Week of Warmth

FAMILY!!! Hello!!

From the sound of the emails I've gotten, sounds like everyone is doing fantastic!! It's good to hear that everyone is having fun. I'm SUPER jealous of Gwendel right now!! Sounds like the surprise was well worth it! hehe  Thanks for the video Gwendel!  Haha MOM! Your scream was priceless hahah {Gwen flew home and surprised Cheryl and Vince for her Spring Break!}

I too got a bit of a surprise this past week...but mine brought only tears. On Tuesday I get a call from the mission office and they asked me what airport I wanted to fly into so they could confirm my plane tickets... ㅠ.ㅠ(Korean cry face)  Yeah, I sobbed after that one!! But you know what, I still have LOTS of time! So they can just buy those stinkin tickets and I won't even worry about it!

The weather this past week was absolutely heavenly!! Felt closer to summer rather than spring a couple of those days! The weather is a bit colder again today, but I'm hopeful that the warm weather will be staying for good, here shortly. That means I'll get to ship home all of my winter clothes too!! I'm ok with that!

This week was amazing. One of the highlights included President Interviews on Thursday!  I love President and Sister Gilbert so very much!  Usually how it works is when the missionaries are taking turns being interviewed by President, we sit with Sister Gilbert and she fuels the gospel discussion on something that we have been assigned to study.  But this round went a little differently.  To coordinate with the new teaching curriculum, we were each assigned one of the parts of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and with our companion we were going to teach it to each other in the Savior's way.  It was really neat, but I admit my favorite part was planning for it with Sister Taylor!! She had some really neat insights.  

Our topic was faith and we spent the whole week reading and studying about Faith and how it especially applies within the Plan of Salvation. We used a lot of things from Alma 32 where faith is compared to a seed. We drew the 'steps' of the gospel (faith, repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost and enduring to the end) and under each step we drew a tree progressively getting larger. We talked about how our seed of faith can progress only as we progress in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Then, when the small seedling of faith grows into the "Enduring to the End" part of our life, that is when it needs to be the strongest and the largest; that is when the tree becomes most mature and if we endure well, we reap the fruit which is sweetest above all. 

When we started thinking about how that may apply to the Eternities, we recognized, that a lot in this life is a remembering progress. Before we came to this earth, we lived with the Father.  There we were taught and we grew, and we accepted the Plan that was placed before us.  Here in this life, our faith can be strengthened as we seek to remember what we once knew in the eternities.  But we realized that if that is as far as we go, we will stop progressing forward.  The second part requires us to look heavenward.  To reach out into the future with trust and Faith, with an eye single to the glory of God. In a sense the roots we put down are the remembering of what we once knew, and the branches reaching towards the Celestial sun light is the faith of becoming who we were created to be. Faith is remembering to become. But the roots of our faith needs to be in the soil of Christ. Overall it was an awesome lesson, and we drew a pretty sweet diagram! ^^

Talking with President was pretty sweet, and we both got a little teary eyed. I asked him if I could train till I went home and he said that, with my 3 remaining transfers, I'd probably be able to train 1 and a half more times!! Which makes me really happy!! With my time remaining I want to help someone else learn to love Korea as much, no, more, then I do now. I want to be able to make sure that my Korea is in good hands to carry the work forward.

Another really good part about this week was our own day of service!! On Wednesday we had planned going out to this far part in our area (an hour by bus) and we were going to go find and visit Less Active Members.  When we headed out that way, we stopped in on some members who owned a restaurant.  Our purpose was just to do a 10 min. lesson, but the Spirit told us that we needed to stay there and do some service, helping around the restaurant and such. (Which we normally do later on in the week). 

As we served, we saw that Brother Jeong was REALLY sick and having a hard time functioning that day, and that his wife was also getting a little sick. Since we were there to serve, they were able to relax a little bit more and save some of their strength.  Kind of teasingly, they asked us how we knew to come in that day...We didn't, but Heavenly Father did. When it came time for the lesson, again, the Spirit showed us the way we needed to go, rather than follow the lesson plan that we had made. It turned out to be my most favorite lesson with her. We shared a scripture from 2nd Nephi: Christ always remembers us because we are written upon the palms of His hands.  We then talked about the Atonement and the comfort of knowing that we have a Savior that loves us and knows us each individually. In the words of Daddy, we were all leaking by the end.  I feel that something else was ailing them even deeper then a cold, and I know that Heavenly Father directed us to their rescue that day.  He knew exactly what they needed and how grateful I am that, after fasting and praying, I was able to be entrusted with their care for a small moment.

This week was full of service and lessons and lots of other moments of little things that warmed our hearts and the hearts of other people that were put into our paths. I have to say a BIG thank you to my dear sisters for sending me and my companion a wonderful package!! It came on a day that she really needed it! Thank you for turning out and thinking of someone else.  I know it seemed like something small, but it meant so much.  I too am grateful to be able to see little tidbits of the family and y’alls holidays!  Thank you thank you thank you!

I love you all dearly!! Hope everyone has a wonderful week!
kiss love hugs

Ps: thank you Sister Davies and Sister Hatfield for the emails!! I love you both dearly! Thank you for the small emails that always feel like they are packed with a whole bunch of love.  You both are a wonderful example to me! 

And for general info, I don't think that Busan is going to be affected by the new Seoul mission because there used to be 2 missions in Seoul anyways. I think they will just figure it out in the current Seoul mission.