Hola Hermanita!
As promised:
6:20am- The first alarm goes off and you breathe a huge sigh of bliss and sadness. You get to sleep 10 more min! But you have to get up in 10 min. #OppositionInAllThings
6:30am- You bound out of bed with all the energy and excitement of a missionary on a brand new day! Nah, jk. You crack your eyes open and wipe the sleep out of them, you yawn hugely as you stretch/snuggle into your blankets for 5 more seconds of sleep, and then you slowly but surely make your way into a kneeling position to pray. You spend the next 5-10min (prayers are looong out here) thanking Heavenly Father for the blessing of being in New Jersey and having the amazing Sister Brown as your trainer; and pleading that you will be able to teach by the Spirit today, and be able to bless someone- anyone's- life with the gospel.
6:30-7am- Exercise your little heart out cuz we all know exactly where all the wonderful members' food is goin
7-8am- Take a shower to get all the sticky sweat off you (no investigator wants that sadly). Do your hair and makeup, even though you know it'll be ruined by the heat and humidity in an hour. Put on your proselyting clothes and hope the heat won't cause unsightly stains. Eat a satisfying bowl of cereal or oatmeal for breakfast #ILoveBreakfast
8-9am- Personal Study. Sit at your desk and take in as much as you can! You only have a little measly hour to try and learn everything you wanted to get to today. Bask in the gospel and feel the Spirit- stare in awe at your iPad as your mind is blown with the knowledge of the gospel and the wonder of God. Drink one bottle of water.
9-10am- Turn towards you companion, now back at your iPad, now back at your comp- look, she has the White Handbook out! #OldSpiceGotNothinOnMe. Pray together that you can know what it is the people you are seeing today need. Read 2pgs of the white handbook together, a section of Adjusting to Missionary Life, and the monthly scripture in tandem. Discuss and role play what you are teaching today. Discuss what you both studied in personal study. Have a deep doctrine talk and have your minds blown together. Drink another bottle of water.
10-11am- Yay for 12 Week. The guide for new missionaries. Read it together and begin watching The District videos/ reading PMG. Love it. Glory in it. 3 hours of study goes away after training. Go to the ladies room, and then drink a 3rd bottle of water.
11-Noon- Eat a fantastic lunch of either ramen, mac n cheese, or whatever leftovers you have from members.
Noon-6pm- Leave the apartment! Get in the choppa and peal out of the parking lot to go bring the gospel to the people of the 25 townships you cover. Go to your set appointments for the day, and just love the people: they talk for days and are so energetic. Take along your FAIE (foreign accent interpreting ears), they are vital to survival! Teach the less actives the gospel and try to bring them closer to God. Love them, serve them, and befriend them. Show them you care! People won't "care how much you know, until they know how much you care." In between or after or before, go try potential investigators listed in the Area Book. See how they are, ask if there is anything you can do for them- but most of the time get the answer "I have my own religion". Love them anyways. Be kind to them anyways as they slam the door in your faces. Smile and move on. Feel the sadness that comes when people don't accept the gospel. Don't take anything personally! They don't know you, they just aren't one of the prepared. If you have time left over and you've run out of potentials (doesn't happen), knock doors! And then have the above happen again. Keep on keeping on, even as people are mean. Because most of the time, people are super nice! They are friendly and talkative out here, and that's the norm.
6-9pm- At some point you need to eat! It's been 6hrs, and you're starving- but your members are on top of it and are super amazing. So they feed you almost every night. You have chicken and rice 5/7 nights, and pizza or something else the other 2 nights. You love the members and you have an amazing time talking with them and Sister Brown. You laugh more than you have in your life, and your love for them grows wider and wider until you feel like you cannot possibly contain it in your heart. It comes out in your smiles and laughter, in your listening and questions, and in your deep love and sharing of the gospel. They can tell, they feel it and they also feel the Spirit. You rejoice afterwards that the Spirit was so strong! You have nothing but good things to say and talk about with Sister Brown in the car. You want to roll home and die from the amount of good food you just ate. You think you will never be this full in your life again...until the next night. You cherish the left overs that are stacked in your fridge, and you despair as you throw them out because you hadn't gotten around to eating them yet and they went bad. You then continue to try and find new investigators before or after your hour dinner appointment.
9-9:30pm- Planning for your next day! Talk about the people you are going to visit and have set appointments for, and the people you are going to try and see. Sync your iPads at the church because your apartment doesn't have wifi, but you're expected to sync several times a day....ahem.
9:30-10:30pm- Prepare for bed!!! Exhaustedly take off what's left of your makeup and put on pjs. Stumble to the bedside and kneel to pray. Spend a long time in conversation with Heavenly Father. Tell Him your desires and frustrations, don't hold anything back! He already knows your heart, He just wants you to ask and talk to Him. Be grateful. Strive to be humble. Love Him.
10:30pm- Zonk out as you joyously lay your head on your wonderful feather pillow on your bed of fluffy clouds.
So that's that!
Stay Jersey Strong
Love, Sister McAllister
Nah, Jk. i wouldn't do that to you!
My week was pretty great! it was long but also flew by and I really have no
idea what happened lol
We taught a new investigator and it was super sweet. She's 80 and she's
from Jamaica. She says she is filled with the Holy Spirit and so can speak in
tongues, and in her teaching record it says that she does "voodoo", so we were
like ya lets go! She's suuuuuuper cool. We were waiting the whole time for her
to bust out babbling in "tongues", but she never did. She listened and asked
questions, and when we got to Joseph Smith she said "Why have I not heard of
him?" and then we told her about there only being one true church and she was
like "Why have I not heard this before? I want to be a part of that church."
Sweeeeet. So shes coming to church this Sunday, hopefully.
Went to Ellis again. Round 3 was great! It was actually pretty slow for
once and not crazy hectic as its been both times before. We got to go watch the
movie about Ellis and the immigrants, and we could kinda just stand around and
talk with each other and the nice workers there. i met 4 people from Northern
Ireland--their accents were AMAZING. I loved it. I was like please keep talking
to me! One guy talked to me for 15 min about his family and ireland and
everything. And i told him I'm from Scotland-- he told me i better get there
soon, and when I do I need to bring my kilt and eat the haggis. He was super
nice! I wanted him to take me back with him! Man. I love Ellis. I want to work
there after the mish. They get paid pretty well, and they do what I'm doing
every time! Awesome stuff ppl.
On Sunday we were combined with Englewood ward and the Korean Branch becuz
their building was having plumbing probs, so the chapel was overfull and
squished. But it was sweet! S. Brown loved seeing all her people :)
That's about it for me, I can't think right now and the Elders are bein lil
flips behind me wrestling in the FHC, man I love em :)
Love you all!
Stay Jersey Strong.
Love,
Sister McAllister
P.S. Question time! What's goin on in the world? Anything crazy or scary or
weird? How's the ward? What's Sci's email? I heard there were fires in the
west?
Tell Dana and Jenna and Kiley thanks for their letters and thank Pres for
his stamp! There awesome :)
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