THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU FOR THE POSTCARD FROM THE VLA!!!!!!!!! I've
wanted to go there for yeeeaaarrrssss , and now in a weird way i can say that i
have (in spirit). how cool was it up close??? are they huge?? was it
fantastic????? daaaaaddd tell me everything!!! pleeeaaassseee
I'm feeling such great secondhand joy from this vacay! It brings me such
happiness to know you all had a good time! And to know the Coleman's are doing
well! She sent me a postcard too- I love them SO much!
Did you get my letter???
WHOA. EVANN CAME HOME?????? HAS IT BEEN THAT LONG?!?!?!?! OOOOHHH MMMYYY
GOOOOSSSSHHHH time flies!!! wooooooooowwwwwww do you have a pic of her?? is she
super tan??? did she talk in spanish??? whats different about her???? tell me
everything! i need the deets to survive!
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ wow, sorry for the spazziness of the above. i need to tone
myself down haha- but in my defense the only time i can truly be myself now is
in emails sooooooo, sorry you get my week-long pent up craziness- but thats why
you wuv me. :D
Also, I have traded in my melatonin for ibuprofen- so hopefully my liver
will still be alive when i come home haha
My week had some super great parts, and some super not great parts
#OppositionInAllThings
GREAT PARTS!
On Monday there was a Senior Missionary
couple that had served here 5 yrs ago, and they came back! We got to have dinner
and FHE with them and the family they were staying with. There they told us 2
stories that you may or may not have heard before, but holy moly the Spirit was
in that room so powerfully. The first is: there were 2 sister missionaries in
Brazil that were tracting and knocking doors. This one man opened the door, and
was super afraid of them. To the point that he told them to leave and not come
back. Anyways, so the sisters went on and the next day for their pday they went
to the post office. At the post office they saw a wanted poster for the man they
had met the other day. He was wanted for the kidnapping and raping of several
women. The sisters told the police where he lived, and they caught him. When
they questioned the man why he didn't take the sisters as well, since they were
exactly his type, he said- "with those 2 huge men with swords and shields
standing behind them? No way!" These sisters were literally protected by angels.
Goosebumps, right? The second story is: a man and his very pregnant wife
went to Alaska for something and the airport is not too far from the house they
were staying in. The cars couldn't get them their because they were snow or iced
in or something, so they walked. As they were walking they saw a huge grizzly
start charging towards them from the hill ahead of them. It got closer and
closer and closer, until the man stopped. Lifted his arm up to the square. And
said, "in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and by the authority of the
Melchizedek Priesthood which is in me, I command you to stop!" The bear
immediately skidded to a halt,
looked at them, and then walked away. Holy moly, the gospel is true and all who
say it's not are insane! Look at these 2 examples! You can't make this stuff up!
The Lord is watching over us all and we are SO blessed to have this knowledge of
His true and everlasting gospel. Jeez Louise it's beautiful.
Also, on Tuesday, I may or may not have hit a
trashcan and knocked the back of our side mirror off...... but hear me out! A
car turned way wide going the opposite way so i had to swerve to avoid him and
then i hit the trash can going 30mph with the mirror- but we thought nothing had
happened til we parked at the church and realized the back of our mirror was
gone. So we had to go back and search for it, but God is good and it had fallen
into the person's driveway and not in the street to get crushed. So we popped
that sucker back on, and its basically like nothing happened. Ok? It's like it
never happened. I'm still a beautiful driver thank you very
much.
On Thursday we went to place a sign on a
members house in Northvale at 8pm. So it's night already and they live in a
close-knit cul de sac, and we get there and park the car and turn off all the
lights- but we get busy talking about stuff (which is good cuz it all worked
out). So we're sitting there talking and a cop comes around the corner with his
floodlight on. And we're like ??? so we sit there in our dark car (we weren't
thinking ok) and wait for him to pass. But he pops a U-y and parks right behind
us with his lights shining into our car. K we, don't know what to do cuz he
doesnt come out to talk to us or anything, he just sits there. Anyways the
member comes out and talks to the cop for a little while, and then the cop pulls
away and drives off- never stopping to check us or anything....weird stuff,
right? It gets weirder, and obvi we weren't thinking becuz we still went
up and ding-dong ditched their house and left the sign. As we were running away
their neighbor lady sticks her head out of the window and starts screaming at
and berating us! Shes all "Stop going around to peoples houses .You're horrible!
Who do you think you are? You need to stop! i called the cops and they're on
their way!" etc etc. And we yell back and say we have no idea what you're
talking about we just got here, blah blah blah (i dont do that blah blah blah)
Soooo we didnt know what to do, but we didnt really want to talk to
cops...sooooooooooo we ran to the car, and drove off before we had our seatbelts
or the lights on. Yeeaaahhhh, haha that was interesting. We got home safe, dont
worry! But we called the member and left a message saying sorry, we think we
upset your neighbor lady and we dont know why she called the cops on us! Turns
out that there were teens going around "spooking" ppl. Basically the ppl open
their doors and the kids throw candy at them and run away- and that had just
happened 15 or so mins earlier to this lady, so she was watching out for them to
come back. The member got a kick out of it and said it was stinkin hilarious how
much she was callin them and yellin about safety that night. haha, he said that
she described us as "2 ppl wearing trench coats and one was a man!" hahahah i
think i should be offended she called me a man right? ;)
So we think we got a drunk call on Friday
night? This lady calls us and is making no sense and keeps jumping from topic to
topic and asking these random questions about what we believe. So we're
answering her and doing all we can to help her, and then she's confused because
she thought we were from Germany? And then we said no, Utah and Colorado, and
she got more confused and asked us what time it was there. So we said the time
and she was like "oh same as here, so weird" and we're like ??? We live in
Jersey like we said... And she was like "what?!" Sooooo ya haha, we referred her
over to the elders covering her town, but we're pretty sure she was stoned or
something. She asked us if she could bring her atheist boyfriend (she's
atheist), and were like sure! Whoever wants to learn can learn, doesn't matter
who they are. So she asked him and he said no, and all we hear is "well you
don't have to be rude about it." She then proceeds to tell us her background
story with her BF who is going away cuz they were engaged at one point and now
they're not and they were great together and he has a gentle soul but that's why
they're not getting married cuz he's rude. And then she asks "do you have gentle
souls in Germany?" Ya bizarre haha, and S.Carlson and I are trying super
hard not to crack up...idk what even was happening holy moly, but we answered
all her questions and told her there would be elders she could call at this
number tomorrow morning if she wanted to learn more. It was bizarre, becuz she
was there enough that we thought she was cognizant and thinking, but also not
there enough that we think she was high or something haha. Anyways, that was a
pretty hilarious experience.
Also, on
Friday I got to go down to Scotch Plains and go on exchange with Sister Troconis
as S. Carlson and Robinson went to the temple with a Recent Convert. It was
super fun and super weird haha. I kept thinking her and I were the same mission
age, but she's only 2.5 weeks old and I'm almost 4 months! So it was funny
seeing all the greenie stuff she did (which I hope not, but I'm pretty sure, I
did lol). It was a fun 5 hours together though! It'd be really fun if we got to
be real comps at some point!! Good thing I still got 14 months left and she's
got 17 :) which OK, tangent
(go back to the beginning...this is the beginning;) she got her knee surgery the
day we all flew from the MTC to Jersey. And the doctors told her she wouldn't be
walking for 3 months and that it would take 6 months after that for her to be
able to go on a mission. Well she said forget that, and the Lord blessed her to
be able to walk after a week, and here she is on her mission 3 months later.
Crazy right? The Lord is amazing!!
NOT SO GREAT BUT STILL GREAT IN A WAY
PARTS!
We knocked so many doors this week.
Holy moly are my feet tired. And it got bone-chillingly cold the past 2 days.
I'm talking as cold as if there was a foot of snow on the ground but its still
fall and sunny cold. So that's been grand. Especially for all the slammed doors
in our faces! Man, it really hurts though, all kidding aside. To stand there
freezing, feet hurting, and exhausted and before you can even get a word out or
say hi or get past smiling and onto talking- they say "oh. no." *slam* Like,
all these people don't even know what they're rejecting. They don't even give us
the chance to tell them of the greatness and the love and the amazingness that
is the gospel of Jesus Christ. I've had out of the 146 doors we knocked, 102
slammed in my face. haha so, to say my area is hard compared to all the humble,
city areas is an understatement. S. Carlson was like whoa this is waaaaay
different from my last area. aNd i'm like welcoem to the past 4 months of my
life.
I found out some news on Tuesday that really threw me
for a loop. Mosiah 27:29--"My soul hath been redeemed from the gall of
bitterness and bonds of iniquity. I was in the darkest abyss; but now I behold
the marvelous light of God. My soul was r'acked with eternal torment; but I am
snatched, and my soul is pained no more." pretty accurately describes my
experience, though it wasn't after the repentance process. Someone I love very
deeply and dearly is going through a hard time right now, they're pretty lost on
the path back Home, and I didn't know what to do. I cried and cried (which
taught me not to open emails right before an appointment), for at least 30
minutes while praying fervently in the car for peace. The most incredible
feeling literally washed over me as I pleaded with Heavenly Father. I can only
describe it as if I was immersed dry in chilled water: my body raised in
goosebumps, and I had the overwhelming feeling that someone was watching me. I
immediately felt peace. The anguish of my soul was calmed and taken away; I was
left with peace and consolation. I know the Lord heard my prayer and answered my
call. He knew the pain of my heart and soul, He knew the worry and the fear I
felt for this person, and He knows the very desires and hopes of my being. I
immediately stopped crying, and I was completely focused on the person we were
teaching. I know the Lord gave me that focus, and is continuing to give it to
me. I was able to get a priesthood blessing from some kind Elders, and I felt
even more peace. I know the Lord is aware of me, and aware of each of us. He
knows perfectly our pain and anguish so that He has that ability to succor us.
Alma 7:11-12 says "And he shall go forth, suffering pains and afflictions and
temptations of every kind; and this that the word might be fulfilled which saith
he will take upon him the pains and the sicknesses of his people. And he will
take upon him death, that he may loose the bands of death which bind his people;
and he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with
mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to
succor his people according to their infirmities." How much clearer can it get?
He not only went through it to save and redeem and uplift and sanctify us, but
to know our pains and weaknesses perfectly so that He
could help and hold and lift and support us perfectly.
Turn to Him
As the waves crash against the shore
And you’re thinking you can’t anymore,
Turn to Him
And He’ll help you heal again.
When you’ve fallen from the Tree of Life
And are filled with overwhelming strife,
Turn to Him
He’ll reach out a limb.
The billowing storm will calm
And He will become a welcoming balm-
Turn to Him
Even if on a whim.
He will leave you whole and clean
Without any sin to be seen.
Turn to Him
He’ll fill you to the brim.
Even if you’ve done all you can do
And feel you can’t keep pushing through,
Turn to Him
He’ll pull you from the rim.
His hand will help and hold,
Return you true and bold,
To teach what He has told
To those who seek the Fold.
If you turn to Him
Whoa, sorry for the novel. But a lot happened this
week and theres still more to tell you that i havent gotten to but i figured i
should just tell you the happy parts and not my struggles so voila!
have a fantastic rest of fall break! AND JENNA?
You better beat Vista into the ground on Thursday.
Love yous!
Stay Jersey Strong.
Sister McAllister
P.S. In the next package you send, can you send me
a box more of contacts for each eye, and also my black combat boots? :D
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