How Great Thou Art

We had transfers this week, which means I have a new companion! Sister Harmon, from Utah. She is a hoot, I already love her. And the missionary work has been going great!

Crazy miracle: We had an hour before dinner one day and we weren't sure what to do, so we prayed and felt directed to go to one particular street. We parked, got out of the car, and walked a little ways away from the car before knocking on the first door. The lady who opened the first door we went to turned out to be a less active member with a non-member husband. She was super sweet and was so glad we came by! We are going back next week to do service for her. The amazing thing was that for some reason, past missionaries had written on the ward list that she had moved and didn't live there anymore, so we would have never gone to visit her otherwise. It was so cool to see the Lord directing us directly to where he needed us to be!

We went to go contact a lady named Lori who had met with missionaries in the past. We talked with her for a little while, then her friend Frenchy came out to talk to us as well. We taught them both and set an appointment to come back the next day to teach them. When we went back, Frenchy was there and was so excited to see us! It was such a good lesson. We taught her the Plan of Salvation and she loved it. I was a little nervous at first because she told us that her dad had been a Baptist minister (and some Baptists tend to not really like us very much) but she is super open and she just really loves the Lord. She and Lori are also going to play guitar and sing us a song next time we go over, which is super amazing. Also, Lori has a pet raven named Loki (named after the god of mischief) and he hops around her front yard and scared Sister Harmon to death the first time we met him. She might have actually made some crazy noises to scare it away before we found out that it belonged to Lori.....it was pretty funny.

 

(Lori and Loki.)

Mike and Hong came to church this week! We also had a lesson with them, and it was really funny because Mike brought up the Second Coming of Christ, which Hong had never heard about before. We explained it to her, and talked about how a lot of terrible things will continue to happen in the world before he comes again. As we talked, she was getting pretty scared, but we assured her that as long as she was following Christ she didn't have anything to worry about. She still looked scared, and then said "I think I need to start reading my scriptures more!" Haha! I am not one to use scare tactics, but hey, if it gets you to read your scriptures then whatever works!

Women's Conference was on Saturday and it was SO GOOD! And I know that I say that every conference, but I seriously think the talks get better every time. There was an amazing talk on faith by President Uchtdorf which you should all go watch in case you didn't get a chance to on Saturday. Watch it right now! It made me so pumped for next weekend and the rest of conference! It is always such a spiritual feast, and if you go prayerfully, with questions, you will always find answers in the things that are spoken.

The biggest thing that happened this week is that Bonnie got baptized! It was such a good baptismal service. Her brother Rex and his wife Margaret flew out from Georgia to be there and her brother was able to baptize and confirm her. So many people from the ward showed up to support her, which was amazing considering she moved to Palmdale this week so she won't even be in our ward anymore. :( But she is already being a great little missionary in the retirement home she moved to – she's been inviting other residents to come to church with her! :) During the closing song at her baptism I looked over at her, and her head was bowed and her eyes were closed, so at first I thought she had fallen asleep. But then I noticed that she was singing along. "And when I think, that God his son not sparing, sent him to die, I scarce can take it in. That on the cross, my burden gladly bearing, he bled and died to take away my sin. Then sings my soul, my Savior God to thee. How Great thou art. How Great thou art." I don't know what it was about seeing her like that, but the spirit was so overwhelming, and I was filled with so much love for her, knowing how much the Lord loves her.

Love you all! Enjoy conference!

Sister Daelemans

Stake, not Steak

We got transfer calls on Saturday, and found out that I will be staying and Sister Dow will be leaving. It was pretty expected, since I just got here and she's been here for 7 1/2 months. But it is sad because Bonnie's baptism is next Saturday and Sister Dow is going to just barely miss it :( Bonnie took the news pretty well though. She is very excited for her baptism, especially since her brother is going to be there, and her kids might be able to come as well!

This weekend was Stake Conference. It was really good. We had a member of the 70, whose name I can't remember for the life of me, but he said a lot of really great things. He spoke about turning our lives to the Savior, and how taking the Sacrament is the ordinance of Enduring to the End. The main reason we go to church is to be able to take the sacrament. To renew our covenants. To repent and turn back to Christ once again. We've been having trouble getting some of our investigators to come to church because they don't understand its importance, and this talk would have been PERFECT for them, but of course they weren't there to hear it. (Oh the irony of giving talks at church on the importance of coming to church. It's always the wrong audience.)

Because we are up in Tehachapi and the Stake Center is in Bakersfield, some smart computer people in the area decided it would be a lot more convenient for everybody if they broadcasted the meeting up to us since 1. the whole stake probably does not fit very comfortably in the stake center and 2. it is really nice not to have to drive an hour away for church. So we watched it on a giant screen in the chapel. It was funny though because there were several times when the connection was temporarily lost, and the video feed repeated the last 5 seconds over and over again until the signal was picked up again. It was especially funny when it happened in the middle of one of the hymns and they kept singing the same thing over and over. :)

Also, side note, I hate trying to explain Stake Conference to investigators. Because you have to explain wards and stakes, and they look at you like "Why is it called a steak?" and you're like "Not steak, Stake" and they are still confused and then sometimes they think about it some more and then wonder why we call it a "ward" because that is also pretty weird since a "ward" is usually an institution for the mentally unstable. So yeah, Stake. It comes from Isaiah. Because we like to quote scriptures and confuse people.

I am excited for this upcoming transfer. I don't know who my companion is going to be yet, because our mission president decided to change the way they do transfer calls. They used to tell us where we are going and who our companion will be, but now the only thing they tell us is if we are staying or if we are leaving. We won't find out the rest until we show up for transfers  Gah, it is so frustrating! I don't like surprises!

I hope you all have a wonderful week!

Much love,

Sister Daelemans

9/12/16

Not much to say this week. We have been trying really hard to find new people to teach, but we just have not been having any success. There is a new approach that our mission president told us to use as we contact people outside or at their door, but so far it hasn't worked for us. We keep trying though! Several members have recently told us about friends they have who they think are ready to take the missionary discussions, so hopefully something will come from that as well.

This is the last week of the transfer! It has gone by SO FAST! Next weekend is Stake Conference, the weekend after that is Bonnie's baptism, and the weekend after that is General Conference AND I will have been out for a year.

Much Love!

Sister Daelemans

Feed My Sheep

That funny moment when your investigator texts you and says she is too busy to keep taking the lessons but you go over anyway and pretend like you didn't get her text message and then she invites you inside and you end up having a really awesome lesson and then she comes to church the next day. Yep, that's what happened this week. Among other things.

This will be a pretty quick email, since I am pressed for time. Here are some other highlights:

1. People keep giving us fresh fruit and it's really awesome.

2. The weather has suddenly cooled off. Yesterday it was in the 70s and it felt AMAZING!

3. That awkward moment when someone in the ward almost died this week but didn't (which was good, obviously) but then in Fast and Testimony meeting everyone got up and basically bore their testimony about that person and how glad they are that he didn't die instead of baring their testimony about Jesus. So. Awkward.

4. We went over to Bonnie's to help her clean and ended up giving her dog a bath in the sink.

5. It was Sister Dow's birthday on Wednesday!

And I actually took pictures this week! Yay!

In town there is a ton of dry grass, which is a huge fire hazard, but instead of mowing it all down they pay to have sheep herders bring their sheep to graze on all the hills and in all the empty fields. So as you drive around Tehachapi you randomly pass by herds of sheep. It's pretty random but also very smart. The other day they were grazing in the fields surrounding a church. The name of the church is Shepherd of the Hills :D I tried to get a picture but you can only kind of see the church in the background. Pretty funny though.

Love you all!

Sister Daelemans

Moving Forward

This week was super weird. We had to spend a ton of time packing and cleaning and moving and unpacking, which was super annoying, but we are finally all settled in to our new place.

It is pretty ugly on the outside but the inside is nice:

Glad that's over.

Our miracle investigator Ashley texted us and told us that she doesn't want us to come back :( We think somebody must have said something to her about the church (something FALSE!) so that was lame. Then we had to go tell this other investigator, Kate, that we couldn't come back to teach her anymore. The sisters had been "teaching" her for a couple weeks before I got there. Except they weren't really teaching her. It was more just her arguing with everything they said and HER trying to convert THEM. So that needed to stop. We showed up and the first thing she does is tell me that the Book of Mormon isn't true, so then I had to tell her that it WAS true but she wouldn't come to know that unless she prayed about it. She told us that she would never pray about it, so I told her we weren't coming back anymore.

But that's okay. We are going to go out and find more wonderful people to teach who want to learn and want to grow closer to the Savior.

Bonnie is doing good. Still excited for her baptism in September. When we are having rough weeks, she is always a ray of sunshine. She was talking about how it was a mistake for her to have moved to Tehachapi because a bunch of terrible things have happened to her in the past year that she's lived here. But then she paused a thought about it for a minute, then said "Except, I guess if I hadn't moved here I wouldn't have met y'all, so maybe it was a good thing after all!" :)

I don't have much else to say this week, other than I LOVE THE GOSPEL! It is such a blessing :) This transfer I have gone on a lot of random rants to Sister Dow about how other church's doctrine doesn't make any sense and how I am so grateful for the truths that we have. It just makes so much sense, and brings so much peace and joy!

Have a super duper week!

Sister Daelemans

Men are that they might have Joy

I am eating Sonic right now. I have been good at eating healthy recently, but I am stress eating because guess what? We are moving apartments. I am so upset about it. I just moved in and got unpacked and now they are moving us because the lease on our condo is up and the owner wants to sell it instead of continuing to rent it. Bleh. Missionary apartments also tend to be very messy and cluttered because most missionaries are like "Eh, I'm not going to stay here for very long, so I'll just make a mess because it doesn't matter. And I'll leave all my junk behind because I can't take it with me." So we have to clean the whole place and sort through a bunch of stuff left by generations of missionaries past. It is stressing me out. Okay, rant over.

Yesterday in church they announced a boundary change for the wards up here in Tehachapi. The Tehachapi ward (where I was) is really big compared to the Bear Valley ward (where I am now) so they took a chunk from T-hach and gave it to BV. It's just really funny that it happened right after I got moved. It's like the ward just moved with me :)

Miracle of the week: We were tracting and we met a lady named Ashley and the first thing she did was invite us inside and ask what message we had to share with her. So we taught her the whole Restoration and she was really listening and paying attention and wants to read the Book of Mormon and find out if it's true! She is so so awesome and so prepared! It was a huge tender mercy. I have had cool experiences tracting in the past that made me realize why we do it, but this was probably the most amazing one yet. And my companion Sister Dow, who hasn't been out as long, said that she now has a testimony of tracting as well. The only thing that will hold Ashley back is that she has to work on Sundays and can't come to church. But we are meeting with her on Thursday, and hopefully something will happen that will allow her work situation to change.

Bonnie is doing fabulously. SHE IS THE CUTEST OLD LADY ON THE PLANET! I will need to get a picture with her this week to show you how dang cute she is. And she is so prepared! We taught her the Word of Wisdom this week. We knew that she drank coffee because we saw it in her kitchen, so we weren't sure how she would take it. When we committed her to live the Word of Wisdom during the lesson she said "Yes, of course! I drink coffee but I will just have to stop." Wow, what amazing faith! :)

I got to meet Hong and Mike this week. They are our other investigators. It is really interesting to teach them. Hong has very limited gospel knowledge, so we have to keep things basic for her to understand, but her husband is very familiar with religion and has lots of questions. Some of his questions are super random though. We need to help him feel the spirit more and help Hong to understand what we're talking about. But I am excited to continue teaching them both!

Recently I have been reading 2 Nephi 2. It is only one chapter, but it has so much in it. I don't even know what keeps drawing me to it, but I ended up studying it 3 days in a row, and then in church we talked about the Fall of Adam and Eve, which is what the chapter is partially about. Clearly I am supposed to be learning something important from it. One thing that I've learned from it is that Satan's goal is for us to be miserable, like him, but God's goal is for us to have joy. v25 "Adam fell that men might be; and men are, that they might have joy." The chapter also talks about how in order to have joy, we need to face opposition and to experience pain and sorrow. We need the bad to recognize and appreciate the good.

I have definitely seen that to be true, in life before and during my mission. Some days are really hard, but they make the miracles so much more sweet. I love me investigators so much more because of all the miserable rude people I talk to. God's plan is so good! :) We just have to recognize the good when it does come and to find joy in it.

I hope that you may all be able to find joy this week, in spite of whatever opposition you might face. Find the good in every day!

Love,

Sister Daelemans

The Golden Bear Sisters

I have too much to say, so I will try to summarize everything the best I can:

New Companion: Sister Dow! She is from Maine, so another East coaster! (woot woot!) Been out 6 months, has never been in another area. Pretty quiet, we get along pretty well so far.

New area: it's....an adjustment. Covering 2 wards is SUPER STRESSFUL! Sunday at church was ridiculous running back and forth between classes and meetings and having everyone try to stop you in the hallway to say hello to the new sister (me.) Bleh! It was definitely not a day of rest. But there seem to be a lot of really great people in the 2 wards.

The First ward is Golden Hills. It is basically the more rural outskirts of Tehachapi. They call that area Golden Hills because it sounds a lot nicer than Dead Brown Grass Hills. Actually, it is very pretty when you are looking at it from a distance. All of the streets are super random and confusing, so I felt lost all the time (thank goodness Sister Dow has a GPS.)

The Second ward is Bear Valley. So Bear Valley is weird. It is basically a gigantic gated community out in the mountains. I expected all of the houses to be very large. There are indeed many large houses, but it turns out there are also many normal sized houses as well. It is very pretty there, with lots of trees and a couple of ponds (apparently the locals call them "lakes." I scoffed at that when Sister Dow told me – I guess Californians have never seen real lakes before.) Many of the people that live there have horses. We also see a lot of deer and we've been told that there are also a number of mountain lions. Please pray that I won't be eaten by one. The ward boundaries also includes several other valleys in Tehachapi outside of Bear Valley, that aren't gated, but they are all very pretty and not very highly populated. Because everything is spread out we are spending a lot more time driving places than I am used to and it is driving me nuts!

Investigators: We are teaching an older lady named Bonnie. She is the cutest little old lady ever! She loves the Gospel and Jesus Christ so much :) Last night we went over to teach her a lesson but she had just taken some medication that was making her very sleepy and she was trying to stay awake so hard but she just kept falling asleep mid sentence. We ended up just sharing a scripture with her instead of a lesson. She is hopefully going to be baptized the end of September. We also have 2 other investigators that have already been taught for a little while, Hong (she's Chinese) and Mike her husband, but they have been out of town, and then sick, so I have not actually been able to meet them yet. We also started teaching a girl named Anna. She is in her 20s but is mildly mentally handicapped, so I'm not exactly sure how that is going to work out yet. I guess we will figure it out as we go.

Random: We went raspberry picking today. There is a member here that has a field of raspberry bushes that people can pick themselves and then leave money in the "honesty box." She told us we could come and get as many raspberries as we wanted for free, so we did.

Miracle: We were in between Golden Hills and Bear Valley last night when we realized we were out of gas. We had an appointment in Bear Valley, so we just continued in that direction, and decided we would just buy a little gas to keep us going, because we felt super bad about having to get gas on the Sabbath. We drove the 8 miles to the gas station on empty. Crisis averted! ......Except the gas station didn't have power. And it was the only gas station within 10 miles. We continued on empty until we reached a members house, who thankfully had some emergency gas in a can that they were able to give us. And, it was a double miracle because we didn't have to buy gas on a Sunday!

More random: There seem to be a lot of weird people that we talked to this week. One lady yelled at us and basically told us we should go to Africa instead of California because the people in California "already have Jesus". On the flip side we talked to a preacher who was very nice but he told us that the reason California has so many fires is because it's a consequence for all the wickedness here. He told us that what we were doing was very much needed in California right now. I would be interested to see what the two would say to each other if they met and randomly started talking about religion.

We were terrible about taking pictures, but here's what I've got for the week:



​Also, look what this street is called!! :D

Have a great week!

Sister Daelemans