June 20, 2011

Dear family,

I hope that you've all had a great week! Ours here was pretty good! We picked up two new investigators and set 3 new baptismal dates! It was a good week, filled with some pretty cool stories, so strap in!

The week started kind of slow... On Tuesday night we got to go to the relief society activity for the month. They had a Summer Salad Social, and there were a ton of the ward and less actives and non-members there. It was really cool to go and meet everyone. I felt a little bit like a politician as I circulated through everyone, like I was "working the room" hahaha. But it was great because we got to meet a bunch of the less actives and some of the sister's non member friends. No real interest in taking the lessons yet, but we'll work on them. :)

Wednesday was a REALLY hard day. We had no scheduled lessons, so we basically just knocked on doors ALL day. We had no success and it was VERY discouraging. I was having a really hard day that day, so at about 4:00, I decided that we were going to do something else. So we found some shade (have I mentioned that it's in the 90's most days now, and this week it will get over 100?) and started "randomly" calling less actives and former investigators to see if we might be able to set up any appointments for either that night or later in the week. We got a few takers. One of them being a former investigator named Erica. The Elders stopped meeting with her over a year ago because Erica and her family were always too busy to meet or to come to church. We set up an appointment for the next day. Thursday we met with her and one of the first things she told us was that she's been having a really hard time lately and yesterday she had told her mom, who is living with her, that she missed the missionaries, and if they would come back, she would listen better. And we called two hours after that!!! How cool is that!!! We talked about adversity and why life has to be so hard. We talked about the Book of Mormon and told her we'd come back on Saturday. When we did, we talked about the Doctrine of Christ from 3 Nephi 11, and talked a lot about baptism. She and her 9 year old daughter were both very into it, and we committed them both to be baptized on July 17th, and they said YES!!! It was so cool. The spirit was definately there, and I'm so excited to be able to continue teaching them. :)

We've also been able to get into several of the less active's homes this week. It's been fun to teach new people. When I was first transferred here, I missed the people of Colusa a lot, but as I've started to embrace the ward, they've opened up and embraced us. Yesterday, when they passed the dinner calendar around, we found out that the entire months of June and July have already been filled. The ward is excited to have us here, and they're excited to help us do the work! It's a different feeling from before, and I'm glad to be here.

This upcoming week should be pretty cool. We have a bunch of appointments scheduled already and two baptisms on Sunday. YAY!!! Chris, who I told you about already, and Ken, who we met for the first time last night. He's a single dad who's son was baptized in December. He's a super cool guy, and has a very strong testimony of the gospel! It's so cool that he gets to get baptized. Also, I get to go to the temple on Friday!!! I'm so excited. I haven't been since December, and I never realized how much strength I drew from temple attendance before my mission. It's been eye opening to find out exactly how fast I've lost sight of the eternal perspective, which we gain from going to the temple. So I'm really excited to go, and plus, I found out that Sister Barfuss is going on the same day, in the same session, so I'll get to see her again, which i can hardly wait for! I love that girl!!! Then, on Friday afternoon and night, we'll be working in Colusa, teaching some of the investigators and less actives there, which will be really good! This week is going to be really good. :)

I love you all and I love my mission. I can't wait to hear how you're all doing!

Love, Sister Reid

June 13, 2011

Dear friends and family,

I hope that everything has been great with all of you this last week. Things here have been CRAZY! I think I told you all last week that I was being "shotgunned" to a new area and that I am also training. So first things are first... My new companion's name is Sister Hurtado. She's from Peru and she speaks very little English. She learned everything she knows about the language at the MTC... So it's been an interesting week. lol. She's a convert of about 4 years. She's 22 years old. She has 3 siblings. She's the 2nd oldest. Her mom, and two younger siblings are members, but her dad and older sister are not. Her family was not very supportive of her coming on her mission at first, but they warmed up to the idea, and now she's here! It's going to be a challenge for us, as we learn to communicate and to teach together.

Next up: The ward. We're serving in the Feather River ward. We're still in the Yuba City Stake, mostly because President asked that I keep my eyes on Colusa still, which I'm grateful for. He's given permission for us to spend 3 or 4 days a month in Colusa, teaching the investigators and less actives that we've been working with. Colusa is about 45 minutes away from where we're serving now. The ward we're in is part of down-town Yuba City (population about 65,000). It's so nice to be around people again! And the ward is amazing. The Ward Mission Leader is excited to have us here and so is everyone else in the ward. At first, I was very overwhelmed by the substantial learning curve -- I know NOTHING about the investigators, less actives, ward leadership, and the area. Bless their hearts, but the elders who were serving here before us did not do a very good job keeping accurate records, so I was not given a whole lot of information. And I've learned a lot about what an Elder considers a "clean" apartment.... hahahaha. But we've been so busy trying to catch up and learn everything and meet everyone that this morning was the first opportunity we had to clean. And I still haven't completely unpacked.

A lot of the lessons we've taught this week have been mostly just introducing ourselves and assesing the needs of the investigators and less actives. The elders left us with two progressing investigators, and we set baptismal dates with both of them this week. Chris is the first. And he's interesting. :) A couple months ago, the stake had a Mormon Helping Hands service project, and one of the homes that we worked on was Chris's. There's no other way to describe him than to be blunt, so here it is: He's gay. Really. A lot. But he's read the Book of Mormon, and come to church every week since the service project. He knows that the lifestyle he's been leading is wrong, and when he was interviewed by the Mission President, he committed to living a heterosexual lifestyle. Now he calls himself a "non-practicing gay man" with the idea that eventually, the spirit and Heavenly Father, will help him to change completely. President Pendleton gave us the okay, and so we set his date for the 26th of this month. The other progressing investigator is Ken. He has a 10 year old son that started coming to scouts with one of his friends. The son, Tanner, got baptized a few weeks ago. Ken has been a little slower in accepting the gospel, but this week, when we met with him, he said he wanted to be baptized, so he's getting baptized the same time as Chris. The 26th is going to be a fun night!

That's pretty much it for this week. I'm looking forward to the learning experiences that I will be having with my companion this transfer and to the new people I'll get to know and love in the Feather River ward. I'm grateful for all of your prayers. I've really felt them this week as I've knelt in prayer myself. Prayer has really been the only thing that's gotten me through this first week, and it's what I'll continue to rely on as I work hard to get to know my new area and my new companion. I pray for all of you every day; for your health, your success, and for you to have happiness in your lives. I love you all so much. I know I couldn't do this without your support. So thanks, and I'll talk to you next week. :)

Love, Sister Reid

June 6.2011

Hello everyone!

I'm not sure that I have much to tell you this week. It the hardest week I've had since I started my mission. We found out on monday night when he called that President Pendleton was considering closing our area. It's something that I've considered for this area too, but I wanted it to happen after I left, not while I was still here. So we had a hard time working this last week, since it's hard to pick up new investigators when they won't have anyone to teach them... And it was extra hard because we couldn't tell anyone about it. President Pendleton is closing the area mostly because there just isn't the member support for the work like there should be. Honestly, it has been really hard to work here, effectively. But we've been doing our best. The final decision was made Saturday when, because of a little rain, the barbeque/chapel tour that Sister Barfuss and I have been working on for almost 15 weeks was canceled. It was really hard to see that all the work we've done here for this huge missionary event was canceled, with no regret on the part of the branch.

But even at that point, we didn't know what was going to happen to the work here for sure until President Pendleton called us this morning to let us know that we would be leaving tomorrow. It's heart breaking. And I can only hope and pray that the branch won't lose the investigators and less actives we've been teaching after we leave.

So, I bet you're all wondering where I'm going now! Well, I found out just this morning that I'll be "shotgunning" a new ward. Some of you may know it as "whitewashing," but it essentially means that the missionaries in the area are both being moved out at the same time, and that me and my companion will move in without any preconcieved notions about the area. It'll be challenging, but the hardest part, and the part that I'm most nervous about is that I'll also be training again. So not only will I know nothing about the new ward, but I'll also have a brand new companion who needs to be taught everything! Yikes!!! I'm very nervous and I'll need all your prayers and support and love and letters and emails that you can send my way for the next several weeks.

So... sorry it's short. But we had a tough week here, and I've got an even tougher week ahead. I can't wait to tell you all about it next week, though.

Love, Sister Reid

May 30, 2011

Hello everyone! I hope that all of you had a great week! Mine was pretty good. Not great, but good. :) We had some successes with a few of our investigators that I'll tell you about in a few minutes, and I had the opportunity to do exchanges down in Yuba City. I spent two days with my MTC Companion, and things have really changed for her. We had a great day yesterday, (it's always awesome when Sundays are great on the mission) and today we're exchanging again, only this time Sister Barfuss is going to Yuba and I will be with Sister Oro, who has been on her mission only 5 weeks. She is from the Phillipines. It should be a great day.

So to start with: Exchanges. Because we live so far away from the other sisters, we usually do exchanges only twice a transfer, and then it's for Monday night through Wednesday afternoon. I got to go to Yuba this week and spend the time with Sister Threlkeld, who most of you may remember was my MTC companion. When we served together there, it was not the easiest companionship. We didn't really get along that well and I think it had something to do with both of our attitudes about each other. We weren't really serving together, so neither of us put much effort into it. As a result, neither of us really had much fun at the MTC. Going on exchanges with her this week was an eye opener. Sister Threlkeld has changed so much since the MTC. She's a new person. And she's trying to make the effort. It was worth being away from Sister Barfuss and my area for two days if only to see that Sister Threlkeld's mission has changed her. It makes me wonder how much my mission has changed me. What kind of person was I before, and will any of you even recognize me?

Anyway. The next cool thing that happened after exchanges was that we had a sister's training at the Mission home on Thursday. Basically, all the sisters in the whole mission (the senior sisters and the wives of the presidency too) all get together for lunch and a special "district meeting" where we get trained by each other and president Pendleton. It was a good thing for me. We talked a lot about commitments and progressing investigators. And when we have investigators that aren't keeping the commitments, we have to realize that in those cases, all of my faith won't do anything for them. If they're not willing to do the things required to grow their own faith, than we should walk away, and not worry about it. It was good for me to hear. We've had to drop several of our investigators in the last couple weeks and that has been hard for me. When you love and pray for them so much, and they don't reciprocate in the way that you need them to, it hurts. But it was good for President to say that it's okay to let them go, and then not to worry about them. The Lord loves them, and He'll continue to work with them and someday, He'll send them the missionaries again, who can help them when they're ready. :)

So it was a good day - plus we got to see all the other sisters too. I got to meet some of the newer sisters that I haven't met since I've been up here. And I got to see Sister Christensen again. I miss that girl! It was cool. For a lot of the sisters, it was the last time they'll see President and Sister Pendleton. They're leaving at the end of June. :( Sister Barfuss and I have interviews on Wednesday, and that will be the last time for us. It will be hard to say goodbye...

On Friday we were back to pounding the pavement. We walked 6 or 7 miles, and I know that we haven't done it in awhile because I got 4 brand new blisters on my right foot... I guess we should be walking more... lol.

On Saturday night we had a great lesson with Jan and Leonard. We talked a lot about faith and we were able to discover some of their concerns. The spirit was amazing! We found out that they've been dragging their feet about getting baptized because, even though they know that it's true, they don't understand why they need to be baptized again... since they've both been baptized already. :) So we have a good place to go with them when we meet with them next time.

We had a great lesson with a new investigator on Sunday afternoon. Joann has investigated the church before but has never prayed about the book of mormon. We talked about that and about baptism with her as well. It was a good lesson. I'm really enjoying teaching people about the gospel. It's awesome, and I almost can't wait each day for the cool things that will happen...

Which, not many have been lately... Sadly. Sister Barfuss and I were talking about it last night, and we've decided that we need to pray for and expect that the Lord is preparing people for us to find. Last night we committed to be better and talking to people and working harder. We're already seeing results because today while we were at the Laudromat, a total stranger came up to us and started asking about our name tags. We won't teach him because he's moving to South Carolina this week, but that conversation sparked another with a lady that just moved to Colusa a few months ago. Her name is Jenny and she's been trying to find friends. She already knows a few of the people from church through a sewing group that she joined. We invited her to the Relief Society Activity for next week which is a "needles" night where everyone is just bringing sewing projects they've been working on, and they'll be teaching us about crocheting and knitting and crosstitching and stuff like that. She's excited and so are we!

So that's about it for today. I love you all and I miss you and I can't wait till Monday agian to tell you all the crazy cool things that will have happened by then. Remember that you can ask Heavenly Father for miracles, and if you work for them, He'll give them to you. It's a cool principle of Faith that I'm learning this week. Read about and study Faith in the Bible Dictionary!

Love Sister Reid

May 23, 2011

A short email today, and I'm sorry. My mission president and his wife are finishing their missions in a month, and we've been asked to take some time today to share our testimonies with them. So some of my email time got eaten up by that. I apologize. A longer email will come next week.

We had a really cool experience this week. We had the opportunity to have a mini missionary with us all week. Her name is Laren Walker. She's one of the young single adults in the branch here. She's home for the summer from college. Her family was all converted about 6 years ago. Ever since then, Laren has wanted to serve a mission. She's been coming with us to a bunch of our lessons, and when we suggested that she might want to serve a mini mission, she jumped at the chance. She could only serve one week, though, because she goes back to school on the 4th. So Tuesday night, we picked her up from the Stake President's office, where she'd just been set apart as a full time missionary, and she'll be with us until this afternoon. It's been really cool to have her with us, and I'll be super sad tonight when it's just me and Sister Barfuss agian. The house will be empty.

We had a great lesson with Michael this week. At the end of teaching him the Plan of Salvation, we asked him to say the prayer, and this time to ask specifically if what we were teaching was true. In his prayer, he said, "I trust the girls but I need you to show me." and then he closed the prayer really fast, which I thought was weird. After the prayer he said, "I asked that question, and I felt uplifted. It kind of freaked me out, and I had to end the prayer." It was cool. We also got permission to go to his baptism in Chico in a couple weeks. We'll have taught him most of the lessons by then, so that will be awesome!

That's it for this week. A longer email with more spiritual stuff for next time, I promise.

Love, Sister Reid