Second 9 - Letter 52 - St Helena, CA

The 88:73

Hello Everyone! This week has been crazy! We have so many wonderful things going on here in Saint Helena! First things first English Class is the best thing that we have done. We are having so much success with it! We have 5 students in our class and they are all so willing to learn English. It is really so fun to help them and they are just so excited about it! We also ran into one of our students tracting and so we shared a little bit of the restoration with him. He seemed interested in learning a little more about the gospel so we will hopefuly be able to start teaching him soon. Also we had a blitz in our area and we recieved so many referrals and we also picked up a new investigator named Manuel that we found during the blitz. He is in his late 20s and is super interested in learning more about our religion. He prayed during our lesson and it was one of the most powerful prayers that I have ever heard. He was so heartfelt and really wanted to express his feelings to His Father in Heaven. He is the first new investigator that we have picked up this transfer so that was such a great feeling. We have so many wonderful investigators that we love and that are progressing but we need more people to teach. This week we had a great lesson with Eva and Gilberto. It was a neat experience because we were not sure what to teach them and we went into the lesson not even knowing what to do or what we were going to teach but then we were in the lesson it was so clear that we we needed to teach them about prophets. We had a great lesson with them and they really opened up to us and we were able to be ourselves as well. It was awesome. We also taught Maria Vina more about the restoration and she really began to understand about how important the priesthood is and she basically taught her self which was neat. We are teaching great lessons and everything is going very well here in Saint Helena.

Also, this week marked two very big events in history. I have been out on my mission for 1 year! Yikes! Time is flying by! It is so crazy but as I look back at this year it was one time in my life that I don't have regrets! I know that I am doing my all! I have worked hard, had fun, learned a lot, served a lot and enjoyed every second. I am going to continue to live it up these last six months because this is a time in my life that I will never ever get to have again! The second historical event helped me realize how much of a privilige it is to be serving in the mission field at this time. The second historical event requires a drum roll, bells and whistels whatever you got...................

The California Santa Rosa Mission is the First Mission in THE WORLD to have the 88:73!

Translation: The California Santa Rosa Mission is the first Mission in THE WORLD to use i-pad minis to share the gospel with the entire world!

I hope that you all understand how huge this is. Every single missionary in our mission now has a cute little ipad mini. Other missions have had some zones and some districts with these devices but our mission is the first mission where every single missionary has one of these devices to share the gospel.

It is absolutley amazing! I can't believe it! President Alba has dubbed it the 88:73 after Doctorine and Covenants 88:73 which says that the Lord will hasten his work in His time! His time is truly right now and it is a privilige to be a part of it! I never thought that I would be in the mission field when these devices are being used but now I have one sitting in my bag! With these devices we are now a loud to friend any of our non-member or less active friends or family on facebook. We can start having facebook chat lessons with them or even Skype lessons. We will also start teaching mormon.org referrals. We are able to use gospel library to share videos during lessons or during visits with members. We can also do our journals and studies on the 88:73 so it will all be saved in the cloud for the rest of our lives. It is all so excitinh and we are still waiting to recieve more training on all of this so that we can be as effective as possible. Our areabook is even digital now. So everything is becoming so much more accessible so that we can play our part in the hastening.

I have been friending several friends from high school and many family members on facebook. I am still trying to figure out the best way to talk to them about the gosel but because this is still missionary work I always seek guidance from Heavenly Father and it comes.

So this week is going to be neat as we learn more and are able to do more online! I would invite you all to think of friends who you could share the gospel with online because this method is a lot less overwelming. Also think of who do you know that I could start teaching online? Please e-mail me with any questions on how to share the gospel online or with anyone who you would like me to try and teach online. The Lord is hastening His work and the whole world is opened up to our hands. On June 23rd many people thought China would be opened and it has.... online! This is such an exciting time and you all can be a part of it as well!

However, we are not able to friend any of our member friends...yet but don't freak out if you see me on facebook I am not breaking rules!

Thank you for your thoughts and prayers!

Love,

Hermana Hillary Andrews

Second 9 - Letter 51 - St Helena, CA

Go Big and NEVER Go Home!

Hola Hola Hola! Como esta? First of all, muchisimas gracias for all of the birthday wishes. I felt so so so loved! You are all amazing! My Birthday was great! Really one of the best! First of all the sisters that we live with got my birthday packages on Monday when we weren't home and then hid them from me so I went into my birthday thinking that I was not going to get any packages but then during the birthday breakfast that they had for me they surprised me with all of my packages and I loved everything. On my birthday I really took to heart what dad said in his birthday card about enjoying every day and just making every day a good day no matter what. So we worked super super hard on my birthday and it was great! We got 12 contacts which was awesome because we are supposed to be doing 10 contacts every day and we have been struggling with that so it felt so good to be successful and to work hard. My favorite gift has been the canciones para los ninos because we have already memorized a child's prayer in Spanish and are working on the baptism song about rainbows. It is really fun!

This week I went on exchanges in Napa and it was really fun to be in a Spanish branch area for a day! While I was gone on the exchanges the hermanas did our English class and our one less active came and then four other people came that just found out about it through flyers. So that was awesome and it is proving to be a great finding tool. We taught our last English class to Maria Elena before she went back to Mexico and it was bitter sweet. She is so sweet and is starting to have interest in the gospel and so we are going to refer her to Mexico so that she can be taught the gospel there.

 The work has been a little slow but we are breaking ground on trying to get our investigators to church and it is because the members are on board to help us. We had a member come to our lesson who did not even speak Spanish but was so willing to help us and it was great! What I have learned this week is that every day is a good day and you just have to make the best of it! Our motto for this next week is go big and never go home because we are just going to work so hard and put the past behind us and not worry about the future and just focus on the now! Sorry this is a random and short e-mail but we are in Santa Rosa for my physical therapy and so things are crazy!

Keep on keepin on!

Love,

Hermana Andrews

Second 9 - Letter 50 - St Helena, CA

Little by little . . . .

Buenos tardes! Como esta? I hope you are all doing well and that those of you that started school and schedules again are surviving! 

This week lots of little yet wonderful things occurred and it helped me realize that when the little miracles add up they add up to many incredible blessings and experiences. 

Little Miracle #1: The Garcia's (Patricia and Gilberto) got baptized! This is the first couple that we taught when we got here and then we decided to give them back to the English sisters to teach because they were more comfortable being taught by them. However, they feed us dinner ever Wednesday and we are teaching Gilberto's mom English so we have gotten to know them well. They had been investigating for 13 years and it was an incredible experience to see them get baptized! They were just beaming and so many of their non-member family came which was so neat! Even though I did not have a huge part in their conversion it was still amazing to see it all come together.

Little Miracle #2: In a zone meeting on Friday we talked a lot about the divine companionship (the two of us and the Holy Ghost). This Friday we were trying to get an investigator to a baptism and we had the hardest time figuring out what to do because they were not answering and so we prayed over and over again to allow our third companion to work with us and help us know what to do. The investigator did not end up coming to the baptism and we did not have any huge miracles come form the choices we made but it was a great experience to have the Holy Ghost working so closely with us.

Little Miracle #3: Like I mentioned before we are teaching Gilberto Garcias mom Maria Elena English. She is not that interested in the gospel but after coming to the baptism she has a lot of questions about the church which we are hoping to answer this week. She goes back to Mexico on Friday but she told us that she wants to write us to practice her English and keep in touch. I hope this happens because she is an incredible lady!

Little Miracle #4: The cutest young couple just moved into our branch! He is 23 and served his mission in Uruguay and she is 21. They are so fun and it is a really big deal in the branch because we need more members very badly!

Little Miracle #5: All four of our investigators are progressing and have found great member friends for each of them! We are just hoping that they can all get work off on Sunday's because that is what is stopping all of them from coming to church.

Little Miracle #6: We have found so many ways to advertise for our English class this week and are excited for our first class on Tuesday! We have passed out over 100 flyers and we hope to have a good turn out! 

Little Miracle #7: We had the funnest little relief society activity this week that really helped get to know some of our members better. We were also able to help our sweet relief society president set it up which she really appreciated. 

Little Miracle #8: Yesterday in Branch Council we were talking about our only Spnaish member Reinaldo and our Branch President told me that he has realized that I have a very special connection with Reinaldo because many people have a hard time understanding him or getting him to understand them but he sees that we have a very good relationship. It made me so happy to hear this because I try so hard to love everyone as Christ would and my branch president could see that I am doing this with Reinaldo. I considered this compliment was the best birthday gift ever (because another little thing is I turn 22 on Thursday YIKES) because it feels good to know I an at least helping one person! 

Well so many wonderful things are happening even though they aren't huge by small and simple things great things are brought to past. Look for the little miracles in your lives and remember that your prayers are also little miracles in my daily life because they bring me strength.

Thank you for all the birthday wishes and of course the prayers and support!

Love you more than figs (fresh figs off the tree I am obsessed I know weird but they are so good),

Hermana Hillary

Second 9 - Letter 49 - St Helena, CA

D&C 64:33

Hola hola! Last week I forgot to say that this week is the beginning of a new transfer! I guess I am just getting so used to all of this I forgot to give you all the heads up but I am staying here in St.Helena with my dear Hermana Zimmerman for another 6 weeks! Yay! We are both super excited because we get a long really well and we know that there is so much work that we can do in this area!

This week I had a very interesting experience that once again made it so apparent that the hand of the Lord is truly in my every day life. This last week with transfers coming I had kind of been joking around that if President called me to ask me to train or to be a Sister Trainer Leader I would say no because I was already stressed enough. However, I knew that if he really did call I would not say no in the end I would say yes because it would be the Lord's will. Sure enough Sister Alba called me on Wednesday night and asked me to be a Sister Trainer Leader which means that I go to Mission Leadership Council (MLC) once a month and participate in teaching in Zone meetings and District meetings with the Elders who are leaders. I was not really given a chance to accept or reject the calling so of course I just agreed and made the plans to go to MLC on Friday. I went to MLC on Friday and it was such a wonderful experience to learn and to grow. The training that we recieved was incredible and exactly what I needed to hear but throughout the meeting I felt a little stressed and overwhelmed on how I was going to do all that was being asked of me and take care of myself. Then on Friday night Sister Alba called me and said that she was worried about me and if I was going to be able to take care of myself and be a good leader. We decided to fast and pray about it over the weekend and then talk about it after that. As I fasted and prayed I felt a peace that everything would work out and that the most important thing that I need to do is to take care of myself. I came accross D&C 64:33 and I found my answer. "Wherefore, be not ^aweary in ^bwell-doing, for ye are laying the foundation of a great work. And out of ^csmall things proceedeth that which is great." I took this scripture very literally. I must not feel weary because the work that I am doing is so great and even if I can only do a small amount of work each day great things will come out of it. So this morining I called Sister Alba back and we decided that for right now I will not serve as a Sister Trainer Leader but I will just work on being the best that I can be and I feel so happy about this decesion. The Lord knows what we can handle and he will truly watch out for us.

I am excited to take care of myself and be the best that I can be because we have so many wonderful things going on and I need to be in tip top shape. I went to physical therapy again and got a great exercise program to start working on so that will be great. We have four investigators and they are all progressing right now which is amazing. We have Gilberto and Eva who are a older couple who are Christian and have been reading the Book of Mormon together. Then there is Maria Vina who is a mother of many teenage children and she loves learning about the gospel because it helps her know how she can help them. Every time we visit her she says that it feels as if angels are with her it melts my heart every time. And last but not least we are teaching Carina who is a young mother who has many family members who are members and she is searching for the truth. This week we invited her to be baptized and she said that she really wants to be baptized but does not feel like she is ready but then we testified that we feel so strongly that she will be ready and she commited to be baptized on the 31st of August. We really have so many wonderful people who are so  ready to come unto the waters of baptism and I really have a feeling like this transfer will be there time!

We are also starting to teach English classes as a way to find people to teach and we are also going to start teaching our members Spanish so this will be fun! Facebook is also a great way to share the gospel with others by sharing a video or wuote or something else simple to share our beliefs. This work is incredible and we can all find little ways to do it! The Lord knows that we are all capable of sharing the gospel and if we ask he will help us find the little ways that we are supposed to share it!

Even though sometimes I am in pain and this work is hard the tender mercies and blessings make it all so so so so worth it. It can be worth it for you just look for the ways! I know you can do it!

Love you all so much! Love you more than California Strawberries!

Hermana Hillary