Pret and Some New Investigators

Dear Family,

Good week.

Highlights:

Pret. We found a Pret in Glasgow.  We got it and ate it in the middle of Buchanan Street in downtown Glasgow. Seriously, it was just right back to the days of London, and it was so much fun. I love Glasgow, it is one of the prettiest cities in the world, and has the coolest train station, by far. Love it.

We found a new investigator and lost them in the same week. Haha. It was the girlfriend of a less-active in our ward, and she just moved back to Ireland the visit after we gave her a Book of Mormon. How funny is that? Seed is planted and may be reaped somewhere else. :)

We stopped a man after our dinner appointment with the Spiers (they are so nice, seriously love their family) and this guy that we stopped turned out to be an all-out crazy. We were talking about God, and then he said, "I am the perfect person for you two to be talking to. I can see the Holy Spirit in your eyes but they are pinned." I don't know what that means, but he told us that the Catholic faith is the only true church on the Earth. He told us that we needed to really look at ourselves and open our minds. He told us that he had the gift of healing and the gift of tongues, and then he grabbed our hands and started sort of praying with us and then put his hands on our heads and started "speaking in tongues." Oh my goodness, it was so scary! I know that this kind of thing is dangerous, but I was absolutely stunned and had clearly never been in that situation before--as I assume not many have--and so after a little bit I backed away, told him he was making me uncomfortable, and we walked away. Seriously, it was scary. But we were okay! We said our own prayer after and felt better.

We went by a lady that we'd chapped into a few weeks ago, L--, who hasn't been home ever since. She was there but was very busy, but I remembered the counsel of one of our AP's, Elder Okebrand, who said, "Be a little bit persistent." I asked her if she had five minutes that we could come in and share a scripture, and she let us in! We shared Alma 7:11-12, which is my go-to thanks to Sister Nicoll, and then we left! Just a five-minute appointment, but she knows that we are friendly and nice and won't stay around for forever. And she said we could come back. Miracle!

Whilst chapping, we ran into a really nice lady named J--. At the end of our conversation (she is very involved in the Church of Scotland) we asked if we could pray with her, and so she invited us in to pray and have a wee blether. My second invite into a house EVER! It was awesome. At the end, she told us we could come back anytime (which is solid, because she's unemployed), and then we ran into her today in City Center. Seriously, it was awesome. A little miracle and a little friend for the Church.

I got out of the shower one night this week, and it smelled like s'mores in our flat, but then Sister Jackson had just gotten confused and put her jacket on the fireplace to heat it up faster.....:) That jacket went in the bin.

So those were mostly the funny bits of the week. I am always writing the funny stuff in my e-mails, because I feel like most missionary e-mails are all spiritual and that makes everybody skim and not read. But maybe mine are a little far in the other direction, eh? I don't know. Maybe I'm just not spiritual.

A man in our ward was talking in Church and he was saying how the DOING in the gospel makes the difference. When we obtain answers, it is because we act on something. When Joseph Smith wanted to know the truth, he read the scripture that poses the question (if any of you lack wisdom) let him ask of God (an answer that can be obtained only through Action.) We need to ACT if we want answers. That is why we are always committed to do things, because that is the only way we will obtain answers. Some people don't have a testimony of going to church. Usually those are the people who don't go. Some people don't have a testimony of the Book of Mormon. Those people probably haven't read it. They haven't gotten their answer, because they haven't put any action forth to get their answer. Even Satan knows the principles of the gospel, and I'm sure that he knows what the Book of Mormon says. But he doesn't obtain the reward, because he chooses to act opposite to what the Book says. Interesting idea. It reminds us that we need to act on the truths that we know rather than to read the book and assume it will be absorbed in us.

Quote of the week: "Are there so many fascinating, exciting things to do or so many challenges pressing down upon you that it is hard to keep focused on that which is essential? When things of the world crowd in, all too often, the wrong things take highest priority. Then it is easy to forget the fundamental purpose of life. Satan has a powerful tool to use against good people. It is distraction. He would have good people fill life with "good things" so there is no room for the essential ones. Have you unconsciously been caught in that trap?"

Go out and do some essential things this week! Because, really, nothing else matters. :)

The Church is True! I promise!

Sister Ricks

22 Lessons

Dearest Family,

Did I send this picture already? I think maybe. But here ya go. AR in EK.

This week was excellent! One of the goals of our mission, and one of the standards of excellence, is to get at least 20 lessons a week. It would be prime if they were all investigator lessons, but I've never even gotten it with less-active and recent-convert lessons. I've tried every week, but it's hard. I've been right on the brink and have missed the mark. But this week was different!!! We taught 22 LESSONS! And 15 were investigator lessons. It was seriously a miracle. Maybe it's because most of you went to Yellowstone without me and so God decided to bless me in His own way. And boy, am I grateful! :)

On Monday we ran up to EK's Loch and Castle. It was the Heritage Loch and it's gorgeous. Running there was interesting. Sometimes I forget that even though I love to run, I haven't really done it for 3 or 4 months, and so 5 miles is going to be a bit long for me! Still, it was really fun even though I made Sister Jackson, the marathon runner, stop a couple of times. My feet hurt. :) It also started bucketing on our way up. Seriously, it was so wet. So we just stood and looked across a beautiful loch at a tiny castle in the pouring rain. Moments like that make you grateful to be a missionary where you are and doing what you are doing. We were sitting there staring at the beauty and this lady went by and said, "No excuse to stop running!" Haha. It was awesome. Way fun.

On Monday evening we went out to eat with I-- and JM, two of my favorite people in the world. They were so fun and we went out to eat at this awesome Chinese place that had delicious food and smaller portions so we weren't too stuffed. Just enough. :) It was good! We finished the night by reading Moroni 10 with Brother S-- at FHE--his first time ever finishing it surrounded by his friends at Family Night! It was so fun and really exciting.

On Tuesday we accidentally got lost in Glasgow after district meeting. Oops. I forgot when we went to lunch as a district that I didn't know where we were and forgot my Glasgow map. But we got a nice lil' tour of Glasgow and eventually found our way home. It was pretty neat; we had just learned about service at district meeting and about how we should look on the street for people who need help. When we got home, we saw these ladies with loads of groceries and asked if we could help. Turns out that one is a less-active that I've tried by before. She let us help us with her groceries, and we have an appointment with her tonight! She said she'd been thinking about coming to church. Blessing of district meeting and applying the things that we learn.

Sister Jackson stopped a lady this week on the street right as a bee attacked me. So she was busy talking to the lady while I was swatting the bee with my Book of Mormon. Haha. 

People have been feeding us SO MUCH FOOD this week! Luckily we are running and my weight is exactly what it was when I started my mission.  Anyway, we went to a lady and she fed us 12 biscuits. 12! EACH! It was madness. 

Nobody told us on Wednesday night that our missionary coordination meeting was cancelled for a few weeks, so we sat and played I-Spy for 20 minutes until we had to call somebody and they told us it was cancelled. Haha. Oops! Apparently East Kilbride no longer needs coordination with their missionaries. Just kidding. It was pretty funny though. 

I realized this week that I've been out for 4 1/2 months ... that is 1/4 of the way done with my mission! Seriously, it is crazy how time seems to have flown by. I never realized until this week just how much I love being a missionary. I have the best job in the world: I am a full-time serviceperson, trying to bring others the good news of the gospel that will make them happier than anything else. I just get to serve and be with members and people on the street and meet all sorts of crazies! Being a missionary is the best! I love it. Check out psalms 89:47: Remember How Short My Time Is! Seriously.

We had exchanges with our Sister Training Leaders this week, and so Sister Jackson went back to Irvine for a couple of days while her trainer, Sister Passey who is now a STL, came to East Kilbride. As always, nearly all of our awesome appointments fell through but it was still a pretty good day. I missed Sister Jackson though. I cut Sister Passey's hair. How nice of me. Now she is walking around with one side long, one side short, and the top spiky. I'd say I did a pretty good job.

Exchange with Sister Passey

A lady in our ward was feeding us, and as we left I ended the message with, “In the name of.....uh.....see ya." So awkward!

I know I've already told you about the negativity thing, but I really have realized how much I lose the Spirit when I hear negativity. One of my favorite less-actives, who we see every Saturday evening at 8 o'clock, just started talking about all the things she didn't like about the church:   the choir isn't great and lets everybody in so it doesn’t sound wonderful, the Primary teachers don't know how to handle the kids, the organist shrugs her shoulders every time she makes a mistake, nobody talked to her friend that she brought to church, etc. I know I've said things like that about church before, but when she was talking about it I started crying. I didn't cry enough for her to see, but I wanted to say, "Stop talking about these people like that! They are my dearest friends, people that I absolutely love." She wouldn't comment about what she liked about the church, only the things that she didn't like. And she said she can never see herself going back to church. It just broke my heart. Church isn't about having a great choir or even great friends. Church is about worshipping Heavenly Father and taking the sacrament and obeying the commandments. If we have a strong enough testimony, it won't matter what kind of service is held or what kind of people are in the ward. We will go because we love God, not because we love the ward or the people.

Church was absolutely fabulous. Sister Jackson gave a great talk about fasting, and we also got to do a musical number where she played the viola and I sang "Where Love Is." It made our investigator, A--, cry when we were practicing before church. That was nice! I think this ward is liking our companionship, because we are getting so many more dinner appointments than ever before! This ward is great, and we got our goal of six joint-teaches this week! That was so exciting!!!!! :) Seriously, it was am amazing week!

We were teaching our reactivated less-active, Brother H--, right after church. Even though I'd tried to see if anyone could stay for a couple of minutes and teach with us, no one could. So we were going to teach him outside the church, in public, like normal. But then it started raining. Harder than it has rained in my entire four months. I was laughing so hard, and we ended up running to a tunnel and teaching there. It was hilarious. Then we went home and put all of our stuff in sandwich bags, inside a plastic shopping bag, inside our bags. Haha. Then it was sunny for most the rest of the day. Scottish weather--all 4 seasons in 1 day.

One thing that I learned from church that I especially liked is about the scripture "If ye love me, keep my commandments." If we emphasize different words in the scripture, it takes on new meaning.

If ye love me, keep my commandments.

If: It's a choice. Not an automatic thing.

Ye: Love is a choice that WE make. We choose to love Jesus Christ. He already loves us. 

Love: As Elder Holland said, "The crowning characteristic of love is always loyalty."

Me: Jesus Christ is the center of the gospel, and if we love Him, we will keep the commandments.

Keep: Keep them in your hearts. Write them in your hearts. Don't do them every once in awhile and let them go. Keep them. 

My: They are commandments from Jesus Christ. They are His commandments. That is how we can be sure they are for our benefit. 

Commandments: Emphasis on the S. There are lots of commandmentS. We can't just pick and choose the ones we want to keep. The Ten Commandments are not multiple choice.

I also like to do the scripture the other way around: "Keep my commandments if ye love me." It just makes you think a bit more. Why do we keep the commandments? Is it because we are blessed? Because they make us happy? Because the church members around us will judge us if we don't? Nope. We keep them because we love Jesus Christ, and He has asked us to keep them. And that's really all there is to it. 

Well. Sorry. That was a bit of a dogmatic e-mail, but just some thoughts and experiences I had for the week. 

Have a good week, each of you! Have a missionary experience! :) Witness a miracle. Help someone out. Be happy. Do what is right. Love God and love yourself and love your neighbor, and you will be all right. 

Love you! 

Sister Ricks 

She Runs!!!

Dearest Family,

Sometimes I hate looking at a blank e-mail and not knowing what to say. I would much prefer to use my two-hour e-mail time to read all of your e-mails and be able to talk to you. But, alas, earwax!! (Name the book)We're off.

Life is great here in East Kilbride. Sister Jackson is lovely. She is wee, only about 5'4. She loves to run, which makes me so happy, because we wake up at 6:20 and go on a 30 minute run every morning. What a blessing! She hasn't had any companions yet who have gone running with her, so we are both very excited about that. In fact, we are using our P-day to go on a long run up to our one and only castle in EK. I am so excited. Hope the weather cooperates.

Saying good-bye to Sister Jones was really sad. I was very sad to see her go. On Monday and Tuesday, we went to all the people that she wanted to see. It was weird and didn't feel like we were missionaries, but it was still jolly good. We got to see some of the less-actives that generally don't see us because they are sick, but they wanted to see her because it was her last few days. That was nice. I'm sure some great things happened, but I forgot to bring my last journal (I am already finished with it. :( ) and so I am just going to leave it. It was good. It was sad. I didn't like that she was leaving me.

Picking up Sister Jackson went smoothly, luckily. We had to walk through Glasgow with her luggage, but we got to EK just fine and are doing well. I've been getting us lost and we've been talking to people. So there you go. Missionary work at its finest.

Brother S-- drank again this week. He still met us and we had a wonderful lesson where he committed to go to the Addiction Recovery Group, but then church came and he didn't show up. We had a great joint teach scheduled with one of his friends who stopped drinking. I called him and he said he wasn't in the mood to go to church and didn't want to go to our lesson. I am so sad about it and won't continue to dwell on it because it totally bums me out.

S-- is our friend who is the Family History one. She is really nice but doesn't really know what we are doing here. Sister Jackson asked her if she was interested in learning about our beliefs and she isn't even a little bit. But she always wants us to visit her and loves to feed and take care of us. So...we're not really sure what to do about that. We don't want to offend her, but also want to fulfill our purpose. Her son came to yesterday's end-of-dinner and the sharing of the spiritual thought though. The spirit was definitely there and you never know, there could be a seed that is planted!

Sister Jackson is very bold in her lessons and street finding. I can definitely learn a lot from her! She has never really done much finding/chapping before, because they had loads of investigators in Irvine. Since we only have Brother S-- as a progressing investigator, and he isn't exactly progressing, we are doing lots of finding. I accidentally took her for three hours chapping because our try-bys weren't in. Luckily she had a great attitude about it.

None of the less-actives that we are working with, nor our investigators, came to church. That was a bit discouraging.

Miracle: We were walking up the road and were approaching this teenage girl. We usually don't stop teenagers (I'm not sure why, but nobody ever does, maybe because they can be mean) and this girl was especially scary looking. She had skulls on her bag, severely colored hair, etc. Sister Jackson stopped her and gave her a card.  She said she'd look at it and seemed interested and said she'd give us a call. WHAT? That was the power of God reminding me that it isn't my place to judge, and that it's lucky that ultimately He is the only one who can judge.

I'm looking back and realizing that this letter sounds a bit depressing, but that was not my intention. I really am doing so well! The work is moving forward and we have some potential investigators that will hopefully turn into real investigators. One of our incredible less actives, Sister P--, prayed that this week we would speak with at least three people that would be nice to us, even if they weren't interested. That was such a sweet prayer and I feel the Spirit strongly when I hear people pray and you know they are talking very specifically to Heavenly Father. They know He is there and that He will answer them.

I have a favorite quote of the week: "Don't give up. Don't you quit. You keep walking. You keep trying. There is help and happiness ahead—a lot of it. You keep your chin up. It will be all right in the end. Trust God and believe in good things to come." --Jeffrey R. Holland

Do it! Trust in good things to come, because there are miracles around us every day if we open our spiritual eyes and see them! God is good and the gospel is true.

Love you all.

Sister Ricks

All Scotland Zone Conference

A Day In The Life of...

Dearest Family,

 

The big news of the day is that Moves call came. Sister Jones and I were convinced that we were staying together, and I'd even told Mr. Journal several times that we were. Heavenly Father had other plans for us though, and so we got a call in the middle of chapping from the Mission Office. It wasn't supposed to be the Mission Office-it was supposed to be the Zone Leaders! Consequently, we talked to President Brown who gave Sister Jones the calling of Finglas, in the Dublin Zone, to be the Senior Companion to a missionary who just finished training: Sister Brand. I am staying in East Kilbride with a sister named Sister Jackson, who is coming over from Irvine in the Paisley Zone and was just finished being trained. She is a viola major and is incredible at musicianship! She is, according to Sister Ashdown who is in her zone, very uplifting and cute! She is supposed to be a bit quiet, and so I hope not to talk off her ear. (At least not too much).

 

I thought it would be fun, and Sister Jones did it as well, to take pictures throughout the day and have a little Day In the Life Of...Sister Ricks! So here we go. I chose July 31, because it was a Day of Miracles, and because it's Harry Potter's birthday. ;) 

 

The alarm clock goes off at 6:30 a.m.

I feel like this. :)

I say my morning prayers.

We head out to our favorite roundabout where we run around! I love our exercise time!

We also do squats for exercise. Squatting is so fun.

Then we eat breakfast! I love to eat breakfast, especially Crunchy Nut. That is delicious!

Then we do our hair and get ready for the day.

Then I get to do Personal Study! Personal Study is my favorite time of the day and always goes by much too quickly!

Then we have Companionship Study. This time we confirm our plans for the day, sing, read 3 pages from the White Handbook, and tell each other what we've learned. We make lesson plans for those we will see and we discuss how to help people.

Now we are out and about--10:00! Today we are teaching S---, our recently reactivated member. He has a hard time with the gospel and I think he believes it is true but just has a funny way of looking at it. We found out that he is writing his own book, which is nice. He is a good guy. This picture is taken as we are walking on our wee path to the church. Notice my coat and my skirt don't match. Is anybody mad? I thought so. Dad is always mad.

After S--- it is time for lunch! We come back to the flat and I HAVE POST!! My lovely friend Annabelle has written me. Having post is the best. :)

We also eat lunch. I had a nectarine, yoghurt, and piece of toast. And my insulin pen. :)

During lunch, for which we have 1 hour, I take a nap. Naps are the BEST and really get me through the day. And yes, I sleep with my leg up. I know, it's weird.

We are out again and ready to hit the world at 11:30! We start by waiting at the bus stop outside our flat. It seems like we are always waiting at a bus stop.

check out the sign we saw on HARRY POTTER'S BIRTHDAY!

Our Appointment, Sister B---, cancelled on us and so we go GQ in Calderwood. We meet an incredible lady who we stop and chat with for awhile. She is interested in the Book of Mormon and everything and only tells us after we've taught her for a wee while that she's met the missionaries before because she's dating a member of our ward who is Less-Active! It was kind of like she was testing us. Anyway, little miracle there for sure. We will call her and try to meet with her after her holiday. She was Irish and just had a gorgeous accent.

Now we meet with C---. C--- was a miracle from the day before. Sister Jones and I walked by a bus stop and said "Hiya!" to this woman and her son but didn't really talk to them. About a minute later, we hear a little boy running after us and he said, "where is the LDS church?" because his mom had sent him. We went back and talked with her and she had been sealed in the temple but hadn't been at church for a long time and has just moved here. When we met with her today, we found out that she has been ex-communicated and has had just a lot of horrible things happen in life, but she wants to sort things out and get back on track. It was an awesome lesson, and was the only lesson where I said we should offer a kneeling prayer after the first time we taught her. it usually feels too weird. Hopefully when we meet with her this week, her 9-year old unbaptised son will be there! :)

After C---, we rode the bus back to East Kilbride Bus Station. The bus was empty on the top level so we snapped a quick picture.

When we got to the bus station, we walked over to our favorite person ever-S---! She is the one who we chapped with Family History and then saw her in the park and talked to her. Today, she fed us! She texted us and invited us to dinner! She is just wonderful and shared with us her sad life story. Her husband cheated on her and left her about 4 months ago after having been together for so long. It was so sad but she fed us vegetarian mince over spaghetti. It was delicious!

It was raining after, so we got a brallie from S--- and went on our way to the church. Notice I'm not wearing a coat anymore. Variable Scottish weather!!

Missionary Coordination Meeting at our church!

After, we met Brother S--- at Sister Green's (she is a ward missionary) home. Every other lesson with him, we read from the Book of Mormon. He is so close to being done!

This is a picture of us teaching Brother S---. Posed, obviously. We wanted one picture teaching. Took forever to get it too.

We walked home from Brother S-- and did Nightly Planning. Nightly Planning is so necessary but is so hard sometimes! We are always so tired. This is where we make our plans for the next day.

I write in my journal

I pray!

Now for the best part of the day: Bedtime!!!

There we go for one day in my life. How nice!

 

I know that this gospel is true! I am so grateful to go and share with the good people of East Kilbride, and although I am nervous to get a new companion, I know that this is what the Lord wants from me!

 

I love you all and pray for you daily. Have a good week!

Love,

Sister Ricks