There is a lady who we are teaching who is from Cape
Verde. She is here for medical treatment and is staying with family for the
time. She had a tumor in her brain, and they went in and removed it. However,
she now has another cysts in there, and a blood clot in here back. She was in
the hospital for a week and a half. The doctors are doing a lot of tests to
help figure out what is wrong. She is in a lot of pain and is taking pain
killers. We went to visit with her last night and she kept saying "God
knows". This woman is heartbroken because she has to stay here for another
six months at the least, and this is that much more time spent away from her
three kids and husband in Cape Verde. She misses her family so much, but all
she says is "God knows". Her faith is absolutely amazing. Her visa is
expired, so she would have to go back to the Cape to get another one, but she
cant because she is receiving medical treatment that they don't have there. And
she has to have this treatment to live. And she still says "God
knows". If everyone's faith could be like this the world would be so much
different. I feel like it would be a better place, where people treated each
other nicer, and had more understanding. I have a lot to learn from this
woman.
email 10/14
I want to let you know that I have had a great week. At
transfer meeting this Thursday President Haight spoke about obedience and
shared this story. It is about a girl on her mission in Italy. Her mission pres
had told them in a conference to not go into the water. So one day, a really
hot day, her and her comp decided to walk along the beach, and they got closer
and closer to the water. Soon they were ankle deep, and then they were calf
deep. Then they realized that they needed to get out. Earlier that morning the
girl had cut herself shaving in the shower. A few days later this girls leg is
swollen and very painful. It got to the point to where her comp had to carry
her into the doctors office. The doctor looked at her leg and he could feel it
throbbing. So they decide to do an immediate procedure to relive the swelling.
When they cut into her leg insects came spilling out. Now this was due to a
small nick from shaving and severe disobedience. He shared another story.
Two sister down in South
America knocked on this mans door. He opened the door and they said that they
were from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. He said come in we
need your help. His mother was having severe back pain, and they didn't know
why. The girls asked if they could look at her back, they got permission, and
when they lifted her shirt they saw a hole in her back that insects had made a
nest in. These girls were calm and immediately said a prayer. They they were
able to get they help this woman needed. Because of their obedience they were
able to remain calm, and to do the things which needed to be done to save this
sisters life.
Ok, bugs, gross. But it got the point across. Now whenever
there is a slight possibility of disobedience we think of the possible
consequence, and having insects in your leg is not worth it, not matter what it
is.
I can bear my testimony in Portuguese!
Eu sei que o evangelho é restaurado e verdadeiro. Eu sei que o Livro
de Mórmon é verdadeiro e foi traduzido por Joseph Smith. Eu sei que o Filho
de Deus vive. Ele é amoroso e poderoso. Eu sei que o Espírito Santo nos
guia. Eu sei que igreja é restaurada. Eu sei que os profetas são
verdadeiros e importantes. Eu sei que as escrituras são verdadeiras. Deus
e Jesus Cristo são amorosos. Eu sou grata por minha familia e meus
amigos. Eu sou grata por o Salvador e seu amor. Eu sou grata por a oportunidade
de estar juntos com Sister Lee e Sister Rose. Eu sou grata por O Livro de
Mórmon e as escrituras. Eu sou grata por os profetas. Eu sou grata por o evangelho.
Em nome de Jesus Cristo, Amém.
This
is my testimony in Portuguese :) enjoy
E-mail 9/23/13
It has been a fantastic morning! Grandpa made me pancakes
and hot chocolate, he makes this a lot. It is the breakfast of champions. I am
sooo spoiled. I don't know what I am going to do when they leave. :( This is
our last week with them. So sad. But at least we got to spend the time we
had with them. I think we are going to the zoo today. I cant wait to see the
two elephants they have. :D For District Meeting Lunch we went and sat in the
park and watched them. I think it was the best lunch I have ever had. :)
This was the first
week that I could see my breath on the walk to the gym. EEEKKKK!!!!! It is
already winter here!! I am not sure what I am supposed to so in the actual
winter time. Blah. We are going to go to Savers to see if we can find some
gloves. I have never been so grateful for thrift stores in my
life!!!!! Will you put some money into my account? The leaves are starting
to change color!!!!! They are sooo pretty! I saw this tree the other day
that was cherry red. It was the coolest thing ever. I am enjoying parts of
fall. I like the leaves and stuff. But I am not liking the cold. It rains here
all the time too!! It was super rainy yesterday.
The Investigators are doing well. They are progressing. We
have one that wont answer her phone or her door...
I got asked the other day, in target of all places, if I
was Nun. Yeah it was pretty funny. I also got the door closed in my face
for the first time this week. It has been interesting...
So I know that it is ridiculous but I have been dying to get a Russian hat. You know the kinds
with the fur around the edges. the sister I told you about has one, and I want
one sooooo bad. But in all reality, anything that keeps my ears from falling
off will do nicely. Any color of skirt. I will just be happy that I have
another skirt!! Mom, I have learned a very valuable lesson. You don't take
anything for granted on your mission. everything is important, and it
matters. Every little thing counts. You stop worrying about little things like
color and stuff and are just grateful that you have more than 3 outfits to
wear. :)
New email and pictures 9/16
Sister Lee and I have moved in with the senior couple because
the family that we were living with has a foreign exchange student living with
them and we can’t live in the same house as a male of that age. So our new
address is 215 Dartmouth Woods Dr. Dartmouth 02747. I love living here. We are
getting spoiled sooo much. It is like living with grandparents. They are super
sweet and funny. They cook for us and take us places so we don't take up miles
on our car. I love it here. They are unfortunately leaving at the end of the
month. :.(
Yeah the game was way fun. YES, we have four investigators!
One of which got baptized yesterday! My first baptism!!!! I was sooo excited.
Sister Lee and I couldn't go because I have been really sick for the past 3
weeks. I finally got an antibiotic and I threw it up yesterday morning so we
didn't go to church. I was soooo sad not to be able to see her get
baptized. We have been teaching a lot. I have no time anymore. I am pretty sure
that I had way more time to do things like write letters and such in my last
area, and here when we get home, all I want to do is go to bed. Yeah it is
starting to get a bit chilly. It seems like it has been raining every night,
which I am sure doesn't help at all. The members say that this winter is
supposed to be a really bad one. I am sooo not looking forward to it.
I am, as the natives of this area say, all set. Thank you
though. Because we have been living with the Simpsons, this month has been easy
money wise. We finally have our own washer and dryer so I won’t need to pay 2
dollars for every load of wash and 2 dollars for every load of dryer. I am
super excited. They also buy food, so we don't really need to buy that either.
They take us out to lunch too!!!!! They took us to this place called Davies
Locker the other day. Oh my gosh! It is
right on the water, and it is the best seafood I have ever had in my life!!! I
got fish and chips and I was in heaven.
New e-mail 9/9
it is starting to cool off here, which is nice, but it makes
me scared for winter. The people in the ward are the BEST!!! this is what a
ward should be!! One of the members in the ward council set up a meeting and
gave everyone who showed up, which was sadly only the missionaries, a list of
less actives that we needed to track down. It is fantastic!! These people
really care for others. We have an investigator that the elders have been
working with forever, and she just passed her baptismal interview yesterday! I
am sooo excited. We are going to help her set up the program for her baptism
this Sunday. It is so great to see how different the people here are. They love
having us. There is a lady in the ward who's daughter is serving in El
Salvador, and the daughter sent her mom an email telling her to help us in any
way and to feed us. So I asked that sister if she would come with me to the
Spanish gospel principles with our investigator, that way she feels welcomed.
it is great to sit in a class and not understand a word the teacher is saying,
its like my high school nightmares all over again...
So I will tell you like that daughter told her
mom, help the missionaries. GO and tell them that you are willing to help. I
will testify to you right now that when you help bring people unto Christ
everything in your lives will work out. Helping the missionaries and doing
missionary work is the best way to help yourself and your family. I have seen
this happen. The Lord takes care of those who take care of others. So go and
let them know that you are WILLING to help them, ask them what you can do, and
then do it. Trust me, they will follow up. feed them. it is hard to live off of
the budget that we are given. And for some missionaries, they are not blessed
with parents like mine who can afford to send me money when I need it. Please
make sure that they are not eating beans and rice every night for dinner,
because that does happen. Take care of them and treat them as if they were me.
Understanding
Insight
Revelation
Conversion
This is how I study my scriptures. I will read a couple of
verses, and then go through this list.
Understanding: what do I understand about what I just read.
Insight: From what I understand, what insights do i get out
of this.
Revelation: From those insights, what is it that God is
trying to tell me? What is it that He wants me to learn from this?
Conversion: If that is what God is trying to tell me, what
am I going to do about it?
You guys can do this as a family, and/or on your own. I have
gotten more out of the scriptures than I ever have. I have also come closer to
Christ. Try this for a week as a family and then tell me how it goes.
9/3 e-mail
Sorry that I didn't write yesterday, but Sister Lee and I
went to the temple with the other missionaries and then we went to a red sox game!!!!!! It was the best pday of
my life. I have so many stories for you.
First off we are living with a member family, on a farm. It
it awesome. They have two little girls and a little boy. Dorthy, Lucy, and
Ezra. They are all super blonde and adorable. Ezra is about 1.5 years old, and
he will run/waddle down the hall screaming. It is sooo cute. We have our own
bedroom and bathroom. It is the Master bed/bath. Which means that we also have
a walk in closet. It is sooo humid here!! it is so bad. it actually got foggy
last night. I couldn't believe it. So we share the land we live on with a bunch
of chickens, a goat named buttercup, a sheep named Lydia, and a pony named Sunset. It is super cool.
Second, guess who is
driving!!!! That's right me! So we get here on Thursday and we share the area with our zone
leaders. elders with power, hahahaha. anyway, so we get here on Thursday, and
on Friday night we go to help someone move and then eat dinner at their house.
They live in New Bedford. So we drive over there and Sister
Vieira, the mom that we live with, told us that when we park we have to park
across the street from their apartment. So there were two parking lots. I
pulled into the first one, which was deserted, and there is a sign saying city
parking only, or something like that. So we look over and there is another one.
However, the barbed wire fence around it didn't cross my mind at the time. So we
decide to park in the second one. We park in a slot that is labeled visitors. So we go and help the family and eat at their house, and when it is
all done the dad goes to walk us to our car. They had locked the gate. The
opening we had driven through was now padlocked shut. wunderbar. So it also
just happens to be labor day weekend, which means that there wasn't a chance to
retrieve it until Tuesday. Thankfully we got it back and everything was OK. Our
elders had to take us everywhere because everything here is so spread apart. It
was crazy!!!!!
August 19, 2013
In the movie Evan Almighty, the female actress says to
God (Morgan Freeman) something along the lines of she has asked for patience
and hasn't gotten any. And he replies, "Let me ask you something. If someone
prays for patience, you think God gives them patience? Or does he give them the
opportunity to be patient? If he prayed for courage, does God give him courage,
or does he give him opportunities to be courageous? If someone prayed for the
family to be closer, do you think God zaps them with warm fuzzy feelings, or
does he give them opportunities to love each other?" She had wanted her
family to get closer, but it doesn't just magically happen. Heavenly Father
doesn't just give us what we want, but he gives us the chance to earn it. I keep
this in mind when I am praying. I have opportunities to practice things such as
patience, but if I don't actually practice patience when Heavenly Father gives
me the opportunity, I don't think that He will give me as many opportunities.
New Post!
August 12, 2013
Sister Palmer asked this be posted to her blog:
Sister Palmer asked this be posted to her blog:
"Go trusting in God, and continue to trust in Him, and
He will open your way and multiply blessings upon you, and your souls will be
satisfied with His goodness. I cannot promise you and good in taking an
unrighteous course; your lives must be examples of good works." - Brigham
Young
This has really stuck out to me this week. I have really
needed to trust in the Lord and know that there are actually people here that
need the gospel. Even though I am covering two areas it has been really slow.
On Thursday we tracked down less actives in Framingham. Two people answered the
door. One was active, but had just come back from vacation and her husband is a
ward auxiliary, so we wanted to introduce ourselves. The second, started off by
telling us that it wasn't a good time and to set another time, but then she
decided that she didn't want us to come back at all. She hadn't been active for a
long time and she had no desire to become active again. She didn't want visitors
either. It was very disappointing. We realized that one day she will stand
before God and He will ask her why she never came back. He sent us to her. She
had the chance. I wonder how it will all play out in the end. All I know is
that I must trust in the Lord and be obedient to the commandments. Hopefully
the people around me will be able to see the light within me and want to have a
light of their own.
New Letter!!!
July 29, 2012
**must see new picture!**
Umm, If I was to say anything. It would be that God knows our weaknesses, and that is why he pushes us. We are modern day pioneers. Are we going to sit in the snow and give up, letting our faith in God be replaced by doubt and disbelief? Or are we going to be strong and have the strength to persevere and carry on? Are we going to have the strength and trust in the Lord to walk through our own personal icy rivers? One of Gods many gifts to us is trials and tribulations. What we do in the midst of them is our gift to God. In the song "we'll bring the world his truth" the word as was replaced with now, so it stated " we are now the armies of helaman...We are now the Lords missionaries". I used to think of the army of Helaman as a story, as something that happened a long time ago. As if the army ended when those boys eventually died. But the army of Helaman is here. We may not wear armor, we may not carry swords, but the battle we fight is real. We go against a strong enemy who our individual weaknesses and strikes at us individually. But if you are truly converted to the gospel then you will have the power to resist the temptations of the adversary. You will delight in doing the work of the Lord, and bringing to pass His work and Glory. Heavenly Father pushes us because He knows what we can become, He know what we can achieve. As I have been out here I have asked myself a lot, what am I going to accomplish today. What good can I bring into the lives of those around me? What does Heavenly Father want me to learn so that I may help others? Putting others before myself and loving them wholeheartedly has been a big trial for me. It is something I am still trying to overcome. I pray for help always, but I cannot sit idly by on the river bank and do nothing about it. I have to take action and exersize my faith and hope, believing that I can over come my trials.
Umm, If I was to say anything. It would be that God knows our weaknesses, and that is why he pushes us. We are modern day pioneers. Are we going to sit in the snow and give up, letting our faith in God be replaced by doubt and disbelief? Or are we going to be strong and have the strength to persevere and carry on? Are we going to have the strength and trust in the Lord to walk through our own personal icy rivers? One of Gods many gifts to us is trials and tribulations. What we do in the midst of them is our gift to God. In the song "we'll bring the world his truth" the word as was replaced with now, so it stated " we are now the armies of helaman...We are now the Lords missionaries". I used to think of the army of Helaman as a story, as something that happened a long time ago. As if the army ended when those boys eventually died. But the army of Helaman is here. We may not wear armor, we may not carry swords, but the battle we fight is real. We go against a strong enemy who our individual weaknesses and strikes at us individually. But if you are truly converted to the gospel then you will have the power to resist the temptations of the adversary. You will delight in doing the work of the Lord, and bringing to pass His work and Glory. Heavenly Father pushes us because He knows what we can become, He know what we can achieve. As I have been out here I have asked myself a lot, what am I going to accomplish today. What good can I bring into the lives of those around me? What does Heavenly Father want me to learn so that I may help others? Putting others before myself and loving them wholeheartedly has been a big trial for me. It is something I am still trying to overcome. I pray for help always, but I cannot sit idly by on the river bank and do nothing about it. I have to take action and exersize my faith and hope, believing that I can over come my trials.
Made it to Boston!
July 22, 2013
This is a compilation of today's emails from Bree
This is a compilation of today's emails from Bree
Sooo much has happened. I am into Boston and went to the
Presidents house, which is totally colonial style, and completely awesome!!! I
want a house like that one day... Their family is super cool. I spent a couple
of days there. My second day there Sister Slater and I went street contacting
in Boston Commons. It was super ineffective and I think that that was the point
that they were trying to make. We really focus a lot on member missionary work.
So I went to the transfer meeting to meet my new companion and find out where I
was going. It was really funny, because President asked how I was doing and if
I wanted to meet my new companion and I was like YEAH!!! So he told me it was
Sister Klecker. I had met her when I was staying at Presidents house because her
last comp was a STL. I really like her a lot, we get along fabulously and are
so alike. :) So then we found out that we are OPENING TWO new areas.
TTWWWOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!! So there haven't been sisters in either area, and we
cover two different wards!! I was at church yesterday from 8-5. It is crazy.
the areas we cover are Marlborough and Framingham. We live in Marlborough. :) I
love it here. We live in the forest, it is soooooooooooooo green!!
Sister Klecker is from Franklin Mass. hahahaha. my apartment
is great, except that we randomly find slugs in it........... It depends on the
ward. Plus it is summer time so everyone is on vacation. We only have one
family of invesitgators......did you get my picture?????????
yeah we are pretty busy. No sightseeing yet. So our
investigator family is from Ghana and they made this meal for us called Fufu.
you should look it up....
I see lots of elders in your pictures! Yeah we had a ton in our district. We
had only four sister!!!
yes the groups of pics that I have been sending are of my
district.
It is hard to take pics mom cause I cant look like a
tourist......... sooo yeah. I have a letter for syd, but I am having trouble
figuring out my mailbox, so I have been looking for one around town
Are you at the library?
YES I AM :):):) its hard to see books and not be able to read them :.(
Did you see the pic of steve?? that's the slug that we found
in our apartment.
We have this cool retro 70s couch that is this weird shade
of green, and its pleather
Im ok. The Fufu I ate did not agree with my stomach and
absent gallbladder.... So I don't feel the best, but im fine. Im sooo happy its
Pday
Called to Serve in the Massachusetts Boston Mission
I have been called as a Sister Missionary to serve in the Boston, Massachusetts area. I am so excited and know I will have a special purpose while I am on my mission.
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