July 9, 2010

So, business first: one of my favorite scriptures and plaque scripture is Alma 29:9. (A plaque with Lauren's picture along with her favorite scripture will hang on the wall at our chapel until she returns home).
I found my tape recorder. Wahoo! :-) I put it in a very special place, and sure enough, I forgot where that was. Anyways, right now in Washington it is very hot, very hot and sunny. It is like being back home in Temecula. So, all my summer clothes are coming in handy except I don't have that many.
So, missionary work is going awesome, except we are struggling with finding new investigators. We had an investigator drop us. We went to his door, and as we were walking toward his door, we saw him run and hide in his backyard. We knocked on the door, and his roommate answered and said that he just left and a friend just picked him up. Then, we called him out and said "really, because we just saw him run in the backyard." It was kind of funny and sad at the same time. I just wish people were more straight up with us; honest and didn't lie. I just don't get it.
But, we just taught a twenty-five year old girl who has four kids. She is awesome. We have a lot of fun with her. She is to be baptized Aug. 1 st. She has a great amount of faith except she doesn't or is having a hard time reading the Book of Mormon. We taught her today lesson 2, the plan of salvation. Every time I teach it I'm amazed how much our Father in Heaven loves us. I learn something new each and every time. My testimony grows more and more when we present the plan by the Spirit. So far, everyone has said that makes sense. The three degrees of glory is what gets people to rethink because it is so different than what they have ever heard. The only thing they can do is pray about if it is true.
I think my next favorite lesson to teach is the restoration. The restoration video gets me every time. Tears just run down my face. The Spirit is so strong when we have the investigators watch it. I have a strong testimony that Joseph Smith at the young age of 14 saw God the Father and Jesus Christ. I have memorized the First Vision and just love it. What a miraculous experience, and I can only imagine the great amount of faith it took for Joseph Smith.
Anyways, so at first I didn't think that missionary work was all that hard. I didn't think that it was as hard as everyone said....ha, ha, ha, just kidding. Oh, my gosh, it is so hard and challenging, but it is worth it when we finally sit down with an investigator and discuss and teach the lesson and I bear my testimony of the truth of the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ on the earth again. Oh, how glorious....go to D&C 18:15-16. Oh, I am using my new quad scriptures like crazy. They're going to be so marked up by the time I get home.
So, I got your letters Mom and Dad and all the pictures. Wow, you guys had a great time. I've been wanting to do those things for years and now you finally do them when I'm gone. Yep, cool beans! I'm glad you finally really enjoyed yourselves by going hiking, renting Seedos on the lake, or whatever...so fun!!
Thanks, Dad, for giving me the detailed info about your week...not jealous at all! Grrrr...:-) J/K
I finally got the package you sent Mom--yummy. Thank you so much.
My companion puts up pictures of all her family and friends on the walls, and I just put mine in the scrap book you made Mom because I am so worried about getting homesick. I am so determined not to; I don't want it to affect my work here. So, I'll still look, but I don't need a constant reminder/thought of you guys cuz I miss you all so much already and don't need to be homesick. But, please keep sending pictures. I love them lots. I don't have many pictures of Eric and Amber or my kitties--- if you haven't killed them yet, or they haven't died from the heat. I know Dad takes good care of them and Mom cleans the litter box. Ha, ha. I don't get it but thanks Mom. Maybe it is because you dealt with many dirty diapers in the past. Yuck! I know that one day it will be me.
The key to missionary work is love. Without it, you'll have no success in teaching. Having charity and love invites the Spirit into your heart and you are able to discern their needs and teach accordingly. It is amazing how much I understand what these people are going through even though I've never gone through some of their extreme experiences and situations, but it is awesome to be able to feel for them and find some way you can relate.
Right now, we have almost everyone we make an appointment with fall through. They aren't home; some call to reschedule, and then they aren't there at the time they rescheduled. Why, or why do people do that? We aren't scary, or are we? We just want to talk. We are not going to condemn them. Ha, ha. Everyone thinks we are or something. We are here to serve which people won't even let us do. It is a frustrating time. However, it is still awesome, and we are doing well. Some people are receptive. The field is white already to harvest. I love you so much. Miss you all. Keep up the great work. Open your mouths and pray for opportunities to share the gospel and then look for them.
Dad, thanks for typing my letters. I know that they are lengthy (no kidding! Dad K).
Lauren wrote more on the envelope: OK, so the biggest miracle just happened...in my letter I talked about how frustrating the past two ?days, weeks, I don' t know, have been. We've been working hard, being as obedient as we can and wanting and seeking for new investigators today...doblahdah :-) He has been trying our faith. We just got a phone call from a lady in our ward. She said her parents want to be baptized ASAP. We have been praying and praying for the past two weeks for new investigators. Our prayers have been answered. We never gave up! we had a goal of this week to find three new investigators and we got two today. The Lord is always preparing people, prayers are truly answered. Ether 12:6 No witness until after the trial of our faith. I love missionary work. I love the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It truly brings eternal happiness.
The church is true. Go and serve someone today.

Just Arrived....pictures from Lauren

Most of these are pictures during her stay at the MTC.

It is a tradition at the Misssionary Training Center or MTC to stand in front of the wall map and point to the country and place in which you will be serving. There are missions literally all over the world.

Letter from Lauren : Dear Mom & Dad & family & friends, It sounds like you had a great time up in Tahoe,except you haven't given me alot of details. I hear I have a package but my Zone leaders have not gone to the mission home to get it. I received everyones' letters--Erin,Savannah,Will and Coles'. (happy face)I'm in a new place. It's an apartment above a members garage. It's nice but we don't like being seperate from the members so much. We liked living with the members so we can use some of their things. However, it is also nice that we won't be bothered by the members so much. The lady we were living with before was a little weird but nice. She would wake us up in the middle of the night to give us a letter we missed or to make sure we were ok. Ahhhh Oh well! Our place now has bunk beds and i'm on the top. Whoohoo! Not! We have a porch which is nice. It looks over their hugh yard and humongous trees! Seriously, the trees here are huge!

How was your 4th of July? I can't wait to hear. Ours' was alot of fun!! Except we had none of our investigators come to Church but 2 of them. Ahhh it was So frustrating and sad! They promised they would be there and they weren't. We even went to their houses to wake them up. We rang and knocked on their doors a couple of times. But on the plus side,we had a bunch of inactives from the Branch come to Church. We say reactivation is better than a baptism. Okay, now for the 4th of July stuff. So fireworks are a huge thing here. They can buy the BIG STUFF. Everything is pretty much legal here! It's sweet! So the members that we are staying with put on a big fireworks preshow on Saturday. It was awesome!!! It was huge like the ones we see from our backyards and we were super close so of course it was loud. Sunday we went over to our Branch Presidents' home for dinner and lit offsome fireworks. We had to be in by 8:30 which is late normally for the 4th of July. I guess our new Mission President doesn't know that missionaries should probably be in by 6:30 p.m. People here in Wa. are crazy especially with fireworks.There were loud booms and pops everywhere you were last night. As the night went onon it would get louder and louder. We felt as if it was a war going on. Hugh ones! No joke. At 10 p.m. my comp(companion herein will be referred to as comp.) and I walked out to the hill near our house and watched all the millions of fireworks going off. Huge ones! We couldn't see alot of them because the trees were so tall, but the lights in the sky would flash up everywhere. I have some fun pictures to show you but you probably won't get them until next week. Lets see, last week was not a very good week missionary wise. We didn't find any new investigators. Alot of our appointments were canceled and just people flaking out. grrrr... But this week we have set alot of goals to help us findnew people and ways we can get the members more involved. It's the members that need to find, not us! We need to do more of the teaching according to Elder Ballard! It's really cool what our mission has set up to get members involved. Elder Ballard said to members that if they set a date to find someone that wants to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ, he will put someone in your path by that date. So far the new mission president is nice & cool. He's definately different than our last mission president. He'll do a great job! Our elders in our district are crazy! They are pretty disobedient and they wonder why their members are always zero! We do have one Elder who is pretty obedient and they have ok numbers. I have such a testimony of how obedience truly brings success and more abundance of the Spirit with you. It's very evident in the mission. However, you do see disobedient missionaries baptize people... Anyways I'm having fun. There are some tough tiring moments though. People here are not receptive much at all. Howerver, there are some who are. (smily) We get doors slammed in our faces all the time. Nobody even wants to hear what we have to say. Actually, we are having a harder time finding new investigators in the Branch ,but we are seeking and we are wanting to know who they are.It is usually those who have had a really rough life and who have not been happy at all. Those we teach are those who need to change the most. I'm learning ASL(american sign language). It's really cool! It's hard for me to pick it up,but I know a few things. My name is pretty cool in ASL. Anyways I don't know what else to say except that I miss you all tons! I love you mom & dad! How are the kitties? There are so many cats here. I just cling to them. Then I am covered in dog & cat fur. It's so gross! I'm so glad we don't have indoor animals.Yuck!(unless they don't shed) I'm sorry my letters are so boring. Oh wait, just kidding! We have one new investigator this week. I totally forgot. His name is George and he is 18 yrs old. He has been in & out of prison since he was 10. He wants to chage so much. He believes! We are excited to teach him. Love you guys so much. Thanks for all you do for me. Love, Sister Kimball

MTC

Ok This is out of order but I am working out the bugs as a new blogger. I think this says it all.
" It's my kind of mission! This is the mission for me! This is truly where the Lord wants me to serve!"

Letter from Mission President

Dear Brother and Sister Kimball,

We are happy to inform you that your missionary has safely arrived in the mission field. We thought you would enjoy this photo taken with us soon after her arrival.

We appreciate these young people and their families who are willing to make the needed sacrifice to help this important work move forward. A mission can be difficult and challenging at times but the rewards are wonderful. Our missionaries need all the support they can get and we encourage you to write uplifting and supportive letters each week. Our Church leaders have given the missionaries permission to call home on Mother's Day and Christmas. Personal calls home at any other time are not authorized. If in an emergency arises, please call the mission home.

We are looking forward to our association with Sister Kimball in the service of the Lord. We will have a personal visit with her every four to six weeks.. Our missionaries also write a personal report to us once a week. We will come to know your daughter quite intimately and will be greatly interested in her welfare and spiritual growth.

May the Lord continue to bless your home and your family as Sister Kimball serves in this wonderful work. Sincerly, President and Sister Showalter

June 28,2010

Let's see, alot has happened...right now we have 3 investigators with baptismal dates in the month of July. We have only 2 progressing investigators which means they go to church and have been taught two or more lessons. It has been a great week. We are working very hard and have a lot of faith! With that faith, the Lord is blessing us to help and to find those who are ready and prepared to hear the gospel. We have met this one couple that is on meth, getting kicked out of their home, and the husband has just left out of their lives. One of our investigators, Shana, is not married but has been living with her boyfriend for 14 years. Her boyfriend is abusive, both physically and mentally. Shana wants to leave him, but he threatens her, and she is very scared. It is a horrible situation. He is very controlling. Anyway, she is an amazing woman who has been prepared to hear the gospel and join the church. However, Satan is working on her and everyone of our investigators like crazy.
It is very sad some of the situations I run into each and everyday. Most are depressed, no direction in life, and fearful. But, at the same time, they don't want to hear the gospel and learn how to better their lives. Another hard thing is to see recent converts fall away right away. They are baptized and then stop coming to church. The more awesome thing is to see those people who are trying to live the best life they can and pray to God for help even when they don't have the gospel. I love sitting and teaching them the joy and happiness that comes from doing God's will. What's even more amazing is these people willing to change all their old habits to follow our Savior, Jesus Christ. It is pretty awesome.
We are teaching this nineteen year old named Shannon, and it is really hard for me to really love her. She is just weird, bipolar, and I've been struggling. I'm trying. The last lesson we taught her went Okay. The Spirit wasn't with me because she really bugs me. It is amazing what small things we do that offend the Spirit that disqualify us for His complete influence and direction.The Spirit is so strong as we are obedient and faithful, and we recognize His subtle promptings.
My companion and I are becoming such great friends. We are teaching so much more in unity as our friendship developed and as we exercised greater amounts of faith. We just have so much fun together. We laugh all the time. I love missionary work so much. It is truly such a blessing and privilege to be an instrument in the Lord's hand, that He trusts me enough to teach and help our Father's children come unto Him.
We get a new mission president Thursday. We will see what changes, hopefully email. Everyone hates not having it. The mail here takes forever too! They are some sketchy mailmen too. LOL
We move to our own little apartment on Wed. It is above a member's garage, supposedly it is really nice. :-) But, I really like living in a home because we can mooch off the members. :-) They don't care either. We have been having really good dinners lately. Last night, we had yummy soup and rolls. It reminds me of you, Mom. I love home cooked meals. It reminds me of home each and every time. It is crazy the things that remind me of home and family and friends. Did I tell you that everyone has dogs and cats? I mean like everyone. I come home from the day, and my skirt has literally a layer of dog fur on it. Gross! I like dogs but not when they smell, drool, and shed like crazy. HaHa, that's like every dog.
It is crazy the kind of excuses we get from people as to why they won't attend church or why they won't see us. It is annoying. Can't they just tell us they aren't interested and for us to leave them alone. Oh, another fav. is when we know people are home and they refuse to answer the door. Haha. Classic.
So, Mom and Dad(especially Dad) tell me about your conversion story. What did the sisters teach you? What did you have a hard time believing? Mom, what made you finally feel completely converted?
There are a lot of baptisms and very few conversions. They focus a lot on numbers(baptisms) here in Washington. We don't like it.
It is good to have goals and numbers, but it is very intense. I feel like maybe it is like that in other missions. I am not sure.
We have a goal as a mission to baptize 1000 people by the end of the year! Crazy,but definitely, hopefully, possible.
The problem is most new converts are falling away and aren't coming to church or aren't trying to meet with us. Satan is working on all of them and trying to distract them from what is really important.
Oh, I have been asked to give a talk on July 11, 2010, haha because I am new or something. But my companion has been out for nine months, and she has not given a talk yet! Grrrr.....Oh, well.
So, I'll be sending you my new address next monday so you don't have to keep mailing everything to the office even though it may be safer because I can be transferred at the end of July. So giving you my address and you send it there, and I'm not there will be no bueno.
So, I either lost or someone stole or I left my tape recorder at the MTC (which I doubt), but I can't find it anywhere. So, I will probably buy another one next week so that I can send another tape. I also printed out pictures today on a CD. I hope to be able to send those today or maybe tomorrow.
Mom, thanks for the notes on Sean's talk. That was way cool. I just got that this past week. I am glad he is doing well. Does he still seem like the old Sean? Does he still look skinny? Has he grown up a lot? More details, please. :-) Keep me updated with Amber. I am glad she is doing better.
Dad, write the date or type it, whatever, in the letter so I know when you wrote it.
Anyway, I'm loving Washington. The sun is out, and it has been warm, not hot. It is beautiful. The trees are huge, and there are forests or groves of trees everywhere. It is very peaceful and beautiful. The wards are great and very supportive of missionary work. I hope Lake Tahoe was fun. Jake said that it was. I got his letter the other day. I love you so much! Sister Kimball
P.S. What are your plans in July?
P.S.S. I have a challenge for you all---to pray for missionary eyes. Pray for a couple of individuals who may be interested in hearing the gospel. Now take the answer to your prayers and that faith and teach them/mention the church to them.
I promise you the Lord will bless you for your efforts and guide you to those He has prepared. I may be a full time missionary, but we all are missionaries!

Sister Kimball

Letter dated June 28,2010

My 2nd week here,2nd pday! Awe It's crazy how time flies by.

June 15,2010 letter from Sister Kimball

From Lauren's letter June 15,2010
What a wonderful day it has been. I still haven't meet my companion yet but shortly I will. I'm the only sister among the greenies. Oh my goodness Washington is beautiful,sooooobeautiful. It was rainy when we arrived. My mission President is so sweet. It's kind of saad that they are leaving at the beginning of July...We had lunch at the Pesident's home with all the senior missionaries as well. Guess who President Showalter called on to say the blessing on the food? Me! I was totally nervous but honored to give the prayer. The mission President's wife and the secretary welcomed me with the warmest motherly love hug! I imagined hugging you, mom. They were much needed hugs. They love their sisters. I feel so special and so well treated. The Elders are so respectful towards me! I'm so excited! I can't wait. I'll be proselyting tonight and teaching and hopefully extending and iviting investigators to baptism tonight! This is a very succesful mission. They have about 192 missionaries. t's alot! They stress the importance of obedience, strong faith and hard work. I'm so excited! It's my kind of mission! This is the mission for me! This is truly where the Lord wants me to serve...its so green and beautiful and I can feel the spirit so strong here. I can't wait, but I'm very nervous but I can feel the Savior's love for me and he is greatly blessing me. He is strengthening me and taking away my fears. I met with my mission president and in the interview he asked me about my decision to go on a mission. He got to know me and we said a prayer. Than right after he said that during the prayer he felt that he needed to ask what my greatest fear was about my mission. I saaid,"Opening my mouth". He said to trust in your testimony, don't worry about the way you say it but how you say it. Say it with all your heart and the people won't know if you say something off or weird. Just say what comes from your heart. Such a sweet man! I can't beleive I'm here and I'm starting. It's so surreal! I love it and I can't wait to get to work and...sleep. It's such a priviledge to be here and to be apart of the Lord's work here on the earth...P.S. I love it here in Washington! Seriously there are trees everywhere and water. I love it! You have to come up afte my mission. Sister Kimball