Transfers I am going to Liverpool NY !!!!!

So we got transfer calls this weekend, I was all excited thinking i was going to stay in Fonda and I was going to take over the area. But nope, the Lord needs Elders back in Fonda so i am off to Liverpool New York. Haha so to be completely honest when I was told I was going to Liverpool my first thought was Gross i am going to a Nasty sounding soup!!! HAHA my new comps name is Sister Hale. Everyone in my district here in Fonda tell me i will love her because we basically are the same human haha! I am scared but excited at the same time.

So the sad part is 2 of our investigators are getting baptized right after i leave so sadly i will not be there to see their baptism, but they both are going to mail me pictures. It is amazing to see how much people grow over such a short amount of time.

I want you all to know that Keeping all the Lords commandments is so important! We must strive to always be Obedient at all times. There is something I have heard multiple times as i have been on a  mission and that is "Obedience brings Blessings" That is so true we will be blessed so much as we strive to be as completely obedient as possible. I promise you all as a representative of our savior Jesus Christ that as you strive to be obedient and turn to him in pray and ask him for help, i promise he will bless you and help make all your burdens light.

Also another thing is to always remember the sacrifice our savior has made for us. He paid the price for us all not just a few cents but he paid everything for us, imperfect people to be able to be forgiven and to return to our Heavenly Father and so our burdens can become light as we take upon his Yoke. I invite you all to always remember our Savior as it is one of the many promises we made as we entered the waters of Baptism.

Sorry my thoughts are all jummbled up right now but i hope this all makes sense haha

Thank you all for all your love and support :) you are all amazing!!!! I know god loves you all so much!!!!! God be with you till we meet again!

Beautiful Upstate New York

So this week has been a pretty crazy week. Not much to report other then we have 2 new investigators and we have 2 with a baptism just around the corner. Transfers our coming up we have transfer calls the 15th.

I was think on what to share this week and the thought kept coming to me was faith. Faith is one of the first steps in becoming fully converted to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. " Faith without works is dead" that is one of the many saying we have here in the NYUM. We have so many less actives it is quite said they all have powerful testimonies of the restored gospel but as i have been talking with president rogers he has told me that "we must act upon our faith to show our savior that we do love him and know he did in fact die for us" Faith is one of the first steps we make to return to our Heavenly Father. To be truly converted to the Gospel of Jesus Christ we must first have Faith, then we must Repent and apply the Atonement in our lives, Be baptized by someone holding the Priesthood Authority of God, Receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, and Endure to the end. The definition of Faith is " to not have a perfect knowledge of things... if ye have faith ye hope for things which are not seen, which are true." (Alma 32:21)

I invite you all to exercise you faith in our savior Jesus Christ. Take some extra time out of your see all the blessing our Heavenly Father has given you. Because Faith with out works is dead, you can say you have all the faith in the world but if you do not act on that faith you faith will slowly go away. The Prophet Joseph Smith acted on his faith when he read out of the book of James, He had faith that Heavenly Father would answer his prayer of knowing which church he should join. If a 14 year old boy with out a education have the faith that his prayer would be answered and acted upon that faith why can we?

haha sorry i totally just noticed i went a tangent  on faith. But i know faith is so import to the Lords Gospel. That is why it is one of the first principles. Hope you all have a wonderful day and do not forget to always exercise you faith!! Love you all and thank you for all your support and prayers!

Week of Aug 3 2015

So this week has been going pretty good. All my days are all smushed together! I can never tell any day apart anymore! but that is a good thing from what all the missionaries are telling me... hahah i am not to sure about that. hahah

So any ways! I have basically been working hard and never being able to have time to take a minute and breath. HAHA its so fun to never be able to take time and breath you get to see so many miracles!!!!! My big highlight of the week is a 13 year old girl that we are teaching is going to be getting Baptized on Aug 22nd and right after we gave her a date she ran outside to go tell her grandpa and then also this sunday she borrow her testimony and tell the whole branch about it. You can just see the Light of Christ shine in her eye! she is the Best!!!! It is amazing!!! She is almost done with the Book of Mormon too. I am so excited for her!!!!!

Also this sunday I got to do what i know how to do, a young boy with autism that is in the branch dad was out of town and someone picked him up so he could still come to church. Well right before church started he had a melt down and no one knew what to do to calm him down. So I pulled out my bag of tricks and got him talking to me about Walt Disney ( that is his favorite person) It was so nice to be able to do something without wondering if i know how to do it. I felt so blessed!  

Also the branch is finally working like a ward or branch should so the work is going a lot smoother! so thats a big plus!!!!!!

So today during study time i was studying the light of Christ. It is amazing to increase my knowledge about that particular subject. I really think it is so cool how we all have the light of Christ before we receive the gift of the holy ghost but once we receive that gift the light of Christ is so much stronger!!! there is a song my mom sung to me all the time back home its, " Do you have him image in your countenances? Does the Light of Christ shine in your eyes? Will he know you when he comes again because you shall be like him?" Studying the Light of Christ got me thinking about that song..... do we have the Light of Christ in our eye because we strive to become like him? Then i was thinking about the scripture I shared last week .... " you can't serve two masters..... you cannot serve god and mammon" We must strive to serve our Heavenly Father and follow the example of our Savior Jesus Christ, if we have the desire to return to our Heavenly Father again and be in his presents we must gain that light of christ. I invite you all to take the time to study the restored gospel of Jesus christ and gain that testimony of it for yourself so then you can gain that light of christ. 

I love you all and i am so grateful for all your love and support! you all are amazing!!!! :)

week of July 27 2015

Well it has been a week!!! We have been crazy busy this week and it is so much fun!! I am learning how truly blessed you are when you are as obedient as possible. It is amazing to see what miracles can happen for being obedient!!!!

So Friday was my favorite day for meal appointments one of our less actives made me taco soup and chocolate cake!!!!! Little did she know that is like my all time favorite food!!!!!!!!! Sister Van Avery is my mom away from home!!! I love her face!!!

Saturday we went hiking with a less active and i learned a lot about how you are able to live off the land from one of our Less Actives (the Amish guy) Bro Kampfer is pretty cool he was teaching me and my comp a lot!! we even found wild blue berry's, raspberry's and strawberry's! it was awesome!!!! we also picked up 2 new investigators Dave and Marcus! they are both really cool guys and the lord has really prepared them to accept the gospel of jesus christ.

Sunday was awesome 3 of our investigators came to church!!!!!!!!!! I was so happy, they all loved it and couldn't wait to come next week. The branch is finally taking us serious. it is just sad that it took getting our investigators to church for them to see that we are serious about doing the Lord's work. but we also picked up a new investigator too, Donald he is really neat guy he has lots of questions and we really love the plan of salvation. He works a lot so we just pray that we will be able to meet with him soon. #bestreferalever! haha 

Also this morning before i got on to email, sister fiefia and i went and did some serves for a member in our branch, we helped start cleaning her brothers house. (he was a major hoarder) it was NASTY!!!!!!!!!!! but  i was happy to help, Sister Isabel is awesome she reminds me of you mom!!! she is always happy and has a smile on her face even though she is fighting some illness right now. She truly knows how to BE TOUGH like you mommy!!!!

Any who its been great being a missionary!! i am loving every minute!!! soon Sister fiefia will be going home and it will be a whole new adventure with my new companion. 

My brain is currently mush which is sad because i usually leave yall with a spiritual though but instead today i am going to leave you with a scripture for yall to think about and reflect back on you life. 

3 Nephi 13:24; " No man can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and Mammon."

I invite you to think about who you serve do you serve the world or do you serve God? We should strive to put Heavenly Father before ourselves and the World. Remember your locality is first to the Lord, then to your family, then to yourself. We should always remember we wouldn't have all the blessings that we have on this earth if it wasn't for our savior jesus christ. It is because of him we are able to be forgiven, it is because of him we are able to feel relief for our pains and grief. We should always server the Lord before anyone or anything else.

I know you will be blessed as you put the lord first and put all your trust in him.

you are all amazing children of God and thank you for all your prayers

week of uly 20th 2015

July 20 th

Well it was another really fast week! But it has been lots of fun too! I am learning so much as I have go though my mission this far. Right now we (sister Fiefia and I and also the Amsterdam Elders) are trying to work with the Branch because they don't really support us with our work. But we are doing alot of praying and fasting on what we need to do the get the Branch to help us and to become member missionaries.

So this week we had Zone Training Meeting and we also had Interviews with President Rogers. WOW ZTM was truly inspired because it was about working with the members where you serve and how to have there help in the work. So that was awesome because now we have all these really cool ideas on what we can do to help the branch.

I talked in church on Sunday about the Book of Mormon and the role it plays for us as we become truly converted to the Gospel of Jesus Christ! haha it was suppose to be Missionary Sunday LOL never heard of it before but this branch does it quite often i found out because there is barely enough fully active member in the branch to cover every sunday with in a 3 month time period. So i will be speaking a lot i feel.

We have a new investigator he is pretty Rad i am still trying to get to know him but he seems pretty cool so far. But all our other investigators are just Golden they are doing so well. One of the is sadly in the Hospital right now but we pray for him constantly.

This week has been grossly hot, I am pretty sure I have sweated over 5 gallons this week! EW!!!!!!!! But when it s hot and gross that means it will rain and after it rains it cool for a little and gets even more hot and gross. The nasty cycle of life here in New York. LOL but its all worth it. Everyone saying soon it will get cold here, haha that is FALSE!!!! it is just getting hotter and hotter. NY is having a very late summer but oh well cant do much about it but just love it!!!!

Oh just so yall can have a good laugh my mission nick name is Potatoe Head because I am the only missionary form Idaho that talks the way I do. LOL apparently i have a accent i don't know what they are all talking about lol!

Well hope yall have a great day and dont forget to pray!! i know Heavenly Father does in fact here and answer all of your prayers!!! I have recently had a wonderful experience with prayer. I was having a little rough time this week and I was just praying my little heart out that i will be able to get help to just give me the comfort i need. Then this friday i met with my mission president, that was amazing! I helped me so much to know what i needed to do and it was such a wonderful experience. The spirit was so strong there I didnt want to leave i just wanted to stay there talking to him all day. He let me know he is always a phone call away because he knows i will do great thing on my mission and he doesn't want me to worry so much and to always feel free to call and just ask for help. I am so grateful for that. I know Heavenly Father did here my prayers and i was asking him for help. Never forget this, " I need thee every hour most holy one" That is so true we always need our savior and he will always be there as we turn our hearts to him in prayer.

Love the Lord with all your Heart <3

-Sister Loveland XOXOX

Fonda NEW YORK

Well I have made it 1 transfer! HAHAHA so crazy to think i has been that long! I feel like I have already been here forever! But that is good because now i dont ever want to leave!! it is so beautiful here in new york!

So this week has been Crazy!!!!! I barely remember what happened..... so sorry it is a short letter today.... just me and my short term memory lost this week! lol

So I met my GRANDMA (the sister who trained my companion/trainer) she came and visited us! It was so much fun!!! She even came teaching with us! I am so grateful she did because for the longest time i thought i didnt know enough to teach, but after that she gave me the biggest hug and told me that she know i am where i am suppose to be and I am completely ready to share the Gospel to Gods Children. I know i can do all things through Christ!

So we had to drop some more investigators which is sad, but we know they will be ready later on for another set of missionaries. But right now our investigators Brian and Lesa have a B-Day (baptismal date) Brian is August 2nd and Lesa is August 15th. We know Lesa is completely ready she is sad it couldn't be sooner but we have a few more lessons to teach her. So that is that.

I know this work so important!!! This week me and my comp have been praying and fasting our little hearts out to find someone who is in need of gospel and who the lord has prepared for us. I believe it was about 3 days ago we met a sweet old me named Roger. He was sitting out on his porch. I felt we needed to go talk to him so I did just that. Come to find out he really needed to know there was a way for his son to be forgiven and for him to be forgiven. He asked us to come back on Thursday. I know the Lord did listen and answer our prayers. i am so grateful for that.

i want you all to know that you are all missionaries!!!! there is a quote for someone that has always stuck in my head, " EVERY MEMBER A MISSIONARY" you all represent our savior Jesus Christ everyday. As you are a example to our Heavenly Fathers children you are planting seeds. There is a scripture that comes to my mind its, Mosiah 26:18-19 ," Yea, blessed is this people who are willing to bear my name; for in my name shall they be called;and they are mine. and because thou hast inquired of me concerning the transgressor, thou art blessed. thou art my servant; and i covenant with thee that thou shalt have eternal life; and thou shalt serve me and go forth in my name, and shalt gather together my sheep." As you all have made the sacred covenant of baptism you all made the decision to bear is name, help find those lost sheep help the missionaries as much as you can to help those lost sheep come back to the fold. I know as you do so you will be blessed and will receive the best gifts of all gifts which is eternal life.

Thank you so much for all you love and support it really means alot!

Love and Trust the Lord will all you hearts!!!! <3

-Sister Loveland

Well I have been out for 6 weeks

Well i have been out for 6 weeks, I have gone through my first transfer and i am staying in Fonda with Sister Fiefia! I am killing her (aka she is ending her mission with me) everything is just peachy here in New York! just A LOT of rain like every day it is raining! But that's ok we need the rain! The weather so far is nothing like what i expected weird enough to say it is way better then Idahos weather! It hasn't got it over 95 degrees but it is very humid so it feels like it is over 100. But its all good! I still love it here!!! I am learning water is so very important!!!!! same with having snacks in your bag during car fast days! 

So this week we got 6 new investigators which is WONDERFUL!!! My comp and I have been praying so hard to get new investigators sense we dropped most of them 2 weeks ago! The Lord sure did bless us because most of them now have a Baptismal Date and are progressing like crazy!!! They are all Golden!!! I can not wait to see how far they go! 

One of the Elders in the area are getting transfers (Elder Maxwell) he is awesome! He is going to Ethica to reopen. Which should be fun lol he is super excited!! 

Sunday we went to go visit one of our investigators that is in the Hospital, what a great experience. the spirit was so strong as we were visiting with him, he couldn't stop crying as we shared with him about how he isnt alone during this time in his life that the Lord is always with him carrying him. I share the story call Foot Prints in the sand. He stopped me half way and said, " how did you guys know i needed to hear this" and i smiled and said " the lord told us what you needed" at that moment i know that i am suppose to be here. I am suppose to be on a mission for the Lord. He does need me and I know everything i need to know to get my feet on the ground and get going on hastening his work in this part if the vineyard.

 

I have come to learn how truly important it is to pray to our Heavenly Father everyday as many times as possible. It is a commandment to pray to our Heavenly Father in the Name of Jesus Christ. And as we pray we should never forget to give more thanks to the Lord then anything. He has given us so much! And we should always thank him for everything, through our gratitude we can relieve blessings and see miracles happen everyday. I also know that yes the Lord knows everything we will ever go through but do not forget to ask him for help, and to help those that we love and care for, because as we open our hearts to the Lord he will help us. I would like to invite you all to pray to our Heavenly Father in the name of Jesus Christ and just thank him for all he has given you and has done for you through out  your life. I know as you do this you will feel Heavenly Fathers and Jesus Christs love for you so over overwhelmingly and you will know that they do hear and answer every pray you will ever give. As a Representative of our Savior Jesus Christ I can promise you that as you turn to our Heavenly Father in prayer everyday that you will be blessed and you will see miracles everyday. I say these thinks in the name of our Savior Jesu Christ, Amen.

Thank you so much for all you love and support it really means so much to me. I know that your prayers are being answered everyday.

Love the Lord with all you heart! <3

-Sister Maraiha Loveland

xoxoxo

New Mission president Roger and his wife