Laborers in the Vineyard, changing habits

SAN DIEGO — Happy Fourth of July tomorrow! I hope you have some fun:) You all saw the picture of Karen and me; it was so good to see her yesterday!

I have been pondering what I want to tell you about this week, and my thoughts are kind of scattered.

I guess I can start first with an update on our ward. The plants are sprouting here in Avocado!

Thanks to Dad teaching me how to set goals and make plans, we have come far in the ward council in just a few weeks. Of course, it's all Heavenly Father, but He helps a lot more and a lot faster when things are organized. 

I have been taught on my mission what a ward council is supposed to be, and I realize that many times we miss the mark of the Brethren’s vision. It's hard to help ward councils understand what God expects a ward council to be like. It’s all about missionary work — reactivating, finding, retaining. It should be focused around the ward mission plan and how to accomplish those goals, not just to talk about activities and the drama/needs of individuals in each auxiliary, (that’s for presidency meetings) but missionary work as a whole. Church is a tool God uses for missionary work — Relief Society, Young Men's, Young Women's, Sunday School, Priesthood quorums,  all of the activities, service projects — all of that is a tool to help us be missionaries. 

In our ward council this week, we remade a progress record sheet, with our progress as missionaries for the week with less actives, investigators and members. We made a grid of our weekly, monthly, and yearly goals and how the ward's progress was. We then had assignments for each member of the ward council, as well as follow-ups from the previous week. It was amazing to watch these members volunteer to invite their friends to the 4th of July activity, to pray about someone they could have for us to teach by next week, to assign us members from their auxiliaries to teach. There was a fire and an excitement about missionary work! I realized this is what it's all about! I hope that we all can catch the vision, and help revolutionize the way we do missionary work. We need to be Moroni's. And just like Moroni revolutionized war, we can change the old habits of the church and make new more effective ones.

Enough said about that. I also wanted to share a few thoughts from our Zone Leader council this week. Once a month, Sister Tanner and I meet with President, the Assistants and the Zone Leaders and talk about how to continue improving our work. This month, President talked about the urgency of missionary work. He told us this story: He was doing anesthesia on one of the Apostles, and as the Apostle was waking up, he kept trying to get out of bed, squirming and looking very uncomfortable. President asked what he needed, explained that he was just coming out of anesthesia and needed to rest. The apostle responded, "I don’t have time, I need to go, there is so much work to do!" 

President related that story with tears in his eyes, as he explained that in order for us to be disciples of Christ, we need to catch the urgency of this work.

It made me think of the Ensign article from General Conference about the Laborers in the Vineyard. I was reading it this morning and a few things popped out at me. I guess before I share that, I should give background of the story (found in Matthew 20:1-15):

A householder went out early in the morning to hire laborers. After employing the 1st group at 6 in the morning, he returned at 9, noon, and 3, hiring more workers as the urgency of the harvest increased. In the Bible, it says, "he came back a final time about the eleventh hour" which would have been 5 pm. Just an hour later, all the workers were gathered in and received their day’s wages, all of them receiving the same pay.

Elder Holland talked about how it shouldn't make anyone jealous for god to choose to be kind.  And how it was not too late for these laborers who waited all day, with sorrow in their hearts, feeling hopeless and thinking that they would have to return to their families with no way to feed them that night. The householder gave them a great gift. An opportunity to work, even if for just an hour, still it was something. To everyone's surprise at the end of the day, all the laborers received pay, and all of them received the same wage.

To all of you reading this: as I sat today at my mission president’s feet, and as I read the words of an Apostle of God, I was taught from on high that no matter who you are, no matter what you have done, this work is urgent. We need everyone we can! In Elder Holland’s words:

 "However late you think you are, however many chances you think you have missed, however mistakes you feel you have made or talents you think you don’t have or however far from home and family and God you feel you have traveled, I testify that you have not traveled beyond the reach of divine love. It is not possible for you to sink lower than the infinite light of Christ’s Atonement shines.... If you have made covenants, keep them. If you haven't made them, make them. If you have made them and broken them, repent and repair them. It is never too late so long as the Master of the vineyard says there is time. Don't delay. It’s getting late"

I testify to what Elder Holland and President both taught me this week. God needs everyone He can. Come join the ranks! And don’t give up or give in if you have been fighting, no matter how long it has been. We will win. We are on the Lord's side.

"Even when you are tired": a lesson on diligence

" Salvation might come to him that should put his trust in the Lord and should be diligent in keeping his commandments, and continue in the faith, even unto the end of his life. If ye do this ye shall always rejoice and be filled with the love of God and always retain a remission of your sins: and ye shall grow in the knowledge of the glory of him that created you..." Mosiah 4:6, 12.

SAN DIEGO — This week Heavenly Father answered my prayers. I asked him to help me understand the Christ-like attribute of diligence more clearly.

He gave me ample opportunities to practice! A few days ago, I was in the urgent care with one of the sisters from 11:30 p.m. to 4 a.m. Two and a half hours later, I was up and doing morning exercise. If you don’t already know this, sleep is a precious commodity in missionary work. 

And missionary work is just that — WORK! 

Put those two together, and I was one sleepy missionary.  I felt like I was trying to stay awake after taking an Ambien or something!  As I was reading about diligence earlier in the week in Preach My Gospel, one line stuck out to me: "Continue until you have done all you can, even when you are tired." 

Those words kept flashing across my mind as my eyes would droop in tours or lessons, but Heavenly Father helped me continue to be steady, consistent and energetic in His work. His promise came true that, "when you are diligent, you find joy and satisfaction in your work."

I have found a lot of joy this week in the work. I want to tell you about the miracle of the Avocado Ward starting to transform.

If whoever is reading this knows anything about my Dad and Mom, they are very very organized, and very hard working. In fact they are so organized that we have an alphabetical and numerical system to organize the collection of DVD's in our home. Also, family vacations would usually consist of a planned out calendar of our itinerary that Dad would email to us before we would leave on vacation. I bet you can imagine I picked up on a few of those characteristics.

I have found that the phrase, "God is a God of order" is essential in our quest to become like Him. In the Avocado Ward, we have been working so hard these past three weeks to get organized and gain the trust of the members. We have visited every member of the ward council and have plans on how we can work together in missionary work. We are teaching the ward members how to invite their friends to activities and church. And we have reorganized our reporting in ward council so the members can better understand our efforts in their ward. 

Just those simple things have transformed the spirit here. We were able to have 18 lessons this week with only 4 half days in our area (A full time missionary needs to get 20, so we were very blessed)! We are now teaching three part-member families, and Tracy and Amber have a baptism date for July 28th! And hopefully by next week, Sean (a different family) will have a date too. I'll keep you posted (Dad, you asked about Peter- he is a YSA, so we had to pass him off, but I'll let you know if I find anything else out about him).

I just want you to know my testimony of this work. There has been a transformation of what has been happening since I last wrote. Just look back and see the letters! It is the power of Heaven plain and simple. No one can claim that just literally a few weeks ago, this ward didn’t trust missionaries, they didn’t like missionary work, and we had no investigators to teach. Heavenly Father has sent us an army of angels to help us in this work, and because of that, we are seeing an explosion of miracles. 

There is rain falling on the scorched earth of Avocado — the rich soil that comes from burnt earth is sprouting fruit! I can’t wait to update you next week.

The henna tattoo and the Atonement

SAN DIEGO — This is the last week before transfers. I have spent nine months in the Black Mountain Young Single Adult branch. It has been an amazing experience, and I have seen a lot of miracles.

Next Wednesday will be transfers. I feel like I will probably be transferred and I think Sister Kennington and I will also not be the training sisters, either. There are so many wonderful sisters here, I am so excited to see who I get to serve under.

I guess I will get the sad news over first. Sister Kennington and I were up at four this morning to drive to the airport with the Seegmillers and Sisters Burden and Haggerty. Sister Haggerty's headaches came back and is not able to stay. It has been really sad, but we all know Heavenly Father has other plans for her. Elder Seegmiller took us to breakfast, it is always an amazing experience to spend time with him.


Let me tell you something about Elder Seegmiller. He always tells us, "You always have to ask when people refer to the Bretheren, is it a bretheren with a little b or Bretheren with a Big B?" Sister Kennington and I were talking about him the other night, Elder Seegmiller used to work as a go-between with mission presidents and the Twelve Apostles. Just being in his presence, you know you are learning from a man inspired of God.

Sister Kennington and I were laughing last night because we decided Elder Seegmiller is a "bretheren with bold, italicized and underlined" Definitely not a little b and not a big B, either. Heavenly Father has blessed me a lot to learn from him. I write down his words of advice often, I'll share a couple with you right now:

"If you know he won't get invited to the meeting at Adam-Ondi-Ahman, don't say "yes!"

"When talking to the Lord, never ask why, ask what!"

"Girls should go on missions, and the guys should wait. Just tell the guy, a year and a half is a perfect amount of time to save up money, go to school and prepare everything so that when you walk off the plane, you and he can have your first date at the temple!"

Anyway, he taught me a great object lesson about my henna tattoo the other day. We were talking about the Atonement and how I was trying to take the burdens of all the sisters upon myself. He said I should never cry to watch someone be given the opportunity to use the Atonement, but it is when they choose not to that the tears should freely flow.


He looked down at my hand, the henna much faded by now, and told me that my tattoo was an example of the Atonement. I had messed up, I didn't realize what I was doing and the consequence of my mess up was a bright reminder of what I had done. Every time I would give a tour, I would shake a hand, I had to deal with questions and looks of concern or questioning. Just looking at it myself I felt like an idiot every time.

With a lot of work, and with ENDURANCE, the henna has slowly started to fade. With time, I will have a completely new hand. The skin cells will renew and not a single mark of my mistake will be left.

That is the Atonement.

Oh how I wish I could have it scrubbed off that night. Then I wouldn't have had to account to president. Then I wouldn't have had to explain to my peers. But that is not how it it meant to be. I have never been more grateful for the slow and steady process of the henna fading. It has taught me a lesson: just like my hand, with endurance, hard work, and patience, I can use the Atonement in my life to become a completely new person.


As I was thinking about tattoos, my mind has completely 180'd to a really funny story that happened this week that I think you will appreciate. Since Sister Haggerty has been sick, we have been going on exchanges with her companion, Sister Burden, to cover her area as well as ours. We went to stop by a man named Dave in the ghetto of El Cajon. Just to give you an idea, he is a big African-American man that would scare the pants right off of you if you didn't know that inside he was a big teddy bear.

We met him in the parking lot of his apartment complex, and honestly he was being a little rude, washing and waxing his car and not really listening to us, even though he set an appointment. He made his nephew come listen, which was really great, but I was getting frustrated with the situation as we had promised both Dave and Heavenly Father that we would teach him the Restoration.

Well those of you that know my spunky great-grandma Dinah, I have inherited a diluted portion of that spunk (gumption?). I left the conversation with Sisters Kennington and Burden with Dave's nephew, and marched right up to Dave's car, took the wax and the rag from him and told him I would shine his rims, and he would walk over to the sisters and listen to something that would make him really happy.

(Now to give you a little perspective, we were all in pencil skirts because we had to go to our ward that night and be flight attendants for a FHE activity).

So here I am in a pencil skirt shining a guy's rims, all the while, more of his friends are coming up to watch and laugh at why on earth a little white girl is shining Dave's car. I wasn't paying attention very well. All i could think to do was pray with all my might that he would listen. But looking back on that, I can imagine how funny that must have been.

Oh, the crazy things we do as missionaries! It is so great!!!!


Before I go, a quick update on Cameron. He is doing so well. He hopefully will move his baptism date up to the end of April. He went to church again and we are meeting with him to teach him the Gospel at the temple tonight. Keep him in your prayers!


The work is moving forward on my end, I hope it is on yours.