Wednesday, October 17, 2018
Blessings of Missionary Work! 10-15-18
So this week I am especially grateful for the temple and the blessings that come from the temple!
Miracle story this week. So we had a family missionary counsel with a family in our ward about a month ago about the missionary work in the ward. Our mission president has asked us to have these counsels to help further the work through members and we have seen absolute miracles come into their lives because of their willingness to participate in the work.
We went over to this particular family's home for a lesson with our investigator Juan and upon arrival, the sister texted us saying she would be there in 15 minutes. So we waited, until we saw an unfamiliar white truck pull up, the truck bed full of furniture. She, another member of the ward and her 2 teenage daughters got out of the truck with a giant smiles on their faces and we all knew what to do next. The 7 of us moved a dining table with 6 chairs, a sofa, a soft sofa chair, a coffee table and some dishes into their humble home within a matter of minutes.
The miracle of this story is that this sweet family had nothing in their home but a folding table and a few folding chairs to begin with. They are expecting a baby and could not afford furniture for their home. They never complained about what they had or didn't have and they are always so willing to serve others before thinking of themselves. When we asked the sister where all this nice furniture came from she smiled and quietly said the temple. She continued to explain how the housing for the temple missionaries was being renovated as well as the temple. Because the temple is closed for 2 years they don't have senior missionaries living there and working in the temple. She and many other families in need were being blessed with the furnishings of those homes. She said she is so happy because she knows that it all came from the temple and soon she will be able to cradle her baby on the soft sofa that came from the temple.
I am so grateful for the temple! Even though it is closed and under renovation right now it is still blessing the lives of so many people.
Other wonderful parts of this week! We had 5 people come to church yesterday! And Juan is getting baptized at the end of the month! We almost can't keep up with the work right now its so amazing! We are working very hard and unfortunately not getting much sleep but the blessings continue to show! We had a carbon monoxide scare the other night in our apartment so we had the firefighters over and we didn't get to bed until about midnight. Luckily we could stay in the apartment and everything is alright now. Heavenly Father is protecting us and I can really feel his love everywhere I turn. I am so grateful for his love and for the opportunity to help others feel that same love.
-Hermana Barthlome
Miracle story this week. So we had a family missionary counsel with a family in our ward about a month ago about the missionary work in the ward. Our mission president has asked us to have these counsels to help further the work through members and we have seen absolute miracles come into their lives because of their willingness to participate in the work.
We went over to this particular family's home for a lesson with our investigator Juan and upon arrival, the sister texted us saying she would be there in 15 minutes. So we waited, until we saw an unfamiliar white truck pull up, the truck bed full of furniture. She, another member of the ward and her 2 teenage daughters got out of the truck with a giant smiles on their faces and we all knew what to do next. The 7 of us moved a dining table with 6 chairs, a sofa, a soft sofa chair, a coffee table and some dishes into their humble home within a matter of minutes.
The miracle of this story is that this sweet family had nothing in their home but a folding table and a few folding chairs to begin with. They are expecting a baby and could not afford furniture for their home. They never complained about what they had or didn't have and they are always so willing to serve others before thinking of themselves. When we asked the sister where all this nice furniture came from she smiled and quietly said the temple. She continued to explain how the housing for the temple missionaries was being renovated as well as the temple. Because the temple is closed for 2 years they don't have senior missionaries living there and working in the temple. She and many other families in need were being blessed with the furnishings of those homes. She said she is so happy because she knows that it all came from the temple and soon she will be able to cradle her baby on the soft sofa that came from the temple.
I am so grateful for the temple! Even though it is closed and under renovation right now it is still blessing the lives of so many people.
Other wonderful parts of this week! We had 5 people come to church yesterday! And Juan is getting baptized at the end of the month! We almost can't keep up with the work right now its so amazing! We are working very hard and unfortunately not getting much sleep but the blessings continue to show! We had a carbon monoxide scare the other night in our apartment so we had the firefighters over and we didn't get to bed until about midnight. Luckily we could stay in the apartment and everything is alright now. Heavenly Father is protecting us and I can really feel his love everywhere I turn. I am so grateful for his love and for the opportunity to help others feel that same love.
-Hermana Barthlome
Transfers!!! 10-8-18
¡Hola todo mi familia!
So a lot has happened the last couple of weeks!
Sorry for the lack of communication last week... I'm alive and well :) my companion Hermana Miley and I went to visit the city of DC last preparation day. What an experience that was. I'm not supposed to write anything that would make this seem like a travelogue but you could have a 10 minute conversation with my mom to know whats up :)
So we had transfers and I am still in my cute little area of Montgomery Village South! I love it here. My new companion is Hermana Applonie from Hooper Utah! We get along so good and we laugh a lot which lightens up the work. I have noticed my Spanish has gotten 3x better since Wednesday. Its kind of amazing. The gift of tongues is so real. When people ask how we know Spanish its because we have to! There's no other way to do this work and God has performed miracles to help us learn Spanish even when we talk with more people who speak English some days.
Okay I have 2 miracles to talk about! Juan and Bismarck! Juan is our investigator who showed up church his first week by himself! He has been to church 4 times now and is going to get baptized the 27th of October! It has been so fun to teach him because he wants to soak everything all up! His dedication is incredible. We taught him the word of wisdom and he said he would give up coffee faster than we could invite him to do so. He understands everything so well and can connect the dots faster than we can explain them. He is so prepared by the Lord. I have never met anyone so prepared. I have learned from Juan that it is not the missionary that does the work but God. Some would find it frustrating to spend hours upon hours weeks upon weeks of tracting and contacting just to have the investigator show up to church on his own without the help of missionaries. In reality, it is when we act and show our God how hard we are willing to work to find his lost sheep that he will provide when we least expect it.
Bismark is another miracle from this week. He was a referral from the English missionaries and the first night we taught him he was so excited for us to come back. He is fresh from Nicaragua and loves God so much. He loves to learn and told us how he is open and would love to learn more about God and the gospel of Jesus Christ. Those words are hard to come by around here but he said them! I have learned from Bismarck to never stop learning even when it seems like you know everything there is to know. Even the sinple things have deeper meaning than we could ever learn in this life. He has taught me to have such a strong desire, a desperation to learn of the things of God all throughout our lives.
Both Juan and Bismarck came to General Conference Sunday! Juan came that morning and we watched the conference at the church and had lunch afterwards with the sweet african lady who feeds the missionaries at zone conferences! We ate yummy food and taught Juan baptism and then headed to watch the second session. Juan had to leave but Bismarck came to the afternoon session and guess what?? HE TOOK NOTES! this guy is amazing! He hasnt even been to churvh yet and he loved listening to the prophet and apostles! He woukd say "Amen" after everything he loved and quote every scripture the speaker was reading from the bible. We had a mini chapel tour with him after the conference and we are meeting with him tomorrow night to teach him more! We are going to invite him to be baptized the 27th of October with Juan!
I hope you all learned from and loved conference! It is such a good time to be living the gospel of Jesus Christ. There are so many exciting things happening to further the work of the Lord. I hope you all made some goals to work on these next 6 months. If you haven't, I encourage you to make some goals and some plans for those goals to grow from those things you learned in conference! Big or small, goals can help us be better versions of ourselves and thats what this life is all about. Being better everyday and repenting every night.
I love you and hope you all have a good week!
-Hermana Barthlome
Pics:
Hermana and my different versions of juice this week!
Saying goodbye to hermana Joyner!
So a lot has happened the last couple of weeks!
Sorry for the lack of communication last week... I'm alive and well :) my companion Hermana Miley and I went to visit the city of DC last preparation day. What an experience that was. I'm not supposed to write anything that would make this seem like a travelogue but you could have a 10 minute conversation with my mom to know whats up :)
So we had transfers and I am still in my cute little area of Montgomery Village South! I love it here. My new companion is Hermana Applonie from Hooper Utah! We get along so good and we laugh a lot which lightens up the work. I have noticed my Spanish has gotten 3x better since Wednesday. Its kind of amazing. The gift of tongues is so real. When people ask how we know Spanish its because we have to! There's no other way to do this work and God has performed miracles to help us learn Spanish even when we talk with more people who speak English some days.
Okay I have 2 miracles to talk about! Juan and Bismarck! Juan is our investigator who showed up church his first week by himself! He has been to church 4 times now and is going to get baptized the 27th of October! It has been so fun to teach him because he wants to soak everything all up! His dedication is incredible. We taught him the word of wisdom and he said he would give up coffee faster than we could invite him to do so. He understands everything so well and can connect the dots faster than we can explain them. He is so prepared by the Lord. I have never met anyone so prepared. I have learned from Juan that it is not the missionary that does the work but God. Some would find it frustrating to spend hours upon hours weeks upon weeks of tracting and contacting just to have the investigator show up to church on his own without the help of missionaries. In reality, it is when we act and show our God how hard we are willing to work to find his lost sheep that he will provide when we least expect it.
Bismark is another miracle from this week. He was a referral from the English missionaries and the first night we taught him he was so excited for us to come back. He is fresh from Nicaragua and loves God so much. He loves to learn and told us how he is open and would love to learn more about God and the gospel of Jesus Christ. Those words are hard to come by around here but he said them! I have learned from Bismarck to never stop learning even when it seems like you know everything there is to know. Even the sinple things have deeper meaning than we could ever learn in this life. He has taught me to have such a strong desire, a desperation to learn of the things of God all throughout our lives.
Both Juan and Bismarck came to General Conference Sunday! Juan came that morning and we watched the conference at the church and had lunch afterwards with the sweet african lady who feeds the missionaries at zone conferences! We ate yummy food and taught Juan baptism and then headed to watch the second session. Juan had to leave but Bismarck came to the afternoon session and guess what?? HE TOOK NOTES! this guy is amazing! He hasnt even been to churvh yet and he loved listening to the prophet and apostles! He woukd say "Amen" after everything he loved and quote every scripture the speaker was reading from the bible. We had a mini chapel tour with him after the conference and we are meeting with him tomorrow night to teach him more! We are going to invite him to be baptized the 27th of October with Juan!
I hope you all learned from and loved conference! It is such a good time to be living the gospel of Jesus Christ. There are so many exciting things happening to further the work of the Lord. I hope you all made some goals to work on these next 6 months. If you haven't, I encourage you to make some goals and some plans for those goals to grow from those things you learned in conference! Big or small, goals can help us be better versions of ourselves and thats what this life is all about. Being better everyday and repenting every night.
I love you and hope you all have a good week!
-Hermana Barthlome
Pics:
Hermana and my different versions of juice this week!
Saying goodbye to hermana Joyner!
DC! 10-8-18 (Family Letter)
So I'm not really sure where to start with this email haha. But I love you!! Thats a good start :)
So DC. What a city. Hermana Miley and I walked a solid 12 miles or so, met 4 members of the church, and almost got on the wrong subway. Part of DC is in Virginia so I technically left the mission too which is weird! I felt almost disobedient leaving the mission but we had permission to go there so we were fine.
To start out, we drove to the Shady Grove subway about 15 minutes away from our apartment and got me a card and a nice guy helped us get on the right train. He lives in DC and he reminds me of an older version of Parker! When we got off, we saw the elders! They were on the same train as us and we didnt even know! When missionaries go to the city, they dont want them to gather together or hang out. We just said hi and to have a fun preperation day and off we went.
We first walked to the Ford's theatre where President Lincoln was shot. We sat down in the middle of the theatre and they had a 30 minute historical presentation. I learned a lot! It was such an amazing experience to sit there and learn of the history that had occurred within those 4 walls. What a good start start to the morning. We walked across the street to the Peterson house where they transported him for the remaining 9 or so hours if his life. We walked in the room and stood by the bed. It was a little errie but peaceful at the same time. It was a busy street outside but a quiet and respectful atmosphere in the room.
We walked to visit the American Mueaum of art which was interesting and then to the National Archives where the Declaration if Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights are located. There are no pictures allowed to preserve the writing on the documents and they were all very neat to see in person. The Magna Carta was another cool piece of history to view. It is not in English! That caught me by surprise.
We walked to the White House and took some pictures. Its right in the middle of the city which is a little different than I expected. We headed to the Washington Monument (personal favorite) and met a cute member Filipino family who gave us snacks and talked about church. We sat on a bench and gave our feet a quick break before heading over to the WW2 monument. We saw the wall of gold stars. Per each gold star, 100 people died. The giant wall was full of gold stars.
We walked along the reflection pool to the Abraham Lincoln memorial and stood at the feet of the giant statue of the President. I turned around and lost my breath as I saw the Washington Wonument and its reflection in the pool. We headed over to the nursing memorial and the Vietnam War memorial. (Another Favorite) It was silent as people stopped to find names and read of those who gave their lives for this country. It was such a beautiful memorial to pay a reapect for all those who served in that specific war. I could see the long wall full of names and my reflection staring back at me in the shiny stone. Those people gave their lives so that generations to come, like me, could live in safety and freedom.
We started for the Jefferson Memorial to view it from the Tidal Basin. The memorial is made of 13 different types of stone, all from the 13 origional colonies to come together in remembrance of Thomas Jefferson.
Then we saw the time and we ran. We had to walk 2 more miles to get to the subway and we had 45 minutes to get there. Not too hard but we were a little tired from the days adventures so we sped walked. We sped walked past the holocaust museum. The word Holocausta in spanish means burnt offering which we read many times in the scriptures. I will have to take a couple of hours my next trip to visit that museum.
We stopped at Qdoba to grab sone dinner and then got on the subway to head back home. It was an amazi g experience to visit the city. I'm kind of a lame tourist because I didn't even buy a tshirt but I lived in the moment which was good.
I love this country and the religious freedom we have today. I know there are people here who are ready for the gospel and I am so grateful to have this opportunity to share it with them in this beautiful city.
Love you!
-Hermana Barthlome
So DC. What a city. Hermana Miley and I walked a solid 12 miles or so, met 4 members of the church, and almost got on the wrong subway. Part of DC is in Virginia so I technically left the mission too which is weird! I felt almost disobedient leaving the mission but we had permission to go there so we were fine.
To start out, we drove to the Shady Grove subway about 15 minutes away from our apartment and got me a card and a nice guy helped us get on the right train. He lives in DC and he reminds me of an older version of Parker! When we got off, we saw the elders! They were on the same train as us and we didnt even know! When missionaries go to the city, they dont want them to gather together or hang out. We just said hi and to have a fun preperation day and off we went.
We first walked to the Ford's theatre where President Lincoln was shot. We sat down in the middle of the theatre and they had a 30 minute historical presentation. I learned a lot! It was such an amazing experience to sit there and learn of the history that had occurred within those 4 walls. What a good start start to the morning. We walked across the street to the Peterson house where they transported him for the remaining 9 or so hours if his life. We walked in the room and stood by the bed. It was a little errie but peaceful at the same time. It was a busy street outside but a quiet and respectful atmosphere in the room.
We walked to visit the American Mueaum of art which was interesting and then to the National Archives where the Declaration if Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights are located. There are no pictures allowed to preserve the writing on the documents and they were all very neat to see in person. The Magna Carta was another cool piece of history to view. It is not in English! That caught me by surprise.
We walked to the White House and took some pictures. Its right in the middle of the city which is a little different than I expected. We headed to the Washington Monument (personal favorite) and met a cute member Filipino family who gave us snacks and talked about church. We sat on a bench and gave our feet a quick break before heading over to the WW2 monument. We saw the wall of gold stars. Per each gold star, 100 people died. The giant wall was full of gold stars.
We walked along the reflection pool to the Abraham Lincoln memorial and stood at the feet of the giant statue of the President. I turned around and lost my breath as I saw the Washington Wonument and its reflection in the pool. We headed over to the nursing memorial and the Vietnam War memorial. (Another Favorite) It was silent as people stopped to find names and read of those who gave their lives for this country. It was such a beautiful memorial to pay a reapect for all those who served in that specific war. I could see the long wall full of names and my reflection staring back at me in the shiny stone. Those people gave their lives so that generations to come, like me, could live in safety and freedom.
We started for the Jefferson Memorial to view it from the Tidal Basin. The memorial is made of 13 different types of stone, all from the 13 origional colonies to come together in remembrance of Thomas Jefferson.
Then we saw the time and we ran. We had to walk 2 more miles to get to the subway and we had 45 minutes to get there. Not too hard but we were a little tired from the days adventures so we sped walked. We sped walked past the holocaust museum. The word Holocausta in spanish means burnt offering which we read many times in the scriptures. I will have to take a couple of hours my next trip to visit that museum.
We stopped at Qdoba to grab sone dinner and then got on the subway to head back home. It was an amazi g experience to visit the city. I'm kind of a lame tourist because I didn't even buy a tshirt but I lived in the moment which was good.
I love this country and the religious freedom we have today. I know there are people here who are ready for the gospel and I am so grateful to have this opportunity to share it with them in this beautiful city.
Love you!
-Hermana Barthlome
9-24-18
Okay this will be short but it was a good week!
We have an investigator Juan who accepted a baptisimal date for the 13th of October! He has come to church 3 times already and we have taught him the first 3 lessons and he loves everything! The weird thing is that he is in the process of moving so we might have to refer him over to the other missionaries but we will see!
We also have a lady named Maryluz who we are working with and she so awesome! She investigated the church previously and now she is doing so well with reading the Book of Mormon! She loves it. So funny story, we were in the middle of a lesson with her and the French Elders knocked on her door! She opened it up and looked at us and said "your friends are here!" She thought we invited them for the lesson! We were all just in shock for a second and thought what are the chances!?
I love you all so much!
-Hermana Barthlome
We have an investigator Juan who accepted a baptisimal date for the 13th of October! He has come to church 3 times already and we have taught him the first 3 lessons and he loves everything! The weird thing is that he is in the process of moving so we might have to refer him over to the other missionaries but we will see!
We also have a lady named Maryluz who we are working with and she so awesome! She investigated the church previously and now she is doing so well with reading the Book of Mormon! She loves it. So funny story, we were in the middle of a lesson with her and the French Elders knocked on her door! She opened it up and looked at us and said "your friends are here!" She thought we invited them for the lesson! We were all just in shock for a second and thought what are the chances!?
I love you all so much!
-Hermana Barthlome
Fotos! 9-24-18
District activity today!
Volleyball and a food competition!
-Hermana Barthlome
1. Samaria came to church last week! And this week too! She brought her kids and they loved it!
2. Our investigator Juan who has come to church for the last 3 weeks!
3. Exchanges! Hermana Joyner goes home in a week and a half. I'm sure going to miss her!
4. We made tortillas last week! The El salvadorian kind! Its hard to make those things! But they are so good!
Volleyball and a food competition!
-Hermana Barthlome
1. Samaria came to church last week! And this week too! She brought her kids and they loved it!
2. Our investigator Juan who has come to church for the last 3 weeks!
3. Exchanges! Hermana Joyner goes home in a week and a half. I'm sure going to miss her!
4. We made tortillas last week! The El salvadorian kind! Its hard to make those things! But they are so good!
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