August 29th

Hello! I hope you all had a good week because mine was crazy! We
finally had our program on Jesus Christ this past Friday and it went
so well! We has 45 people attend, 5 non-members and 2 less active. We
had members of the ward singing and playing instruments, and
incorporated The Living Christ. Here is videos of me singing Savior,
Redeemer of My Soul.

August 29th

Hey! I hope you all had a good week! I just wanted to make sure to send a couple pictures. Most of what has happened this week is my companions birthday, talking to everyone about our program "Come Follow Me" happening this Friday, Stake conference with Elder Golden from the seventy, and zone p-day!

Several things I have learned lately are 1) holidays are dangerous when it comes to food and you should never tell members when your birthday is. 2) Talking to everyone is rewarded with blessings. 3) when your going to find a referral in the middle of the woods...drive don't walk. And if you do walk...eat blackberries! 4) Elder Golden had stated " Non members and members alike, this church is for everyone" We can be happy for other faiths and the values they teach. Even if they don't listen to us today, they will hear our message in the future. And for now, they are on their own journey towards truth.

I love you! Have an awesome week and let me know how the family is doing :) 

-Sister Hart

August 29th

Hey! I hope you all had a good week! I just wanted to make sure to send a couple pictures. Most of what has happened this week is my companions birthday, talking to everyone about our program "Come Follow Me" happening this Friday, Stake conference with Elder Golden from the seventy, and zone p-day!

Several things I have learned lately are 1) holidays are dangerous when it comes to food and you should never tell members when your birthday is. 2) Talking to everyone is rewarded with blessings. 3) when your going to find a referral in the middle of the woods...drive don't walk. And if you do walk...eat blackberries! 4) Elder Golden had stated " Non members and members alike, this church is for everyone" We can be happy for other faiths and the values they teach. Even if they don't listen to us today, they will hear our message in the future. And for now, they are on their own journey towards truth.

I love you! Have an awesome week and let me know how the family is doing :) 

-Sister Hart

Earlier on August 29th

Hey! I hope you all had a good week! I just wanted to make sure to send a couple pictures. Most of what has happened this week is my companions birthday, talking to everyone about our program "Come Follow Me" happening this Friday, Stake conference with Elder Golden from the seventy, and zone p-day!

Several things I have learned lately are 1) holidays are dangerous when it comes to food and you should never tell members when your birthday is. 2) Talking to everyone is rewarded with blessings. 3) when your going to find a referral in the middle of the woods...drive don't walk. And if you do walk...eat blackberries! 4) Elder Golden had stated " Non members and members alike, this church is for everyone" We can be happy for other faiths and the values they teach. Even if they don't listen to us today, they will hear our message in the future. And for now, they are on their own journey towards truth.

I love you! Have an awesome week and let me know how the family is doing :) 

-Sister Hart

Mission Pics

August 8th

Hey! How is everyone doing? First off I want to answer some questions
asked. So I have not gotten the package from you yet, but we will
check the mil later today. And yes mom they do feed me :P Actually
they probably feed me too much. And of course as soon as I got out on
my mission, my stomach started refusing to tell me when I am full, so
I have to think extra hard about my portions. I am just glad that
sister Ure and I figured out a way to sneak onto the nearby school
track at 6:30 in the morning just so that we can run it off. The
normal meal around here is chicken and potatoes, lasagna, or mac n
cheese with hot dogs. There was one week where almost every night we
had lasagna :p But it's awesome! So many of people out here grow their
own produce, and blackberries grow wild so you can find them all over
the place. One of the funniest things to me is how many Christmas tree
farms I've seen out here.
Currently Sister Ure and I have ourselves swamped with work. Although
there aren't many investigators to teach, we walk around town all the
time. Actually the other day we walked close to 3 miles out to see an
investigator because we were on a car fast. We got a call from our
ward mission leader because the bishop had seen us on the side of the
road and got horribly concerned that we were trying to walk all the
way from Sheridan to Willamina. But think about walking is we run into
so many people on the streets that we can talk to! No matter how weird
they think we are. We are also planning a crazy awesome program
centered on Christ for the whole community. It's going to have
speaking parts of scriptures and the living Christ, music, and videos.
Sister Ure and I were stress eating as the same member that yelled at
us my first week here told Luke the she got a spiritual prompting to
tell him that he may want to wait to get baptized. Ridiculous!!! Which
I don't know why we were nervous because we have so much faith in
Luke. He even told everyone at our pot luck that he's getting baptized
on the 27th. But later we asked him how his conversation went with
her. He said something that made us laugh that I have been thinking
about ever since. He said, "Our conversation was good, she has a
strong testimony, but you know... I don't think she knows Jesus." He
explained that through everything she said she didn't once mention
Jesus Christ. And I think that's something so true that we have to be
aware of. Is out message centered on Jesus Christ as we testify? If
not, then it is not going to be as powerful, your coming from the
wrong frame of mind and the spirit will not bare witness of the truth.
Well I hope you all have an awesome week! Don't forget that we are all
representatives of Christ. We all have taken his name upon us, and it
is a powerful thing.
Love, Sister Hart

August 8th

Hey! How is everyone doing? First off I want to answer some questions
asked. So I have not gotten the package from you yet, but we will
check the mil later today. And yes mom they do feed me :P Actually
they probably feed me too much. And of course as soon as I got out on
my mission, my stomach started refusing to tell me when I am full, so
I have to think extra hard about my portions. I am just glad that
sister Ure and I figured out a way to sneak onto the nearby school
track at 6:30 in the morning just so that we can run it off. The
normal meal around here is chicken and potatoes, lasagna, or mac n
cheese with hot dogs. There was one week where almost every night we
had lasagna :p But it's awesome! So many of people out here grow their
own produce, and blackberries grow wild so you can find them all over
the place. One of the funniest things to me is how many Christmas tree
farms I've seen out here.
Currently Sister Ure and I have ourselves swamped with work. Although
there aren't many investigators to teach, we walk around town all the
time. Actually the other day we walked close to 3 miles out to see an
investigator because we were on a car fast. We got a call from our
ward mission leader because the bishop had seen us on the side of the
road and got horribly concerned that we were trying to walk all the
way from Sheridan to Willamina. But think about walking is we run into
so many people on the streets that we can talk to! No matter how weird
they think we are. We are also planning a crazy awesome program
centered on Christ for the whole community. It's going to have
speaking parts of scriptures and the living Christ, music, and videos.
Sister Ure and I were stress eating as the same member that yelled at
us my first week here told Luke the she got a spiritual prompting to
tell him that he may want to wait to get baptized. Ridiculous!!! Which
I don't know why we were nervous because we have so much faith in
Luke. He even told everyone at our pot luck that he's getting baptized
on the 27th. But later we asked him how his conversation went with
her. He said something that made us laugh that I have been thinking
about ever since. He said, "Our conversation was good, she has a
strong testimony, but you know... I don't think she knows Jesus." He
explained that through everything she said she didn't once mention
Jesus Christ. And I think that's something so true that we have to be
aware of. Is out message centered on Jesus Christ as we testify? If
not, then it is not going to be as powerful, your coming from the
wrong frame of mind and the spirit will not bare witness of the truth.
Well I hope you all have an awesome week! Don't forget that we are all
representatives of Christ. We all have taken his name upon us, and it
is a powerful thing.
Love, Sister Hart

August 8th

Hey! How is everyone doing? First off I want to answer some questions
asked. So I have not gotten the package from you yet, but we will
check the mil later today. And yes mom they do feed me :P Actually
they probably feed me too much. And of course as soon as I got out on
my mission, my stomach started refusing to tell me when I am full, so
I have to think extra hard about my portions. I am just glad that
sister Ure and I figured out a way to sneak onto the nearby school
track at 6:30 in the morning just so that we can run it off. The
normal meal around here is chicken and potatoes, lasagna, or mac n
cheese with hot dogs. There was one week where almost every night we
had lasagna :p But it's awesome! So many of people out here grow their
own produce, and blackberries grow wild so you can find them all over
the place. One of the funniest things to me is how many Christmas tree
farms I've seen out here.
Currently Sister Ure and I have ourselves swamped with work. Although
there aren't many investigators to teach, we walk around town all the
time. Actually the other day we walked close to 3 miles out to see an
investigator because we were on a car fast. We got a call from our
ward mission leader because the bishop had seen us on the side of the
road and got horribly concerned that we were trying to walk all the
way from Sheridan to Willamina. But think about walking is we run into
so many people on the streets that we can talk to! No matter how weird
they think we are. We are also planning a crazy awesome program
centered on Christ for the whole community. It's going to have
speaking parts of scriptures and the living Christ, music, and videos.
Sister Ure and I were stress eating as the same member that yelled at
us my first week here told Luke the she got a spiritual prompting to
tell him that he may want to wait to get baptized. Ridiculous!!! Which
I don't know why we were nervous because we have so much faith in
Luke. He even told everyone at our pot luck that he's getting baptized
on the 27th. But later we asked him how his conversation went with
her. He said something that made us laugh that I have been thinking
about ever since. He said, "Our conversation was good, she has a
strong testimony, but you know... I don't think she knows Jesus." He
explained that through everything she said she didn't once mention
Jesus Christ. And I think that's something so true that we have to be
aware of. Is out message centered on Jesus Christ as we testify? If
not, then it is not going to be as powerful, your coming from the
wrong frame of mind and the spirit will not bare witness of the truth.
Well I hope you all have an awesome week! Don't forget that we are all
representatives of Christ. We all have taken his name upon us, and it
is a powerful thing.
Love, Sister Hart

August 8th

Hey! How is everyone doing? First off I want to answer some questions
asked. So I have not gotten the package from you yet, but we will
check the mil later today. And yes mom they do feed me :P Actually
they probably feed me too much. And of course as soon as I got out on
my mission, my stomach started refusing to tell me when I am full, so
I have to think extra hard about my portions. I am just glad that
sister Ure and I figured out a way to sneak onto the nearby school
track at 6:30 in the morning just so that we can run it off. The
normal meal around here is chicken and potatoes, lasagna, or mac n
cheese with hot dogs. There was one week where almost every night we
had lasagna :p But it's awesome! So many of people out here grow their
own produce, and blackberries grow wild so you can find them all over
the place. One of the funniest things to me is how many Christmas tree
farms I've seen out here.
Currently Sister Ure and I have ourselves swamped with work. Although
there aren't many investigators to teach, we walk around town all the
time. Actually the other day we walked close to 3 miles out to see an
investigator because we were on a car fast. We got a call from our
ward mission leader because the bishop had seen us on the side of the
road and got horribly concerned that we were trying to walk all the
way from Sheridan to Willamina. But think about walking is we run into
so many people on the streets that we can talk to! No matter how weird
they think we are. We are also planning a crazy awesome program
centered on Christ for the whole community. It's going to have
speaking parts of scriptures and the living Christ, music, and videos.
Sister Ure and I were stress eating as the same member that yelled at
us my first week here told Luke the she got a spiritual prompting to
tell him that he may want to wait to get baptized. Ridiculous!!! Which
I don't know why we were nervous because we have so much faith in
Luke. He even told everyone at our pot luck that he's getting baptized
on the 27th. But later we asked him how his conversation went with
her. He said something that made us laugh that I have been thinking
about ever since. He said, "Our conversation was good, she has a
strong testimony, but you know... I don't think she knows Jesus." He
explained that through everything she said she didn't once mention
Jesus Christ. And I think that's something so true that we have to be
aware of. Is out message centered on Jesus Christ as we testify? If
not, then it is not going to be as powerful, your coming from the
wrong frame of mind and the spirit will not bare witness of the truth.
Well I hope you all have an awesome week! Don't forget that we are all
representatives of Christ. We all have taken his name upon us, and it
is a powerful thing.
Love, Sister Hart

August 1st

My face lit up a bit as I looked at the church program until our ward
mission leader said "don't get your hopes up, you're speaking first."
So as you can guess, I spoke in church this past Sunday. I talked
about the Restoration and its role in conversion. Then later on Sister
Ure and I performed a musical number. It was the BYU vocal point
version of the hymn Savior, Redeemer of My Soul. Sister Ure played the
piano while I sang. I was so nervous that I lost my place for a
second, but I'm glad we did it! It's such a beautifully powerful song.
:) Oh and apparently here every 5th Sunday is based on missionary
work. So they had a few people testify of the power of missionary work
and talk about their experiences working with us Sister Missionaries.
So cool!

Ahhhhhhh!!!!!!! We put Luke ON DATE! We had been praying for a little
while about when God knows he could be ready for baptism. We planned
on giving him a date during our lesson, but when Griggs family
mentioned baptism to him just before, we used the opportunity to talk
to him about getting baptized on August 27th. He is so excited and
ready yet nervous for some changes that are going to be made. We
promised him that if he desires it and works for it he WILL be able to
be baptized by the 27th with the help of Jesus Christ and our Father
in Heaven. Tomorrow we start the hardest step by doing the stop
smoking lesson. But if anyone can do it, he can.  Baptism is a huge
step, but it is just the start of a whole new, brighter journey.

I hope you all have a great week! Always trust in God, no matter how
hard it seems sometimes to let go of the reigns. He knows much more
than we do or ever will anyways. Love you!

Sister Hart

June 27

My companion says hello back. This past week has been filled with mostly walking and service. As our teaching pool has gone down, we have been trying to find new investigators by talking to everyone we see. I think the highlight of this week though has been the walls of less actives that we have been breaking down. A big problem out here is keeping the Word of Wisdom. It seems to be that the majority of the residents keep cigarettes on hand. But this past week we have had two members express their earnest desires to quit smoking. One has agreed to take lessons on stopping smoking with us, and the other asked for a priesthood blessing. It was her first blessing in  over a year. We also are teaching the Warnberg family. The dad hasn't attended church since he was 18, and we were able to break down some walls with him as well with answering questions he's held on to for years. The kids are excited for baptism. Them and their mom just need to figure out for themselves if they know the church is true. We are going to try to give them a baptismal date tomorrow! Although things are crazy, I know that the Lord's work will go forth. We are just trying to be as obedient and diligent as we can be.

June 20

But something I forgot, was my experiences on the first day. First off, my mission president and his wife are amazing! Sadly tho, this mission is getting a new president soon. But anywho, the first day we got to see the temple, and the coast. My favorite part was getting to spend some time alone at the shore to think, and then literally and figuratively burring our fears together in the sand. It was awesome!

June 20

I love and miss you so much! My first area is Willamina, Oregon, and my companion/trainer is amazing! It's sort of a hill-billy town near the coast, and apparently it mostly rains during the winter, so it's been pretty sunny. In fact, after being in the sun with my companion for five minutes, I got slightly burnt (I blame you). The people here seem to be pretty nice, besides one member who chewed us out for teacher her mother. We just told her to have a nice day, and then we avoided each other at church on Sunday. 

Besides that, we've had some pretty cool things happen. Kimber, a nine year old girl got baptized on Saturday. And one of my first lesson with Sister Ure was so exciting! She was telling this 30-40 year old man and his mom that God loves them, and he had a smirk. Sister Ure asked what he was thinking, and he said that he just felt good, like a warm hug. She told him that that is what the Holy Spirit feels like, and he agreed. He said he hadn't felt that in his life in a long time.

May 28

Although today was a bit stressful, it was the best day I've had at the MTC so far. We have really grown as a district, not only to each other but also to Christ and our Heavenly Father. Learning how and what to teach, and practicing on investigators and each other has invited the spirit into my heart. I love this gospel, I want to share it with others. Elder Tetreault, our district leader told us to keep in our hearts why we are here. Things can get overwhelming fast and it's important to remind yourself why you are a missionary. And although Sister Tayco would say it's the ice cream we get on Sunday and Wednesday night, we all know it's because we love Heavenly Father and others more than ourselves.I want to be bold in teaching, because this is The Only Way.

"Through the Atonement you can be blessed with Strength Beyond Your Own. If you don't think you can do something, then your right! When you lose yourself in the work of others and call upon His strength, than you can, and will" -Elder Bednar

May 31st

So much has happened lately it's been hard to find time to write. After sister Wagstaff went home I sort of placed myself in a companionship with sister Wynder and sister Tayco. They taught me so much in the day I spent with them, including planning skills and how to teach our first practice investigator.Now I'm placed in a companionship with sister Warburton and sister Roberts. I love them, but the past few days have been a bit discouraging from having to be away from class and planning so much. On Monday we took sister Roberts to the ER because of the pain she had been feeling. You'll be happy to know I haven't lost my humor though. As we were heading back to the MTC our driver mentioned that his van was ghetto. So naturally, I told him it matches his personality. Crushed by my joke, he then went on to say that he'll make sure my assignment changes to serve 18 months in Provo....I said sorry and repented.

Our first TRC was panicked, rushed, and a huge learning curve! Our second left us feeling the power of Heavenly Father's plan for us as missionaries. We had planned to teach the Plan of Salvation, but as we began, Sister Roberts started to speak about Joseph Smith. In my head, I was picturing myself throwing all our plans and resources out the door. I realized though that she was acting by a prompting from the spirit. All three of us used scriptures, personal examples and testified of the restoration and the power of prayer. It was obvious that the spirit was there with us in the room, and that it was God's plan.