love, serve, teach: Letter home March 24, 2014

Dear Mommy, Dad, Dexter, Isaac, Hannah, Jacob, Adam, and Peter,

Thank you soo much for your letter today. I seriously love you guys so much (: The pictures of everyone with the sombreros, ukeleles, and mustaches made me laugh so hard! Haha, you would fit right in in Arizona :D Also Isaac with the giant sheep horns... he looks like Loki haha. It looks like Hannah's birthday was so much fun. :)

I'm so glad you could get a blessing and feel that peace. (: I am so grateful for all of you! I love you all SO much. Also hearing about the Sunday school class this week made me smile, and Peter's prayer. That made my whole day :D

I also loved Isaac's analogy with the sheep, and the Atonement healing. That is so true!! Wow! I love how even though it hurts, and you do have to bleed sometimes, as a whole it is a beautiful process. It beautifies and sanctifies us, so that those ugly, hurting sins are gone, and all that's left is us, beautiful and whole, as God wants us to be. (: I love the Atonement and Jesus Christ.

This week has been so hard! We have met more unkind people this week than we have my entire mission. It surprises me how some people treat us - it's like once we put on a nametag, they forget that we're human. It's so sad. However, we have kept working, kept praying, and kept striving constantly to be more obedient and more consecrated missionaries. There was a brother in our ward who gave a talk this Sunday that I loved. He was talking about a difficult time in his mission, where they had no success, no matter how hard they tried. He and his companion decided to go through the entire white handbook, and make their prayers and scripture studies more meaningful, and try to consecrate themselves more fully, in every way. He said - and I loved this - that nothing changed. The food tasted the same, the people were still unkind and didn't accept the message. But something changed inside of him and his companion.

That's truly one of the greatest blessings I am recieving from serving a mission. I don't know how much of a difference I'll make in these people's lives. I love them, and want so badly to help them. But I am learning to give my heart, and even my desires, completely to the Lord. Just wanting to do His will, and not mine - not out of duty, but because I love Him. I just want to have all of me dedicated to the work. It's hard, and takes time. (: But I try and be better every day.

We had one really amazing miracle this week. A person we talked to on the street (nonmember) gave us this referral of someone who was going through a hard time. We've knocked many times, but this week a lady named B. opened the door. We talked with her, and told her who we were. She told us her daughter used to meet with the missionaries in Mesa! They used to come over all the time. So she invited us to come back when her daughter was home too.

When we came back a few days later, she opened the door, and she told us more about what had happened. It was heartbreaking. Turns out her daughter and her grandaughter lived in Mesa. The grandaughter had been studying with the missionaries, and had actually been baptized, and went to church every Sunday, and had many close friends in the ward. Last year they moved to Maricopa, and then the daughter got really sick. She ended up passing away last November :( Since then, they have struggled so much and gone through so much pain with her passing. When B's daughter found out we had stopped by, she wanted to meet with us. She wanted to know more about the afterlife, and where her daughter has gone, and what her daugther believed.

Isn't that incredible? My heart just broke as I was listening to her share their experiences. But I couldn't help but think that maybe their daughter is on the other side, doing her part in maybe guiding us so that her family can accept the gospel too. It was just an amazing experience.

We are excited for this new week! It was hard this past week. We couldn't meet with R, because of family issues, so we haven't seen her at all :/. T is doing awesome though. We love him and his family so much. T can't be baptized until he looks at some other churches, and they all want to study some other religions before they commit. But I know as they study and pray, they will be able to feel the Spirit, and that will lead them and guide them, and answer their questions. I hope I can be there when T gets baptized! And I hope so much that they can all go to the temple someday. I can see T being an AMAZING missionary somewhere, and their family is just so wonderful. I hope so much that they can recieve those blessings of the temple someday. That would make my entire mission, and I would always look with so much joy and gratitude. (: I still will, of course. but I hope they go to the temple someday. (:

Well, two crazy things happened this week.

First - we saw a rattlesnake!!!! We were knocking this trailer in a little deserty side of town, where everything is pretty broken down. It's literally in the middle of the Arizona desert; sand, tumbleweeds, and broken bottles. Anyways. We were walking away from the doorstep, and suddenly we heard a rattling sound. I looked down and SCREAMED - there was a rattlesnake like one foot away from us! We immediately ran back to the porch and just stood there. It didn't leave, but eventually it was about eight feet away from the porch, so we walked in a huge circle around it back to our bikes. It was so terrifying! Can you believe it?? I saw a rattlesnake, and it rattled at us! It even looked at us and did the thing where it sways your head at you... it was so scary.

We also saw the biggest beehive I've ever seen in my life. We were biking along, and I looked up, and saw what looked like a large purse hanging in the tree. I yelled to Sis R, and we both looked up at it, and then we realized that it was dark brown because of the hundreds and hundreds of bees that were crawling all over it. It was so crazy!

So, it was quite an adventure this week, haha.

Oh, and this Monday apparently was the darkest night of the whole year.... so we got pictures. :)

Well, I love you guys! Thanks so much for writing and just for everything. Mommy, I am so grateful for your letter and your love. It means the world to me. I can't imagine life without you and our whole family. I miss you guys.

Oh, and CONGRATS to Britt and Dexter!!!!!!!!!!! Britt messaged me and I replied to her. (: Haha but hopefully Isaac won't get engaged while I'm gone, so it's all good. :) But her ring is so beautiful!!! I am so happy for them. It's so awesome to have her officially join the family. I'm excited to come home and spend time with them. I wish Dexter the best of luck in all those choices too, with the Marines and everything. I am so proud of all of you.

Oh, and I got the bday package. 21... this week... crazy :) There's nowhere else I would rather celebrate than where I am now!! :)

Love you guys!!!!

love,

Sister Whitney Morris

Here are funny pictures of us sisters.... we have fun, haha.

Also, I have this little idea. (: I'm getting so many wonderful letters from my mission, but their all emails.. so I was wondering if maybe you guys could print out the emails you send me and stick them in a binder? That way I could have all the letters you sent me. There are so many things you write me that I want to remember and don't want to lose. If it's too much paper or time, don't worry about it. But I would just love to have those memories and letters, and not lose them. Thoughts? Let me know what you think (:

love,

me.

Rattlesnake. It was so terrifying.