Friday, December 18, 2020

Adventures in the CLAM: Couch Gang (July 6, 2020-July 12, 2020)

 


Hello one and all!
LA LOVE:
This week I started My Plan, a program to help missionaries make goals and plans for their future in the six weeks before going home. Most missionaries are afraid of doing this because most missionaries are afraid of going home, but it wasn't bad at all. Maybe it's because I'm an extremely decisive person and have always had a vision of what I want in life, but it was an awesome way to prepare for what's ahead and a swell reminder that it's actually a good thing.
The other day we got a knock on our door. We opened the door and it was Sister Nault and Sister Torkornoo. All they said was, "Come out. Come out now." They were smiling so I knew it wasn't bad, but I definitely wasn't expecting Elder Mangum and Elder Breinholt to be carrying a couch up the stairs when we came outside. It was the most confusing few seconds of my life. But I mean, now everyone in our little family has a couch, plus Sister Nault and Sister Torkornoo got a return appointment out of it just by taking this free couch, so we'll take what we can get.
EVENTS OF THE WEEK:
We went to the beach with our sisters on p-day!
Elder Mangum and Sister Allred had birthdays two days apart from each other, so we had a little family birthday party lunch! I made a gluten free red velvet cake (both Elder Mangum and Sister Allred's favorite) and we had lunch and cake on our balconies on the day between their birthdays. I love those two missionaries.
President had us watch a seminar by Elder Bednar about repentance and we learned some beautiful truths. I really enjoyed what we learned about repentance and just got to have an enjoyable spiritual morning together as a mission.
District council was a great one this week! We have new members of our district, Elder Arnold and Elder Utley (we are seriously getting new missionaries here in the CLAM all the time). We learned about using all of our lessons to help our friends understand repentance and the principles behind the Sabbath day.
We went on exchanges! It was Sister Allred's first exchange and she loved it. She went to Cabrillo with Sister Wall, and I stayed in Palos Verdes with Sister Price. She is awesome! I learned so much from her. She is such a knowledgeable missionary and a great teacher. We had a great time working in the Lord's vineyard together that day, including teaching a great Makeup with the Sisters and mission prep!
We woke up Sunday morning to a TRANSFER EMAIL. Let me be clear my friends: IT IS NOT TRANSFER WEEK. But due to all the new missionaries we are getting all the time, there are still transfers... literally every week. This week Sister Allred and I found out we will be in a trio! We are receiving Sister Sanchez and we are so excited to have her. We pick her up this coming Tuesday.
We had the privilege of teaching the online Relief Society lesson this week! We have a great ward. We discussed "A Perfect Brightness of Hope" by Elder Jeffrey R. Holland and "Let This House Be Built unto My Name" by Elder David A. Bednar. Both are amazing talks that can teach us a lot, about present life and the future. I highly recommend giving them a read.
FRIENDS:
Khiara is so amazing. We taught her about baptismal covenants now that she has made that decision and she understood them perfectly. We also taught her and Sophia about eternal families and the role that temples play in that, and they loved it! It was so beautiful to watch them talk about how excited they were to give the gift of the gospel to their future children.
Craig is doing wonderful. We taught the Restoration pretty briefly, and in the middle of the lesson, he just called himself to repentance and said that he needs to read his scripture more. He decided he was going to take time to read every day, and he has read more on his own than he ever has now! This led to us testifying of the Book of Mormon and how we can come to know of its truth, which led to Craig asking what the difference between the Book of Mormon and the Bible is. We spent the next lesson talking about the importance of the scriptures and the similarities and differences of the Book of Mormon. For our last lesson of the week with him we did a Come, Follow Me study and it unexpectedly turned into a discussion about how there are only two sides of the fight: God and the adversary. Craig said he definitely knew what side he wanted to be on.
Cathryn is amazing! This week we learned about how God is our loving Heavenly Father and Sister Anderson came with us.
Tomm is fantastic. He is progressing a lot. We taught him about a lot of things--the Fall of Adam and Eve, baptism, the sacrament. It came up that these things must be done with proper authority. Tomm asked if we go to our different churches and never know which one has the authority. We told him there IS a way we can know, and then taught him about the Restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
We got to teach Jan with the elders of Wilshire 3! He was really receptive to our message and had a lot of questions about our beliefs, and he committed to keep meeting with the elders! It was fun to get to teach with an old friend of mine from Wilshire and to see Jan grow and progress so much in just one lesson.
We talked to Beverly this week about the Book of Mormon. She said she wasn't interested in reading it but didn't know what it was about, so upon explaining, she said it sounded nice, and that maybe she would read it someday, but not today. Stay tuned, folks. The Spirit of the Lord works in many ways.
To close, I wanted to share a scripture that Sister Price shared with me on exchanges that really blessed me. She and I are both going home very soon, which can be a scary thing to face as a missionary. But she read this scripture to me, 2 Nephi 4:26. It was written by the prophet Nephi, after experiencing great sorrow but also reflecting on the amazing blessings he's seen from the Lord. He wrote:
"O then, if I have seen so great things, if the Lord in his condescension unto the children of men hath visited men in so much mercy, why should my heart weep and my soul linger in the valley of sorrow, and my flesh waste away, and my strength slacken, because of mine afflictions?"
This verse is more fitting for this week than I can say. I have seen many great things out here, everyone. There is so much to rejoice in. I can't afford to be weighed down with sorrow. The Lord is on our side!
Thanks and much love!
--Sister Day

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