Week 71-Transfer 11

Aloooooha!

2/17/14

Aloha familia! Happy Valentines Day and Happy President's Day!

For Valentines Day we got to go share a message at a Senior Citizen's complex in Kahuku. It was a crazy day but turned out pretty good in the end. I LOVED the package! Thanks so much for the letter Dad! Happy Valentines Day! I will give you a hug and kiss for it when I get home:) We actually had no idea it was President's Day till this morning from the Senior Couples. It doesn't make too much of a difference to us except that we get no mail. Haha, not like that's too much different for me anyways....:) It did give me a chance to talk about my missionary work to a man at the grocery store when we were checking out. I asked him what he was doing for the holiday, which le​d​

to him asking me what I was doing, which led to my missionary work and the church! He had to leave quickly but it's always fun to talk to random people in the store about what we do:) 

Anyways, this week has been pretty crazy. Transfer weeks always are. I am loving being in the Young Single Adult wards! There is so much work to be done here and I really love teaching people around that age group! We have 2 with dates for baptism and 4 progressing investigators and a really solid Potential investigator who we will probably set a date with this week. It is so exciting! I think this is the perfect area to finish up in. The only thing I'm not super excited about i​s​ Sundays. I love sacrament meeting and church and everything, but going to 5 or 6 sacrament meetings, plus ward counsel meetings and Stake correlation meetings all day long is something I'm not too used to. I think dad, that I understand what you meant. I admit, I was fighting to stay awake the whole time. I did love the chance I got to meet so many new people from the wards though! 

So as a mission we are reading the Book of Mormon in 80 days together. We have been doing it since January first and we are half way through Alma now. It's amazing to me how much I have grown to LOVE the Book of Mormon! It truly is a book inspired of God. Every time I read it I learn so much more than the time before. I love reading about Alma and Amulek and Ammon and his brothers especially. I feel like I can learn so much more from them now, since I'm a missionary and they are like the greatest missionaries ever! 

Something that I have been thinking about lately, because of transfers, and watching the sisters react to where they have been put, is that Heavenly Father truly does love us so much. There is a parable that Jesus Christ gives in the New Testament. He says, "if a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?" (Luke 11:11-13)  If we needed bread, fish, or eggs; stones, serpents or scorpions would be useless and harmful right. I think one thing that the Savior was trying to teach is that Heavenly Father does not give us useless or harmful things

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There are some situations in transfers or in life that simply seem unfair. I have felt it a lot in my life and am just beginning to realize that truly, nothing is "unfair." Heavenly Father truly can make all things be for our good. He can "consecrate [our] afflictions for [our] gain." (2 Nephi 2:2) I have been working so much on my mission, on counting my blessings. It's amazing the difference it has made in my perspective. When I find myself thinking about all the reasons my mission is hard or things that I lack spiritually, or even comparing myself with others, it's amazing how quickly my attitude can change when I begin to count my blessings, forget myself, and get to work. Just like Nephi did in 2 Nephi 4:) 

Sorry this has been a little random, this week really has been just as random:). This transfer we are working on getting the area book in order since a lot of things have changed recently and the area book is kind of a mess, and we are just going to share the gospel with everyone and help them come closer to Jesus Christ through Faith, Repentance, Baptism, Receiving the Holy Ghost, and Enduring to the End (the most important part:)! I love this work and am doing my best to be the kind of missionary Heavenly Father expects of me. There are a lot of mistakes I make and a lot of things I need to work on, but that just makes me all the more grateful for the Atonement in my life! I love you all so much and have been and will be praying for you always! You are the best!

Les Quiero,

Hermana Rowley (Shayla)

That's me and Alex before I left the area, and then me and my new companion, Sister Yoo:)