Miracle Week

February 8, 2016

Wow!!! Just Wow!!! That is mostly the gist of this whole week!! I don't know what me and my companions did differently this week to deserve all these miracles but they happened!

Ok, let me start with Tuesday. So we went on splits with the STLs because we had interviews later that day so they didn't want to go all the way back to Banff when they would have to come back for interviews anyway. We had some fun times almost getting peed on by a little boy and scooping poop. Haha:) But that is besides the point. We had interviews and President wants us to focus on a Christlike attribute every transfer now so I chose obedience. I honestly need to work more on being exactly obedient which I think I have already told you... But what he told me was to treat these last few months of my mission like a mini mission. He told me to give all I had to being obedient and being the best missionary I can be these last couple months. I can't say that I have fully started to take that to heart yet but it is getting there:)

That night we went and visited a potential that is also a former but was barely taught in the past and Sister Jensen knows her less active sister from her last area. She was packing things up because the exterminator was coming the next day to spray and so we offered to help! Scored an in haha! We got to talk to her more and get to know her feelings on the church, she was even going to church on her own at one point and didn't even know if she was baptized or not. So we took her information to church on Sunday and found out she isn't baptized!!! So we are going to fix that and get her son baptized as well!

Wednesday is our day to go see an older lady that was being taught at one point but is getting demensia  so can't really be taught anymore. And she had had a stroke the previous week so we thought it would be good to do something to cheer her up a bit! She had been asking for a watch for a long time so we got her one and drew her a picture of all the sisters that have met with her. But sad day... She wasn't NOT in the mood and totally kicked us out! It was kind of a downer to the day...

But everything was ok because we got a new investigator that night and we didn't have to do anything!! All we had to do was just show up! Our members had a neighbor that had some questions and so they invited us over to answer the questions and we invited her to take the lessons and come to church!! Bam!! New investigator!! Members are so great!!

Thursday was pretty low key.

But Friday was the real miracle day!!! So a couple weeks ago some guy walked into the church to pray and bishop happened to be there and started talking to him and got his name and the street that he lived on, but only the street. So he contacted us and told us this and was like ok, I want you to tract the whole street and find this guy. And let me tell you it was not a short street but we were not going to let our bishop down so we had started to tract it a couple weeks ago asking for Mark Furgason. And no luck.. So we gave up for a couple weeks and decided to try again on Friday. We decided to start on the opposite end this time. We prayed to find this guy and low and behold the second door we knocked on was his house!!!! Miracle? I think yes!!! We were definitely led straight to the house! And I figured out I really could be led by the spirit!!!

So then we decided to go stop some of our members because member work is the best right? We did and talked to them for a while about who the visit and home taught and we talked about a lady they had been working with for a long time. They said yeah we really do need to find a way to get her and you guys over here sometime. She had been taught in the past but it kind of just stopped. So after we left he called her and she said she was trying to quit smoking and wanted to start taking the lessons again!!! What?? Crazy right!!!

Sorry this email is getting way long but I still have more miracles!! I will skip Saturday and just say we got into some less actives that we are going to start teaching on a regular basis now and we had an amazing Relief Society Conference all about living in the moment.

But I will move on to Sunday!! Because our new investigator came to church and 2 less actives!!! AND best part of all a non member came to church all by himself and decided to sit next to us of all people! We got his number and we are going to start teaching him!!! Now is that a miracle or what??

I truly cannot believe all the things that have happened for us this week! It has been incredible!! I am so pumped for the next couple of months and all that is in store for us!!! I have learned so much about how important it is to be obedient and listen to the spirit and work with members!!! Ahhhhh!! I couldn't be more happy!!!

I love you guys!!! God is so incredibly good!!!

Love,

Sister Hatch

" I am a hole in the flute that the Christ's breath blows through. Listen to the music."

Another Transfer Down

February 1, 2016

Another transfer come and gone! And we made it through! I am still on a three leg!! WOOT! WOOT!

Things have kind of been a little bit frustrating lately because all our investigators have gone downhill... No one is really progressing but I guess that is a sign that we need to work harder to find new ones:) Some incredible news though!!! Sarah, my investigator in my last area, got baptized last week!!! I am so sad I couldn't go BUT I am so extremely happy for her!!! 

 With a start of a new transfer, it is a new beginning! We are starting to focus on Christlike attributes and so our Zone chose to work on humility and I personally chose to work on obedience. I have been getting very lax in my obedience which I feel should be the opposite. Because I am getting closer to the end of my mission, I want to do the best I can with the time I have left in being the best missionary I possibly can be! I don't have time to waste! 

President Miles' letter really helped me today though to not be so hard on myself and recognize why I have been feeling the way I have been lately. He is just so inspired!!! He said, "Not only is He pleased with you but He accepts you just the way you are.  Because of God’s love for us He shows us our weaknesses so that we can change and become like Him.  Please don’t think of your weaknesses, and we all have them, as God not accepting our service or not being well pleased with us.  The Lord ‘chastens those He loves’.  Through Christ and the divine principle of repentance we change our attitudes, or behavior, and our very souls, as we draw nearer to God.  The only way this change occurs is with some pain on our own.  Sometimes the pain is manifest in discouragement, feelings of little worth, or through sin.  The Lord brings to light those areas of our life where we can improve on.  This is a manifestation of His love, not his displeasure in us.  It’s His way of helping us become in this life all that He desires.  Through this process we experience a ‘fullness of joy in this life and in the life to come’." Isn't he great?

I am so grateful for this chance to be on a mission and I want to do all I can while I am here to help the people of Canada have a relationship with God! The gospel is so good!! Christ is so merciful and the Plan of Happiness is so real! Don't ever forget the worth have according to God! Only His opinion matters in the end!:) 

I love you!!

Love,

Sister Hatch

Spa Night

The Baptism of Sarah one of her investigators from her last area.

Wow!!! Another transfer has already flown by!!! Ahhh!! Where is the time going?? We won't know about who is being transferred until tomorrow night but we are pretty confident we are staying together for another one which I couldn't be more happy about!!! I love being in a trio!! Also transfers are going to be a little different this time because the First Presidency told all the missions around the world that we are not to have official transfer meetings anymore. So we will now know our companions and new area before the actual transfer day which is pretty cool! 

This week we had a worldwide mission broadcast which was pretty awesome!! The theme was "Teach Repentance and Baptize Converts". Probably because so many people become less active after being baptized... So we need to focus more on making sure the people we teach are truly converted before we baptize them and the way to do that is finding through members! When they have that support in the church they are more likely to stay:)

We also had a chance to do splits a couple times this week in our area and we got so much more done!! Plus our Ward Mission Leader is awesome and is going to try to set up splits with members at least twice a month! So exciting!! 

We also went to Canmore again which was a blast!! We went on a hike that was pretty much walking on a frozen river the whole time and I fell a lot but it was still fun!! 

Our investigators aren't really progressing but we are going to change that soon!!! 

I am loving life and trying to work hard, but I know I can always work harder!! Love you guys!!!

Love, 

Sister Hatch

 "If thou art merry, praise the Lord with singing, with music, with dancing, and with a prayer of praise and thanksgiving."

D&C 136:28

Baby It's Cold Outside

January 18, 2016

This week we got another new investigator!!!! His name is Abin, we met him on the street and he is from India! He is so awesome!!! We taught him the first lesson and he was very intrigued by the Book of Mormon because he is Christian and also the idea of having a modern day prophet. When we taught him about prophets he was very cautious because the Bible says to be aware of false prophets but it was good! That means that he will pray more to find out if it is true! ...hopefully.... And then he even brought up how he believes that there is 3 heavens and we were like hey, us too!!! So we are going to teach him the Plan of Salvation next:) 

I also taught Priesthood for the first time in my life on Sunday! That was pretty weird...But it went well!

We have also been learning how to do family history with our bishop's wife!! I love family history so much!!! When you actually know how to find names it is pretty addicting!! I hope I can find a name I can do in the temple before I go home!

I finally figured out what I want to do with my life. I want to be a librarian!! Isn't it perfect? I love to read and organize things and I can also work with kids reading them books and stuff, it is just so perfect so I am super excited about that! And we met a member in our ward who is super into reading and not the fictional love story kind that I usually read but the non fiction you can actually learn form them types of books!! And it got me so pumped to go home and read a ton!!! I have so many books I need to read when I get home! 

Oh and I started my D&C countdown yesterday so 137 days until I am home but who's counting:)

Sorry I am not writing much but we are going to Canmore again today and going ice skating so I don't have that much time! I love you guys and I did get the package from the ward, it was awesome!!! Nothing beats American Oreos!!! I hope you guys had a good week:) Stay amazing!

Love,

Sister Hatch

Taking a little nap while waiting for the bus.

It was -16 the other night with a windchill of -26 and we were walking!! So we were frozen missionaries! And we decided to eat ice cream that day too haha:)

Satan Is Tricky

January 11, 2016

How many times can I tell you that missionary work is amazing and you not get tired of it?! I LOVE THE LORD AND HIS WORK!!! There is literally no better thing! I just wish that everyone could realize the goodness of the gospel as well! I feel like I can't get enough work done fast enough (if that makes sense). There is SO much to do but so little time!!!

Yesterday at one of our ward councils we were given so many assignments of people we needed to see and I was getting overwhelmed because we hadn't even been able to accomplish seeing all the people we needed to see the week previous!! I have never had this problem of so much work and not enough time to do it in! I love it!! IT also doesn't help that we have been trying to get over sicknesses too so we haven't been as productive as we could be. But we are going to get things done this week!

So we got to meet with the medium lady again this week and she had a lot of crazy experiences to share! Some of them getting into borderline crazy stuff but it was really interesting! She was talking about how she would have out of body experiences where she would go and rescue spirits that didn't know they had passed on... And how she talked to Jesus and saw God. It was pretty interesting but then we were reading in the Gospel Principles book the next day and it said that mediums were associated with the devil. So we called our mission president and he said we probably shouldn't teach her... Which was sad because she is a super sweet lady but I guess it's for the best. I have been really curious about the spirit world now though. 

We also had another amazing lesson with a less active who has committed to live the "mormon" life style for 6 months and is now coming to the end of that time. He says that if he hasn't found that it is true by the end of 6 months then he will never try it again. So he only has two more weeks left until he decides if he has a testimony or not and right now he is claiming to still not have one even though he went and bore his testimony on Fast Sunday... So he is a little frustrating because we can totally see that he has a testimony he just either doesn't want to admit it or doesn't want to recognize it. But we had an awesome lesson where he felt the spirit SO strong he started crying 5 different times and Sister Jensen even got really bold and told him that the church needed him and he was being stupid. It was pretty great but nothing is clicking within him that all those feelings are from God. He is a pretty awesome guy though and has taught us a lot!!

Other than those crazy lessons we met a potential on the street that we will hopefully be able to meet with this week. We went to ESL (English as a second language class) last night and met a really awesome lady from Iran that possibly wants to learn more! And we have a few potentials we are waiting for to get back to us. So I would say it has been a pretty successful week!!! We also realized that we have more than 200 less actives in this area!!! 200!!!! That is absolutely insane!!! We will never be bored here!! I will definitely be ok staying here the rest of my mission. Plus if I do stay here I will have more of a chance of going to the Topleys sealing in May because I am the closest to the temple I have ever been my whole mission!!! It is great how the Lord works!!!

I love you guys!!! Thank you for all the love!!! Keep being a light to others!! They need it in this Satan infested world!

Love,

Sister Hatch

"Everyone says love hurts, but that is not true. Loneliness hurts. Rejection hurts. Losing someone hurts. Envy hurts. Everyone gets these things confused with love, but in reality love is the only thing in the world that covers up all pain and makes someone feel wonderful again. Love is the only thing in this world that does not hurt." -Liam Neeson

"For ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord: walk as children of light." (Ephesians 5:8)