24-11-14

Dear family and friends,

This week I've seen how the Lord waits until we cannot endure another second before He swoops in and saves us. I've seen how He is truly on our side and doesn't enjoy seeing us suffer but wants us to have success. Sometimes our own doubts stop us from seeing the blessings. I really want more than anything to come home from my mission a changed person, just trusting wholly in the Lord and His timing.

Yesterday I received some sad news. I was just in the Visitors' Center reading the Conference Ensign when Sister Larsen from Washington 6th Branch came in. She put her arm around me and asked me to walk with her. Instantly I knew something was wrong, and she told me that Mazie Breen, an older lady in her ward whom Sister Donaldson and I had reactivated and she went through the Temple, had suffered a heart attack and passed away the night before (Saturday night). It was such a shock and I just cried and cried into her arms. We both cried together in one of the teaching rooms and rejoiced that she had changed her life in time. She was baptized when she was 8 and had even been endowed when she was younger but after some years away from the Church we taught her and she went back through the Temple for the first time in like 60 years. Her husband was always against the church and left the home whenever we were there but Sister Larsen said that as Mazie passed her husband asked lots of questions and will even let her be buried in her temple clothes. It is incredible. She told me that Mazie had read the scriptures every day since we were there up until the day before she died and that she attended the Temple regularly and talked of Sister Donaldson and I often as angels sent from Heavenly Father. I will attend her funeral tomorrow and pay my last respects. Oh I was so sad when I heard that she had died. But she is prepared to rest in the arms of Christ.

Well this week we were able to find 3 new investigators!!! One is A, N's roommate.  We taught about Enos and the power of prayer and N taught him how to pray. When we got to the part in the story that says "Thy sins are forgiven thee and thou shalt be blessed" he proper perked up and was really interested that his sins could be forgiven him. It is a privilege to preach repentance and forgiveness through Christ's atonement to even the seemingly hardened football players haha. It is just the best thing to let people know that they can be whole again. N met with us on his own later on in the week and we taugt him the law of chastity. He has been with his girlfriend for four years so we knew that there would need to be some changes made in his life in order to live it. He took it really well and I asked him if he believes this is from God and he said "Well if you two say it is from God then I trust you" and it was so touching. It reminded me of the Book of Mormon when King Lamoni and his father trust everything the missionaries say. N is coming along slowly but surely. it will be a joyous day when he decides to be baptised. He came to Church for the first time in his own Ward and enjoyed it. So we're getting there!

Another new investigator is a CHINESE BOY named T! I LOVE HIM!!!!!! HE IS SO CUTE haha! His English has some improving to do but he LOVES the Book of Mormon and has read some of it already and we watched The Restoration in Chinese. He has accepted a baptismal date already and is just so pure in heart. We also found this boy named M who is very...depressed. The Elders taught him for a while but he lives in our area and he was abused for a long time as a child and doesn't believe that he is lovable and is sober from drugs, alchool and pornography. He got out of prison and is changing his life. He'll be a more challenging one to share the love of God with than T, but he'll get there. We don't give up just because someone's had a hard life, if anything he needs it more! But it is a joy to have all of these children of God being brought into our lives.

Zone Conference was wonderful! We watched Meet the Mormons and it was WONDERFUL! It was so weird to see clips of movies from the world but it was great. We heard music that wasn't Mormon Tabernacle Choir and saw Elder Niumatalolo who served in our mission whose Dad was featured on there and he talked on the screen a lot. We all cheered when he came on. Haha! Then we watched the new Christmas initative named He is the Gift, similar to Because of Him. The Church has bought the main masthead of youtube for advertising for the whole of December and a place on Times Square for the whole month too. Each missionary has been trained on how to give out the cards and the VC is getting a new kiosk of it. IT IS SO EXCITING! It is a wonderful video and touches me every time I see it. It will be available on christmas.mormon.org the day after thanksgiving. It's a nice easy way to share the gospel with people. It will touch many lives, and us misisonaries are being asked to record how many new investgiators we get as a result of it. Exciting!

Our little J got baptised this week! When she got out the water and was in the changing room she said "Oh my goodness, I'm a freaking Mormon!" hahahaha #ILOVEYSA because in Brazil her family members (cousins and aunties etc) were Mormon and they always annoyed her and she never was a fan of the Church but came here and went to the VC and felt something and read the Book of Mormon and just knows it is true! It's incredible - the power of that book. So her baptism went well and she brought lots of Brazilian non members there with her so we taught The Restoration while she was getting changed. She is moving back to Brazil in December so it's sad to think I might never see

her again :((( D got baptised last week in Provo and confirmed this week in his Ward and his non member family all came. We were actually giving the talks in Church and of course they were about missionary work so it was interesting to try and figure out how to talk about missionary work in front of non members, so I kept emphasising how we are all children of God and the worth of souls being great in the eyes of God. I hardly even prepare for talks anymore because I've served for long enough to have experiences that I can share and scriptures memorized etc, its truly a blessing or it would take a long time to prep for talks every single week! It's cool how every talk is different though! We spoke in the Young Single Adult 4th Ward last week and ate with the Bishop on Saturday and he said that three young women have come to his office to go on a mission since our talk. It was cool because I just felt strongly that I needed to talk about the things that hold us back from being missionaries like fear or feeling unworthy and how it's wrong. It's good to see that the Spirit can touch someone. We are making our way around all of the Wards slowly!

So we ate dinner with the Bishop and his wife and our investigator A who is having a hard time. Susan Black said she would come to the lesson with us but then couldn't so it was just us five there but it went really well. We focused a lot of the lesson on the great apostasy so she could see the need for a restoration and we had a great discussion and shared lots of great scriptures prophesying about the apostasy. She is praying about a baptismal date!

I went on three exchanges within the last week! #exhausting! I got to be with MY BABYGIRL SISTER GARCIA! She came into my area with me and we had a blast!!!! I love her so much! Then I was with one of the German Sisters that I'm already close friends with and went to her area and we were able to see miracles. We prayed hard to find one new investigator by the end of the evening and went to this recent converts' home who has a non member husband who comes to Church but has never wanted to learn.We just laid it out that if they want their family to be blessed they need to both go to the Temple! He accepted the invitation to learn for himself and we rejoiced so much! In YSA our lessons usually last about 25 minutes but I forgot how long people talk for in Family Wards, the old people just TALK AND TALK AND TALK AND TALK! Everywhere we went we were there for an hour!!!! But it was wonderful!

We've decorated the VC all Christmassy and it looks great! Thankgsgiving this week is looking good. We get to have a VC dinner and talent show with all the Senior Couples, then we were invited over to President and Sister Center's house with the Assistants to the President, and then our Stake President has invited us over! So it's all exciting!!!

I love my mission and I love my Saviour Jesus Christ.
Happy thanksgiving everyone! 

Love Sister Nicholls