Week 23 (8/6/18): Jenga for the win

A cool insight from the scriptures- I was reading in Preach My Gospel and it was talking about how Jesus Christ overcame the obstacle of physical death for us, and it reminded me of the brother of Jared. He had 2 problems: breathing and light. He went to the Lord, and the Lord solved the first one, how they would be able to breathe in the barges. But then the Lord asked him to work on the second one himself, and so he carved 16 stones out of a rock and brought them to the Lord. He asked the Lord to make them light up. He put forth this effort, but he couldn't make it actually light up on his own. Only the Lord had the power to do that. It's the same with us. There are two obstacles keeping us from returning to live with God- death and sin. Jesus Christ overcame the first for us, but He asks us to work on the second. But really, we just bring rocks to the Lord. But through His power through the Atonement of Jesus Christ, our efforts can be made enough.

Love you bye!

Sister Cate

Week 22 (7/30/18): Smoke makes for great sunsets!

Okay, you're going to get a shorter email than normal because I don't have access to a computer today, but really because I have family history work I want to do. It's so addictive, but one of the greatest works ever! (Our bishop's wife may have said that right now I'm here to help the living. I almost replied "Well, you tell them that!" Because they want their work done.) There's one family that has so many duplicates. Like, they each have like 4 first names, and I think whoever records things just chooses two at random, so they never match up. One lady had 11 duplicates. But it's okay, because they're my favorite branch of the family. Mostly because that's where I've spent most of my time. 

We have had so much smoke here from the Yosemite fire. Rest assured, we are nowhere near the actual fire, but we do get the smoke. But the sunsets are gorgeous! Just like how in our lives, we need our trials to make our lives better and more beautiful. But the days can seem kind of gray. 

We have had lots of amazing experiences this week. Lots of stopping by at just the right time, being able to speak Spanish, and so much teaching. An 8 year old girl is getting baptized on Friday, and neither of her parents are members, but her sister is, and they're moving to Oregon next week, so we have taught her almost every day this week. So that's been amazing! 

Also, last Monday, we went to the DMV so Sister Howard could take her permit test, and we met Jessica. Come to find out, she was getting baptized this last Saturday, and she invited us to come. She was super excited to see us, and it was an answer to our prayers too, since it helped distract Sister Howard from being nervous. The baptism was awesome, and we gave the interlude. It was totally meant to be! 

Now back to family history. I promise I love you, but they need me right now. 

Love you bye! 

Sister Cate 

Week 21 (7/23/18): Happy Rebirth Day to me!

Today is the 12th anniversary of my baptism! It's crazy to think that it was 12 years ago, and even crazier to think that I'm 20. 

We had a crazy experience this week. We got so lost in some almond orchards (groves?) this week. Like, spent 20 minutes trying to get out. Our car got so dusty. Anyways, after the GPS led us astray, into the middle of the almond orchard and we finally got out, we made our way to the member's home that we were trying to visit. Well, it turns out that she had only gotten there a couple minutes before we did, and if we hadn't gotten lost, we would have missed her. So that was a huge blessing!

We have seen a lot of progress with less active members. Anyways, they love having us in their homes. One sister and her daughter have come back, and two kids have come back (a ward member is picking them up). And one of the girls is going to be baptized sometime really soon, maybe even before the month is over. She wants to get baptized before their family moves, and we're going to work with their new ward before they even move to try to get them going to church from the very beginning. 

Oh, also, we got transfer calls, and both Sister Howard and I are staying! It's going to be fun! I'm really looking forward to this next transfer. 

Love you bye! 

Sister Cate 

A sister we met with collects and sells a lot of movie memorabilia and gave me a sonic screwdriver necklace!

If you have a Costco, you have got to try this stuff. It is addictive, but it is so good!!!

There is a pig in the front yard of a house in town...

Week 20 (7/16/18): "I think the pulpit must have a strong magnetic field..."

"... because whenever I'm up here, my memory is erased."

-the high council speaker who spoke after me

This week has been crazy. I don't even remember what all happened this week. 

We finally figured out how to do missionary work in this area. We discovered that tracting in the morning is better, and if we talk about family history work, people will actually listen to us. But hey, if I get to talk about and do family history more, I am ecstatic! And I made a lot of progress on mine this week, which was so cool! 

The person we tracted into last Friday or Saturday is actually interested in learning more! She had read a little bit from the Book of Mormon since we'd last seen her, and she was interested by it. This is so exciting! I'm kind of in shock, since I've never had this happen before. 

Then Saturday was fun. Sister Howard went all out (well, as all out as she could) for my birthday. She even got up 15 minutes early to put up streamers, and she is not a morning person. And she was so concerned about making sure that it was a good birthday for me. I felt so loved! 

Then we got a phone call from Temple Square during planning or companion study, and they had a referral for us! She has met with missionaries before, and asked for a copy of the Book of Mormon, and she's even come to church in Chowchilla before! We met with her briefly, though it wasn't a good time, but we're hopeful! She even said that she was excited to get back into the Book of Mormon! 

Then I got to go down to Visalia for Steven Farmer's baptism. It was amazing. And my talk, which I'd been asked to give 24 hours before, went really well. Seriously, he's the most prepared person I've ever met. And I got to see people from Mill Creek again, which was so good. 

And the fact that my family came to Chowchilla to drop off a birthday present for me was also amazing. They know me so well. They got me Expo markers! And barbeque potato chips! I'm really glad that they didn't decide to meet up with Sister Stocker at the church, because we were at the church right then!! But it all worked out, and it was nice to feel so loved. Plus they did the temple work for the family I've been working on for over a year, so that was amazing!  

All in all, it's been a good week. Sorry this is shorter than usual. I'm fighting off a bug, so I'm really tired. But I had a 3 hour nap this morning, so I'm doing better! 

Love you, bye! 

Sister Cate

Week 19 (7/9/18): I may never eat ice cream the same way again...

This week has been kind of a rollercoaster. There were highs and lows. I feel like I am really growing a lot here. Sister Howard and I are very different personality wise, but we have a lot of the same weaknesses. So it has really forced me to grow, but that's definitely not a bad thing. And it's actually been a relatively painless progress.

Now for the normal tender mercy novel. 

One day, we got to a less active's apartment and were knocking on the door when he drove up. So we were able to have a great conversation about how God guides our lives. He thought it was so cool that we got there at exactly the right time. Definitely not a coincidence!

On the 4th, we visited an older sister, and it was really good because her family was out of town, Anna she doesn't have any plans for the day. Then she asked us to take a frozen pizza over to another elderly couple, which we did, and they really needed the visit too. And we thought we weren't going to be able to see anyone that day!

Then Saturday was amazing! During companionship study, a less active sister texted us asking us to ask the missionaries in Madera to give another less active sister in our ward a blessing because she was in Madera hospital because she broke her femur. But it was amazing that the first people she reached out to was us!

Probably my favorite was a meeting with our ward mission leader. We mentioned that we wanted to help the youth do family history work and we started talking about his, and he mentioned how he couldn't get father than his great-grandfather on one line. Well, we found a census where he was a son to the head of the household and right there was his great-great-grandfather. When I said, "That's his dad," Brother Long started tearing up and you could feel the Spirit so strongly. It was probably in my top 5 favorite experiences of my mission. And it took maybe 5 minutes, and he had parents and 3 additional siblings. It was so moving.

After that, we tracted, and it was totally a Fourth Floor, Last Door experience. We went 3 blocks down and then 3 blocks back, and at the second to last house, after facing a ton of rejection and no success, we knock on this door and a 12 year old girl answers. We ask if we can share a message, and the older sister said she was headed to the store, but that we could share a message with the other sisters. So we came in and shared 3 Nephi 11:10-11 and talked about the Book of Mormon. And they said we could come back! They just moved here, have a two week old baby, and haven't found a church yet. We hope to visit tomorrow or Wednesday!

We also stopped by another less active's house, and he was actually there! So we are visiting with him later this week!

Then, a couple less active families came to church! It was so cool to finally see them there!

So yesterday we started delivering all these Relief Society activity flyers to all the less active sisters, and we decided to take one to someone we're teaching, and we got there and her husband, who is a member but hasn't come to church for 10 years, was outside! Now, we were told by previous missionaries that we would never talk to him, that he left the room whenever missionaries came. But he was super nice and invited us in and talked with us for a while. Our ward mission leader and his wife took them cookies the day before, and I think that softened his heart a lot. Members are the best!!

This week, I read from the book of Ruth. So Ruth was gleaning in the fields. She was picking up the barley that the reapers dropped. I imagine it was kind of slow going. She probably needed a lot to support her and Naomi. But with hard work and some intervention by Boaz, she was able to gather about an ephah or batley kernals (grains?). Do you know how much an ephah is? About 8 GALLONS!! But she did it by picking up one piece at a time. 

And sometimes in our lives, we feel like we're not making much progress, but with hard work and some intervention on the part of the Lord, our little efforts add up to become great. It reminds me of Alma 37:6 which says:

"Now ye may suppose that this is foolishness in me; but behold I say unto you, that by small and simple things are great things brought to pass; and small means in many instances doth confound the wise."

Anyways, we have been super blessed.

Sister Cate

I made a friend. He sat on my shoulder the entire time we were there. 

In another missionary apartment.

Week 18 (7/3/18): "You get complacent, you get hit by a car."

From ward council... 

The alternate title for this week is "They're less active on Facebook." Facebook is the best! It is so helpful. 

This week was so good. There were so many miracles. But there was one big one. Last night, we tried seeing a bunch of less actives, and while we had a long list of names, we finished them much more quickly than we had expected, so we weren't sure what to do. Sister Howard suggested we visit the Zamanos, a mainly Spanish family. While we were on the way, we got a text back from a less active we'd texted, but we were 95% certain was a home phone. We were wrong. But it was so exciting, because from previous missionaries' notes, they are so ready to come back to church. Anyways, we get there, choose a scripture to base our spiritual thought off of, and we go in. And it was amazing. The gift of tongues is real! I was able to speak fluent Spanish, and understand so much better than I normally can, and she was so engaged in the spiritual thought, and the Spirit was so strong! I came out, and was just like "Wow." It was amazing! It gave me so much confidence that maybe I can teach a lesson in Spanish if asked to, because with God's help, I can speak Spanish. And I think that's part of why I was transferred to Chowchilla with Sister Howard, because if I had come to Chowchilla with a Spanish speaking companion, I think I would have let my companion do all the talking, and I never would have realized that with God's help, I really can contribute something. 

Also, I love the story of the man with the palsy in Mark 2. The thought I had as I was studying for a specific family this week was that they really needed all 4 people. Imagine if one hadn't shown up. It would have been so much more difficult to get that man up on the roof and to Jesus to be healed. Yes, they probably could have done it with 3 or even 2 people, but it probably would have been a lot more painful for that man. And just like they needed all 4 people, everyone is needed. We all have a role to play in God's plan, and everyone is needed. 

Love you, bye! (The way we end phone calls with other missionaries here!) 

Sister Cate

With Sister Howard this week, we used dry erase markers and pens and pencils to explain how the Jaredites fit into the Book of Mormon, and Coriantumr and how their records were found. It was fun! 

One fun thing about our apartment- we have a TON of snails! 

Can you tell I was tired of inserting records? 

It's so fun to tell people I lived in Gilroy. The look on their faces... 

Sister Howard and I.