Thank Goodness for General Conference!

Hey everyone, 

 

Again, your lives sound awesome right now. I'm so grateful that you are being blessed while I am away. I'm somewhat jealous you guys get to go shooting though, I had a lot of fun when I did it with the Heckamans. And I'm not surprised that Matthew (Whitney's cousin) is now the AP in Italy. He's awesome. I hope you all enjoyed General Conference too, the talks were incredible. Sunday morning session really spoke to me the most, and my favorites were Elder Bednar, Elder Holland, Elder Anderson, Elder Zwick, Pres. Uchtdorf, Sister Jean Stevens, and of course Pres. Monson. A few key things I got from Conference are these:

 

1) Replace your fear with faith. 

2) What is the load that you're carrying? Will it give you the "spiritual traction" to move forward? If it will, do you just need to make the decision to actually move forward? 

3) Trials make our faith stronger and our spiritual roots run deeper. 

4) Stop the corrupt communication with each other!

5) Obedience does not show weakness, it shows wisdom, especially with obeying God's laws (which never change)

6) Gratitude is the way you can find peace right now, whether the times are bad or good. 

What was weird about Conference is that it starts at noon here for the morning session, then the afternoon session starts at 4 pm. Kind of late compared to what I'm used to! Also, we went to the church building for all 4 sessions, and the turn-out was pretty scarce because everyone was home. For the Saturday afternoon session, it was just the two of us, and the elders serving in the other ward! 

I would be lying if I said that mission life has been sunshine-y and great. But hope is never lost. Despite the figurative storms that really came down over the weekend, I have seen some tender mercies from the Lord. We went to a potential investigator's home, and I was able to do a very fluid door approach that came naturally to me. The man, Gary, was interested to read the Book of Mormon, so we are going back to drop one off to him and hopefully teach him more. Members that we have had dinner with show such compassion to us, and the other night, this sweet 6 year old girl just came up and gave me a hug. So Mom, keep giving the sister missionaries hugs, because they totally need them! At other times, when I am literally left on my own to make plans and figure out what to do because my trainer is not helping me, I have plead in prayer and felt the arms of the Spirit embrace me. The power of the Holy Ghost is real. Christ suffered all things and knows exactly what we feel. We are never truly left on our own. We just need to put our trust in Him and pay attention to the whisperings of the Spirit. 

Regarding investigators, we have had to leave Ron and Suzan alone for a little while, because both of Ron's parents passed away within a week of each other and family life is crazy right now. We got Mike, our "eterna-gator" (eternal investigator) to Conference, and one of the talks really called him out, that he shouldn't be putting off receiving the ordinance of baptism any more! Another eterna-gator, Hailey who's 21, watched it yesterday too, and we actually have dinner with her tonight! She's awesome. 

Letters are veryyyyy appreciated- and seriously, I have replied to everyone right away, so I GUARANTEE that you will get a letter back :)

One funny story though- I got attacked a dog this week (classic missionary incident). These less-actives had three small dogs, two dachshunds and a Yorkie, which all attacked us at the door. One dachshund was super bratty and latched onto my leg, leaving a huge bite mark in one of my boots. Stupid dog. The Yorkie was nicer though, and sat on my lap while we visited the couple. Holding puppies makes up for not being able to hold people's babies for sure! (mission rules state you can't hold children). 

Love you all, 

Sister Petersen

(sorry, no pictures this week!)

 

1201 Colony Drive #42

Zanesville, OH 43701