with the gospel of Jesus
Christ. And I didn't realize what I had until I saw the difficulties of life
without it. I want everyone to have what I have in life because it truly
does bring joy into the hearts of every human soul. I love this gospel because
it makes me happy. true happiness is what everyone searches for in life. And
all of us have the freedom to choose our own degree of happiness
based on our choices. We can learn to make good choices, in fact I
think that is a big part of life, learning to make more of the
good choices, and less of the bad. As soon as we figure out what the good
choices are it's like a light bulb moment and you think to yourself,
"I knew this all along, I just never thought it would actually make me
happy."
Living a missionary lifestyle kind of did that for me. After a
year and a half of living missionary standards, breaking away from the world
for a while helped me take a step back, take a breather, and reevaluate
the way I live my life. That was kind of a shock for me because I
thought I was doing alright in life. And I was, life was alright.
But nothing compared to how I've lived my life the last year and
a half. True, living the gospel of Jesus Christ is challenging, it is not the
easiest pathway to take in this world, you will make mistakes. It
stretches you, pushes you FAR out of your comfort zone, and you do
things that the world doesn't necessarily deem to be the "in
thing" to do. There has been no greater strength and learning in
my life than the last year and a half being a missionary. Having
the things, people, and comforts that I love around me gone.
I thought about what is really important in life. And everything
that I love, I mean truly deeply love, when it all boiled down,
was Heavenly Father, and my family. And by family I don't just mean
my mom and dad and brothers and sisters back home in Utah, although I do love
them so much more than I ever thought. I also mean the people I've
met here, and those back home. I really love them and want them to
have the joy which comes through living the gospel. It's not because I
want them to become "Mormon." That isn't what makes me happy. I
know plenty of Mormons who don't live the gospel and aren't happy. Having the
title Mormon does not automatically make your life perfect and full of nothing
but good.
Knowing what I know AND LIVING the gospel because I
am a member of the restored church of Jesus Christ is what
makes me happy. And I want that for everyone. And I'm not afraid to show
everyone, member and non member alike that this is what has brought me
happiness. And I don't ever want to lose that because of fear or
unpopularity or whatever else it may be.
I love this gospel and it's a part of me that cannot be
separated from who I am as a person, because there is no difference. I am
who I am because I am a child of God and I know it and I will live it, and
forever love it. And I love everyone else the same. We are all children of God
and we all deserve to know that. I've promised to live my life as
an example of Jesus Christ and I will always strive to live up to that
promise. It doesn't end after we are baptized or after we are a missionary. That's
what I love about this gospel, you never have a limit to progression, or a
limit to happiness or joy. "We are made of the stuff of
eternity!"
Love you all! have a grrreeeaaattt week!
Love Sister Ficklin
haha my comp.
Lula
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