Charity

 (Someone in her ward sent me the pictures last week. Before a youth activity they asked Rebecca and her companion to "test" the photo booth. :)

Every single week we leave the church after emailing and I'm like "Oh I should have put that in my email! I'll write about it next week." and I just don't think it's ever going to happen that I sit down at this computer and feel any kind of confidence about what to share with y'all.
We had a very busy week, and yet didn't do as much teaching as I would have liked. We spent a day in Montreal for the "Sister Hilaire is four weeks old" meeting, we helped a few people move, and we had exchanges in Gatineau. So, I spent more time in the province of Quebec this week than I had since I got transferred here, and that was nice. It's funny how you start to miss the weird Quebecois accent after a while. Sister Hilaire doesn't understand that yet :) she's still afraid to serve there.

It is a miracle that selfish worries and concerns can become insignificant when you choose to exercise charity (I'm realizing that it is a choice) and make someone else's concerns your own. That's not something I was very good at before, and I still wouldn't say it's a strength, but I'm working on it. This isn't to say that all personal concerns are selfish; there are many things that happen in our lives that need to be dealt with and worked through -- but being concerned for the welfare of other people always makes our own burdens lighter, making it possible for us to reach out and help others. This is a gift from Heavenly Father, and it is made possible through the Atonement of Jesus Christ. If we are willing to lay our burdens at the feet of Christ, our hands are free to lift someone else and help them learn to do the same.  Mosiah 18:8-11

This whole training thing is humbling to say the least, and I still don't know what I'm doing. But Sister Hilaire is patient with me. The Lord is patient with me. And I think I'm doing alright at being patient with myself.

I REALLY love this ward. I would be more than happy to spend the rest of my mission here, but we'll see whether or not the Lord has other plans. We get transfer calls this week, but I know I'm staying here for at least one more transfer #training so it'll be the call in six weeks that is more nerve wracking.

I don't really know what else to say...things are good! I'm a happy camper! Wish I had something humorous to share, but as per usual I can think about many times this week when I laughed really hard and cannot for the life of me remember what was so darn funny.

Oh but we went to the tulip festival last week with Sister Perdue and her companion and that was way fun :)

I love you all! Souvenez-vous qui vous êtes ♥
Sister Lonas

You are sons and daughters of God!

I had the best birthday ever.
I love this ward, I love my district, I love my family, I love my companion! Everyone is so nice.
I can't believe I spent just about my whole time being 19 on the mish. Weird, right?

In other news, we have Elders again! And it already feels so much better being able to divide and conquer, and work together to make sure everyone is seen. We were getting a little frayed.

I feel like the last few weeks I've been really struggling with knowing what in the world to say to y'all. Oh, but that reminds me, it's been hilarious realizing all the weird stuff I say as Sister Hilaire picks up phrases from me. Like, she now says "what in the world?" and she asked me yesterday "What does it mean 'snackaroo'?" so basically Sister Hilaire talks like my mom :) What a wonderful thing it is to learn a new language. My favorite French phrase I've picked up literally means "I have other cats to whip" but I pretty much only use that if it's just us.

We have fun :) and I keep forgetting to mention that Sister Hilaire was baptized just a little less than four years ago, so that's been really special. She asks doctrinal questions a lot that she thinks are embarrassing not to already know and it really just makes me aware of how we all have a whole lot to learn. Heavenly Father must just think we're all so cute as we make these tiny little steps in our personal progression.

Yesterday, Brother Stewart and his wife took us to Five Guys for my birthday (my birthday is lasting way too long) and I ate a REAL hamburger for the first time my whole mission. I was sitting there, eating American food with people whose company I enjoy, and Metallica came on (I'm seriously questioning some of the music that didn't bother me before my mission, some adjustments will have to be made to past playlists) and it was like "oh hey look, I still exist!" So that was nice :)

We were taught recently my Elder Oaks in a missionary training broadcast this message:

“In this unique worldwide gathering, it is most important to remind you missionaries  who you are and what you are called to do. You are sons and daughters of God! Everything else we are is subordinate to that.”

The coolest thing is that that's what makes it possible for us to relate to other people, because everyone has that in common. And everything that makes me me, including being American, and the music that I listen to or used to listen to, and my favorite color, and my love of sunshine -- while important -- is subordinate to my divine origin as a daughter of God.

I love you. And yet, my love for each of you is yet subordinate to the love of your Heavenly Father. Souvenez-vous qui vous êtes et d'où vous venez ♥

Sister Lonas

Birthday pictures!

It's a Canadian holiday today so we won't get a letter until tomorrow. But two ward members were kind enough to send me some pictures from her birthday last week. And now we also get to meet Sister Hilaire!
 

It's short! Sorry!

Monday, May 16, 2016 (...and I forgot to post this on Monday. Today, May 19th, is her birthday!!)

I don't have a lot of time left and I can't think of anything to say anyway so this'll be short.

But it was a good week! I cannot stress enough how much I love being a missionary and I love this area and I really love Sister Hilaire.

I think growing up I really had it ingrained into me that Heavenly Father loves me, but the natural implication that he must therefore love everyone else around me just as much wasn't something I spent as much time thinking about. I'm grateful I do now. That doctrine has done more to change my behavior and attitude than anything else.

I cannot stress enough how grateful I am for my current circumstances. We get to meet with amazing people every single day. We get to take part in the promise that when we follow and teach by the Spirit, we and those we teach are edified and rejoice together.

Oh and hahahahahaha it snowed last night...

I love you all,
Souvenez-vous qui vous êtes ♥

Next week I'll try and remember to give myself time to actually tell you all about what it is we're up to here in Ontario :)

Joyeuse Fête des Mères!

I typed the subject and then have been staring at the screen for like five minutes. I'm pretty sure I told my family all the important things on skype yesterday. This might be a really disjointed email.

It was wonderful to see my family :) There are a lot of people in it.  I cried a lot. It was pretty characteristic. Strong feelings tend to manifest themselves that way for me. I really love my family. My nieces and nephews are the cutest and they're really.....really funny. Hahahaha :) And I still have a good while left on the mish but this was my last skype call! The next time I see you all will be in person. Pretty weird.

So, Mothers Day. We talked in zone training last week about improving and maintaining mission culture and in explaining "culture", President Patrick said that the culture of our own homes was "what mom would always say". Which led to all kinds of reflection. A favorite Book of Mormon story about the two thousand stripling warriors, who were really just young boys, demonstrates the power of "what mom always says"...

47 Now they never had fought, yet they did not fear death; and they did think more upon the liberty of their fathers than they did upon their lives; yea, they had been taught by their mothers, that if they did not doubt, God would deliver them. 48 And they rehearsed unto me the words of their mothers, saying: We do not doubt our mothers knew it. 

 

We can rehearse the words of our mothers because mom repeats herself. Moms always have. And there is power in what she repeats, for the same reason there is power in memorizing verses of scripture. We can pull on those words whenever or wherever we might need them.

Naturally, this all led me to thinking about two specific things that my mom always says.

• Everyone is just doing the best they can with what they have.
• You never know the whole story.

In other words, my mom has taught (or tried to teach) me to have charity. I thought this was helpful to me before, but it has proved even more valuable on my mission. I'm still working on having charity for others. But everything I know about charity began in my home with my mother. I have a really wonderful mom.

I love you all! Sorry for the weird spacing of this email :)
Souvenez-vous qui vous êtes ♥
Sister Lonas

Greeny Fire

Sorry, I didn't know pday wold be on a different day this week! We had interviews with President on Monday and zone training yesterday.

When I came into the mission field (kind of feels like yesterday, kind of feels like a million years ago...) Sister Schmuhl (my mission mom) talked a lot about greeny fire and how I just had so much energy and I gave her so much energy and I really didn't understand what she was talking about. I do now! Greeny fire is a real thing! And it makes miracles happen!

So Sister Hilaire is from Grenoble, France and she is wonderful. Hmmmm my mom (the real one) said she wanted to "hear all the details about her and our new lives together" which sounds a little bit like we're married but that's kind of what a companionship feels like sometimes. So, all the details...She speaks English really well, she learned Spanish in the MTC (language study is pretty complicated), she and I just kind of go back and forth between speaking English and French together. Both of us always want to be speaking the other person's native language to practice. Sometimes I pretend to speak Spanish.

Sooo, the Elders that were supposed to come in...didn't. The new Elder from the MTC had problems with his visa so he couldn't come in yet. It's just us in the ward for a few weeks (not sure how many yet, but they're hoping not more than four). I still don't really feel like I know this ward that well, but I have had a lot of help in the last week. It's true that the Holy Ghost brings all things to our remembrance. It is such a blessing to be with a companion who has so much enthusiasm for the work, it keeps me from feeling stressed or sorry for myself :) Rather than being overwhelmed about picking up everyone the Elders were teaching, I can just be excited that Sister Hilaire gets so much teaching experience in her first few weeks and we get to stay busy! It's so hard when you feel like you have nothing to do to be effective. That hasn't been the case!

And we've seen that when you show the Lord you are willing to do absolutely whatever you can to take care of the people in the area, He gives you more people to teach. And when you are being exactly obedient, especially in the schedule, He somehow makes the time for you to teach them all. I don't know how it works, but I don't question it.

I am so grateful to be set apart at this time as a full-time representative of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. How great is this calling. I know that hearts are changed when people do things to increase their faith, such as praying and reading their scriptures and deciding to be baptized and confirmed and being baptized and confirmed. I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet called of God to restore the church of Jesus Christ on the earth.

I wish I had time to talk about all the people we've seen this week and tell about the miracles and tender mercies, but alas. Fortunately, being exactly obedient to God's commandments brings about miracles no matter what your calling. I know God loves you and will answer your prayers, because He loves me and answers my prayers and I'm not that special.

I love you all SO much! And really, Sister Hilaire and I had every intention to take a picture together before emailing and it just didn't happen. Here's crossing our fingers for next week.
Souvenez-vous qui vous êtes. Vous êtes un enfant de Dieu et Il vous aime plus qu'on est capable de comprendre.

Oh and family! I am so excited to see your faces on Sunday :) And missionaries, have fun skyping with your families! Happy Mothers' Day!