Words "as if from the dust"

Hello friends!

Well, this is it. This is most likely my last blog email. Weird. I'm dying*, it's for real!

We had a great week here in Clayton! We saw a ton of miracles! We even ate dinner with Sister Miracle! We had exchanges this week with the sister training leaders and had a really great day. We found a new investigator, we got to do service AND we finally met a less active we have been trying to meet for forever (seriously, Hna. Reed has been here 9 months total and she just barely met him!) and that same less active came to church on Sunday!!! Miracles.

The biggest miracles happened yesterday at church. Guess who passed the sacrament for the first time?! Peyton, his dad, and Ted!!!!!!!!!! It was the proudest moment of my mission!!!! And just when we thought that no investigators were coming, in walked 3 of them that we weren't expecting! It was a huge miracle!

So, like I said earlier, this will most likely be my last blog letter. I just want to finish it off with my testimony. I have learned so much in the last 18 months, and the most important thing I have learned and had solidified, is my knowledge that we have a loving Heavenly Father. The creator and governor of the universe is our fFther, and He really loves us. He loves us so much that He sent His Son to atone for us and to save us. I know that the only way to gain access to that atoning sacrifice is to follow the example that Christ set for us. I am so grateful that God loves and trusted me enough to let me come and serve Him for these 18 months. I have loved sharing this message with the people in the Virginia, Chesapeake Mission and I'm so excited to continue serving Christ for the rest of my life!!!!

La Iglesia es verdadera. Never forget that.

I love you all! See you in a week!

Hermana Fields

*Dying=coming home/returning from mission ;)

Hello friends!

 I hope y'all are having a great week!

We had a really great week out here in Clayton!

I don't have very much time to write, but a big highlight from the week was our very last conference with President and Sister Baker! It was on missionary wellness! We had three workshops, one where we talked about mental health and took the color code test. I rediscovered that I'm super blue. No surprise there! Then we learned how to budget and be self-reliant and then the best part, we got to play oompa loompa! It's this weird sport some elders made up a long time ago. It's basically basketball and ultimate frisbee mixed together and played with a football! It was really hard to keep up with all the elders, but it was fun to be up and running around. :)

Everyone is doing great here! We unfortunately didn't have a ton of lessons this week, but we'll have more this week!

Les quiero!

Hermana Fields

Happy Mother's Day

Hello friends!

Sorry it's been a few weeks! Things have just been boringly crazy here! 

We have been doing well out here in Clayton! Hermana Reed and I have started the month of 
"lasts", last transfer, last month, last fast Sunday, last zone meeting, last deep clean day, last phone call home, last everything! We're surviving though! 

We had a wonderful Mother's Day, yesterday! The primary sang a beautiful song that I had never heard before. The best part was when one of the little boys marched himself up to the microphone, adjusted it so it was right in front of his face and sang that way the whole song. His dad is newer so I was worried that that would stress him out, but I looked over and he had a big smile on his face! The little boy walked back after the song and said, "I just wanted to sing!". It was really cute. :) 

Skyping was ,for some reason, very difficult due to ridiculous technical difficulties. But, it all worked out in the end and we had lovely conversations with our families. :) It was rather trunky knowing that I will see them in 3 weeks though, haha!

The work is still moving forward! We have three wonderful people that are currently set for baptism and we're so excited for all of them. :) The only sad part is that I won't be here for any of them. :/ At least they are coming to Jesus, though! That's all that matters. :)

I hope you all had a wonderful Mother's Day yesterday and that this week is a good one!

La iglesia es verdadera!!!

Hermana Fields

Look at this cute thing Hermana Bills made all of us "dying" missionaries! 

Also, look at my flight itinerary that I got last week...

Ted's Baptism

Sorry! Short email today!

Ted got baptized!!! And, it was beautiful:)

Got a new companion! She's from New York! Sister Zsembery

The end!



Love Y'all!

Last Transfer

Hello again!


Well, today marks the official first day of my last transfer as a missionary. Weird right? I don't understand what happened... Anyway, we got our call on Saturday and guess what's happening? HERMANA REED AND I ARE DYING TOGETHER!!!!!  (#BirthToEarth) We are so excited! In our interviews President Baker told us that he didn't want to move either of us, but he also didn't want to white wash our area when we went home, so the solution that he came up with is that he is sending in an English sister to be in our companionship. That will be an adventure! This will be my 4th trio! That's just my life I guess, haha.


This week was one of those weeks that is just gone before you can blink. Weeks seem to just keep going faster and faster the closer I get to the end of my mission! We had some great successes and saw some miracles, though!


A few weeks ago we received a phone call, but missed it. In the message the woman introduced herself, but all we could understand was her name and that she needed the address of the church. Sometimes Spanish is really hard to understand over voice message... We thought she must have been a member visiting, so we texted her the address and figured we would meet her at church. She didn't show up at church and with all of missionary life going on we kinda forgot about it.  Later last week we kept getting this weird call that we missed every time and every time there would just be a message left with an electronic voice giving the number. It was pretty weird and by the third call we were a little freaked out. The last time it called, we were listening to the message, and for some reason we decided to listen to the rest of our saved messages. That message from a few weeks ago was still on there. We decided to call her back and figure out who she was. I am so happy that we did. She is not a member and her friend, who is a bishop in Texas, has been talking to her about the church and she is super interested! It also turned out that she did come to church, but too late and so she thought there weren't Spanish services! If we hadn't have called her she would have been lost forever! She lives in Smithfield, so we gave her to the Smithfield sisters and they taught her. She loved it, committed to baptism and came to church! It was perfect because after this transfer this area is becoming English so it was good that she lived in Smithfield not Clayton. However, d to the extreme shortage in Spanish sisters, Smithfield area was closed. But! President Baker gave us permission to go down and teach her!!!!! Another miracle is that she already wanted to have her lessons on Fridays at 1:00 so we can just go over after district meetings and we don't have to make another trip down!!!! Heavenly Father really does work in mysterious ways:)


That is about the biggest excitement this week:) Oh that and we have a baptism coming up on Saturday! We're so excited! I'll give more details next week:)


Well, I hope you all have a beautifully blessed week:) Love y'all!


Hermana Fields

Emma

Hello Friends!
     We had another great week in the Clayton Ward! Things are going well. :)
     We had interviews this week with President Baker. It was weird, though, because it was my last interview before my exit interview!!! Also, this was the Baker's last round of interviews before they go home, too!
     Miracle of the week: Emma got baptized! When I was in the Smithfield Ward I taught her for almost a transfer. She is this cute little ten year old that knows the gospel way better than I did when I was ten! She had a problem getting baptized though because she didn't know any men that she trusted enough to baptize her. It took a lot of work, but she was finally baptized! It was such a beautiful baptismal service, too. The spirit was so strong. I could just feel how happy Heavenly Father was, and I could hear it too through the blessing she was given when she was confirmed. I was so grateful that I was able to have a part in her coming to Christ through baptism. At times in my mission I have been so discouraged because I haven't had lots of "baptisms". That whole counting your baptisms thing has always bothered me anyway, but I really realized this weekend that the number of my investigators that I have seen baptized doesn't matter at all. Emma didn't count as "my baptism", but I am just so happy that another precious daughter of God took an enormous step towards Him, and I'm happy that I was able to play a part in that! I am so grateful for the opportunity that I have to be a missionary. I have never felt so much joy in my life. I know that the joy I feel is only a tiny little piece of the joy Heavenly Father feels when his children come to Him. I'm just so grateful that He lets me have a part in that!


I hope you all have a beautifully blessed week!
les quiero!


Hermana Fields

 

Peyton's Baptism :)

Hello friends!

Today I would like to tell y'all the very moving story of a young man named Peyton.

Peyton, is a 15 year old, and super cool. One day we are all going to see him playing MLB. This year Peyton made a decision that has changed his whole family. He decided to take early morning seminary. Peyton's family hadn't been to church in a loooong time, and so he wasn't really raised in the Church and didn't know very much about it. But, because of the amazing examples from his neighbors, when they asked him if he wanted to take seminary, he said yes. One day, the sister missionaries knocked on the Richards' door and sat down for a visit with Sister R. She then told them that her son had been thinking a lot about being baptized. He started taking the lessons and ever since then his family has come to church faithfully every week. Peyton was baptize on Saturday and confirmed on Sunday, and will be ordained to the Aaronic priesthood next week. I can't even tell you all how proud I am of this kid. He has changed his family because he decided to be baptized. He didn't do it because his parents wanted him to, or because it's just what everyone else was doing. He did it because he knew it was right. This amazing family is well on their way to becoming eternal and I am soooo proud of them! Right after Peyton was baptized, the old relief society president leaned over to Hna. Reed and said, "Their names have been on the roster a very long time." This baptism was an absolute miracle. All of you youth out there, you can have a make a huge difference in your families! So basically this weekend was a very happy one for the Clayton ward:)

This week we saw so many miracles that they all ran together and basically just turned into one big miracle week. Right now our ward is doing a 40 day missionary fast. Each day for 40 days a different family has signed up to fast for the missionary efforts on the ward. At first I thought that it might be good, but we didn't see anything. In the last few weeks it feels like this ward is on fire and everything is moving in the right direction! This week in sacrament meeting there were around 160 people. A few months ago there were about 130 on average. This ward is going places! 

I literally have never been so happy to be a missionary. Sorry Mom, but I might not come home! Just kidding, I will. But I just don't know how I'm going to be able to say goodbye to these people! I've only been here for a little less then 4 weeks and I already love them so much!

So, that was our week. :)

Remember that the Easter Bunny isn't real, but Christ is and through him we can find new life!:) #Halleluja

I hope everyone is alive and well! I love you all! 

Hermana Fields

Baptism!

Pollen Puddle :/

A story our investigator Caelem told us :)