Everyday Is A Wonderful Day In The Mission Field

Hola familia!

         I can't even believe another week has passed! That means I only have ONE more P-day! Craziness! As always, I've learned so much this week and have had so much fun :) It's sad to think I have to leave soon. I still haven't heard anything at all about my visa. I don't even know how to go about getting a reassignment. Hopefully my Branch President just takes care of it, and I can know by next week where in the world I'm going. It feels like I've submitted my papers all over again! The anticipation is killing me! Ahhhh!

         Okay. You're going to laugh your head off. I, Hermana Roper, got randomly called on to give a talk in sacrament.  Ask me how I feel about that. Not very good. Haha scariest thing ever! What's even scarier is that our new President doesn't allow notes. He said stories are better, and doesn't allow us to read scriptures. (Not like I can read scriptures in Spanish anyway?) But this week's talk was on Faith. The story I shared was of our family going through the temple :) It took so much faith on everyone's part for us to get there. It's crazy to think that we tried for so long to get there, but we never gave up and we were so blessed :) That's easy to say in English….Yeah try it in Spanish.

         I thought for sure it wouldn't be me. Nobody in our district has even gotten called on and I was like, "Oh President Lindahl knows I am the worst at Spanish.  He'd never pick on me." Wrong. VERY wrong. He told me he's so inspired at how much I've learned that he wanted to show the other missionaries in the new districts that it's okay to come in here with zero Spanish. I was really surprised with myself. I didn't even have to break out in English! I spoke the entire time in Spanish with no notes.  The Gift of Tongues is REAL, even if at times I don't feel it.

         Speaking of President Lindahl.. He told me I need to go to BYU lol. I had an interview with him Sunday and he said, "Have you ever thought of attending BYU? You do realize there will be many RM's waiting for the Sisters to get home, right? Just keep that long, blonde hair, stay in the shape that you're in, and you'll compete with the best of 'em." Ummm... Thanks? Hahaha!

         Him and his wife are SO inspirational. His wife also talked this week. Here's some things I learned from her. The Lord doesn't ask for half of a sacrifice. He takes the offering that we have and makes it more. He could've fed the thousands without any food to start out with, but that's not how the Lord works. He wants all we have to offer.  He will make more out of us than we could ever imagine. He gives us the strength to make it through. We will doubt, but if we give Him a chance he will make so much out of us. How can we expect to return to Him without going through grief and the same experiences? Christ went through more than anyone and look how perfect He is. How can we become like him without experiencing trials? We can't. It was really an amazing talk!

         Tuesday we had Robert P. Swenson talk. He's the director of missionary services here. It was great, as usual :) The thing I got out of it was "Every day is a wonderful day in the mission field... You decide!" That's something I've really come to learn. It would be so easy to have a horrible day every day, but that's definitely a personal decision. I know that our attitude towards our missions though is a direct reflection of our love for Heavenly Father, and that really puts it in perspective. I try to always make everyday the best that I can!

         One of the biggest lessons I learned this week didn't come from a devotional or a teacher; it came from my companion. We were given three different investigators with different problems. One of them had a problem with tithing. Our purpose was to make our lessons personal so we started brainstorming stories. Hermana Petersen doesn't like to open up. She hates feeling vulnerable, but she did. She bore the strongest testimony of tithing. There was a time in her life where her dad didn't have a job for several years. Her mom had a side job sewing, but she said they really had no money. Although they lacked so much, her mom ALWAYS paid tithing first. She said they still to this day have no idea how rent got paid some months, and how they made it through. People would drop of clothes and food to them. One Christmas someone even doorbell ditched them and dropped off a Christmas tree and presents. People amaze me! I was in tears by the time she got done telling the story. She was in tears too! I felt the spirit so strong. There's no denying tithing is a blessing. She said that as soon as her dad got a job everything started breaking. She said she felt that while her dad didn't have a job they were in this protective bubble of the Lord and he was taking care of them. How awesome is that? I was definitely inspired. What amazing people! That's one of our goals though as a companionship is to open up more to our investigators. We can't expect them to open up if we don't. It's going great so far :)

         Another speaker from the week was Mattew O. Richardson (Gen. Sunday School). He talked about how important each of our parts is. There's a certain part we need to be. "Whate'er thou art, act well thy part." I don't know if you've ever heard of the stone that says this, but it has a cool story with it. The symbols on the stone actually represent numbers like this

5 10 3

4 6 8

9 2 7

     No matter which way you add the numbers it equals 18. He compared this to our individual parts. He said, "What if you don't want to be an 8? You want to be a 5. What happens to the rest of the mathematical square? It doesn't work." Each of our parts is important. It's okay to be a 5! We are what we're supposed to be. Someone's part might be being the best at Spanish, while someone else's part might be bearing powerful testimonies. If I don't act well my part, the whole picture won't work.

         “Something great happens when we act well our part. All things will work together for your good if you act well your part." Look up the story about this with David O. Mckay. That's where it comes from. It would probably make more sense that way :)

         Anyway he then told a story about a little girl seeing him at the MTC and asking her grandma, "Is that a REAL missionary?" He said since then he has asked himself similar questions. Throughout life we can always ask ourselves similar questions. What would a real missionary do? What would a real mother do? What would a real wife do? What would a real sister do? What would a real friend do? And finally, what will I do? I learned so much!

         This week Hermano Sagers had a great lesson as well. We talked about our weaknesses a.k.a something nobody likes to talk about. My favorite quote from his lesson: "We need to enjoy being ourselves despite our weaknesses. We are all amazing, immortal children of God. Everyone we come in contact with is an amazing human being... Even the check out lady at the grocery store that we usually ignore." He's a great teacher! Weaknesses are really for our benefit.

         This week I have been more confused than ever about Spanish! Verbs are going to kill me over, and that's that. I have made too many verb trees this week to even count. Irregular verbs can die and I wouldn't even be sad. My study journal is FULL of verbs! Some days I want to scream! But it will come :) That's another thing Hermano Sagers said! It was something like "Was Spanish one of the requirements to serve a mission? Last time I checked it was love, charity, faith, desire, etc. Plus, I've never met a return missionary that didn't learn the language." Thank you Hermano Sagers!

         And yep. That reminds me of my embarrassing Spanish stories from this week. I called Hermano Sagers a girl, because of one itsy bitsy letter. He goes around the room and has us translate English sentences into Spanish. My question I had to translate was "What did my teacher teach?" Well, I said maestra instead of maestro, which implies my teacher is a girl. Oooops.

         Hermana Petersen and I also taught Carlos and thought we were asking him about his summer the whole time, when really we were saying winter. Look up the words! They're so alike lol. We finally realized our mistake when he said he hates summer because of the snow.  In that very same lesson he was trying to tell us his favorite summer food and said something with the word frito and we were stumped. Frio means cold so we were like umm ice cream? popsicle? He finally was like KENTUCKY! and that's when we had the light bulb moment of oooooh fried chicken! Haha who would've guessed frito meant fried?? Stinkin Spanish!

      Well I better get going now :) Thank you SO much for everything! I loved the 4th of July packages from everybody! It's so comforting to know I have such great support. I couldn't ask for more. I'll talk to you next week! :) I LOVE YOU!! 

Love,

Hermana Roper

     

It Only Takes One To Change Lives

Hola familia!

         It's hard to believe another week has already passed here at the MTC. That means I only have less than THREE weeks to learn Spanish!! Not good haha. I am almost positive I will get reassigned so I might actually be here an extra week. Lots of missionaries are being reassigned lately.

         Well….Let's see. I never know where to start. All the days jumble together. I'll start with how awesome the missionary broadcast was! It was awesome, right? And yes, mom, I'm famous ;) haha it really was so incredible to be in the presence of such amazing people. The whole Marriott center was packed! Okay, I can tell I'm already weird. I saw a couple holding hands and my first reaction was "Oh. My. Gosh. You can't do that!!" I tend to forget there are people outside of the MTC... It was weird to see people without nametags lol. Anyway, I don't even know how to pick what my favorite part was! It was all so amazing. It makes me regret not being a better member missionary. Sometimes we think there's nothing we can do, but as members we can do SO much!

         I also loved the repeating message of love. Our actions should be motivated by love. As a missionary, I know if I can forget myself and love,  then I will be just fine. I also love love love Elder Packer! He is so powerful. I love that he talked about us needing to go away from the script. We shouldn't live our lives according to the script. I know if we trust the spirit, it will be there. I love that he said, "It comes when you start." How can we expect to get anywhere if we don't start? LOVED it. I also loved when he said, "I don't know how much longer I'll be learning here, but after I will go to another realm and attend a new school" (or something like that). We should always be learning, even after this life.

         The biggest thing I took out of Sunday didn't even come from the broadcast though. It came from Relief Society. Sister Agostini (R.S. General Board) spoke. She talked about her son being in the army. She said each time she talked to him on the phone or skype, she always prepared herself for it to be the last time. I can't even imagine. But she related it back to Heavenly Father sending us into enemy's territory. He sent us here knowing it could be the last time he sees us, but He still did it. He did it so we could grow. The amazing thing about our Father in Heaven is that he has given us the weapons to win this battle. He wouldn't send us to battle without giving us a way to win. We need to not only face the world, but change the world. We need to live life on the offensive. Heavenly Father doesn't need us to do this work; He could do it by himself. It's a privilege to be doing His work. It was such an amazing talk!

         This week also had the best Tuesday devotional EVER. Janice Kapp Perry spoke! Yeah.. The one who wrote all those amazing Primary songs. No big deal or anything. ;) She had us sing a medley of Primary songs and ahhhhh SO great! In the song we sang A Child's Prayer, I Love to See the Temple, I Belong to the Church (of Jesus Christ... I don't know the title haha), I'm Trying to be Like Jesus, To Bring the World His Truth, (The Army of Helaman), and Love is Spoken Here. I wanted to keep singing them all night!

         Okay so the best part of the devotional=her husband's fist pump at the pulpit. It was a full on “Pitch Perfect/Breakfast Club” fist pump. She was talking about how they first met. She said one night before a clarinet recital he came up to her and said, "I can think of better things you could do with those lips than play the clarinet!" At this point her husband gets up, walks over to her, and plants one on her! Ya know on “She's the Man” when she's like, "You kiss her! Kiss the crap out of her!" He did just that. Full on, grabbed her face and kissed her lol. He then fist pumps to all of us missionaries, and of course we all stand up and clap so he does it again and bam! DOUBLE fist pump. How awesome does he sound? I am determined to marry someone like him haha. So after this, she finished her talk and we ended with singing the new As Sisters in Zion, and Helaman's Army. One Elder stood up, and we all followed and it was AMAZING. I don't think I've felt the spirit that strong before. I don’t even think there was a dry eye in the room.

         Later that night, as a District, we were talking about the one Elder who stood up. It only took one Elder to get all of us 4,000 missionaries to stand. We related that to our mission. It could only take us to change so many lives! It was an amazing night. I've been singing Primary songs all week! :) One last thing Sister Perry said was, "We know this work will go on with or without any of us, but what would become of us?" She's so right. I know that this work could easily go on without me. I could go home and no matter what, the Lord would fulfill his promises, but where would that leave me? Why not make something of myself in the process? :)

         Let's see.. What else happened this week.. Oh I can explain one picture. We had the challenge of "The Golden Disney Investigator." We do things like this every Sunday. Rapunzel won :) Because seriously.. Can you think of a more receptive Disney character than her? She needs the Atonement! Haha we seriously argued (Uhh... I mean discusssed) this for hours! Some of the characters were Simba, Tarzan, Marvin the Fish, the old man from Up, Bambi, and the Beast. There were a lot! It was fun though lol.

         One kinda cool thing happend this week with Ian, our investigator aka Hermano Haug. We went in planning on talking about families and all of a sudden he whips this question out of his butt, "How are prophets called? Like, do you vote like in politics?" We both just looked at each other like,  "Umm do you know how to answer in Spanish?" Lol. So Hermana Petersen starts trying to explain and our lesson was going downhill FAST. We couldn't think of any Spanish words! So as she's at least trying, I sit there. All of a sudden Articles of Faith five and six pop into my head and I hurry and find them and have him read them. I know it was the spirit! So he read them and had no more questions :) He was like oooh I get it. So now we have a great lesson planned for introducing him to the Priesthood and then to the ordinances, which means baptism! We'll see how it goes :) Carlos on the other hand... If he says “no se” one more time I'm gonna freak lol. That's his answer for everything, which means, “I don't know.” He kinda freaked out on us this week and was like "I don't believe in prayer!" and we were just kinda like well... That's a bummer lol. It's hard to figure out how to teach someone who doesn't want to try! We'll get him though, don't you worry ;)

         So mom, you would LOVE my companion. I know I do! She pulls dog jokes on me now... Hermana McChesney goes "Oh I'm just pullin your tail" and I was like "That's not even the saying? It's 'I'm just pulling your leg'" and Hermana Petersen says, "Well for you, it's tail since you're a dog." Not. Funny. She's pickin up your slack! I do love her so much though. Yesterday was bad, but she listened to me and was there for me and I love her for that :) Companionships are definitely meant to be! Yesterday was her birthday and I love birthdays and made a big deal out of hers :) Made her wear a birthday girl tag and everything haha. I even got a whole Chinese district to sing happy birthday to her in Chinese! It was fun :)

         So of course you know there's an embarrassing story of the week... Yep, you're right. I forgot to take my towel to the shower. Who does that?! I think I'm having bad luck with the bathrooms here or something lol. By the way.. Cleaning the showers=best thing ever! Who would've thought I'd love cleaning?? Anyway.. Yep. There I stood without a towel in the shower. I decided to speak up and was like "Umm hello? I forgot my towel." Thankfully a sister had two lol. Sheesh. I am so awkward.

         I think that's my only awkward story for the week though, so I'm improving right? Haha right! I'm so grateful to be here serving the Lord. This week has given me a new perspective on everything :) I'm so grateful for the support! I still get made fun of for getting packages almost every other day and letters every day and I LOVE it :) I have the best friends and family out there! No battle, can't top it :) I hope everyone has a great week!

Love,

Hermana Roper :)

Every Day Is A New Day!

Hola Everyone!

Another week down at the good ole MTC! The days are really long here, but it seems like the weeks fly by. I honestly get the days sooo confused! I learned so much this week though. My Spanish gets better everyday, and each day gets easier. I've learned that there's no such thing as a bad day. There's only such thing as bad hours. The days are so long that if a whole day was bad I don't think I could handle it lol. My days are like a roller coaster, up and down all the time! It's nice to know that every day is a new day, and has so much potential :)

We keep getting so many new missionaries! As of Monday my district will be the oldest, which is crazy! Some sisters in the new district have had 7 years of Spanish before though.. So I still feel like a baby! Remind me why I didn't take Spanish in high school?! Sheesh.

One thing I said in Spanish this week was that God forgives us of our fish. I meant to say “pecados” (sins) and ended up saying “pescados” or something that apparently means fish. Awesome L Oh and then in class we were learning the verb “Gustar” and for an activity everyone in the class asks another person a question and we answer it using “gustar”. Elder Keetch asked me, "Do you like being a missionary?" and instead of replying "Yes, I like being a missionary" I said, "Yes, missionaries please me." Epic fail. Even the teacher was laughing hysterically. (Hermano Haug's laugh is so contagious by the way!)

One quote I heard this week that goes along perfectly with both of those stories is from President Lindahl: "Misery+Time=Humor".  Right on, President, right on. Oh! President Lindahl is Gatlan's old mission president! How crazy is that? He said he was President of the Mendoza Argentina Mission so I just asked if he knew him and it turns out he absolutely loves him! He said he was such a hard working missionary and served him well. He told me to tell him hi for him. He's an awesome President. President Peer got released to move to a Russian-speaking branch. President Lindahl is just as inspired as President Peer was! One thing that's scary is that he told us when we get called on to speak on Sundays we aren't allowed to quote scriptures or use notes. On a good note, this Sunday is the broadcast, and the next is fast Sunday so I'm safe for two more weeks lol.

Before I forget, be sure to watch the missionary broadcast Sunday. It's at 4:00 and should be really great! I'll be in the choir of 2500 so listen close for my voice ;) The songs we're singing really give me chills! Choir is one of my favorite things at the MTC believe it or not haha. The zone leaders keep saying that the prophet has some huge announcement…But really, what could be bigger than changing the mission age?! The prophet will be there to speak along with the apostles.

To add on the excitement there's a mission president seminar going on at the MTC so the prophet and apostles will be HERE for a WEEK at the MTC! We aren't allowed to go talk to them or get pictures, but it's still mother flipping exciting. This week will be a lot crazier, but I'm really excited :)

This week I had my first TRC experience. TRC is when we teach actual members. There's no role-playing and we're just supposed to teach them. It was pretty scary! Hermano Sagers told us, "TRC is like a roller coaster. You get really nervous, but afterwards you'll be like that was the best thing EVER!!" Well.. That wasn't the right analogy to use with me because of the fact that I'm terrified of roller coasters! He was right though. I think we all came out of TRC learning way more than we taught them.

I actually met a girl from Peru and she said in Piura we'll get tan and love the food. I wonder if she knows that she had been eating guinea pigs all those years she lived there?? Haha she was really great though! Another brother we taught was from Juab and he just got back from his mission. He gave me hope because he said he had zero Spanish before his mission as well. Yay for people like him!

One of my new favorite teachers is Hermano Ridge. He had to substitute a couple times for us this week. Maybe I liked him so much cause he never talked in Spanish? But really, I have so much written down from him!

·      " To be humble is to recognize where your true source of power comes from"

·      "Satan will do anything to make you feel inadequate; Satan's a liar. If you start to believe him, he has won"

·      "Ever seen a cat act like a dog? Why does it do that? Because it thinks it's a dog. When people act wicked, it's because they've forgotten they're sons and daughters of God"

·      "If Heavenly Father was here he'd give you the biggest hug and let you know how grateful he is for your service. Whenever you get discouraged, think of that."

He was really inspiring! Sadly, he's gone to teach seminary now :( But he taught me a lot.

Some other people I've heard from in devotionals lately is on Sunday Stephen B. Allen (managing director of the missionary dept.) and Robert C. Gay (of the seventy). Before I forget, we had the best musical number from an Elder here. I think it was called, "He knows that I know" and oh boy was it good! Anyway, Stephen B. Allen was really motivational. He told us that when everything says you can't, believe in the part of you that says you can and that we need to stop worrying about who we aren't and start noticing who we are. He told us to finish every race we start. We've now started the race of a mission and it's time to finish it.

Elder Gay was great as well. One thing that really hit home to me was that he talked about the army on the other side of the veil helping us. When he said that, I got the best feeling. I know we are being helped. We are fighting as much as we can here, and so is the army in Heaven. We literally have an army of angels around us. I know we do! We couldn't do it if we didn't. He asked us, “What is the power you have? The power you have is to astonish the world."

The other thing that stuck out in the Tuesday devotional was the hymn we sang. I've heard it a million times, but I love it. It was "More Holiness Give Me." I wrote down all the lyrics, but I don't wanna type them so look it up haha. Every single lyric is perfect.

Okay let's think of some funny things. Oh! Elder Keetch. So we're in a really serious discussion on Kolob and Elder Gonzalves says "Hermano Haug, is Kolob a place? Like, can we drive or walk there?" and Elder Keetch says under his breath, "No.. But you could hike there?..." Haha! Maybe you had to be there, or know Elder Keetch, but he's so funny. All the Elders in my district are.

So here.. EVERY sister sings in the shower. One will start and everyone joins. Well….I decided I had had enough of the church music so I started singing T-Swift. Yeah.. NOBODY joined. Aca-awkward right? Hahaha

         One other thing I love here is sand volleyball!! It's so much fun! Elder Fulton and I have this war going on.  I serve it to him every time and he can never get it.  And it's hilarious! That's all. But it's so much fun!

Gym time is the best. My companion hates running and exercising, but I make her run with me anyway. She told me her ankles are bad, but I didn't realize how truthful this was until this week. We're running to play volleyball and I turn around to see her getting up off the ground. She was like, "Did you see that?" Apparently she biffed it hard and was just getting up as I turned around. It was so funny to turn around and see her looking around to see if anyone saw haha! Good times at gym :)

Let everyone know how grateful I am for the support, letters, packages, and prayers! I'm so blessed, and couldn't do it without you. As hard as it is to be away, there's nothing more important I could be doing right now. I know this is where I'm supposed to be. I love you all so much!

Love,

Hermana Roper