10-19

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dear Family,

Haha, I love getting your emails! The glorious pig picture with the sunbeams was soooo hilarious... she is so fat! Hahaha. It looks like an awesome weekend with Dexter and Britt, and all the sheep and everything. It looks so fun :) Virginia is so beautiful! I love seeing the pictures!   :) I am sooo grateful I served a mission before I get married... I don't think I could have done it without the experiences I'm learning from haha. I'm glad my car is okay! :)  That's so sad about the kitten! Aw I hope it's healing okay. Great job on your talk, Hannah! That's so cool you could speak about family history, and that it wasn't boring!! Wow! I wish I could have heard it :D Have you ever thought about serving a mission? You would be an AMAZING missionary! I'm happy to hear that E is doing well, and that he's going strong and receiving the priesthood. He is amazing. It's inspiring to see him, and to see all the friendship and fellowship and love you and Randi and everyone has for him. I love seeing people join the church, it can be so hard for them, but it's also some of the times of the greatest love and friendships.  The nacho pictures were hilarious!!! Hahaha.  My diabetes is going well, but I will need some more set changes :) If you could please send some, that would be awesome!

Well, this week has been fantastic!! Well, very hard, but also amazing. I don't even know where to start! My companion... well it has been a learning week! AtWhen describing our personalities, we put it in a scenario: If we went hiking, she would be the hiker to stop and look at the flowers, look at the scenery, sit down for water, stop and talk to people, ect. I would be the hiker who goes straight to the top. Haha, not that I don't enjoy the beauty, but I like to be focused and work hard and am pretty fast paced as a missionary. Luckily, in companionship inventory on Friday (it's a time we set apart to talk with each other, talk about things we can improve on to improve our relationship, our strengths and weaknesses, etc.) we talked about it, and we made some goals to have more positive, friendship building communication with each other. We made a list of random questions to ask each other in the car. As we opened up and slowly felt more comfortable joking with each other and just talking with each other again, the whole dynamic of our companionship changed. We're nurturing our companionship and it is blossoming into a awesome friendship and working in unity. :) It was so cool... earlier in the day we had called and asked Sister T if she could come talk with us and help us out. Well, when she got there Friday night, we sat down and talked with her, and she said it was the oddest helping companions out talk she's ever had, because we were both happy and could laugh with each other and were willing to talk about everything. She gave us some AMAZING advice. She mainly advised me to first, not get offended easily. Just tell myself that I will not be offended, no matter what. Then she advised both of us to serve each other. Man, that has made such a huge difference!!! I've always been nervous to, because I'm scared that my companion will think I'm weird or it will be awkward. Well, when Sister T talked with us, I realized that I just need to do it anyways! If it comes from my love for her, she'll feel it. So immediately Sister D and I both started serving each other, and oh man! Our companionship has changed so much! We are so happy, and I just love serving with her! We still have our differences, but we respect and love and accept each other, and it has made all the difference!

There was also one really cool experience that helped me out alot. I was reading the addiction recovery program packet in my personal study for one of our investigators, and I came across a section that said to make a list of people you have hard feelings for. Then you take steps to forgive them. If you can't, it advises you to kneel and pray a specific prayer for them every day. It gives you some scriptures to study. And then you write in your journal about it, and how your feelings change for them over the next two weeks. I am SO GRATEFUL I chose to serve a mission! I want to change, and become more like Christ. One verse of my favorite hymn "Savior, Redeemer of my soul" has been stuck in my head. It says

" Oer-rule mine acts to serve thine ends

Change frowning foes to smiling friends

Chasten my soul, till I shall be

In perfect harmony with Thee

Make me more worth of Thy love

And fit me for the life above"

every time I write that, or sing that in my head, tears come to my eyes. Even now. I love my Savior. I want His chastening, I want to become more worthy of His love. I feel that He has chastened me in my experiences with my companions, and it has turned out to be one of the sweetest experiences of my whole mission. I feel the Spirit so strongly, and I feel His love, and I feel so happy! Chastening at first feels like your swallowing bitter medicine. But we have to trust that this medicine comes from our loving Heavenly Father, the Master Doctor. That medicine is what is needed to heal our spiritual infirmities and weaknesses. If we take it as prescribed, He will heal us. We will become who He wants us to be. I just love my Savior. This Christmas, I want to give Him greater service and kindness in my character, and in my companionships. And also a greater testimony and closer relationship with Him.

So, as you can see, it has been a huge week for personal growth. I am so, so grateful. 

Aside from that, it's been a huge week! We had two exchanges this week, it was so busy! I got to go in the Spanish area, and I LOVED it!!! I love, love love serving in Spanish wards and going with the Spanish missionaries. I want to learn Spanish so badly :) We visited this funny old lady who has this tiny pet chihuahua. Well, she's single, so she talks to the chihuahua like it's her boyfriend. She'll yell in Spanish "I'm leaving you!!! I'm leaving you!! How could you do this to me?!" And then the chihuahua yells and whines and barks back to her, like he's so sorry and it's so dramatic hahaha. It's soooo funny!!! I wish I could send you a video, it is the funniest thing I've ever seen. She just does it for fun hahaha.

We ate at this really humble house... they fed us outside, some kind of meat and beans I didn't recognize with chili powder. The family was so funny! Especially the dad! He talked to me in Spanish and Hermana F acted as a translator. We ate in their backyard, and there were soooo many mosquitos... my legs got eaten up!! It was horrible! But they showed us all their animals after, they have tons of goats and chickens, and a giant pig that almost attacked us haha. It was really fun! It was a great exchange!

Then we had a service project at a farm and helped a family thin out their crops. That was alot of fun! Their a nonmember family, and the dad is so sick. He's basically falling apart from the inside out
:( So we got to do some farm work. That was alot of fun! We had another exchange, which was great... I love the sisters we serve with. I learn so much from them. I'm so grateful for the opportunity to get to know each of them.

We also had the best weekend ever!!! So L, sadly, smoked again :( It is sooo hard for her. But she's back on track, going strong on day 4 today, and I believe she'll make it! Progress is sometimes two steps forward, one step back. I know she'll make it! Saturday we took her and A to the temple open house in Phoenix, and it was SO BEAUTIFUL. Wow! I love, love, love Arizona!! The temple was sooo gorgeous... it had the Arizona desert theme, even with the beautiful Arizona diamond triangle patterns on the couches, and the murals were of the desert landscape, with the cactuses and rocks and desert blossoms.. it was so gorgeous. I love Arizona. The Spirit was also so strong. And they had beautiful, beautiful artwork...  it was such a special experience. After the open house, we came home and had lunch, and then got everything ready for A's baptism. That was so special!! He was glowing, and so, so happy! His family came, and it was such a spiritual experience. There was one really funny thing that happened haha. So we as missionaries always give some sort of presentation while their changing out of the baptismal suits. So we had planned to pass around notecards and have everyone write a note for A, to put in a book to give him. Well... we had it all planned out, and even had all the notecards in the programs so everyone had one. But in the Holy Ghost talk, the lady pulled out these notecards and pens, and had the exact same idea!! She totally stole our show hahaha. So we had about 5 minutes to whisper to each other frantically figuring out what we were going to do instead, since we couldn't do that now haha. But we decided to share a mormon message called "lifting burdens" about the Atonement, and then share our testimonies, and then open up the time for people to share their testimonies. It actually ended up being incredible. The Spirit was soooo strong. So many people bore their testimonies, and were so emotional. One man whose A's friend in our ward is struggling with serious cancer. He got up and shared his testimony, crying, and shared with us how this experience made him want to keep his baptismal covenants. It was so powerful... I definitely know that happened for a reason. It was meant to be. :) 

Sunday was good, but so long. 6 hours of church is hard haha. But I love all the members, so it's all good! We had a delicious carne asada dinner, and then went to the mission president's devotional in Tempe with A and L. It was an awesome weekend!

So, it has been an amazing week. I am so happy! I love being a missionary. I hit my 11 month mark of entering the MTC today... so weird!! It has gone so fast. Too fast. I LOVE my mission. It is the greatest experience of my life so far, and I trust it is one of the greatest experiences for my life after. 

I love you guys :) Hope you have an awesome week!!

love,

Sister Whitney Morris

 

p day shopping and froyo

 

oh, and I dyed my hair back to my natural color. It was crazy... Sis D did it. Right before I went in the shower to get the hair dye out, the power went out!! Haha so I almost had to take a shower in the dark... we were all freaking out, and then the power went back on . It was super weird :)

phx temple

 

 

 

the baptism, and A and his family, and all the sisters who taught him :) love this kid! He is the sweetest kid ever