Hello!
Cole Harbour is amazing :D We've had a fantastic week and the work just carries on. One thing I really love about this area is just that the spirit is so strong here! I feel that we are constantly seeing miracles and tender mercies, we're meeting the right person at the right time, we're having prayers answered. Nothing HUGE has happened, but really, "By small and simple things do great things come to pass" so I'm excited to see these "great things" unfold in the next few weeks!
I'm pressed for time so I'll simply include a few of my favorites from the week!
Zone training!
I was able to prepare a training on Teaching for Understanding! so I started with a demonstration of teaching simply. I had an elder (Elder Simmons) come up and told him to write in Chinese on the board for me, I just told him Ni Hao then he wrote some hashtags# in an attempt. Then I explained to him the tones in Chinese and wrote it out in English to see if that would help, still nothing, so then I wrote it really quickly as an example and he couldn't follow. Eventually I took him step by step through it. The Zone was great about supporting him, cheering haha and it really helped drive home the example. I explained the three focus things using my example. The Doctrine; there is a wrong way to teach, Where it is found: PMG-teaching for understanding, Why is it important to them: Because we are called to teach the gospel simply. I thought it went pretty well, we got some laughs and when we did our role plays those three points were often used in the evaluations.
I also gave my final testimony for the zone. That was crazy. I never thought that day would come! Thank goodness I still have time left. People look at me like I'm turning into a ghost I'm so old. Sheesh! (mission old that is)
Friday: We were able to go to the temple to be there for a couple in the ward who were being sealed to each other. In the temple, with people who have authority, man and wife can be married to each other for time and all eternity. This is how we can be with our families forever. I was so touched as I watched them. The Sister has MS and was confined to a wheel chair. she can't do anything on her own, is skin and bones, and can hardly talk. I heard she wasn't always this way. Her husband, strong, happy and healthy is so attentive to her every need. He would do anything for her, and he does do everything she needs. To see his steadfastness in that trial, that he hasn't given up on her and that he was willing to be sealed to her for eternity showed me a depth of love, and commitment, and perspective I have rarely seen before. It was a precious moment.
Saturday: I got a phone call from one of my friends in Amherst, Nova Scotia! Sarah, a girl in the branch there called because she and some of the Amherst crew came up to the temple! I got to see her and Connie! A woman I helped to teach and baptize, it was such a blessing. I was feeling kind of down about my time there, wondering if I had helped at all. And as I talked to them I just felt so much love, they updated me on people I knew and had taught or helped and it helped me to see that I did make an impact there! I really needed to hear that, as I have been reflecting on my mission there are so many ways I feel I have fallen short. But that was a tender mercy from God telling me that I have done good in the world, that I have helped even in a small way. And that's enough!
I love this work! And I fully intend to do as many good deeds as I can before I leave. To teach and preach and do as missionaries do :) Whenever I am down or if I'm not in the mood to talk to people because I'm afraid they'll be rude or won't listen I recite in my head the standard of truth:
"The Standard of Truth has been erected, no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing. Persecutions may rage, mobs may combine, armies may assemble and calumny may defame, but the truth of God will go forth, boldly, nobly and independent till it has penetrated every continent, visited every climb, swept ever country and sounded in ever ear. Till the purposes of God have been accomplished and the great Jehovah shall say, the work is done."
Amen Brothers and Sisters!
Sister Smith
ps. There is still time to send letters ;)
Cole Harbour is amazing :D We've had a fantastic week and the work just carries on. One thing I really love about this area is just that the spirit is so strong here! I feel that we are constantly seeing miracles and tender mercies, we're meeting the right person at the right time, we're having prayers answered. Nothing HUGE has happened, but really, "By small and simple things do great things come to pass" so I'm excited to see these "great things" unfold in the next few weeks!
I'm pressed for time so I'll simply include a few of my favorites from the week!
Zone training!
I was able to prepare a training on Teaching for Understanding! so I started with a demonstration of teaching simply. I had an elder (Elder Simmons) come up and told him to write in Chinese on the board for me, I just told him Ni Hao then he wrote some hashtags# in an attempt. Then I explained to him the tones in Chinese and wrote it out in English to see if that would help, still nothing, so then I wrote it really quickly as an example and he couldn't follow. Eventually I took him step by step through it. The Zone was great about supporting him, cheering haha and it really helped drive home the example. I explained the three focus things using my example. The Doctrine; there is a wrong way to teach, Where it is found: PMG-teaching for understanding, Why is it important to them: Because we are called to teach the gospel simply. I thought it went pretty well, we got some laughs and when we did our role plays those three points were often used in the evaluations.
I also gave my final testimony for the zone. That was crazy. I never thought that day would come! Thank goodness I still have time left. People look at me like I'm turning into a ghost I'm so old. Sheesh! (mission old that is)
Friday: We were able to go to the temple to be there for a couple in the ward who were being sealed to each other. In the temple, with people who have authority, man and wife can be married to each other for time and all eternity. This is how we can be with our families forever. I was so touched as I watched them. The Sister has MS and was confined to a wheel chair. she can't do anything on her own, is skin and bones, and can hardly talk. I heard she wasn't always this way. Her husband, strong, happy and healthy is so attentive to her every need. He would do anything for her, and he does do everything she needs. To see his steadfastness in that trial, that he hasn't given up on her and that he was willing to be sealed to her for eternity showed me a depth of love, and commitment, and perspective I have rarely seen before. It was a precious moment.
Saturday: I got a phone call from one of my friends in Amherst, Nova Scotia! Sarah, a girl in the branch there called because she and some of the Amherst crew came up to the temple! I got to see her and Connie! A woman I helped to teach and baptize, it was such a blessing. I was feeling kind of down about my time there, wondering if I had helped at all. And as I talked to them I just felt so much love, they updated me on people I knew and had taught or helped and it helped me to see that I did make an impact there! I really needed to hear that, as I have been reflecting on my mission there are so many ways I feel I have fallen short. But that was a tender mercy from God telling me that I have done good in the world, that I have helped even in a small way. And that's enough!
I love this work! And I fully intend to do as many good deeds as I can before I leave. To teach and preach and do as missionaries do :) Whenever I am down or if I'm not in the mood to talk to people because I'm afraid they'll be rude or won't listen I recite in my head the standard of truth:
"The Standard of Truth has been erected, no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing. Persecutions may rage, mobs may combine, armies may assemble and calumny may defame, but the truth of God will go forth, boldly, nobly and independent till it has penetrated every continent, visited every climb, swept ever country and sounded in ever ear. Till the purposes of God have been accomplished and the great Jehovah shall say, the work is done."
Amen Brothers and Sisters!
Sister Smith
ps. There is still time to send letters ;)