Hey!
so it's been an exciting week for us, LOTS of service to do and
so little time! You could say drayton valley is needy.... and i
wouldn't disagree but i love the people so much and have made so many
amazing friendships I'm going to miss serving them! Also news I've found a
new great grandma! Sister Bondi has volunteered and has requested that
i call her "GG" ha ha i wish i could send you pictures she's the cutetest
89 year old I've ever met and we have the same passion for the gospel! she
used to live in Vancouver 2nd ward.... small world!
Any who this last
week we received a referral from the elders in Fort St. John! I was so
excited, I've been praying for a while that heavenly father would lead me and
sister Jones to people that need our help! We stopped by a couple times, no
answer.... and then we got a cell phone number.... still no answer! BUT even
though i didn't leave a message they must have seen a new number on their
call display and called us back Sunday afternoon! I answered and set up an
appointment with Jamie Courchesne for that afternoon! We went over and she
was so friendly telling us all about herself and her family! Her mother is
a member who joined up in Fort St. John and so she's been told bits
and pieces of church doctrine. she explained that she had a hard time
with churches that had "silly" rules like not being able to take blood
or to exchange a rice cracker for bread in the sacrament if you are
a celiac (because she is) well.... her and sister Jones became
great friends from then on! started swapping celiac recipes it
was hilarious.... we taught her about God is our loving Heavenly
Father and read the introduction to the Book of Mormon! she was so
respectful and discussed it well and agreed to start reading in first nephi
and set up an appointment with us for Tuesday to teach the restoration!
o I'm just so happy to have the chance to meet people who have open hearts
it's so wonderful!
At church this week Brother Musson returned from
holidays and received the Aaron priesthood! it was so wonderful..... he's so
great and strong in his scripture study! Sister Maria Tapsoba was at church
as usual and received her temple recommend along with our other
recent convert brother Strasbourg. they both have family names ready to
take to the temple for the FIRST time on Saturday and I'm so excited
for them! i wish so badly we were allowed to go! I found out Sunday that
a recent convert of a year just went through the temple with his wife (the
meadows) and received their endowment! they will be sealed to their two
little girls in Vancouver July 4th and are so excited! i gotta tell ya even
the roughest of people are children of God, we have oil patch workers here
joining the church and making temple covenants it's so
amazing!!!
well! last but not least we have two full time missionary
couples from Edmonton now assigned to our branch. they will commute three
times a week and be in the elders quorum presidency and in the
branch presidency to strengthen and provide leadership! what an answer
to prayers! i love seeing REAL changes for good when you really use
the church leadership system and say you two cents worth :)
i love you
all so much, i hope you're staying strong and using all the tools the gospel
of Jesus Christ offers to bring you hope and happiness in this crazy world we
live in!
i leave you with this quote from conference April
2012:
"Our doctrine is clear; we are to be positive and of good cheer.
We emphasize our faith, not our fears. We rejoice in the Lord's
assurance that He will stand by us and give us guidance and direction. The
Holy Ghost testifies to our hearts that we have a loving Father in
Heaven, whose merciful plan for our redemption WILL be fulfilled in
every aspect because for the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ." -Elder
Cook
Have a great week! cheers!
sister wotherspoon
Thursday, June 21, 2012
Monday, April 16, 2012
14 Months out in the field toady!! Wahoo!! Can you believe it? That I've lasted this long hahaha i know, o the miracles of our heavenly father and thank you for all your support! The emails and pictures, letters and talks! I couldn't have made it here without your support!
Well this week was exciting! We had snowstorms for three days straight BUT because it's spring it's all gone now and I'm happy about that! Just when you thought you could put your winter stuff away.... everyone says to watch out for the may long weekend snow dump though, so much to look forward to! Any who! This week we had a ton of plans, back plans and plan C's get cancelled BUT we still managed to teach 19 lessons, half of those being with those investigating the church! The members are loving us and i really am feeling like a part of the branch now here in drayton valley! I just love serving with sister jones. She's such a great support and strength in the missionary work. She's so fun and the members upstairs always catch us hysterically laughing, because if we couldn't laugh at the crazy weird things that happen in the small oil rig town then we would go crazy! Bro Strausberg has been called as a new branch missionary and he was baptized in January! he's going strong and diving into preach my gospel! it will be nice to have the help. We got to do some service this week for some active members. The cressman's allowed us to come over, we took down Christmas lights, fed horses, picked up litter on their huge acreage and cleaned their home while cooking dinner . There are so many hard working members that are so over run with life! i feel fortunate to help. whenever i think of how to
help others i think what would my mom do? what would my mom appreciate? makes things easier!
District Meeting was this week! our zone leaders and president Campbell and his wife joined us for a lovely meeting on discussing the qualities that we must have to qualify to be missionaries. It was the usual discussion until we learned about hope..... it really struck me that we teach our investigators to act on faith A LOT but when do we instill in the them the confidence and expectation of the blessings that come as we live the gospel! the hope is really what, as the
Bookof Mormon teaches, keeps us sure and steadfast always abounding in good works! isn't that what we want for those in the church and newly joined! hope seems to be the answer to my never ending question "how can we keep people strong in the church". let's teach hope! let's teach them that the quality of their lives WILL improve and that all of god's promises will be given to them including eternal life if they are obedient! :) o that was so awesome, i love it when the holy
ghost is teaching the lesson :) We also got to help a family move out and clean their home while spending mornings and evenings reading the Book of Mormon with our investigators! Michael musson has set his baptismal date for may 28thand he told heavenly father in his prayer "I'm so excited! please help the missionaries to prepare me for this date"! so exciting! cam is doing well along with domi and we are excited to meet his wife who has recently returned from Africa!Nothing else too exciting! I'm just trying to enjoy the little things,like the baby animals, kittens and puppies that seem to be popping up everywhere. the sunshine. the moments our
investigators learn new truths and of course the opportunity to exercise and
stay strong for the last three and half months! Love you and miss you
all!! !keep the faith! sister wotherspoon
Well this week was exciting! We had snowstorms for three days straight BUT because it's spring it's all gone now and I'm happy about that! Just when you thought you could put your winter stuff away.... everyone says to watch out for the may long weekend snow dump though, so much to look forward to! Any who! This week we had a ton of plans, back plans and plan C's get cancelled BUT we still managed to teach 19 lessons, half of those being with those investigating the church! The members are loving us and i really am feeling like a part of the branch now here in drayton valley! I just love serving with sister jones. She's such a great support and strength in the missionary work. She's so fun and the members upstairs always catch us hysterically laughing, because if we couldn't laugh at the crazy weird things that happen in the small oil rig town then we would go crazy! Bro Strausberg has been called as a new branch missionary and he was baptized in January! he's going strong and diving into preach my gospel! it will be nice to have the help. We got to do some service this week for some active members. The cressman's allowed us to come over, we took down Christmas lights, fed horses, picked up litter on their huge acreage and cleaned their home while cooking dinner . There are so many hard working members that are so over run with life! i feel fortunate to help. whenever i think of how to
help others i think what would my mom do? what would my mom appreciate? makes things easier!
District Meeting was this week! our zone leaders and president Campbell and his wife joined us for a lovely meeting on discussing the qualities that we must have to qualify to be missionaries. It was the usual discussion until we learned about hope..... it really struck me that we teach our investigators to act on faith A LOT but when do we instill in the them the confidence and expectation of the blessings that come as we live the gospel! the hope is really what, as the
Bookof Mormon teaches, keeps us sure and steadfast always abounding in good works! isn't that what we want for those in the church and newly joined! hope seems to be the answer to my never ending question "how can we keep people strong in the church". let's teach hope! let's teach them that the quality of their lives WILL improve and that all of god's promises will be given to them including eternal life if they are obedient! :) o that was so awesome, i love it when the holy
ghost is teaching the lesson :) We also got to help a family move out and clean their home while spending mornings and evenings reading the Book of Mormon with our investigators! Michael musson has set his baptismal date for may 28thand he told heavenly father in his prayer "I'm so excited! please help the missionaries to prepare me for this date"! so exciting! cam is doing well along with domi and we are excited to meet his wife who has recently returned from Africa!Nothing else too exciting! I'm just trying to enjoy the little things,like the baby animals, kittens and puppies that seem to be popping up everywhere. the sunshine. the moments our
investigators learn new truths and of course the opportunity to exercise and
stay strong for the last three and half months! Love you and miss you
all!! !keep the faith! sister wotherspoon
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
Happy New Year - 2012!
Well since this is "supposed" to be the last year before the end i thought i should make some good goals this year! We had some great talks in sacrament meeting yesterday on goal setting and i loved the acronym that Brother Carter used. He calls the SMART goals: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Timely. So that's what I'm going to do! I've decided that i want to eliminate fear and doubt from my thoughts and vocabulary, i want to read the Old Testament once and The Book of Mormon two more times by the end of my mission along with a conference talk weekly! My overall goal is inspired by my former companion Sister Hayes - "Love More, Eat Less" lol I really encourage you all to make personal goals for this year and include with it spiritual goals because this life is purely the time for us to prepare to meet our heavenly father and i love in Alma 5:11-13 where Alma explains the steps in order to be have a change of heart and be saved! As we exercise faith + humble ourselves + trust in God + and endure with faith to the end we will all be saved! As I've thought about what it means to be saved i don't think it means our final salvation only but that we can be saved from heart ache, misery, unnecessary trials and evil today, tomorrow and forever!
Well now that I've given a little spiritual insight I'll let you know how our week went. it wasn't too busy unfortunately so we took advantage of the wonderful positive weather and went tracting to find new people to teach because Neil has been out of town and Steven is still in Quebec. So! we had some great experiences and even had a couple people invite us back for return appointments. Unfortunately nobody was home or interested anymore when we returned but i really feel that's all we can do! We are showing heavenly father that we are willing to do the work and i know he'll bless us! One girl even texted us after we talked to her at the door because she wanted to know more but then her husband found out and she can't meet with us. I know there are people prepared and i desire soooo badly to be able to teach a family, i should add that to my goals.....
I loved the Christmas season but I'm really excited for normal life to kick in so that we can start visiting with people again and hopefully receive referrals from our members as they return to town!
The cold weather is on it's way, so much adventure in store!
I love you all and miss you so much!
Love Sister Wotherspoon
Monday, December 26, 2011
Happy Boxing Day Everyone!
Wow it's been such an exciting week! so much going on in the missionary world of Lacombe with all the wonderful Christmas events!
We didn't have a chance to teach a lot of lessons this week with people being super busy with Christmas but we were thankful to be able to be at the Live Nativity/ Creche display set up at the church. It was amazing! i have never seen a live nativity, with all the ward volunteering to be the many parts of the Christmas story and people bringing in their animals - sheep, donkey and goat! it was so well done with music, lighting and costumes. I'll attach pictures for everyone to see. on Tuesday we helped set up the creche in the gym for six hours. all the walls were covered with white fabric and tables were set up surrounded with Christmas trees and white lights with the 200 creche's set up. people from all over the communities came and enjoyed the show, the creches and some hot chocolate and apple cider with cookies after! i had a lot of great conversations with people and invited many to take the lessons. i didn't have any immediate luck but i know the community's prospect of the church has increased in respect :D
Christmas eve was exciting! we had our whole day set up with lessons and everybody cancelled.... so we decided to go and visit a little old lady in the lodge senior centre, sister silliker. who I've come to know really well,we went to visit her and she was stuck in her wheel chair needing to go to the hospital! so we got her to the emergency and they gave her strong pain killer shots for her new knee. it was intense and I'm so glad that we were there at the right time, she still tells us we were the angels that arrived right on time! we then came back and went caroling with ward members at another senior centre. it was so fun to sing all the songs and meet new people. we then went to a Christmas party at the bishop's and his family and headed home for the night!
Christmas day was AMAZING! we got to sleep in.... which was awesome! we went to church at 10am and had a wonderful program of commentary that included Jewish customs that they did at the time and musical numbers including one i got to sing in with the choir - Where shepherds lately knelt - it was beautiful! many of the members invited us over but with time constraints we opened presents at home.... had a great brunch with the cuff family that we live with and then headed off to talk to the family on skype! it was so great to see the family... it's been 7 months! we chatted and then headed off to Christmas dinner with the hill family, stopped at a couple other homes and then headed to bed exhausted.
one of my favourite Christmas presents this Christmas was stopping by our new convert's home - Anne - with her new husband Neil! i was so worried if he was actually interested in the gospel and if Anne would stay active. we hadn't heard from them in a week and when we stopped by they said they've been reading the book of mormon together, a chapter a day! that makes me so excited for the work here!
so many blessings to be grateful for. But most of all I'm grateful for the family and friends that have supported me so much throughout the past 10 months of my missionary service. i have good days and harder days but all in all I'm thankful for you guys who remind me of my purpose and pray for me! I love you and miss you! Seven months today I'll be home in surrey! hard to believe.... stay strong and keep the Christmas spirit with you all year long.
lots of love
sister wotherspoon
Monday, December 19, 2011
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Merry Christmas Everyone!!!
Elder O'Randy, Sis. Wotherspoon, Elder Lee
Surrey 1st Ward Missionaries
New Puppies!!!!
A Visit from Santa...HOHOHO
Hello from Winter Wonderland!
I now know first hand why they call Canada the Great White North! It just keeps getting colder.... what a difference between just cold and when there's wind! haha well enough about the weather i had a CRAZY busy week this week. Poor sister Milburn isn't getting her newbie studies in but i think real life training is better then sitting reading out of a textbook anyways!
Well let's see if i can remember it all...
Anne Peters is doing great! she's reading the scriptures and going strong, she came to all three hours of church and to our ward potluck because it was ward conference! Of course her fiance Neil came too and i think he really enjoys church! They are super cute together and through a wonderful miracle Anne and Neil were both able to find their divorce certificates and are getting married by bishop Lowry tonight at the chapel at seven o clock! It's so funny.... Neil - age 84, is
sooooo nervous to get married in front of people that he has to go to the doctor to get a pill for his anxiety! it's going to be fabulous! i asked a lady in the ward who does weddings to decorate, I'll take lots of pictures!
Something fun this week! The Kasners in our ward are breeders of my favourite dog! an Australian sheep dog! they have five puppies and they are so cute! I'll have to go back in a couple weeks when they are running around!
Thursday we had a crazy experience, we were planning on going to this sister missionary cookie thing in Edmonton and on the way there we realized we didn't have our phone.... we went home and couldn't find it! well we had no way of knowing the numbers or address of the place so we missed it.... we were so upset and spent four hours looking for it! we ended up driving up to Edmonton that night for the Christmas conference the next day and just had fun. The Christmas conference was awesome! three hours of training, a great turkey lunch and three hours of hilarious random talents by the missionaries! i sang a Christmas medley including chestnuts roasting on an open fire and have yourself a merry little Christmas with elder smith (from my first district, he's from Toronto). we sang it jazzy at a keyboard and it was super fun! we then found out at ten to four that we being outlying missionaries could go to the temple at four! o man..... we ran! it's a good thing i had my recommend on me!
it was so wonderful to go, i haven't been since April ish! it was so peaceful AND the officiator was Brother Patrick!!!!!! I also saw a guy from one of my ysa wards and a lady came up to me in the celestial room and told me i was pretty ha ha it was a good day :D
well.... later that night after searching for the cell phone more sister Milburn said i wonder if we threw it out in the trash? we decided that couldn't have happened but it wouldn't leave my mind so at ten thirty i said wanna go dumpster diving?!?! we did! when we got to the church parking lot she got out of the car and right there in the snow was our phone!!!!!!! it was a Christmas miracle for sure! it was nearly dead when we lost it but was still alive working in the
snow after two days of -20 degrees!
Another blessing.... Stephen during finals week called us and set up an appointment and invited us to a Christmas band concert at the seventh day Adventist college! he then came to church and he's just plain awesome... Last night i also performed in the red deer Christmas stake fireside singing a song with the choir along to bells!
it's been a crazy week, so many blessings! i know this email was super long but i hope you enjoyed something! thank you all for your emails and your cards and packages! i feel so loved and know that my blessings come from your prayers!
love you all so much! and i really miss you. Happy Holidays!
sister wotherspoon
I now know first hand why they call Canada the Great White North! It just keeps getting colder.... what a difference between just cold and when there's wind! haha well enough about the weather i had a CRAZY busy week this week. Poor sister Milburn isn't getting her newbie studies in but i think real life training is better then sitting reading out of a textbook anyways!
Well let's see if i can remember it all...
Anne Peters is doing great! she's reading the scriptures and going strong, she came to all three hours of church and to our ward potluck because it was ward conference! Of course her fiance Neil came too and i think he really enjoys church! They are super cute together and through a wonderful miracle Anne and Neil were both able to find their divorce certificates and are getting married by bishop Lowry tonight at the chapel at seven o clock! It's so funny.... Neil - age 84, is
sooooo nervous to get married in front of people that he has to go to the doctor to get a pill for his anxiety! it's going to be fabulous! i asked a lady in the ward who does weddings to decorate, I'll take lots of pictures!
Something fun this week! The Kasners in our ward are breeders of my favourite dog! an Australian sheep dog! they have five puppies and they are so cute! I'll have to go back in a couple weeks when they are running around!
Thursday we had a crazy experience, we were planning on going to this sister missionary cookie thing in Edmonton and on the way there we realized we didn't have our phone.... we went home and couldn't find it! well we had no way of knowing the numbers or address of the place so we missed it.... we were so upset and spent four hours looking for it! we ended up driving up to Edmonton that night for the Christmas conference the next day and just had fun. The Christmas conference was awesome! three hours of training, a great turkey lunch and three hours of hilarious random talents by the missionaries! i sang a Christmas medley including chestnuts roasting on an open fire and have yourself a merry little Christmas with elder smith (from my first district, he's from Toronto). we sang it jazzy at a keyboard and it was super fun! we then found out at ten to four that we being outlying missionaries could go to the temple at four! o man..... we ran! it's a good thing i had my recommend on me!
it was so wonderful to go, i haven't been since April ish! it was so peaceful AND the officiator was Brother Patrick!!!!!! I also saw a guy from one of my ysa wards and a lady came up to me in the celestial room and told me i was pretty ha ha it was a good day :D
well.... later that night after searching for the cell phone more sister Milburn said i wonder if we threw it out in the trash? we decided that couldn't have happened but it wouldn't leave my mind so at ten thirty i said wanna go dumpster diving?!?! we did! when we got to the church parking lot she got out of the car and right there in the snow was our phone!!!!!!! it was a Christmas miracle for sure! it was nearly dead when we lost it but was still alive working in the
snow after two days of -20 degrees!
Another blessing.... Stephen during finals week called us and set up an appointment and invited us to a Christmas band concert at the seventh day Adventist college! he then came to church and he's just plain awesome... Last night i also performed in the red deer Christmas stake fireside singing a song with the choir along to bells!
it's been a crazy week, so many blessings! i know this email was super long but i hope you enjoyed something! thank you all for your emails and your cards and packages! i feel so loved and know that my blessings come from your prayers!
love you all so much! and i really miss you. Happy Holidays!
sister wotherspoon
Monday, November 28, 2011
Hey everyone!
This week was SOOOO busy! we had to organize and get the baptism all planned and prepared for while still trying to maintain the quota of twenty lessons a week and fasting and praying for our other investigator stephen, but i'll talk more about that in a minute!
Anne's baptism was fabulous! I'll send a program your way! Sister Cuff and Sister Pelletier two sisters in the ward that know Anne well gave the talks and me and sister Milburn sang "learn of me" by Janice Kapp Perry! Everyone said it was beautiful. The water was warm and a part
of me wishes they would hold her under longer because it just goes by too fast for all the work we do! haha about 60 members of the ward came and we had lots of treats and goodies to eat. We decided to continue my tradition of getting those who attended to write their testimonies on index cards for Anne so that we could put a book together of pictures and testimonies. We also got her ordered a quad of scriptures with her name on it ! i know she loved it! Anne also
invited her "boyfriend" Neil, who's 84!!! haha he's so cute, and i really want to start teaching him this week too we'll see!
we also taught Stephen this week and had a really intense lesson on the second half of the plan of salvation. he has so many questions and the language barrier is hard! ..... well we prayed that night and the next morning we got a call from him saying he wants to come to church and come to all three hours to experience the whole thing! i was so happy! he came and every meeting went sooooo well! he participated in Sunday school and everyone came up to him and was so friendly :D i can't wait to see what he really thought at our lesson this week.
Well that's really all the excitement this week! I'm really loving
sister Milburn, we get along great and she's so excited for missionary
work.
love you all! and miss you a lot..... especially this time of year! :D
love sister kara wotherspoon
This week was SOOOO busy! we had to organize and get the baptism all planned and prepared for while still trying to maintain the quota of twenty lessons a week and fasting and praying for our other investigator stephen, but i'll talk more about that in a minute!
Anne's baptism was fabulous! I'll send a program your way! Sister Cuff and Sister Pelletier two sisters in the ward that know Anne well gave the talks and me and sister Milburn sang "learn of me" by Janice Kapp Perry! Everyone said it was beautiful. The water was warm and a part
of me wishes they would hold her under longer because it just goes by too fast for all the work we do! haha about 60 members of the ward came and we had lots of treats and goodies to eat. We decided to continue my tradition of getting those who attended to write their testimonies on index cards for Anne so that we could put a book together of pictures and testimonies. We also got her ordered a quad of scriptures with her name on it ! i know she loved it! Anne also
invited her "boyfriend" Neil, who's 84!!! haha he's so cute, and i really want to start teaching him this week too we'll see!
we also taught Stephen this week and had a really intense lesson on the second half of the plan of salvation. he has so many questions and the language barrier is hard! ..... well we prayed that night and the next morning we got a call from him saying he wants to come to church and come to all three hours to experience the whole thing! i was so happy! he came and every meeting went sooooo well! he participated in Sunday school and everyone came up to him and was so friendly :D i can't wait to see what he really thought at our lesson this week.
Well that's really all the excitement this week! I'm really loving
sister Milburn, we get along great and she's so excited for missionary
work.
love you all! and miss you a lot..... especially this time of year! :D
love sister kara wotherspoon
Saturday, November 26, 2011
Hey Everyone!
Wow it's been an INTENSE week! so much going on, so much to write about! here it goes...
As you all know I am staying in Lacombe here and training a new missionary! Her name is sister Milburn and she's from Bonnie Lake Washington, just outside Seattle! It's so crazy how we grew up only a couple hours away from each other, had the same temple growing up, we're the same age and she went to BYU too. she's really nice and sooooo excited to do missionary work! i just love her! she's so fun and likes to talk! the members are just loving her and everyone is being so nice and loving to me. I just feel the missionary work booming!
So Wednesday we woke up early at 5:30 and drove into Edmonton. We had great weather and went to the riverbend stake centre where the Edmonton temple is under construction for the trainer meeting. It was great and I picked up sister Milburn! the sisters then went out for lunch at red robin for sister Thomas who was the only sister going home. I just had a feeling we should get sister Milburn a winter jacket and boots instead of waiting till pday and president agreed and thankgoodness we did! the NEXT day we had a huge snow fall and it got down to -26 during the days this week. I was so nervous to drive but took it slow and we are still in one piece! We went to dinner at the stake president's house that night and invited Anne with us to dinner and then went to the Addiction Recovery meeting with her. Anne is doing fabulous! she's gone 8 days without smoking and her Baptism is a go for this Sunday i'm SOOOOOOo excited!!!!
Thursday we found out that our district has been changed so we are meeting only every two weeks with the senior couple in Stettler and a companionship from red deer. so we didn't have district meeting but we taught anne, some member lessons really trying to get more referrals and went to the farmers market in lacombe. they had a huge Santa Claus parade in the snow and then a moonlight midnight shopping day where all the shops were open till late and the farmers market was at the convention centre. we went around talking to people and i hope something comes out of the contacts we made! we also did a little tracting and found a guy who wants us to come back! I'll keep you updated!
Friday was our planning and we also met with our investigator Stephen the french speaking guy from Quebec. i found out he's twenty six and he read from the book of Mormon. We had sister cuff come because she served her mission in France and the spirit was so strong as sister milbu
rn asked him to be baptized! he said it was a big question but that he would continue to pray to know if the book of Mormon was true ! we are really excited for him.
This weekend was stake conference and we had a visiting general authority of the first quorum of the seventy come elder Johnson? he was GREAT! and Anne loved it! we also heard from the temple president and our mission president. the spirit was so strong. The general authority recounted a story about his daughter saying that she had bought her daughters some beautiful jewelery boxes for Christmas and a smaller one for their cousin. when she showed the little girls the small one they just started balling their eyes out because they wanted it so bad. he related it to how our heavenly father has greater things then we could even imagine waiting for us! i loved it.
Emails were changed to today because we volunteered at the festival of trees in red deer and set up garland and decorated trees! it was intense! and so fun. really got me into the Christmas spirit!
well this is all for now. I'm glad you are all doing well and hope to hear from you really soon.
lots of love!
sister Wotherspoon
Wow it's been an INTENSE week! so much going on, so much to write about! here it goes...
As you all know I am staying in Lacombe here and training a new missionary! Her name is sister Milburn and she's from Bonnie Lake Washington, just outside Seattle! It's so crazy how we grew up only a couple hours away from each other, had the same temple growing up, we're the same age and she went to BYU too. she's really nice and sooooo excited to do missionary work! i just love her! she's so fun and likes to talk! the members are just loving her and everyone is being so nice and loving to me. I just feel the missionary work booming!
So Wednesday we woke up early at 5:30 and drove into Edmonton. We had great weather and went to the riverbend stake centre where the Edmonton temple is under construction for the trainer meeting. It was great and I picked up sister Milburn! the sisters then went out for lunch at red robin for sister Thomas who was the only sister going home. I just had a feeling we should get sister Milburn a winter jacket and boots instead of waiting till pday and president agreed and thankgoodness we did! the NEXT day we had a huge snow fall and it got down to -26 during the days this week. I was so nervous to drive but took it slow and we are still in one piece! We went to dinner at the stake president's house that night and invited Anne with us to dinner and then went to the Addiction Recovery meeting with her. Anne is doing fabulous! she's gone 8 days without smoking and her Baptism is a go for this Sunday i'm SOOOOOOo excited!!!!
Thursday we found out that our district has been changed so we are meeting only every two weeks with the senior couple in Stettler and a companionship from red deer. so we didn't have district meeting but we taught anne, some member lessons really trying to get more referrals and went to the farmers market in lacombe. they had a huge Santa Claus parade in the snow and then a moonlight midnight shopping day where all the shops were open till late and the farmers market was at the convention centre. we went around talking to people and i hope something comes out of the contacts we made! we also did a little tracting and found a guy who wants us to come back! I'll keep you updated!
Friday was our planning and we also met with our investigator Stephen the french speaking guy from Quebec. i found out he's twenty six and he read from the book of Mormon. We had sister cuff come because she served her mission in France and the spirit was so strong as sister milbu
rn asked him to be baptized! he said it was a big question but that he would continue to pray to know if the book of Mormon was true ! we are really excited for him.
This weekend was stake conference and we had a visiting general authority of the first quorum of the seventy come elder Johnson? he was GREAT! and Anne loved it! we also heard from the temple president and our mission president. the spirit was so strong. The general authority recounted a story about his daughter saying that she had bought her daughters some beautiful jewelery boxes for Christmas and a smaller one for their cousin. when she showed the little girls the small one they just started balling their eyes out because they wanted it so bad. he related it to how our heavenly father has greater things then we could even imagine waiting for us! i loved it.
Emails were changed to today because we volunteered at the festival of trees in red deer and set up garland and decorated trees! it was intense! and so fun. really got me into the Christmas spirit!
well this is all for now. I'm glad you are all doing well and hope to hear from you really soon.
lots of love!
sister Wotherspoon
Monday, November 21, 2011
Hello my family!
This week has just flown by! Last pday we were having issues with getting mail but of course you can't stop sister wotherspoon.... so we got a member to drive us into red deer and get our mail and i wrote lots of letters which was wonderful. i knew this pday would be busy with transfer news so i'm trying to be prepared. We had a great teaching week we made our 20 lesson goal by teaching 21 lessons even though we only have one investigator. Unfortunately Anne is still smoking and hasn't been able to quite. The devil is working really hard on her through her former church and through her family, lots of drama, so we met with her on Sunday and she told us all about it. it's exhausting..... as much as i love people i can't do everything for them! so i prayed about it... and as i was pondering the thought about having her go talk to a counselor with family services came so I called the bishop and she went to see him that night for a referral. She has been through so much abuse and drama i think it would help her best if she could talk to professional and get the skills she needs to help her over come and deal with her family so the quality of her life can actually change! i love ann so we'll keep working with her and keep helping her prepare for baptism!
Friday night i had a call from the new high councilor in the stake over missionary work that he was going to be speaking in our ward and wanted me to be his speaking partner. He told me to talk on the conference talk by president monson to the priesthood on standing alone. It was amazing! i learned so much and i gave a great talk on how in the world today moral decisions and dilemmas are seen as personal and different for each individual but we know differently. God has always and continues to reveal his laws and what is right and wrong. we are always to stand as witnesses of him. i tied it in to our role as missionaries to invite people to come to know truth and have strong testimonies in the savior and also to be baptized and make the covenant to stand up for God at all times, in all things and in all places. Something i loved is i recited doctrine and covenants 4 verse 2 that says "o ye that embark in the service of God, see that ye serve him with all your heart might mind and strength that ye may stand blameless before God at the last day". i then asked the question "Brothers and Sisters, can we stand blameless before God at the last day if we are not willing to stand for him in this latter days?". it was my first talk on my mission and i learned a lot! :D One of the women in the congregation came to me and said she had came up with a nickname for me, she calls me "nephi-a" haha she's funny.
Wednesday we were able to take Anne to the Addiction Recovery Program in REd Deer and it's aamzing! the spirit was so strong and i just loved being there and sharing and learning from others. I honestly felt the strength of the spirit similar to the spirit i feel in the temple. When i asked the stake president why that was he said ti's the spirit of the atonement at work. so cool. if you ever have a chance to go , please do it will change your life! It's open to all members and non members and is great for any changes you want to make in your life.
Well not too much else exciting! O ya... transfer news! I will be staying in Lacombe and training a new missionary! i guess the lord really trusts me with his fresh and ready servants! I'm excited for a change and i know sister randall is excited to go to my first area up in the north end of Edmonton. She'll do great. We've come to be good friends.
love and miss you all so much, thank you for all your support i love hearing from you!
sister wotherspoon
This week has just flown by! Last pday we were having issues with getting mail but of course you can't stop sister wotherspoon.... so we got a member to drive us into red deer and get our mail and i wrote lots of letters which was wonderful. i knew this pday would be busy with transfer news so i'm trying to be prepared. We had a great teaching week we made our 20 lesson goal by teaching 21 lessons even though we only have one investigator. Unfortunately Anne is still smoking and hasn't been able to quite. The devil is working really hard on her through her former church and through her family, lots of drama, so we met with her on Sunday and she told us all about it. it's exhausting..... as much as i love people i can't do everything for them! so i prayed about it... and as i was pondering the thought about having her go talk to a counselor with family services came so I called the bishop and she went to see him that night for a referral. She has been through so much abuse and drama i think it would help her best if she could talk to professional and get the skills she needs to help her over come and deal with her family so the quality of her life can actually change! i love ann so we'll keep working with her and keep helping her prepare for baptism!
Friday night i had a call from the new high councilor in the stake over missionary work that he was going to be speaking in our ward and wanted me to be his speaking partner. He told me to talk on the conference talk by president monson to the priesthood on standing alone. It was amazing! i learned so much and i gave a great talk on how in the world today moral decisions and dilemmas are seen as personal and different for each individual but we know differently. God has always and continues to reveal his laws and what is right and wrong. we are always to stand as witnesses of him. i tied it in to our role as missionaries to invite people to come to know truth and have strong testimonies in the savior and also to be baptized and make the covenant to stand up for God at all times, in all things and in all places. Something i loved is i recited doctrine and covenants 4 verse 2 that says "o ye that embark in the service of God, see that ye serve him with all your heart might mind and strength that ye may stand blameless before God at the last day". i then asked the question "Brothers and Sisters, can we stand blameless before God at the last day if we are not willing to stand for him in this latter days?". it was my first talk on my mission and i learned a lot! :D One of the women in the congregation came to me and said she had came up with a nickname for me, she calls me "nephi-a" haha she's funny.
Wednesday we were able to take Anne to the Addiction Recovery Program in REd Deer and it's aamzing! the spirit was so strong and i just loved being there and sharing and learning from others. I honestly felt the strength of the spirit similar to the spirit i feel in the temple. When i asked the stake president why that was he said ti's the spirit of the atonement at work. so cool. if you ever have a chance to go , please do it will change your life! It's open to all members and non members and is great for any changes you want to make in your life.
Well not too much else exciting! O ya... transfer news! I will be staying in Lacombe and training a new missionary! i guess the lord really trusts me with his fresh and ready servants! I'm excited for a change and i know sister randall is excited to go to my first area up in the north end of Edmonton. She'll do great. We've come to be good friends.
love and miss you all so much, thank you for all your support i love hearing from you!
sister wotherspoon
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