Bittersweet Week

Hello! 

So this was like the funnest, most entertaining, hilarious week on mission thus far. Haha trios are great but we probably didn't get as much done as we could have... We spent a little too much time making music videos and telling funny stories! But I love Sisters Reupena and Dominguez so much and I know we will be friends long after the mission is over! 

Sadly though, I am getting transferred so our time together is coming abruptly to a close. I am headed off to Montpelier with Sister Mizelle on Wednesday! I'm excited but also super sad to leave this area. I love Pocatello so much and working with the YSA has been such a great experience. 

So enough sad news, lets get to the good stuff! Rian was baptized on Saturday! It was so great! She was glowing the entire time and was so happy! She had two of her friends from high school speak and then we had an elder from our mission do a musical number. Rian had her uncle, who is the only other member of the church in her family, baptize her. 

Rian is such a great example to me. Her family was not supportive at all of her decision to get baptized. Her mom didn't even show up to the baptism and all her dad said to her when he walked in was that she looked like a marshmallow. Buuuut... Rian was super strong and kept a smile on her face and had a great day because of it! 

Well I hope you all have a great week! 

I love ya! 

Until next time,

Sister Park

P.S. 

Funny story from this week: We met a very interesting young man named Jeff who told us that he was a pagan witch and that he was really into magic and stuff. To get a mental picture of Jeff in your mind: picture a 20 year old kid with shoulder length brown hair and blond streaks, eyeliner, sparkly black nail polish and a black tank top. So meeting him was weird enough but then like 10 minutes later we walk by and he is dancing around with this white magic wand that he is levitating in the air (we're telling ourselves there was a string attached). It was so hilarious! But also kind of scary. Definitely the weirdest thing I've seen thus far on my mission. 

Forget Yourself

Hello! Hope y'all had a great week! 

Things here are going well! 

We have adopted another sister, Sister Reupena, into our companionship so now we are in a trio until next week.Sister Dominguez actually trained Sis. R and they are like best friends so they are having fun being together again. 

Everything is still on for Rian's baptism next week! She is doing great and will have her baptismal interview on Tuesday. 

Erika is doing great as well. We taught her about faith and repentance this week. She always has a lot of questions which is so awesome. 

So we got to speak in church yesterday and we got to pick our own topics. So I based my talk on one of my favorite bible scriptures: Matt 16:24-25.

24 ¶Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.

 25 For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.

I talked about how this scripture perfectly explains the biggest lesson I have learned thus far on my mission. I realized that my whole pre-mission life revolved around me. Growing up it was always about me doing well in school, me getting a good part in the ballet, me looking perfect in pictures, me, me, me. On my mission I have learned that as I give my life to Christ and forget myself in His work, I truly have found myself and I feel HAPPY!! I will be forever grateful for the wake-up call my mission has been.

Well I have to get going! I love you all! 

Until next time,

Sister Park

Great Things Are Happening!

Happy 4th of July!!

Today is an all day P-day for us so we got to sleep in this morning and we get to be out until 10 tonight! Pretty crazy huh?

This last week was great! Things are picking up and the Lord is blessing us! 

We are still working with Rian and preparing her for her baptism on the 16th! She is doing great and is excited/nervous for her big day! 

We also set another baptism date with our investigator Ashley for August 6th! We had a great lesson with her and she was talking about how the Book of Mormon has answered a lot of the questions that shes had since she was a little girl. It was a very spiritual lesson and we invited her to be baptized and she said she wanted to! So we set the date! 

We also have a new investigator named Erika and she is totally awesome! She is from Ammon and I actually met her mom and tried to teach her while I was serving there but it never really worked out. Then last Sunday our bishop comes up to us and says that there is a new investigator at church and introduces us to each other. It didn't take long before we connected the dots and realized that she was the same Erika I tried to teach in Ammon! We had our first lesson with her on Thursday and it was awesome! She has felt the spirit as she has come to church and she is super prepared. Its just hard for her because her parents aren't supportive (what else is new?). But shes great and we love her! 

I love this area and hope I get to stay here for the rest of my mission! Haha that probably won't happen but I hope to stay for a while :)

Also big news! All the sisters in our mission will get to go to Star Valley, Wyoming for 10 days and take people on tours of the temple before its dedicated! Its gonna be awesome!! 

I love you all! Hope you have a happy and safe 4th! 

Until next time,

Sister Park

                                                                                                                      

The Lord Began to Bless Them

Hello! Hope you all had a fabulous week and are having a great summer! 

Our week was awesome! 

To start: We set a baptismal date with Rian!! It was crazy! So we had a lesson with Rian on Wednesday and she asked if she could have a friend come. Of course we said yes and her friend Jenny came to the lesson. Jenny is a convert of a couple years and an old friend of Rian's. They hadn't seen each other in years and Jenny just felt like she needed to text Rian and hang out with her while she was in town. So they hung out and Jenny talked to her about her conversion story and they talked a lot about baptism. Then, we came and taught the lesson "The Gospel of Jesus Christ" which is about baptism and faith and the gift of the Holy Ghost and it was all perfect! 

After the lesson we asked Rian if she has thought any more about baptism. She looked at us for a second and then just started sobbing. She buried her face in her arm for like a minute (the longest minute of my life) and then she lifted her head, looked me right in the eye and said, "I want to be baptized". Sister D and I were speechless for a minute but then we composed ourselves and finished teaching. We asked her to pray about what day she should be baptized.

Sister Dominguez and I also prayed about a date and we felt that July 16th was the right day! So then on Saturday we set the date! We asked Rian if she decided what day she wanted to be baptized and she said she had been praying about it but hadn't gotten an answer. Then she asked us if we had prayed about a date and we told her we had. When we said July 16, Rian broke down again and told us that that date had been running through her mind all day. We knew it must have been inspired! 

So July 16th is going to be a great day! 

We also found quite a few promising new investigators this week! After about 2 weeks of knocking on empty doors and talking to not interested people we have finally seen success. It's interesting because right now I am in Alma in the Book of Mormon and I am amazed at how similar our experience has been to Aaron's in Alma 21. Aaron was trying to teach the Amalikites and the people of Middoni and wasn't having any success. In fact, he and his brethren were cast into prison. But they never gave up. They kept persevering and trusting in the Lord and finally, "The Lord began to bless them, insomuch that they brought many to a knowledge of the truth" (v. 17). We have literally seen this happen in our missionary efforts. As we were patient and happy and submitted to God's will, He has blessed us with success! 

I love this gospel! I'm grateful for answered prayers! 

Love you all! 

Until next time,

Sister Park 

Transfers, conferences, and Yellowstone!!‏

Hello! 

Sorry for not being able to email last week! We are allowed to take a trip to Yellowstone one time on our missions and Sister Gilbert and I decided to go last Monday so we didn't have time to write.

Yellowstone was... fuuuun... sorta. Haha I didn't realize how much driving it would be! I probably could have driven home to Arizona in the the time we spent in car on Monday. It was 3.5 hours there and then we had to drive to the sights which took like 45 minutes to get to each one. We only had time to see two things: Mammoth Hot Springs and Old Faithful which were both cool but probably not worth the time we spent in our car.. We went up with Lindsey, Nathan and Rian though and we all got to know each other REAL well after spending 12 hours in a very confined area! 

In other news, Sister Gilbert got transferred to Arimo, ID and my new companion is Sister Dominguez! I love her so much already! She is from North Carolina but her parents are both from El Salvador. She has been on her mission for 16 months and goes home in August so I hope to be her last companion! She's also a Spanish-called sister but she got switched to English work for the last couple months of her mission. She was baptized 7 years ago and has a very strong testimony of the gospel. She has already taught me so much and I'm excited to serve with her! 

Kelvin and Payne are doing okay. Payne's mom died this week so he flew home to Keyna and he'll be there for a couple weeks. Kelvin hasn't come to church again since his first time but he is still reading the Book of Mormon and has finished 1 Nephi! 

We are still teaching Rian and she is doing great! She has such a sincere desire to know the truth but she struggles to remember to read the scriptures and pray. She's awesome though and I feel such a connection with her. We have similar personalities and I think we will be great friends whether or not she decides to get baptized. 

We also had a mission conference with Elder D. Todd Christofferson of the Quorum of the Twelve on Saturday and it was so good! We did a big question and answer session with him and it was so great! I learned so much and received a lot of revelation for questions that I have had but probably the most important revelation was simply the confirmation that Elder Christofferson is truly an Apostle of the Lord. 

I love my mission so much! I grow and learn and become better everyday in a way that I couldn't do otherwise. 

I love you all! 

Until next time,

Sister Park

The Good Samaritan

Happy Memorial Day! I hope you all enjoy your time off work or school! 

This week was great! 

We are still teaching Kelvin and Payne. Their progress has slowed a little and neither of them came to church yesterday. We started teaching their other roommate, Ken and he is really cool. They all just want to know the truth so badly! The difficult thing with them (and with most Africans apparently) is that they struggle to commit to things, like coming to church or showing up for appointments. We literally have to call them like 5 times on the day of our lessons to remind them about it.

We also started teaching another new investigator this week named Anit. He's from Nepal and was raised in the Hindu faith. He is very curious about Mormons though! He went to Temple Square in Salt Lake a few months ago and really liked it. He is excited to learn more about what we believe but we aren't sure how interested he is in actually accepting the gospel or praying to know that its true. But hopefully that curiosity will grow into a desire to believe! 

We also had mission leadership council again this week. President spent most of his time talking about how we should be a blessing in the wards where we serve, not a burden. He said we should spend less time worrying about what other people (our bishops, ward mission leaders, other missionaries) are or aren't doing and just go to work ourselves! He showed the Bible video about the good Samaritan that I had never seen before (I'll put the link at the bottom of this email) and I loved it! 

The story of the good Samaritan has been on my mind a lot this week. Instead of wondering why those people in higher authority (the priest and the Levite) didn't do anything, the Samaritan dropped what he was doing and served the Jew who needed help. As I watched the Samaritan's love and concern for his fellow man, my eyes filled with tears. THAT is what this life is all about. Putting other people before ourselves. Being humble. Loving, serving, and blessing others. 

This week I want to invite each of you to do something for someone else. Forget about your own problems and your own to do list and go serve! I promise that you will feel happier and you will be able to get to all the things you have to do. 

I am so grateful for the opportunity I have to give all of my time and attention to serving others and serving God. This is the Lord's work. I know that. 

I love you all so much.

Until next time,

Sister Park

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times

Hi everyone! 

Hope you all are doing well! This week was... pretty okay. This has been one of the tougher weeks since I've been here in Poky but we are staying optimistic and relying on the Lord a lot.

So first hard thing. Our investigator Sarah, who we have been teaching since I got here was scheduled to get baptized yesterday. Sarah has a strong testimony of the gospel and of the Book of Mormon and she knows that she needs to get baptized. But.. she was scared to tell her family. So she waited and waited and waited. Then finally last Sunday she decided to tell them. Lets just say it did not go well. Her parents were angry and unsupportive. Sarah was distraught and doubts flooded her mind. She still was planning to go through with everything though, and she knew that she wanted to. She passed her baptismal interview, we set up the whole program, had her pick out which jumpsuit she wanted, bought refreshments, and everything was ready to go. 

Then we met with Sarah again on Saturday, the day before her scheduled baptism. She was unsure of everything and she did not feel ready to get baptized. As much as we wanted her to, we could also see that she wasn't quite ready to make the commitment. So she has decided to postpone the baptism a couple months. However, its going to be really tough for her to stay on the strait and narrow these next couple months since she is going back home to Caldwell to live with her anti-Mormon family and druggie friends. So we are very worried. She has promised that she will meet with missionaries there and keep going to church but it will be very difficult for her. 

So please keep Sarah in your prayers! 

Other than that, this week has also been a little slower than most. We haven't been able to teach as much as we usually do and spent a lot of time this week knocking on empty doors. 

But... along with the disappointments this week, we have seen a lot of great things happen as well! I'll share two of the best.

1. Kelvin came to church and loved it! He said we would definitely be back next week!

2. We found an awesome new investigator named Rian. She is AWESOME! She also comes from an anti-Mormon family (sounds familiar, huh?) but she really wants to find out if the Book of Mormon and our doctrine is true. She is super open and has a lot of support from friends so we are excited to keep teaching her.

All in all, this week has been pretty good. There have been some low moments, but that is what life is all about right? Having the low moments and growing from them. We can choose to let these moments make us bitter or better. It's up to us.

Hope you all have a great week! 

Love ya! 

Until next time,

Sister Park