3 Weeks Later & a Mission Call

Sorry there hasn't been a blog post in what feels like forever. These past few months have been a roller coaster. So lets catch all of you up! Starting with the big news first!

#1- After waiting what felt like an ETERNITY, I received my mission call! For those of you who don't know where I will be serving for the next 18 months of my life, I will tell you! On September 9th, 2015, I will report to the Provo Missionary Training Center! There I will learn how to teach investigators about the Gospel of Jesus Christ! After 12 days in what everyone says is like Hogwarts for missionaries I will be sent 2,401.6 miles away from my family! The only contact that I will have is weekly emails or letters and twice a year I will be able to Skype (Mother's Day & Christmas)! Words can't describe how happy I am to serve in such a beautiful place! There is no other place that I would rather serve in than the VIRGINIA RICHMOND MISSION! Being a missionary is NOT going to be easy, its probably going to be the hardest thing that I will ever get myself into, but I sure am ready to invite those people to Come Unto Christ!

#2- With my mission call I also had the opportunity to go through the temple and take my endowments out. (Which is making a promise to my Heavenly Father)! The temple is such a beautiful place not only outside but inside as well! I am so grateful for the temple that is so close to me! 

Those are most of the major things that have happened recently! But there are definitely more to come! At this point in time preparing for my mission was easy, but now that I have about 50 days left till I enter the MTC it is getting harder! 

I am so excited for this next chapter in my life and I can't wait to serve the people of Virginia and to invite those who are prepared to come unto Christ! I love this gospel so much and I can't wait to be a missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints!

July 3rd, 2015~ At the Happiest Place on Earth!

My best friend is serving in the Russia Samara Mission & I am serving in the Virginia Richmond Mission!

Virginia Richmond Mission~ September 9th, 2015

WHYYY?? and a Little Color

The past couple of weeks have been crazy! But I am finally posting. 

So I finally went with the sisters again last night (Sunday) and we went to an investigators house named Willie (sp) and I have never been at an investigators house nor talked to them for a hour. But tonight was different. As I walked in I had NO idea what I was getting myself into... The first lesson we usually teach them about the Restoration and let them know that Our Heavenly Father loves us and has a plan for each and every one of us. But as we were talking to Willie he kept asking us, “why?”, He wanted to know why we believed and how we knew that what we were feeling was true and not just a feeling in our minds. (By the way this is like the shorter version. Haha.) As we tried to teach him there were times that I knew we were being led by the spirit and then there were times when I could feel the adversary. Its crazy how much Satan works on us especially when he knows that we are winning, he will do anything for us to not stay on the straight and narrow path. One scripture that I read to Willie was Alma 32:21- “And now as I said concerning faith-faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things; therefore if ye have faith ye hope for things which are not seen, which are true.” I read this scripture because he was having a hard time understanding how to have faith. As you have faith and hope you start to change and you start to see life and things change as well as yourself. 

As I go out with the missionaries I have not only grown, but I have realized that we can’t make someone change. It is up to them to allow the change to happen in there own life. We can help them and guide them just as Jesus helped us, but unless they are inviting the spirit in and allowing that change to actually change them that is really where it starts. 

With this lesson I learned that we are never actually prepared to go into homes. We can go to mission prep and study the scriptures, but we don’t actually know how things are going to work out with the investigators that we teach. Yesterday (Sunday) I realized how much you needed to be guided by the spirit and follow the guidance of it. 

On another note….. 

Kaylee & I!

Last Saturday (February 28th) I had the opportunity to do The Color Run, and WOW what an amazing experience! I had such an awesome time especially being able to do it with my friends. 

And of course we do photo shoots and here’s two of me showing off The Book of Mormon!

And sometimes things come to an end. But last saturday there were transfers and Sis. Robinson was transferred so here is my “why does she have to be transferred face!"

KELSIE LEAVES ON HER MISSION! I am so excited for you Kelsie! You will be an amazing missionary!

Last but not least I went on another run with the sisters. Sis. Hutchings & Sis. Cook!

Quick Little Post!

I can't believe its already been longer than a week... That's so crazy! I feel like days are going by faster and faster, and it just a couple months my mission papers will be put in! And wow am I scared!

Lately has been crazy, going out with the sister missionaries has been taking up a lot of my time. But thats been okay because it is literally amazing! I love it!

I don't remember if I ever told you about the book that I was reading? Well it was by Elder Holland and its called "To My Friends- Message of Counsel & Comfort." Well I finished it! And wow what an amazing book! I still recall like bits and pieces of it and I definitely use what he wrote and put it into my daily life! It literally is comforting reading it. I love how he used real situations to help myself and others understand that things happen!

This past week has been crazy, a little stressful, amazing, and definitely tiring!

But I know for a fact that the Lord wants me to go through these trials for a reason and that he has a plan for all of us! I love this gospel and I can't wait to share it with so many people!


Sorry this post is super short! :/

See you guys next week! Love you! <3 p="">
Hannah!

Jumping the Line

I'll admit that there are good and bad days! There are days where you just want to lay in bed all day and watch Netflix, or you just want to eat all of the bad food your body can take in. Don't let it! Find something that will get your mind off of those negative things.. Look at all of the things you have accomplished! Maybe you have friends who are so smart and you look at all of the positives that they have, yet while your thinking of the positives of them, you are thinking of the negatives of yours. It's hard to think of the positive things in your life! That's where we are so caught up in worldly things that we don't quite know how much of a blessing it is, to see that we can just jump over a line and be in the long eternal things. I do it sometimes.. I look at how some people get full ride scholarships to their dream schools, and I never did, but there was a reason. If I wouldn't have messed up my knee my senior year, I would have never realized my needs to go on a mission. And with going on a mission I will be receiving so many more blessings in the long run, then I would have received going to the dream school of my choice. As you change your mind set, not only is life going to be better, its going to help you to get what you want in life.

I'm finally getting back into running again. I realized that I needed a stress reliever and that was the only thing that was going to work! But I definitely changed what I do as I run. I don't listen to music all that much anymore. Right now I have been listening to podcasts. BYU Speeches and Devotionals and as I was running last night I listened to "Failure and Success" and "For When I Am Weak, Then Am I Strong." Let me tell you, they were both amazing. They both talked about medical school and also about snowboarding accidents. But even just the line, "For when I am weak, then am I strong." It just sticks out to me. We are going to be weak at times and that just reminds us that we are human and we have trials, but with the Lords help we will be strong after we are weak.

Well thats it for this week.

The posts are starting to just come up when I have time.. So sorry they aren't on a set schedule.

So thankful for the people who read it and who have time to just sit and listen to me blabbb..

Love you all! See you next time.

Hannah

Find Opportunities and Take Them!!

WOW! What an awesome experience. You went to bed at 1 in the morning, yeah you have church, but you stayed up anyways. But when you don't want to wake up and you get this really awesome text message, you get super excited... Guess who it was from? Come on guess... Alright I'll tell you! It was from the amazing sister missionaries in my ward. I got to go out today with them. We went out and taught the gospel. There's no doubt that we got some turn downs, and some "no, thank you's", but we kept going onto others for lessons. One thing that kept standing out was the missionaries saying, "We just wanted to come by and share the gospel with you and to share with every person that we meet." Even though it was Sunday, missionaries don't stop. Its a daily thing. To preach unto the world this gospel for the latter days. In each house we offered up a prayer to leave them with, and in one house her name was Pamela, she shared a message with us, and told us how great we are to be out serving the Lord. It made me so much more excited to go on my mission. As we were leaving Pamela's apartment, we started to walk back to the car, and as we were walking we heard someone yell, " Hey are you guys those missionaries??", all three of us turned around and said, "Yes!" Remind you that there was a brick wall in between us and we totally were on our tippy toes as he stated how great we were to be out and to preach the gospel that we have total faith in. He kept saying "yeah, that John Smith guy" and we said, "Yeah Joseph Smith.." He kept saying it... It was so funny because we could feel our calf muscles cramping! But it was totally worth it because he said that we could come back.. Such an amazing experience to see all it happen.. And we had one other lesson that we were going to go, but we saw some people standing outside and we decided to just go up to them and start talking, and well we gave him a Book of Mormon and we asked if we could leave him with a prayer and asked if we could also come back and teach him and his family a lesson. It was so exciting and I was so glad to have that experience and I can't wait to go back out with them!

Ohhh and a couple of my friends took advantage of going to the temple on Saturday after work. We did some of my family names, and wow you could just feel the spirit! I am so glad that I have friends of the same faith and who have slightly the same goals! Not a day goes by that I don't thank my Heavenly Father for all of the wonderful things that He has given me, especially friends who are there by my side!

Alright!! Till next time!!
Love all of you!

Hannah :)

I Enjoy Long Walks at the Temple!

It takes some people hours or days to actually go to the temple! Sometimes they are there for more than one day. Yet it takes myself 4-5 minutes by car or if I run up there 30 mins. How many times do I go a week.. Well you see I try to at least make it to the temple grounds at least once a week, sometimes I even go a whopping 3 times. But how many times do I actually go inside and do Baptisms for the Dead? Maybe like once every two months. You would think living so close to the temple it would be ten times, maybe even a million times easier., but it's really not that easy. With only such limited things that people who are not endowed can do, we can only really walk around the temple, visit the atrium, sit inside the foyer and participate in Baptisms. But even then its hard, because we need to have at least 3 priesthood leaders to baptize and confirm us. So its kind of hard. Yet it just got easier for us! Starting this week on Friday's and Saturday's youth who have there temple recommend can go up and participate in Baptisms. The best part is, is that there will already be priesthood leaders up there to baptize and confirm you! Isn't that amazing! I thought that this was literally the coolest thing in the world. The temple is such a beautiful place and I am so lucky to live by it! Seeing it shine literally right out my window. My bosses at work (they aren't Mormon) have been asking a lot about the Mormon religion, and on Tuesday and Thursday mornings (where it isn't really busy in the mornings) we talk a lot about it. From the apostles to the temple cinnamon rolls and much more, but one thing that stood out to me is this little story. My boss started it out saying, "I was driving this morning and it was overcast, but the only thing that stood out to me in all of the valley was the Temple. It was just glowing with fog around it." My heart melted because it really is such a beautiful thing and to hear him saying those things was just touching. I am so happy that I will be serving the Lord, and to bring people into this gospel! Theres not many days that go by where I don't take pictures but here are some!

Because who doesn't like temple pictures!

Shayla & I

We promised to never get married outside of the temple! :)

It was just glowing!

Missionary work all the WAY!

A Missionary? YOU'RE CRAZY!

Missionaries coming and going. 18 months to two years. Listening to church music constantly, having a companion standing next to you 24/7.  Leaving your family to help other families see what this gospel is about. Skirts and suits all day, everyday. 6:30 am-10:30 at night. Learning a new language, becoming more accustomed to new and exciting cultures. It sounds exasperating, amazing, new, and most importantly an uplifting thing. You're 18 or 19 getting ready to leave. You are able to start your papers, able to put them in 121 days before the day you turn 18 or 19. Its amazing. Not only that, but the blessings the people you are serving are going to receive.

I never knew that I was gonna go on a mission. I always thought that it was always a guy thing and that the girls who went were just crazy. When the Prophet of the church changed the age, it changed for me too. When it changed I was still thinking that it was crazy for girls to go on a mission, but as I got older, things started looking towards that. All my dreams of going off to college started to fall through. Nothing seemed right. I needed guidance in my life, and going to church and seminary wasn't cutting it. I needed more. Friends and family left on their missions, both sisters and elders. Things in my life weren't good, they weren't right, but at my 17th "birthday" interview with the bishop, I knew I was ready. Ready for my Patriarchal Blessing. He said read this book. It was on Patriarchal Blessings. I started it, but I never finished it (I suck at reading/sticking to books). It took me a year and a half. I finished the Book of Mormon, my Personal Progress, and I finally finished the book. I was actually feeling more and more comfortable with receiving it. And let me tell you, it is such an amazing thing to have. To be able to have something come straight from your Heavenly Father. To have those blessings, and guidance in this life. With that Patriarchal Blessing, I knew exactly why things weren't working out. Why things were hard, and why Satan was and is still being so hard on me. Without doing Personal Progress, reading the Book of Mormon, and getting my Patriarchal Blessing, I wouldn't be going on my mission. It really has helped me guide my life and helped me fight my battles. I can't wait to leave and go on my mission. I am excited but super nervous. But if you're not nervous, you are NOT READY!
With the Lord on your side you can conquer anything. When things fall through, it was meant to happen.

I love you guys. Thank you to those who read this. It not only makes me happy to know that people are reading this (or at least skimming through it, cause who has time to read such a long blog entry.) But I am thankful for all the positive comments I receive back.

And I fail at adding pictures.

Love-
Hannah