Hey everybody!
So....all the news: Rive Sud is staying open, and Sister Leonard and I are staying here together. It was so crazy...we thought for sure that Quebec Ouest (the elders here) were going to close and that we were going to take over their area, but then they kept them open as well as us. Instead they closed Hochelaga sisters. So crazy. I'm excited though, and Lyse was THRILLED when we told her that we were staying. She said that she's been praying all week that we would both stay and that neither of us would be transferred, and she decided that God answered her prayers. It was so neat :) And the whole ward is thrilled that we're staying. It'll be wonderful. I'm really excited for this transfer. It means I'll have been here for about 7 months by the end, which is kind of a long time, but I'm excited for it. I really love the ward and the members here, and then with Lyse getting baptized in 2 weeks, it will be so great. I'm way excited :)
So that was pretty much the exciting news for this week. Other than that, not too much happened. We taught Lyse and she is AMAZING. We taught her word of Wisdom and Law of Chastity, and we told her what we were teaching in advance and so she had a "True to the Faith" book that we gave her and she had already read all about both of those and was willing to make all the changes necessary to live them and so teaching the principles was way easy. And the members have been a huge help; she loves all of them and they're all so welcoming with her. She's so excited for her baptism too...it's wonderful. I LOVE teaching people who understand the importance of the gospel and really want to have those blessings in their lives...it's sucha neat thing to be able to watch them as they find the love and joy that comes only through the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Then we had another pretty neat experience last night. We contacted a guy about a month ago named Stephan who was really neat adn has a really strong faith in Jesus Christ due to some things in his past, and so he said we could come back another time. We've tried calling him about 50 times and he never responded, even after we left messages, so we decided to try to pass by him one more time last night and if he wasn't there then we were going to drop him. So we stopped by and he was home and at first he told us that he thought we were a sect and wasn't sure that he wanted to talk to us, but we said we'd like to just explain a little bit about what we did, so we went out to his porch and sat there and explained about missionaries and the Book of Mormon and it turned out great. He was SO excited to read the Book of Mormon by the end. He's already made a ton of changes in his life and really does want to learn more about Christ. He said we could definitely come back again, but he's going on vacation for the next 2 weeks, so he won't be able to meet with us until after that which kind of stinks, but that's ok, it'll turn out well. I'm excited to teach him. Then at the end in his prayer he thanked God for the "2 angels" that were sent to him that day. We told him that that was really sweet and he said "Well, you have to see it...you two just glow. You have to be angels. I've never seen anything like it before." It was so neat. I'm excited :)
Then this morning we met Presidend and Sister Cannon for the first time and they are wonderful. Sister Cannon is extremely outgoing and friendly and will be a LOT of fun to work with. President Cannon is a little more reserved but he has a really strong testimony of the Gospel and together I think they will just be a wonderful strength and support for the mission. I'm way excited to work with them. It will be a wonderful transfer. And this week (Wednesday) is my 9 month mark! Crazy to think that my mission is already have over...I still have so many things left to learn, so many people left to teach...so much to do! I'm excited to keep working! I love it!
Anyways, i hope you all are doing well...I love you all tons! Take care and have a wonderful week!
Love, Nicole
PS: Happy birthday Sara!
Monday, July 19, 2010
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
Happy 4th of July! :)
Hey everyone!
Things here are going well. Lyse came to church yesterday and it went so well! She`s so excited about her baptism...she just keeps hoping that I`m not transferred before then. Right now it`s set for the 17th, and transfers are a week from tomorrow and we`re pretty sure that our area is either closing or I`m getting transferred. We`ll see though...I was wrong the last 2 times that I tried guessing, so I don`t think I`m going to guess this time at all. But Lyse came to church and LOVED it...she said the best part was how welcoming everyone was and how they all seemed to be friends with each other; it`s very different from the Catholic church that she attended before. She also told me that she had been really disappointed with the Catholic church and she had told herself that if she ever beleived in something again, it would have to be something really GOOD and they would have to be honestly trying to follow Christ and His teachings. I asked her if she had found it and she said ``I`m not sure; I think I have.`` Then I told her that I knew she had and went on to bear my testimony. It was so great. And it was really funny because at her lesson on Wednesday she was showing us how she usually asked a question then would open the Book of Mormon and read the first chapter she found, so she showed us and the first time she opened it up to the Topical Guide under the topic of Baptism. Then she tried again and opened it to Moroni 8 where it talks about infant baptisms. It was so funny :)
Also this week one of the elders` investigators, Dominico, got baptized and he asked me to give the talk on the Holy Ghost, so I talked about the goals of the Holy Ghost...why we really have that gift. He`s here to testify of truth, to lead us, to direct us, to comfort us, but also he is there to purify and sanctify us. It was something I read in a talk by Presidetn Eyring this week...he said that the Holy Ghost cannot dwell in unholy places and that each time we feel the HOly Ghost, we can know that the Atonement of Jesus Christ is working in our lives and that we area being cleansed from the mistakes that we have made. It was really neat. I thought I did ok, but I hadn`t really written the talk out and just talking in French is a little tough sometimes, but afterwards I had several people come up and say I had done a good job. Then yesterday at church I had 2 more woman go out of there way to tell me that they had really enjoyed my talk and what a good stage presence I have. It was exciting for me :)
We didn`t get tons of finding time in this week what with p-day, interviews all day Tuesday, lessons on Wednesday, and St. John Baptiste day on Thursday, but it was still a good week. We did teach an awful lesson on Saturday though...remember that Baptist preacher Sister Tschumi and I met last transfer? Well, we met these 2 YSA guys and set up a lesson with them. We show up and start to teach them with our member, Sister Belanger (she`s the one who helped us with Patrick a lot), and then up walks the Baptist preacher with his dad who had been a preacher for 20 years and they came to argue with us. It was SO frustrating. Sister Belanger bore a great testimony though and we left not too long after. It shook both Sister Leonard and I bit...we really don`t like those kind of confrontations, but it just fortified Sister Belanger. And it was so cute; yesterday in church President and Sister mcKinnon spoke (they`re leaving on thursday, it`s so sad!) and President was using a lot of the same scriptures that the Baptist preacher had used and Sister Belanger ran up from the back of the chapel and came and sat next to me and Sister Leonard and gave me a huge hug and sat there the whole talk. Then she thanked me for inviting her the day before and said that it had really fortified her testimony. It almost made me cry; she is so sweet. I just love the members here :)
So all in all, it was a good week. My birthday was wonderful...all the missionaries were here for zone interviews and they all sang me happy birthday and one set of elders bought me 2 cakes...it was so sweet :) So it was fun and I`m looking forward to this next week: working hard, meeting our new President on Saturday, transfer calls Saturday night...it should be interesting! I hope you all have a wonderful week...love you tons!
Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey
Things here are going well. Lyse came to church yesterday and it went so well! She`s so excited about her baptism...she just keeps hoping that I`m not transferred before then. Right now it`s set for the 17th, and transfers are a week from tomorrow and we`re pretty sure that our area is either closing or I`m getting transferred. We`ll see though...I was wrong the last 2 times that I tried guessing, so I don`t think I`m going to guess this time at all. But Lyse came to church and LOVED it...she said the best part was how welcoming everyone was and how they all seemed to be friends with each other; it`s very different from the Catholic church that she attended before. She also told me that she had been really disappointed with the Catholic church and she had told herself that if she ever beleived in something again, it would have to be something really GOOD and they would have to be honestly trying to follow Christ and His teachings. I asked her if she had found it and she said ``I`m not sure; I think I have.`` Then I told her that I knew she had and went on to bear my testimony. It was so great. And it was really funny because at her lesson on Wednesday she was showing us how she usually asked a question then would open the Book of Mormon and read the first chapter she found, so she showed us and the first time she opened it up to the Topical Guide under the topic of Baptism. Then she tried again and opened it to Moroni 8 where it talks about infant baptisms. It was so funny :)
Also this week one of the elders` investigators, Dominico, got baptized and he asked me to give the talk on the Holy Ghost, so I talked about the goals of the Holy Ghost...why we really have that gift. He`s here to testify of truth, to lead us, to direct us, to comfort us, but also he is there to purify and sanctify us. It was something I read in a talk by Presidetn Eyring this week...he said that the Holy Ghost cannot dwell in unholy places and that each time we feel the HOly Ghost, we can know that the Atonement of Jesus Christ is working in our lives and that we area being cleansed from the mistakes that we have made. It was really neat. I thought I did ok, but I hadn`t really written the talk out and just talking in French is a little tough sometimes, but afterwards I had several people come up and say I had done a good job. Then yesterday at church I had 2 more woman go out of there way to tell me that they had really enjoyed my talk and what a good stage presence I have. It was exciting for me :)
We didn`t get tons of finding time in this week what with p-day, interviews all day Tuesday, lessons on Wednesday, and St. John Baptiste day on Thursday, but it was still a good week. We did teach an awful lesson on Saturday though...remember that Baptist preacher Sister Tschumi and I met last transfer? Well, we met these 2 YSA guys and set up a lesson with them. We show up and start to teach them with our member, Sister Belanger (she`s the one who helped us with Patrick a lot), and then up walks the Baptist preacher with his dad who had been a preacher for 20 years and they came to argue with us. It was SO frustrating. Sister Belanger bore a great testimony though and we left not too long after. It shook both Sister Leonard and I bit...we really don`t like those kind of confrontations, but it just fortified Sister Belanger. And it was so cute; yesterday in church President and Sister mcKinnon spoke (they`re leaving on thursday, it`s so sad!) and President was using a lot of the same scriptures that the Baptist preacher had used and Sister Belanger ran up from the back of the chapel and came and sat next to me and Sister Leonard and gave me a huge hug and sat there the whole talk. Then she thanked me for inviting her the day before and said that it had really fortified her testimony. It almost made me cry; she is so sweet. I just love the members here :)
So all in all, it was a good week. My birthday was wonderful...all the missionaries were here for zone interviews and they all sang me happy birthday and one set of elders bought me 2 cakes...it was so sweet :) So it was fun and I`m looking forward to this next week: working hard, meeting our new President on Saturday, transfer calls Saturday night...it should be interesting! I hope you all have a wonderful week...love you tons!
Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey
Friday, June 18, 2010
"To be a living, modern witness in word and deed, of the divinity of His great and marvelous latter-day work..."
Hey everyone!
This week was such a fun week. We had a really wonderful time. And SO many funny things happened...it was crazy. One was kind of scary, but then when we figured it out it was just funny. Wednesday night at around midnight the phone rang so I got up to answer it, but then saw it was from an unknown person, no number listed, so I decided I probably shouldn't answer it. Not even a minute later, we got a phone call from a 502 area code, which I didn't even recognize the area code, so I ignored it. That person called back another time and then in the next 5 minutes we got 3 more phone calls from another phone number with a 502 area code that had an extra number on the end. It was really strange. So the next day we got permission to look up where the area code is located to see if it was even in Quebec or if it was somewhere else, and we found out 502 is an area code in Kentucky, and we just laughed and decided not to call the person back because it was long distance. But then Thursday afternoon we were talking to the Victoriaville sisters and they said they had gotten 5 phone calls the night before (all at different times...one at midnight, one at 1:00, one at 2:00, etc.) from the same phone number that had called us. They had tried calling back, but couldn't get through, so they suggested that we try calling. We called back the first number and it said the number was incomplete. So then we called the second number that was too long and it went through but we couldn't understand the person on the other end at all because each time he talked it made a staticky noise like when the TV is on but not on a regular channel, so we hung up. It was so strange. Then on Saturday we went out contacting with one of our recent converts, Gabriel, and we got 2 more phone calls from the same phone number, but I missed them both. It was so strange. So later that night Gabriel looked it up on his computer and found out that the 502 isn't an area code...it's a country code for Guatemala and the phone numbers there are 8 digits, and that's why the number had an extra digit. We then figured out the person calling was a guy that Soeur Leonard had taught in Victoriaville who had just moved back to Guatemala and was supposed to be getting baptized there this past weekend, which explained why it was only us and Victoriaville who got the random phone calls. It was kinda creepy at first, but then it was just funny after we found out that it was probably just Walter trying to cal us :)
Also this week we decided to go and try and visit some less actives, and that was fun. We went and saw one, Lucien Gugiere, who I had never heard of before and then Soeur Bruniau mentioned his name. So we called him and he gladly invited us over and it was so fun. He knows so much about the gospel and has about a million books in his library. He's retired now and so he spends his time constructing a website for the church in French (since there aren't many French resources provided from the church online) where he's taking all the resource materials like "Ancres dans la Foi" and putting them online. He has every ensign ever published since 1984 when he joined the church and all the Church News as well. It was so crazy. Unfortunately, his wife of 43 years and his 3 children are not at all interested in the church and they just found out his wife has cancer and so she asked him to stay at home with her a little more. We're hopeful that soon she'll soften up a little and at least allow him to come to church without getting upset, but we'll see. We also had planned to pass by another woman who speaks Spanish but has lived here forever and stopped coming to church a long time ago, but we decided to knock a street or two first. Then Sister Leonard felt like we needed to go stop by, so we stopped knocking and went straight over there and the woman was outside with her boyfriend on the porch and we talked to them for quite awhile. He said he's atheist, but asked us quite a few questions anyways about what we're doing and what we believe. It was a really neat experience.
Other than that, the week was pretty much the same as normal (lots of knocking, a couple lessons, visiting with members and the other missionaries), except for a few random exceptions. We went one day to visit Patrick (he had canceled on the elders 3 times in a row, so we decided to go try and he set a lesson with us..kind of funny) and one the way out we saw a woman who was fairly well dressed in this little window at the side of a huge dumpster digging through the trash can. Thinking that she may have lost something, we went and asked if we could help her, and she just said no thank you and then walked away. Except she didn't look like she was homeless and searching for food...we're not quite sure what she was doing, but it was kind of funny. Then there was another time where we were on this LONG country road with nothing really around and we decided to get out and pick a few daisies to put on our table back home to make it look a little prettier. So Sister Leonard gets out and picks one or two and then turns around and sees this creepy man with long, unkempt hair, beer in hand, standing and staring at her. He said hello and she freaked out and ran back to the car. It was so funny :) Then another time we were going contacting and we parked the car and said a little prayer before starting and then when I finished I saw a car next to us out of the corner of my eye and I looked over and there was a man parked in the street next to us staring at us. We both freaked out and it took us a good 30 seconds before we realized it was just our recent convert, Gabriel. He thought it was the funniest thing ever; we both found it terrifying. But afterward it was pretty funny :) Then for English class instead of just teaching them, we went down to Old Quebec and went to a little market they have there each spring and then they gave us a tour of Old Quebec and pointed out some of the things that we had to see while we were down there. It was really neat. I think there were other random things that happened as well, but I can't really think of them right now...it was a really fun week though. I love it here :)
I'm also really looking forward to this next week...We were supposed to have interviews this Friday, but then for some reason they were canceled and so they've been rescheduled for next Tuesday (my birthday!) so that should be fun. All the missionaries are then coming down on Sunday evening and our p-day on Monday will be spent with them and then interviews on Tuesday. It will be interesting celebrating my birthday with EVERYONE here...we were planning on just having a dinner with just our district, but this should be fun too. And Gabrielle is coming on Sunday; I'm so excited! :) It'll be fun to see her again. And then we're also teaching Liz again and have some other things set up...it should be a lot of fun. I'm excited to work this week! But anyways, I hope you are all doing well and everything is going fabulous back home. I love you all tons!
Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey
This week was such a fun week. We had a really wonderful time. And SO many funny things happened...it was crazy. One was kind of scary, but then when we figured it out it was just funny. Wednesday night at around midnight the phone rang so I got up to answer it, but then saw it was from an unknown person, no number listed, so I decided I probably shouldn't answer it. Not even a minute later, we got a phone call from a 502 area code, which I didn't even recognize the area code, so I ignored it. That person called back another time and then in the next 5 minutes we got 3 more phone calls from another phone number with a 502 area code that had an extra number on the end. It was really strange. So the next day we got permission to look up where the area code is located to see if it was even in Quebec or if it was somewhere else, and we found out 502 is an area code in Kentucky, and we just laughed and decided not to call the person back because it was long distance. But then Thursday afternoon we were talking to the Victoriaville sisters and they said they had gotten 5 phone calls the night before (all at different times...one at midnight, one at 1:00, one at 2:00, etc.) from the same phone number that had called us. They had tried calling back, but couldn't get through, so they suggested that we try calling. We called back the first number and it said the number was incomplete. So then we called the second number that was too long and it went through but we couldn't understand the person on the other end at all because each time he talked it made a staticky noise like when the TV is on but not on a regular channel, so we hung up. It was so strange. Then on Saturday we went out contacting with one of our recent converts, Gabriel, and we got 2 more phone calls from the same phone number, but I missed them both. It was so strange. So later that night Gabriel looked it up on his computer and found out that the 502 isn't an area code...it's a country code for Guatemala and the phone numbers there are 8 digits, and that's why the number had an extra digit. We then figured out the person calling was a guy that Soeur Leonard had taught in Victoriaville who had just moved back to Guatemala and was supposed to be getting baptized there this past weekend, which explained why it was only us and Victoriaville who got the random phone calls. It was kinda creepy at first, but then it was just funny after we found out that it was probably just Walter trying to cal us :)
Also this week we decided to go and try and visit some less actives, and that was fun. We went and saw one, Lucien Gugiere, who I had never heard of before and then Soeur Bruniau mentioned his name. So we called him and he gladly invited us over and it was so fun. He knows so much about the gospel and has about a million books in his library. He's retired now and so he spends his time constructing a website for the church in French (since there aren't many French resources provided from the church online) where he's taking all the resource materials like "Ancres dans la Foi" and putting them online. He has every ensign ever published since 1984 when he joined the church and all the Church News as well. It was so crazy. Unfortunately, his wife of 43 years and his 3 children are not at all interested in the church and they just found out his wife has cancer and so she asked him to stay at home with her a little more. We're hopeful that soon she'll soften up a little and at least allow him to come to church without getting upset, but we'll see. We also had planned to pass by another woman who speaks Spanish but has lived here forever and stopped coming to church a long time ago, but we decided to knock a street or two first. Then Sister Leonard felt like we needed to go stop by, so we stopped knocking and went straight over there and the woman was outside with her boyfriend on the porch and we talked to them for quite awhile. He said he's atheist, but asked us quite a few questions anyways about what we're doing and what we believe. It was a really neat experience.
Other than that, the week was pretty much the same as normal (lots of knocking, a couple lessons, visiting with members and the other missionaries), except for a few random exceptions. We went one day to visit Patrick (he had canceled on the elders 3 times in a row, so we decided to go try and he set a lesson with us..kind of funny) and one the way out we saw a woman who was fairly well dressed in this little window at the side of a huge dumpster digging through the trash can. Thinking that she may have lost something, we went and asked if we could help her, and she just said no thank you and then walked away. Except she didn't look like she was homeless and searching for food...we're not quite sure what she was doing, but it was kind of funny. Then there was another time where we were on this LONG country road with nothing really around and we decided to get out and pick a few daisies to put on our table back home to make it look a little prettier. So Sister Leonard gets out and picks one or two and then turns around and sees this creepy man with long, unkempt hair, beer in hand, standing and staring at her. He said hello and she freaked out and ran back to the car. It was so funny :) Then another time we were going contacting and we parked the car and said a little prayer before starting and then when I finished I saw a car next to us out of the corner of my eye and I looked over and there was a man parked in the street next to us staring at us. We both freaked out and it took us a good 30 seconds before we realized it was just our recent convert, Gabriel. He thought it was the funniest thing ever; we both found it terrifying. But afterward it was pretty funny :) Then for English class instead of just teaching them, we went down to Old Quebec and went to a little market they have there each spring and then they gave us a tour of Old Quebec and pointed out some of the things that we had to see while we were down there. It was really neat. I think there were other random things that happened as well, but I can't really think of them right now...it was a really fun week though. I love it here :)
I'm also really looking forward to this next week...We were supposed to have interviews this Friday, but then for some reason they were canceled and so they've been rescheduled for next Tuesday (my birthday!) so that should be fun. All the missionaries are then coming down on Sunday evening and our p-day on Monday will be spent with them and then interviews on Tuesday. It will be interesting celebrating my birthday with EVERYONE here...we were planning on just having a dinner with just our district, but this should be fun too. And Gabrielle is coming on Sunday; I'm so excited! :) It'll be fun to see her again. And then we're also teaching Liz again and have some other things set up...it should be a lot of fun. I'm excited to work this week! But anyways, I hope you are all doing well and everything is going fabulous back home. I love you all tons!
Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey
Monday, June 7, 2010
"My commission is to do what He wants done. To say what He wants said."
Hey everyone!
This week was wonderful...we had zone conference, which is always amazing! It was President and Sister McKinnon's last zone conference...they'll still be here for interviews, but this was their last zone conference and it was so sad! I'm going to miss them...I'm excited about the new mission president, but I love the Mckinnon's; it'll be sad to see them go. But the conference itself was wonderful with a lot of really impressive trainings.
This week was pretty uneventful...we did a lot of finding at the beginning, but then Sister Leonard got sick at the end and so we didn't do very much the last couple of days. We did teach Liz on Tuesday and it went really well! We taught her the Plan of Salvation which is my favorite lesson to teach, and I think it went well. She had a bit of a difficult time because she believes more in reincarnation and said that before judgment if we haven't learned everything that we need to learn, we just go back to the premortal existence and start over again and we do that over and over and over again until we learn all the lessons that we need to learn on this life. We talked about how agency is so important to God that He's never going to take that away from us. If we don't want to learn the lessons that He wants us to learn, He's not going to force us; He's not going to watch us suffer through this life again, still not learning the same lessons if we don't want to learn it. I think she accepted that a little bit more...we'll see. Then she said that she had had questions and she knew that she needed different answers to them than the ones that she had and so she started looking for them, and that's when Sister Tschumi and I showed up. So then Sister Gelinas bore testimony and said that if she had questions and we showed up right after, maybe she needed to start looking a little harder to try to find the answers in what we were saying instead of just thinking that she knew everything. She agreed and we're meeting with her again next week, so we'll see how it goes :)
Oh, and then it was so wonderful after that! We came home on Tuesday right after the lesson and the zone leaders had come and heart attacked our house! I just love them; they really are so wonderful. We have pretty incredible elders in our district :) Oh, and all the elders came down right before zone conference and Elder Garcia had found out that it was my birthday at the end of this month, so he kept asking me what I wanted and then decided he's making me a cake and they're cooking us dinner...I just love them :) But anyways, so the rest of the afternoon on Tuesday we spent finding...we were going to contact on this one street, but then we saw a guy with a gun, so we decided that we should probably go to a different street, haha. Then the next day that we went and taught a less active, Claire Dion, and that went well. We talked about the 10 commandments and following God's plan for us. I think it went really well...she said that with her boyfriend, they have a really good relationship between them, but not with God, and so we suggested that maybe she needed to invte God into the relationship, and one way she could do that pretty easily was through having a fmaily home evening with him and maybe the Carrier family who live nearby and she said that was a really good idea. So then we called the Carrier's and asked them if they could also call and invite her to have an FHE with them, but they said they'd tried that a year ago and she'd said no, so they didn't want to try again. It was so frustrating...I'm really learning here how important member participation and member support is for the missionary work. Everything works out better when the members are helping and bearing testimony...it's a good lesson I hope to remember when I get back.
I think that was about it for the week though...it was good and I'm looking forward to this next week. I love Sister Leonard and we have a lot of fun together, so it should be a wonderful week. I hope everything is going well for you and I love you all tons!!
Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey
This week was wonderful...we had zone conference, which is always amazing! It was President and Sister McKinnon's last zone conference...they'll still be here for interviews, but this was their last zone conference and it was so sad! I'm going to miss them...I'm excited about the new mission president, but I love the Mckinnon's; it'll be sad to see them go. But the conference itself was wonderful with a lot of really impressive trainings.
This week was pretty uneventful...we did a lot of finding at the beginning, but then Sister Leonard got sick at the end and so we didn't do very much the last couple of days. We did teach Liz on Tuesday and it went really well! We taught her the Plan of Salvation which is my favorite lesson to teach, and I think it went well. She had a bit of a difficult time because she believes more in reincarnation and said that before judgment if we haven't learned everything that we need to learn, we just go back to the premortal existence and start over again and we do that over and over and over again until we learn all the lessons that we need to learn on this life. We talked about how agency is so important to God that He's never going to take that away from us. If we don't want to learn the lessons that He wants us to learn, He's not going to force us; He's not going to watch us suffer through this life again, still not learning the same lessons if we don't want to learn it. I think she accepted that a little bit more...we'll see. Then she said that she had had questions and she knew that she needed different answers to them than the ones that she had and so she started looking for them, and that's when Sister Tschumi and I showed up. So then Sister Gelinas bore testimony and said that if she had questions and we showed up right after, maybe she needed to start looking a little harder to try to find the answers in what we were saying instead of just thinking that she knew everything. She agreed and we're meeting with her again next week, so we'll see how it goes :)
Oh, and then it was so wonderful after that! We came home on Tuesday right after the lesson and the zone leaders had come and heart attacked our house! I just love them; they really are so wonderful. We have pretty incredible elders in our district :) Oh, and all the elders came down right before zone conference and Elder Garcia had found out that it was my birthday at the end of this month, so he kept asking me what I wanted and then decided he's making me a cake and they're cooking us dinner...I just love them :) But anyways, so the rest of the afternoon on Tuesday we spent finding...we were going to contact on this one street, but then we saw a guy with a gun, so we decided that we should probably go to a different street, haha. Then the next day that we went and taught a less active, Claire Dion, and that went well. We talked about the 10 commandments and following God's plan for us. I think it went really well...she said that with her boyfriend, they have a really good relationship between them, but not with God, and so we suggested that maybe she needed to invte God into the relationship, and one way she could do that pretty easily was through having a fmaily home evening with him and maybe the Carrier family who live nearby and she said that was a really good idea. So then we called the Carrier's and asked them if they could also call and invite her to have an FHE with them, but they said they'd tried that a year ago and she'd said no, so they didn't want to try again. It was so frustrating...I'm really learning here how important member participation and member support is for the missionary work. Everything works out better when the members are helping and bearing testimony...it's a good lesson I hope to remember when I get back.
I think that was about it for the week though...it was good and I'm looking forward to this next week. I love Sister Leonard and we have a lot of fun together, so it should be a wonderful week. I hope everything is going well for you and I love you all tons!!
Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey
Monday, May 31, 2010
"My words are His words and my doctrine is His doctrine."
Hey everyone!
This week was WONDERFUL. It was really fun getting to know my knew companion and working with her. Her name is Sister Leonard and she's from Belgium. She's so neat; I love her. She reminds me a lot of Sister Pearson: she loves to work and we have a lot of fun together. We spent a lot of time this week finding, which was good. While she was in the MTC, Sister Leonard heard tell of a prophecy from one of the General Authorities saying that someday, people all along the St. Laurent River would be members of the church and have the gospel in their lives. We're not sure how true it is, but we decided to start trying to fulfill it, so we found a street that stretches clear along the south shore of the St. Laurent and we decided that's what we're going to be working on this month. I'm excited for it :)
I don't have tons to say about this week...not much happened. We heart-attacked the zone leaders apartment on Friday and that was so much fun. They were in Montreal all day for Zone Leader council and generally they're not in the best of moods when they get back, so we decided to surprise them with hearts everywhere...so fun. I loved it :) And SIster Leonard had received a HUGE package (12 kilos) full of Belgian chocolate and candies, so we left them some of those as well. They really appreciated it adn it made things pretty fun.
We also visited with the Caron's (our neighbors) twice this week, and both times went really well. Soeur Caron is less-active and is really nice, but generally doesn't participate tons in the lessons, but both times this week she was asking questions and participating in what we were saying. It was neat. We now know a little bit more about the problems she has and so we have a better idea of where to start working next. Also this week we had a really neat experience in English class. First we asked if someone wanted to volunteer to give the prayer and Michel (one of the men in the class) gave one that he had written, beginning with "Dear Heavenly Father" and ending "in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen." Then for the English class we had them all write a letter to someone they didn't know to practice introducing themselves and asking questions, as well as their grammar and spelling. I brought several pictures from Montreal and let them each choose who they wanted to write. Most picked missionaries, but one woman picked Robyn and then another picked my recent convert, Rob. I'd brought a picture of his baptismal day and I explained to all the students a little about who each of the people in the pictures was so they would know what kind of questions to ask. The woman who picked Rob, Guillaune, asked Rob in her letter how he had found the church, what he felt like after his baptism (if he was more happy, etc), and if he thought his life would be better because of this new religion. I got to explain a little about his conversion story and it was really neat. It would've been better if he'd been there to bear testimony, but it was still really a neat experience and I thought it was great she was even thinking to ask questions like that.
So overall the week was good. Nothing too exciting happened, but I love my new companion and we're looking forward to a wonderful week and a wonderful transfer. It should be good :) I hope all is going well for you! I love you all tons!! Take care! :)
Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey
This week was WONDERFUL. It was really fun getting to know my knew companion and working with her. Her name is Sister Leonard and she's from Belgium. She's so neat; I love her. She reminds me a lot of Sister Pearson: she loves to work and we have a lot of fun together. We spent a lot of time this week finding, which was good. While she was in the MTC, Sister Leonard heard tell of a prophecy from one of the General Authorities saying that someday, people all along the St. Laurent River would be members of the church and have the gospel in their lives. We're not sure how true it is, but we decided to start trying to fulfill it, so we found a street that stretches clear along the south shore of the St. Laurent and we decided that's what we're going to be working on this month. I'm excited for it :)
I don't have tons to say about this week...not much happened. We heart-attacked the zone leaders apartment on Friday and that was so much fun. They were in Montreal all day for Zone Leader council and generally they're not in the best of moods when they get back, so we decided to surprise them with hearts everywhere...so fun. I loved it :) And SIster Leonard had received a HUGE package (12 kilos) full of Belgian chocolate and candies, so we left them some of those as well. They really appreciated it adn it made things pretty fun.
We also visited with the Caron's (our neighbors) twice this week, and both times went really well. Soeur Caron is less-active and is really nice, but generally doesn't participate tons in the lessons, but both times this week she was asking questions and participating in what we were saying. It was neat. We now know a little bit more about the problems she has and so we have a better idea of where to start working next. Also this week we had a really neat experience in English class. First we asked if someone wanted to volunteer to give the prayer and Michel (one of the men in the class) gave one that he had written, beginning with "Dear Heavenly Father" and ending "in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen." Then for the English class we had them all write a letter to someone they didn't know to practice introducing themselves and asking questions, as well as their grammar and spelling. I brought several pictures from Montreal and let them each choose who they wanted to write. Most picked missionaries, but one woman picked Robyn and then another picked my recent convert, Rob. I'd brought a picture of his baptismal day and I explained to all the students a little about who each of the people in the pictures was so they would know what kind of questions to ask. The woman who picked Rob, Guillaune, asked Rob in her letter how he had found the church, what he felt like after his baptism (if he was more happy, etc), and if he thought his life would be better because of this new religion. I got to explain a little about his conversion story and it was really neat. It would've been better if he'd been there to bear testimony, but it was still really a neat experience and I thought it was great she was even thinking to ask questions like that.
So overall the week was good. Nothing too exciting happened, but I love my new companion and we're looking forward to a wonderful week and a wonderful transfer. It should be good :) I hope all is going well for you! I love you all tons!! Take care! :)
Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey
Thursday, May 27, 2010
My voice is His voice, and my acts are His acts...``
Hello everybody!
This week has been crazy....I ended up getting sick for most of it, so we didn`t get tons of work done, but we did still do quite a bit. I`ve been fighting a cold for the last 3 months or so, and it finally won this Tuesday and I was barely able to stand without falling over, so Siste Tschumi and I decided that tracting was probably not the best activity and we spent the next three days at home while I slept. Not ideal for the last week of the transfer, but sometimes there`s not much of a choice. But anyways, in between all of the sleeping, we did get some things done! We taught Liz again...she`s doing so well! I`m not sure if I mentioned her in any of the last e-mails...we`ve taught her twice now and have the third appointment with her tomorrow. We met her while knocking doors one day and she said she doesn`t believe in God or religion because there are so many difficulties in her life (she has huntington`s disease and because of that she lost her job, her home, her husband, and her family doesn`t talk to her tons) and so many people go to church just on Sundays and then are complete hypocrites the rest of the week. Or at least, that was her reasoning for why she doesn`t believe in anything. She also said that of the churches, ours was probably the most generous and the most christlike, and she`d be happy to listen to us, and if we could convince her, that`d be great. So we`ve taught her now a couple of times and I think she`s slowly starting to change her perspective and realize that we`re really there because we honestly believe what we teach. We`re here because we want others to have better lives and more happiness, and we know how that`s possible, and so we`re here to share it. I`m excited to keep teaching her...it`ll be fun :)
We also taught a girl named Shirley yesterday. She`s actually one of the zone leaders investigators, but they didn`t have a chaperone and so they couldn`t teach her and so they asked us to. She`s from Columbia, has a 2 year old daughter who was way active, and doesn`t speak a word of either French or English, only Spanish. Crazy. So we took a Spanish speaking member with us (who unfortunately was so preoccupied with the little girl that she didn`t get a chance to talk very much, but Sister Tschumi did amazing as a teacher, so it turned out all right :) ) and taught the first discussion. It was really interesting...it kind of made me want to learn Spanish, but then I remembered that I`m struggling with French and should probably stick with just one foreign language for now. Maybe in the future....we`ll see. But anyways, it was interesting...she stopped Sister Tschumi in the middle of the lesson and looked at me and told me that I was beautiful and she loved my eyes. She said that she reminded me of some of the people in her Pentecostal congregation back in Columbia who even though they wore longer skirts and not much jewelry and didn`t have that more `worldy` beauty, they were still more beautiful than most of the world because they had the light of Christ in them and people can see that and are drawn towards that. And I have that same light in my eyes that just draws people towards me. It was pretty neat :) I hope others can see that too....
But anyways, so all that was fun. Also this week we had TRANSFER CALLS!! That`s always exciting. I was pretty sure that both Sister Tschumi and I were staying here, and that`s what everyone else thought as well. Elder Grinton talked to me for awhile on Thursday (he`s my zone leader and had just talked to the Assistants the day before when they were going over what was going to happen in our zone) and told me that he had recommended that I specifically stay, that we stay together, and the reasons why he said that, and they said they thought that was a good idea so they were going to pray about keeping us together. But then transfer call night came (Saturday) and we were all at the Institute Center making fluatas (spelling?) for our dinner that we were having and instead of the zone leaders just telling us that we were both staying, the Assistants called us saying that I was staying, but Sister Tschumi was being transferred to Monterrey, which is in Montreal Spanish-speaking. Insane. So I`m getting Sister Leonard as my new companion. She came out the same time that Sister Cottrell did (so this will be her 3rd transfer), she`s from Belgium, and she speaks French, English, and Spanish, and she`s amazing. She`s so outgoing and way excited to be here and be a missionary. It should be fun...I`m excited. And pretty much the rest of our district is staying the same...Elder Williams is leaving which will be really sad, but Elder Magre, Elder de la Torre, and Elder Grinton are all staying, so it should be a blast. I`m way excited for this transfer :)
Other than that, i can`t think of anything really interesting that happened this week. I know everybody was shocked at church on Sunday when they announced that Sister Tschumi was leaving...they were all certain that I was going to leave and she was going to stay. But that`s all right...I love Quebec and I`m excited to stay here another one :) But anyways, I hope you all have a wonderful week! Take care! Love you all! :)
Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey
This week has been crazy....I ended up getting sick for most of it, so we didn`t get tons of work done, but we did still do quite a bit. I`ve been fighting a cold for the last 3 months or so, and it finally won this Tuesday and I was barely able to stand without falling over, so Siste Tschumi and I decided that tracting was probably not the best activity and we spent the next three days at home while I slept. Not ideal for the last week of the transfer, but sometimes there`s not much of a choice. But anyways, in between all of the sleeping, we did get some things done! We taught Liz again...she`s doing so well! I`m not sure if I mentioned her in any of the last e-mails...we`ve taught her twice now and have the third appointment with her tomorrow. We met her while knocking doors one day and she said she doesn`t believe in God or religion because there are so many difficulties in her life (she has huntington`s disease and because of that she lost her job, her home, her husband, and her family doesn`t talk to her tons) and so many people go to church just on Sundays and then are complete hypocrites the rest of the week. Or at least, that was her reasoning for why she doesn`t believe in anything. She also said that of the churches, ours was probably the most generous and the most christlike, and she`d be happy to listen to us, and if we could convince her, that`d be great. So we`ve taught her now a couple of times and I think she`s slowly starting to change her perspective and realize that we`re really there because we honestly believe what we teach. We`re here because we want others to have better lives and more happiness, and we know how that`s possible, and so we`re here to share it. I`m excited to keep teaching her...it`ll be fun :)
We also taught a girl named Shirley yesterday. She`s actually one of the zone leaders investigators, but they didn`t have a chaperone and so they couldn`t teach her and so they asked us to. She`s from Columbia, has a 2 year old daughter who was way active, and doesn`t speak a word of either French or English, only Spanish. Crazy. So we took a Spanish speaking member with us (who unfortunately was so preoccupied with the little girl that she didn`t get a chance to talk very much, but Sister Tschumi did amazing as a teacher, so it turned out all right :) ) and taught the first discussion. It was really interesting...it kind of made me want to learn Spanish, but then I remembered that I`m struggling with French and should probably stick with just one foreign language for now. Maybe in the future....we`ll see. But anyways, it was interesting...she stopped Sister Tschumi in the middle of the lesson and looked at me and told me that I was beautiful and she loved my eyes. She said that she reminded me of some of the people in her Pentecostal congregation back in Columbia who even though they wore longer skirts and not much jewelry and didn`t have that more `worldy` beauty, they were still more beautiful than most of the world because they had the light of Christ in them and people can see that and are drawn towards that. And I have that same light in my eyes that just draws people towards me. It was pretty neat :) I hope others can see that too....
But anyways, so all that was fun. Also this week we had TRANSFER CALLS!! That`s always exciting. I was pretty sure that both Sister Tschumi and I were staying here, and that`s what everyone else thought as well. Elder Grinton talked to me for awhile on Thursday (he`s my zone leader and had just talked to the Assistants the day before when they were going over what was going to happen in our zone) and told me that he had recommended that I specifically stay, that we stay together, and the reasons why he said that, and they said they thought that was a good idea so they were going to pray about keeping us together. But then transfer call night came (Saturday) and we were all at the Institute Center making fluatas (spelling?) for our dinner that we were having and instead of the zone leaders just telling us that we were both staying, the Assistants called us saying that I was staying, but Sister Tschumi was being transferred to Monterrey, which is in Montreal Spanish-speaking. Insane. So I`m getting Sister Leonard as my new companion. She came out the same time that Sister Cottrell did (so this will be her 3rd transfer), she`s from Belgium, and she speaks French, English, and Spanish, and she`s amazing. She`s so outgoing and way excited to be here and be a missionary. It should be fun...I`m excited. And pretty much the rest of our district is staying the same...Elder Williams is leaving which will be really sad, but Elder Magre, Elder de la Torre, and Elder Grinton are all staying, so it should be a blast. I`m way excited for this transfer :)
Other than that, i can`t think of anything really interesting that happened this week. I know everybody was shocked at church on Sunday when they announced that Sister Tschumi was leaving...they were all certain that I was going to leave and she was going to stay. But that`s all right...I love Quebec and I`m excited to stay here another one :) But anyways, I hope you all have a wonderful week! Take care! Love you all! :)
Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey
Monday, May 17, 2010
"To say and do what He Himself would say and do if He personally were ministering to the people to whom He has sent me."
Hey everyone!
So the past 2 weeks have been so much fun! It really has been great to be a missionary. The weather has been GORGEOUS and it makes everything even better than it was before! We've been working really hard, like always, but it was nice to have a bit of a break in the middle of tracting this week. On average we go out knocking doors about 5 hours a day, sometimes more, sometimes a bit less, with the occasional less active/recent convert lesson in between. But then last Sunday was MOther's Day so we all got to call home (which was wonderful!) and then Monday we had our zone activity with all the other missionaries in our zone, followed by zone interviews on Tuesday. It really was wonderful. We spent most of the day on Monday playing soccer with the other missionaries, which was fun. I'm not the best at it, but I found that if I just run towards people and kick, something happens. Either I kick the ball and it goes away from the goal, or I kick the person and they fall down, thus also preventing them from scoring. I'm not sure that's the way the game is supposed to be played, but it seemed to work ;)
Then zone conference was really wonderful. We had a really great training from the zone leaders about redefining our vocabulary. So we set, as a zone, the definitions for 10+, committing on the first lesson, and junior companions so that everyone was on the same page and we all knew exactly what was expected of us. And they asked the Junior companions to step it up a little bit. They have great faith and great insight, and they need to show that, use it, and use their excitement to push the senior companions to be better and work harder. Sister McKinnon said that's the first time since she's been there that anyone's given a training on that and it was a little different and unexpected at first, but it went really well and I really enjoyed it. Then we also had the district leader trainings and Sister McKinnon's trainings. Oh, and the AP's told us about this really great ice cream place that we went to afterwards, and it was SO good...it's not very far away from the church and they're all chocolate dipped cones and the chocolate is so thick on them (needless to say I gave up my no chocolate goal for that day ;) ). That doesn't really have anything to do with the zone conference, but it was a fun break in the week...I enjoyed it.
Then what else happened? I talked with Patrick and he is doing SO well...I just love him. He's got some difficult decisions to make in his life right now, but he was talking to me and he said the one thing he knows he needs to hold on to is that faith. He says he prays every night and every morning and he reads his scriptures daily and he knows that that's important, so even when it's hard, he's going to keep doing that. It was really neat. I just love him! :) Then we also taught a couple other people this week. We stopped by a guy's house named Daniel who we taught once about 2 weeks ago. He told us that he had read in the Book of Mormong and it was really interesting, but then he'd looked up things on the church's website and he's not sure he wants to get involved in the church enough that he has to pay tithing or go to church each week. We talked about the blessings that come and what a blessing it is to have the gift of the HOly Ghost all the time, and he said that would be great, but he's not sure he can do it. So we told him to keep the Book of Mormon and keep reading it and then to pray and ask if God wants him to continue going forward with the gospel and we'd call him in a couple of days to see what his answer is. So that was yesterday and we're planning on calling him tomorrow so see what he's decided...we'll see how that goes! Then we've had a couple other lessons, but nothing too promising...we're going to keep working though and I'm sure we'll find someone who's interested soon!
Other than that, the week has been pretty average. Transfer calls are coming up this Saturday and we have no idea what's going to happen. We know there will be a lot of changes with the elders and there's at least one new sister coming in (as of right now at least) so we'll see what happens! I'll let you know next Monday! :)
Anyways, I hope you all have a wonderful week! Take care! I love you all ! :)
Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey
So the past 2 weeks have been so much fun! It really has been great to be a missionary. The weather has been GORGEOUS and it makes everything even better than it was before! We've been working really hard, like always, but it was nice to have a bit of a break in the middle of tracting this week. On average we go out knocking doors about 5 hours a day, sometimes more, sometimes a bit less, with the occasional less active/recent convert lesson in between. But then last Sunday was MOther's Day so we all got to call home (which was wonderful!) and then Monday we had our zone activity with all the other missionaries in our zone, followed by zone interviews on Tuesday. It really was wonderful. We spent most of the day on Monday playing soccer with the other missionaries, which was fun. I'm not the best at it, but I found that if I just run towards people and kick, something happens. Either I kick the ball and it goes away from the goal, or I kick the person and they fall down, thus also preventing them from scoring. I'm not sure that's the way the game is supposed to be played, but it seemed to work ;)
Then zone conference was really wonderful. We had a really great training from the zone leaders about redefining our vocabulary. So we set, as a zone, the definitions for 10+, committing on the first lesson, and junior companions so that everyone was on the same page and we all knew exactly what was expected of us. And they asked the Junior companions to step it up a little bit. They have great faith and great insight, and they need to show that, use it, and use their excitement to push the senior companions to be better and work harder. Sister McKinnon said that's the first time since she's been there that anyone's given a training on that and it was a little different and unexpected at first, but it went really well and I really enjoyed it. Then we also had the district leader trainings and Sister McKinnon's trainings. Oh, and the AP's told us about this really great ice cream place that we went to afterwards, and it was SO good...it's not very far away from the church and they're all chocolate dipped cones and the chocolate is so thick on them (needless to say I gave up my no chocolate goal for that day ;) ). That doesn't really have anything to do with the zone conference, but it was a fun break in the week...I enjoyed it.
Then what else happened? I talked with Patrick and he is doing SO well...I just love him. He's got some difficult decisions to make in his life right now, but he was talking to me and he said the one thing he knows he needs to hold on to is that faith. He says he prays every night and every morning and he reads his scriptures daily and he knows that that's important, so even when it's hard, he's going to keep doing that. It was really neat. I just love him! :) Then we also taught a couple other people this week. We stopped by a guy's house named Daniel who we taught once about 2 weeks ago. He told us that he had read in the Book of Mormong and it was really interesting, but then he'd looked up things on the church's website and he's not sure he wants to get involved in the church enough that he has to pay tithing or go to church each week. We talked about the blessings that come and what a blessing it is to have the gift of the HOly Ghost all the time, and he said that would be great, but he's not sure he can do it. So we told him to keep the Book of Mormon and keep reading it and then to pray and ask if God wants him to continue going forward with the gospel and we'd call him in a couple of days to see what his answer is. So that was yesterday and we're planning on calling him tomorrow so see what he's decided...we'll see how that goes! Then we've had a couple other lessons, but nothing too promising...we're going to keep working though and I'm sure we'll find someone who's interested soon!
Other than that, the week has been pretty average. Transfer calls are coming up this Saturday and we have no idea what's going to happen. We know there will be a lot of changes with the elders and there's at least one new sister coming in (as of right now at least) so we'll see what happens! I'll let you know next Monday! :)
Anyways, I hope you all have a wonderful week! Take care! I love you all ! :)
Love, Sister Nicole Lindsey
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)